Running gag in Iced Tracks where every photo/portrait/painting of Ingo and Zisu has Zisu wearing a full suit of armor that shows no skin or defining features. It's impossible to tell if there's anyone in there.
This becomes a bit that is committed to to the extent of people not actually being sure if they actually have a queen, or if the "wedding" was a stunt to get nobles to stop sending their daughters to make eyes at Ingo, and their current king actually has no wife at all.
Ignore the red-haired silver-eyed extremely loud little children running around those totally aren't his and his supposed "wife's," those are adopted. They aren't blood heirs.
(Cue Ingo insisting that yes of course these are his children, whose else would they be, as he pats the shoulders of two of the kids, then gestures to the other two and says "these two are adopted")
(Do not imply to a man who has borne witness to the birth of his children that no, those aren't of your blood)
("Oh so my wife was playing a bit, then" "Majesty, some people don't think you have a wife --" "Then who on earth is that woman I see every day and night? I doubt I could hallucinate such a beauty")
(Zisu is losing it off to the side)
Basically, Emmet and Evelyn are the normal couple, Ingo and Zisu are full of shenanigans and go down in history as the absolute happiest couple and also the one that caused the most distress in their panel of advisors
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Things were basically fine during Ingo and Emmet's childhood until they were like seven.
Ingo basically came out of the womb sneezing snowflakes, and that was perfectly fine. By the time he was about three, he could make tiny flurries -- and often did so unintentionally -- around him and some lumps of snow. Freezing cups of water by accident.
Five, and he was making snowballs. He accidentally froze the entire fountain in the courtyard just walking by.
Seven, and we've got a tiny prince making snowmen and freezing small ponds to go ice skating with his brother.
After his isolation, Ingo never really experimented with his powers, but they were clearly getting significantly stronger, because by the time he ascends to the throne, he's. well. capable of accidentally causing a blizzard to cover Nimbasa, freezing the rivers that run in from the coast on either side of Route 4, and generally causing a catastrophe.
Things went from 0 to 100 very fast in the interim, clearly.
Conversely, Emmet is a grown adult and the worst he does is sneeze flakes of ash and spit embers when he's mad. Has he set things on fire? No. He's not cursed.
Also I want you to know that I'm listening to "Once Upon a December," hence the abrupt icy au posting.
I like to imagine that Ingo, in Iced Tracks, has to deal with a panel of advisors, as royalty so often seems to have to do.
Anyway, this is fine for the most part. A bundle of them keep trying to get him to hook up with some foreign princess to strengthen ties between regions, which is... understandable.
The problem comes up when Zisu enters the scene as a royal guard and Ingo is entirely enamored with this very much not royal woman.
Cue half of his council trying to encourage him towards maybe seeking romance elsewhere, maybe see about any princesses or widowed queens you could wed, your Majesty; your brother is courting the third-oldest Kalosion princess and she has three sisters, perhaps you could consider courting one of them (please)?
Meanwhile Ingo is just looking at Zisu and thinking, "Very beautiful. Very powerful."
(Zisu has been terrible for the council's average health, she keeps kidnapping Ingo during meetings with the excuse of him needing sunlight and rest because he works too hard)
(Spirits him off to some corner of the gardens for the rest of the afternoon)
In short, the advisors are thinking about strengthening ties with Unova and other regions, and Ingo is just deeply in love and is completely ignoring such matters.
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(Tags from this reblog) (so, so late in responding to these, ouf)
Yeah, it is a horrible time for everyone!
(This got super long, so full rant is under the cut)
Ingo was raised to believe that his powers, like Emmet's, were a gift from one of the Dragons.
He's has been under the impression that his powers -- while unusually strong -- should be able to be controlled, and believes that he is at fault for his own lack of control.
In actuality, bonds are needed to temper the uncontrolled ice that Kyurem cursed him with at birth. The powers grew with age, and unfortunately, Ingo was cut off from the very thing he needed to have any hope of controlling them.
On Kyurem's side of things, however, it sought to spread the same agony of isolation that it felt to the humans that scorn it. Its curses, throughout the ages, always end in tragedy -- the cursed child is either killed, or goes mad and winds up dead by force or by choice.
Ingo is the first cursed child it has ever met, and it was intrigued by him. Here's this isolated, lost soul, deprived of the warmth all children should have, and yet he isn't mad. He's more sad, than anything, and desperate to keep his twin and kingdom safe.
