Trent followed his brother after the girl. He was curious, as well, and he wanted to see what was up.

It didn't take long before they came upon what looked like the outskirts of a farm. Really, it was just a fence, but it was a split-rail fence with a gate in it.

"That must be where she said she lives with her friend," he commented to his brother.

Meanwhile, on the ranch, Margaret was working on keeping the legendaries from Gowlithe-piling Professor Oak, especially Mew. The little thing remembered Oak, and clearly wanted to play with him more, and so Margaret had to keep a firm grip on it.

Professor Oak was having a blast looking at all the legendaries, and he blinked when he found Aleron holding on to Suicune and Shaymin.

"Ah," he started.

"Don't even ask. Vulpix adopted them, so they adopted me." Aleron shrugged. "Trust me, if we let them go you'd be buried in legendaries and we'd have to dig you out with a couple Dugtrio."

"Yeah, looks like," Quen said quietly, looking around. So far everything looked pretty normal... except that he didn't see many pokemon. A few that looked wild just sort of roaming around, and a clutzy little Eevee chasing an Oddish, but other than that, nothing. He blinked.

While Margaret was holding on to Mew, Azelf, Mesprit, and Uxie all decided to get a closer look at Oak. They all crowded around much like Mew tended to, and poked and prodded at him a bit. Uxie in particular seemed to have a fascination with the white lab coat, and kept tugging on it.

Trent jumped when a Noctowl suddenly hooted from the trees above them. He looked up to find one staring down at them. As he watched, it hooted loudly again and spread its wings, taking off towards what seemed to be a ranch house.

"That Noctowl belongs to someone," he murmured to his brother. "Aren't Noctowls Johto natives? And nocturnal?" He shook his head. "That one's trained."

Margaret's attention was grabbed quickly when she heard Noctowl outside. Normally, her pokemon was asleep at this hour, but something must have woken her up.

"...Noctowl says someone's outside," she said to Aleron. "This side of the fence."

"So it is." Quen watched the bird pokemon fly off. "Maybe her friend's? Between the two of them, they could have quite a few pokemon. Maybe we just can't see them yet."

"Oh, Arceus curse it," she grumbled. "It must be those two guys I showed to the Falls earlier. I'll go see if I can shoo them away before they see this."

Aleron let go of the two legendaries, who immediately joined the other three in investigating Professor Oak, who didn't seem to mind in the least. In fact, he was grinning like a loon.

Without a word, Vulpix, Jolteon, and Rapidash all accompanied Aleron back towards the fence, all three of them just a little wary and protective.

"Lost already? I thought my directions were clear enough." Aleron smiled as she stopped a few feet away from the two.

"No, your directions were fine," Trent replied. He gave a bit of a sheepish grin, but made no move to get closer. That Jolteon didn't look all that friendly.

When it took more than a few minutes for Aleron to come back, Margaret started to wonder what was going on.

"Watch them," she said to Oak, handing Mew to him. Mew chirped in triumph and glomped onto the side of Oak's head, but Margaret ignored them in favor of heading outside. Espeon followed her.

"Is everything alright?" she called as she got closer to her friend. She eyed the two guys warily.

"Yeah, everything's fine," Aleron called back. "May I ask why you're here, then?" She looked at the brothers evenly, not quite so open and friendly now.

"Uh. We were curious." Quen shrugged. "Really, we didn't mean any harm."

"Curious about what?" Margaret asked cautiously. She glanced between the two guys. Something seemed a bit... off. She wasn't sure what it was, but it set her on edge.

"Well, we heard that you had some rare pokemon here for Professor Oak to see," Quen said with a negligent little shrug. "We were just curious."

"And you decided not to knock." Aleron's voice was dry.

"We figured that Noctowl would let you know." Which was true enough. "And we would have knocked at the house, or yelled or something."

Espeon stared at the guys for a moment before jumping up on Margaret's shoulder and saying something in her ear. The guys weren't telling the truth. Or at least, not the whole truth.

"What's the real reason?" Margaret asked. She looked between the two.

