Chapter Thirty-Two - Zoobs

When he was but an infant, Zubat had been taught that his place in the darkened world in which they lived was to grow strong and protect the swarm.

Their world was the cave, and it had everything they might want.

Insects and the occasional Bug-type pokemon would come in in great enough numbers to be picked up, and they could always fly out to grab more to eat. The other inhabitants of the cave were geodudes and gravelers and there were plenty of rattata around.

Once or twice, an onix would burst through the walls, and there was a colony of sandshrew in the deeper parts of the cave and a large family of wooper with a quagsire overlooking them below, where a small lake sat within the confines of their home.

They had water to drink, and no competition in the air. At worst, a rock-headed geodude might toss a rock at one of them, but they always replied to that by screaming them into submission.

Life was rather peaceful... or it had been.

The cave was home to his flock, but they weren't the only ones within. A steady stream of humans moved by, and he had always found them... strange.

The humans were never quite the same. There were some that stumbled around almost blind. Others moved with surety and purpose. Still others, in red jackets and with powerful pokemon companions, would lay down lights to illuminate the main paths through the cave. These helped the humans get around, seeing as how they could only barely see in the dark, and their hearing was no good.

Still, the humans minded their own most of the time.

Most of the time.

Lately there had been some that were chasing after him.

Not his flock. Not his family. Not his friends. Not even the friends he made with other local pokemon. They were chasing after him, specifically.

Three days ago, a hiker had unleashed a graveler on him. He'd hit it with a supersonic scream and ran off. A week ago it had been a smaller human child that launched a pidgey at him. He'd flown away, weaving around a stalagmite that the pidgey didn't see. The smack behind him had been very satisfying.

Still, it begged the question... what was wrong with all of these humans?

Those infesting the cave today were the worst so far. They'd come out of nowhere, loud as can be and completely fearless.

They came in, kicked some geodudes around and used pokemon none of his swarm were familiar with. Large poison-spewing balls, big bulbous plant-pokemon. Some they were familiar with. Ekans showed up in the brush outside of the cave on rare occasions, and they had zubat and golbat of their own.

They had powerful lights that they used to scan the ceiling, and when he first felt the warmth of one of those lights, the humans went crazy.

He flew away the first time. Then the second. Then the third.

They were unbelievably persistent. Worse, they didn't mind attacking the rest of the swarm with their powerful pokemon.

They all knew that if they all worked together, they could probably defeat these humans but...

There was a certain set of stories in the caves. He wasn't sure if he believed them, but they always went a certain way, and were always attributed to some of the cave's oldest pokemon. Pokemon that had been with humans and then left. They spoke of their humans dying, travelling far away, or just releasing them back to the wilds. These pokemon were often the strongest in the cave. A Golem, and an ancient Crobat who lingered in the deepest depths.

They told stories of why none should attack a human, lest of all the children. The pokemon these humans had with them were fair game. They were even good to practice against, and if one was captured by a human that they liked the look of... well, it wasn't always all that bad.

He wasn't sure if he wanted to be captured, so when he was found for the fourth time in two days by the same group, he fled.

That night, when he swung around and flew out of the cave, his stomach aching for a meal he'd skipped earlier in the day, he flew headlong into a wall.

A net had been draped across the ceiling, thin lines, set far apart, enough so that he didn't hear the lines in the air ahead of him until it was far too late.

Zubat tumbled to the ground and then tried to fight off the net. All that did was tangle him further into its grasp.

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He felt light on him, and two figures burst out from under a tarp he'd initially thought was a large boulder. "Did we get the right one this time?" one asked.

"I think so? Yeah, look, it's green."

"Well, capture it already!"

A pokeball came out, and he glared. He was not going to be captured in such an underhanded way. He gathered some air in his lungs, then screamed as hard as he could as the ball sailed at him. His attack struck it out of the air and it went flying away.

"Wow, you suck at throwing," one human said.

"I don't! He used Supersonic on it. Strong little guy." The human approached, and zubat scanned him with his ears, then cracked his eyes open. He was dressed in all-black, with some human-symbol on his chest and a cruel grin on. He levelled a pokeball at zubat, then spiked it down hard.

Zubat cried out as the ball struck him, then he was fighting in some space that wasn't the cave, batting at something that tried to grip him. The sensation broke, and he found himself stumbling back into his cave home, confused and very angry. "Zubat!" he screeched.

Then he was slammed to the ground by a long, thin limb.

Zubat was quick to roll over and try to take flight. There was an ekans next to the human trainer. "Ekans... Ek ek ekans." Sorry... I must do as he says.

"Zu, zubat!" Leave me alone!

"Come on, Ekans, give it a Poison Sting!"

"No, you idiot, zubat are Poison-type. That'll do nothing but annoy it. Use wrap, if we're gonna injure it we don't want it to be visible, otherwise it'll be harder to sell."

The human nodded. "Good point. Ekans, quick, use wrap."

The ekans met zubat's eyes, and there was something sad in hers for a moment. Then she leapt forwards and bowled him over. The next thing he knew he was stuck in the snake's grasp and was being crushed.

"Yeah! Make it faint!" the trainer said.

"Z-zubat!" Help!

He screamed it, but he wasn't expecting any actual help.

He certainly wasn't expecting to hear feet running closer and for a pair of additional humans to come around the corner. "Is everyone okay over here?" one of them asked as she held up a small ball of light.

"Holy Arceus, Team Rocket!" the other human said. She whipped out two pokeballs right away, summoning two pokemon who were unfamiliar to him.

The two trainers trying to capture him were caught flat-footed. "Better part of discretion?" one asked.

"No, we stay and fight," the other said. Then when his companion sent out a pokemon of his own, he immediately recalled ekans and bolted further into the cave.

"H-hey! You coward!" his friend said.

"Oh no, Bellsprout, Vine Whip his ankles. We're not letting them both get away!" the trainer said.

Zubat flapped his wings. He wanted nothing more than to get away from all of this... but he couldn't even get into the air, let alone fly away. He felt like all the energy had been sapped out of him, and he was certain that he was hurt.

So he settled for laying on the ground and watching the two newcomers fight the one mean human who'd stayed behind. Maybe it would be nice to see his would-be-captor be taught a lesson?

The other human had two small pokemon with her, neither pokemon he was familiar with. They both seemed young though.

"Dammit. Go rattata!" the mean man said. A large rattata appeared before him. "Quick Attack that Bellsprout!"

Zubat blinked, and a moment later the rattata was next to the bellsprout, ramming it with its head.

"Bellsprout! Poison Powder. Sage, get in there and take out the rattata!" the girl said.

"Uh," the other said. "Is this a normal fight?"

"No, of course not! He's a criminal, Broccoli. They steal pokemon."

"Are you sure he's a criminal?"

"He's wearing their uniform."

"That seems like something very stupid for a criminal to do, just saying."

Zubat had no idea what they were on about, but he did enjoy seeing them tag-team the rattata, sending it flying back into its trainer. He swore some more, then tried to run again, only for the bellsprout to trip him up again.

A moment later, the humans were tying the man up with some rope from a pack he'd hidden under his own tarp.

One of them approached him, moving slow, the one with the bellsprout and the ghost. "Hey there, buddy," she said. "You look hurt. Would you mind if I help you heal a little? Then we can chat, what do you say?"

***