So, curiously, it shares the secret of controlling its powers -- the warmth of bonds -- and forms a connection with Ingo. Ingo gets some control over his "gift," and Kyurem gets a bond for the first time in centuries, if not the first time ever.
So they both get solace and find a level of understanding in each other, and then things go wrong, and Emmet finds Ingo. Cue interaction and separation (may have dropped him down a chasm, oops), and Ingo's emotions becoming once again volatile and full of guilt.
Kyurem chooses arguably the worst time to confess that it cursed Ingo, because Ingo is already full of guilt and self-hatred for hurting Emmet again, and the Kyurem basically tells him that he was never meant to control himself.
Ingo was, as per Kyurem's interference, essentially born to sow misery in his family. Kyurem, when it cursed him, wanted him to be miserable, and to spread that cold hatred to those around him, because Kyurem couldn't do that itself.
Control wasn't ever anything Ingo was meant to have.
Needless to say, the abrupt realization that, frankly, none of this is Ingo's fault simultaneously lifted an enormous weight from his shoulders and incited the worst, most vicious wrath Kyurem has ever been on the receiving end of.
I remember mentioning that bonds need to be reciprocated and upheld. The bond between Ingo and Emmet is all but broken, and while Emmet keeps offering his end, Ingo never picks it up and ties it to his own, completing the connection.
Ingo breaks their bond just about immediately, which leaves them both worse off than they were before, because Kyurem can now properly mourn its isolation, and Ingo properly embraces his own (symbolized by his eyes adopting a sulfur tone and his skin turning pallid, almost gray, visually matching with Kyurem).
So... yeah, betrayal is a good word for it. Ingo has been trusting Kyurem and eagerly accepting its tutorship in the hopes of bettering himself, and then he finds out that... basically, it was this or death, and was always meant to be death.
Everything about Ingo's existence at that point in the fic is a happy (read as: miserable) accident set in place by Kyurem.
And Kyurem didn't even tell him, didn't even think to tell him, until when? When he tells it that he almost killed his twin again? When he's a mess of emotions? When he's already poured everything he has into their connection, worn his heart on his sleeve and confessed every bit of self-blame he's ever felt to it?
It tells him that it was all unnecessary?
It couldn't have said as such earlier, so that he'd have had even a tiny, modicum of a chance at making things right?
I don't know where Sinnoh/Hisui fit into Iced Tracks, as far as worldbuilding goes, but I had this silly idea of there being Adaman and Irida as royals or representatives of Hisui, and Zisu being the captain of the royal guard or something.
I mention Zisu because my dumb brain was like, "oy, you like Dojoshipping, have a brain bunny."
Some time after the main part of Iced Tracks, the Hisuian rulers/representatives end up visiting Unova. Zisu goes with them, and prior to proper, formal introductions at the event, Emmet notices Ingo glancing at Zisu with a certain amount of interest.
And of course he promptly decides to be a nuisance by striking up conversation with Zisu so that he can be the one to introduce her to Ingo.
Naturally, the introduction is done about like, "This is my brother, Ingo, the king," followed very bluntly by, "He likes women who can snap him in half."
In an instant, the temperature of the entire room plummets by thirty degrees. The scepter Ingo is holding is entirely encased in ice. Emmet acts oblivious. Zisu is a bit confused but also kind of amused.
Ingo is glaring at Emmet with enough venom to kill a lesser man.
(He is positively mortified)
(Zisu's freaking cute little perplexed smile is not helping)
Or, in fewer words: Emmet almost gets sent to the dungeons for the night by trying to play matchmaker with his brother and a foreign royal captain.
To further the "Hisui exists during Iced Tracks and Emmet tries to hook Zisu up with Ingo," idea I brought up here, if Ingo and Zisu do get married, I like to think that she gets really huggy during the summer.
Like, really huggy.
Summer is hot. Ingo is very much colder than your average human. Zisu married a living ice pack, and by golly, she's going to take advantage of that.
The result? Hugs. Lots and lots of hugs. Ingo is perfectly fine with this development (he likes hugs).
Also her just draping herself over him when she finishes a bout of training and is all hot and stuff, and Ingo being perfectly fine with it even though his wife is all hot and sweaty and sticky. She needs to cool off!
Kicking the blankets off at night because it's too warm isn't enough; Zisu needs to be Ingo's blanket or he needs to be hers because it is too dang hot dangit it's the middle of July.
They sleep better than anyone in the palace because Ingo can't feel the heat -- but was touch-starved for years and loves cuddling -- and Zisu has Ingo as her own personal AC unit.