Quen blinked. "I don't know what you mean." He shifted his weight, his Absol staring unerringly at Margaret and Espeon. Absol knew what was going on. Now the silly trainers just needed to catch up.

Espeon knew what was going on, too, and kept an eye on the Absol for all the good it did. She knew very well that the only move she knew that would hit a dark-type was Shadow Ball, and even then it wouldn't be effective.

Trent looked between them all as the tension mounted.

"Okay, look," he finally said. He looked at Aleron. "My brother and I figure you've got a close bond with fire-types. Moreso than the average trainer. We wanted to ask you about it."

Aleron blinked at that. That was not what she'd been expecting, and after a moment she crossed her arms over her chest.

"Okay, yeah, so I like fire-types. What of it?"

"Nothing bad," Quen hurried to add. "Just that my brother's like that with water-types, and I'm like that with dark-types. They're... easier to understand than any other type."

"Easier how?" Margaret asked cautiously. The more she thought about his words, the closer her mind got to the conclusion that these two guys were like her and Aleron.

"It's just... easier. I understand Absol much better than, say, his Blastoise, and yet I've known Blastoise longer." Quen shrugged. That was as close as he could get without outright saying he could talk to his pokemon and understand every word they said.

Realization dawned on Aleron's face, and she looked over at Margaret with a quirked eyebrow.

Margaret glanced at Aleron and gave a slight nod. She knew what was going on now.

"Dark-types and water-types, you said?" she ventured. Trent nodded.

"I've got a bunch of water-types," he confirmed.

The irony of that dawned on Aleron after a moment, and she grimaced. "Alright. Well, I already told you I've got a bunch of fire-types, although having some off-types does help keep the team more balanced."

Quen nodded, watching the two girls. They all seemed to be at a sort of understanding, and yet no one was willing to say anything more. Hmm. How to proceed now...

"I work with psychic-types," Margaret admitted after a moment. "Most of mine are dual-type, though."

Trent nodded as well. That was interesting, the girls were their opposite types, and dual-types were always useful. He himself trained a few of them.

Aleron looked down at her Vulpix and quirked an eyebrow. "Well?"

Vulpix snorted and sat down daintily, some of her tails wrapping around her feet. Clearly she didn't care, and she wasn't disputing what was being said, either.

Aleron sighed. "Well. I guess this might take a little longer to hash out. So, I assume you two talk to yours?"

"Regularly." Quen grinned briefly. "It's much easier to know what they're saying rather than trying to interpret."

"No kidding," Margaret said. She looked at Espeon. "What say you?" Espeon just looked at her and went back to keeping an eye on the Absol. "Right, and only one my group can even learn Miracle Eye, and she's still too young..." She shook her head. She needed a Medicham or something.

Quen snorted. "We're offended. It's not like we're about to attack you or anything. Out of all my group, Absol likes battling the least."

"Dark-types give me issues," Margaret defended. "All the time. I just like being prepared."

Trent snorted. Really, Quen should have expected that one, especially after seeing the Noctowl and the Espeon. He'd only ever heard of one or two psychic-fighting types, and what were the chances this girl would have one to set her at ease?

Quen rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say. So, you two have the affinities too?"

"Yeah." Aleron shrugged, patting Rapidash's neck. "Apparently you two were part of the experiment."

"What experiment?" Quen looked at her sharply.

"Silph Co, in Saffron City, was doing type-affinity research," Margaret said. She looked at the two a bit oddly. "You were both part of it, right? Where they exposed young children to different pokemon types to figure out what kind of people were sensitive to which types?"

"No..." Trent replied slowly. "I don't remember anything like that." He looked at his brother.

Quen shook his head. "Neither do I," he said quietly. "I don't remember ever going to Kanto before this, let alone to Silph Co. I know that Dad gave me Misdreavous for my birthday, same year he gave you Squirtle." He looked over at Trent.

"Misdreavus are false-psychics," Margaret mused. That was interesting. She shook her head a bit. "My parents work at Silph Co, so I always knew about the research. My parents just didn't tell me I was part of it."

"We were, what, nine?" Trent asked his brother. "It was before we got registered as trainers at ten, I know that. But still, I don't remember going to Kanto, either..."