Raticate (Rattata)
Rattus vulgaris ho’ouka
Overview
Raticate are nothing if not versatile. Their mix of hardiness, intelligence, and fecundity has allowed them to find a niche in almost every corner of the world. Most species and subspecies adjust well to captivity and the Alolan raticate is no exception. Diet aside the species is relatively low maintenance. Even their selective taste in food can be useful when grocery shopping. Families that can afford the food bill may find raticate to be a good pet for teaching children about pokémon care. On the island challenge they may not be the strongest member of a team in the long run, but their relatively easy care can balance out more care-intensive team members.
Physiology
All stages of the Alolan raticate are classified as dual normal- and dark-types by the Department of Agriculture. The dark subtype is justified by their nocturnal behavior and resistance to telepathy. The latter was probably developed to help them prey on the psychic birds of Akala, the first island they were introduced to in the archipelago.
Rattata are small quadrupeds. Their fur is counter-shaded with cream fur on the bottom and black fur on their back. They have prominent ears with tufts of black fur on top. Their incisors are very large and protrude from their mouth even when it is closed. They have a long prehensile tail that is used for balance while running or climbing.
Healthy raticate are nearly as wide as they are long. Their tail loses its fur and their hindlegs become proportionally larger and stronger while their front legs become proportionally smaller. The fur on their belly darkens to a mottled brown color. They gain large, puffy cheeks with cream colored fur on them.
Rattata are primarily quadrupeds that sometimes stand on two legs to scout out their surroundings. Raticate, when they move at all, tend to waddle on their hind legs. This keeps their teeth in play during fights and makes them appear larger than they really are. Raticate and rattata primarily defend themselves with their teeth, and a fully grown raticate can bite with up to 8,000 Newtons of force. Most of the average raticate’s mass is composed of fat reserves. Their claws are neither particularly long or sharp. This leaves them few weapons aside from their teeth in a fight.
Raticate navigate primarily through their keen sense of smell. Their vision is comparable to a human’s during the day and far superior at night. Despite their large ears raticate are nearly deaf. The leading theory is that their atrophied hearing helps avoid attacks from the noivern and crobat they compete for nest space with. The ears are either vestigial or help with heat regulation. The alolan raticate’s sense of taste is one of the strongest observed in nature. While technically omnivorous, they will only eat very fresh meat from a handful of species. In captivity they have shown a greater willingness to eat meat that is fresh, high quality and well prepared. They can subsist on vegetation alone provided that their protein needs are met.
Raticate grow to a length of three feet excluding their tail or four feet including it. They can weigh up to eighty pounds but usually only weigh around fifty. Most wild rattata die before their second birthday without becoming fully grown. Raticate in captivity can live up to six years. The lifespan of wild raticate is unknown.
Behavior
Every night, rattata leave their nest to scour the earth for any food they can find. Their habit of gnawing through doors to pilfer pantries is well documented. As daybreak approaches the rattata all retreat back to their home. Fully grown raticate only leave their nest to defend their territory. It is believed that raticate live in groups of one dominant female and at least one male breeding partner. They live with dozens of their offspring and a few unrelated rattata. Raticate either dig their own tunnel network to live in or, when available, take to living in existing caves or burrows.
Most of the food the rattata acquire is given to the raticate of the nest. It is believed that the raticate take more than they need in order to keep the rattata in a state of starvation. This limits the number of rattata that reach their adult state and can compete for sexual partners, territory, and food.
Raticate nests have been known to go to war. These fights are apparently unplanned and simply occur when two rattata find the same piece of food at roughly the same time. The loser of their squabble will call reinforcements. As losses mount and increasing number of reinforcements are called, the raticate on both sides will leave their nests and join the fray. The fight ends when the dominant raticate in either nest is killed, one side’s losses are great enough that their raticate calls a retreat, or the sun rises and gumshoos begin to wake up. In the latter case the fight will usually resume at the same place roughly ninety minutes after sundown.
Defeated raticate will often abandon the rattata in their nest and swim to another island to start again. Their fat reserves make them quite buoyant and they use their tails to propel themselves through the water.
Husbandry
The Alolan raticate has become accustomed to eating large quantities of very high-quality food. Both stages of the evolutionary line require roughly 40% of their weight in food each week. They will become upset if they receive less than that and will frequently seek out food to eat on their own. If a raticate believes itself to be chronically deprived, it will either stop obeying orders or run away. Raticate will frequently reject food they deem to be insufficiently fresh or tasty. It is recommended that trainers bring well-trained raticate with them when shopping so it can select food that it will eat. This both saves on guesswork and ensures that their trainer will eat well themselves. However, this can make raticate expensive to care for.
Raticate require objects, preferably metal or bone, to gnaw on. If they are not provided these objects, they will resort to chewing on furniture, load-bearing walls and kitchen appliances.
Wild raticate use specialized chambers of their nest for urination and defecation. This makes them quite easy to housebreak.
Raticate will ask to be groomed at least twice a week. They are essentially incapable of grooming themselves and quite insistent upon cleanliness. Rattata can even be trained to help tidy up their home. Both stages are very social and cuddly pokémon and will usually seek to be close to their trainer. They enjoy sleeping alongside their trainer, but their sleep patterns tend to prevent this from happening. Fully grown raticate seldom mind being used as a pillow during the day.
Rattata, like most naturally hierarchal pokémon, acclimate rather quickly to taking orders from a human. Raticate are somewhat harder to tame, but they will usually come around to a human who feeds them well.
Illness
Raticate are carriers of several human diseases. They should be vaccinated within two weeks of capture or birth. They can infect and be infected by their trainer. The best solution to this is keeping both parties clean.
Raticate’s sensitive stomachs make them vulnerable to food poisoning. They will usually refuse food that would make them sick, but sometimes they make an error in judgment or, if desperate, will eat food they suspect is bad.
Gumshoos were introduced to Alola to curtail the growing raticate population. Ultimately, they proved unsuccessful. This is largely because Alola’s relative dearth of mid-size nocturnal predators allowed the raticate to become nocturnal and avoid gumshoos with relatively few consequences. The raticate population was ultimately checked by another invasive species, albeit one introduced unintentionally. The white mask fungus is a parasitic mold that spreads across a raticate’s face. The mold prevents breathing, contaminates the food they eat, and usually blinds them. It is the leading cause of raticate death in captivity. The first sign of an infection is usually a raticate vigorously rubbing their face against an object without gnawing on it. Infections spotted very early on can be treated. If the infection is allowed to develop the raticate will need to be euthanized.
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Evolution
Rattata, provided they are sufficiently fed, will typically evolve into a raticate within a year of their birth. Very well fed rattata or those that battle frequently can evolve in less six months. The appearance of cream-colored fur surrounding their entire mouth is the formal demarcation line between rattata and raticate.
Battle
The Alolan raticate has no presence in the international or national professional battling circuits. Other species do, although they are usually a crutch for young trainers due to the relatively short time it takes to fully train one and raise it to maturity. The atomic raticate was well on its way to establishing itself as one of the premier threats on the international competitive scene. Then it was banned in every league. At present it is highly unlikely the restrictions upon it will ever be lifted.
Rattata are fast but fragile. Their bite is one of the strongest attacks that new trainers are likely to have access to. The optimal strategies for a rattata take advantage of this through priority or speed-boosting moves to dodge attacks and close the distance. Rattata fight somewhat better against large opponents than small ones as they can weave around attacks and hit vulnerable areas. Rattata are surprisingly clever and capable of learning a number of dark-type tricks and attacks.
Raticate do not like to fight. They are nowhere near as agile as their juvenile form. On balance they sport the bulk necessary to take a few hits before going down. The sheer power of a raticate bite is enough to end most fights in a few hits, but by that point the raticate will likely either be too injured to continue or otherwise give up. By the time a raticate reaches maturity it is best to retire it to the role of grocery shopping aid and refocus training time and resources on pokémon with a more combative disposition and a higher strength ceiling.
Acquisition
Rattata can be caught, adopted, or purchased with a Class I license. They can be found nearly anywhere in Alola at night, or in caves during the day.
Raticate can be adopted or purchased with a Class I license or caught with a Class II license. They are usually only found safeguarding their nests underground alongside dozens of rattata that will defend them in battle. It is recommended that trainers wishing to own a raticate should simply capture and raise a rattata.
Due to their fecundity the few trainers who wish to breed raticate will often end up with more offspring than they desire to keep. As such, rattata can be easily purchased or adopted in the major cities of Alola.
Breeding
A raticate exposed to another raticate (or a closely related species) of the opposite sex will attempt to breed with it. They have no particular breeding season and, in the wild, are believed to reproduce continuously. After a pregnancy of roughly eighty days a raticate will give birth to around fifteen offspring. Trainers are required to spay or neuter their raticate unless they possess a permit to breed them.
Relatives
Unlike dartrix, the various species of raticate do not fall into clear groupings. Only a handful of particularly common or interesting ones will be noted here. Trainers wishing to do further reading are advised to go to their local library and check out a copy of Raticate: A Story of Global Conquest by Dr. Ellen Faraday.
Western raticate (R. vulgaris) have dark grey fur. Their tails are short and hairless. They are much leaner than the Alolan raticate descended from them. They have more developed legs and feet tipped in long claws. Western raticate do not dig burrows or seek shelter in caves. They live in social groups of one pair of raticate and their most recent litter. Western raticate seek shelter in tall grass, marshlands or tree branches when possible. Their range covers temperate Europe from Kalos to the Caucuses. After the outbreak of atomic raticate in Galar a very through extermination program for all raticate was undertaken. The island is now free of raticate. Paldea is similarly raticate-free due to the presence of gumshoos, maushold, and an abundance of mid-size and large felines.
The eastern raticate (R. marshal) is the second most common species. They have a lighter coloration with cream chest fur and light brown fur on their back. They are primarily quadrupeds who sometimes rear up on their hind legs for intimidation. They are even more fecund than the Alolan raticate and can produce up to seventy offspring a year. The eastern raticate is primarily diurnal. Most of their diet is comprised of small animals and pokémon, although they have also been known to dig up the roots of plants and eat them. Eastern raticate are found in eastern China, northern India, Central Asia, and on the southern Japanese islands.
Raticate have fared poorly in Africa due to the sheer number of mid-sized predators and felines that exist, including the plains gumshoos. The main species there is the six-eyed raticate (R. hexagonum). These raticate do not, in fact, have six eyes; they have two and, ironically, are nearly blind. The remaining eyes are their nostrils and two facial markings that serve an unknown purpose. They are one of the smaller raticate subspecies, but also one of the heaviest. This is because their bodies are coated in thin layers of metallic fur and their claws are composed of nearly pure iron. They dig elaborate tunnel networks underground. One of the few things that is well documented is that they seek out and eat metal deposits. This previously limited their range and numbers, but the growth of modern, metal-filled cities on the continent has removed these limiting factors. There have been dozens of events where swarms of thousands of six-eyed raticate ascended upon the business district of an African city and began to devour the buildings. Whether they eat something other than metal has yet to be established as they eat any cameras stuck in to their tunnels to observe them. No specimen has survived in captivity for more than three weeks.
The Caribbean raticate (R. hydrophilus) is the only species known to spend most of its time in the water. They have long, broad tails roughly equal to half of their body length. Their paws are large and webbed and their body is slender with short, fine, counter-shaded fur. Caribbean raticate swim out to coral reefs or similarly abundant areas during the day and swim down to hunt slow moving or stationary pokémon underwater. They use their front paws to grab ahold of their prey and their powerful jaws to crunch down and kill it. They are even capable of shattering mollusk shells. At night they retreat to nearby islands to sleep on or near the shore. Faster invasive species such as sharpedo have begun to compete with them for food or hunt them directly, leading to a sharp decline in their numbers in the last fifteen years. The species is still in no danger of going extinct due to a strong captive breeding program.
While the six-eyed raticate can damage cities and the western raticate is a well-known carrier of plagues, neither has terrified the public quite like the atomic raticate (R. musacomedentis vastator). Prior to 1971, the dominant raticate species in Papua New Guinea were arboreal herbivores that moved from tree to tree eating leaves and fruit. This species, the New Guinean raticate, only reached lengths of thirteen inches. In March 1971 the United States government began a series of oceanic nuclear bomb tests in the sea between Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. That August a field biologist in New Guinea recorded seeing a raticate over six feet in length. In October a biologist working on the opposite side of the country documented a ten-foot raticate. The atomic raticate became too large for the trees to support them and they moved to the ground. At some point they changed their diet to suit their new habitat. By the start of 1971 the remaining humans in the provinces of Enga, the Southern Highlands, the Western Highlands, and Hela had been evacuated.
In 1974 there was an outbreak of crossbred atomic and western raticate in Motostoke. Approximately 35,000 people were killed over the course of three years. A 1982 outbreak in Toronto led to the destruction of the city’s subway system and the deaths of approximately 11,000 people. Subsequent outbreaks across Canada killed another 5,000. There have been no sightings of the species outside of New Guinea since 2002. Atomic raticate are by far the most prodigious breeders of all subspecies, capable of producing up to 600 offspring a year which mature over the course of roughly eleven months if properly fed. They have been known to bide their time in the forests near urban areas until their numbers are great enough to begin the proper hunt. It is believed that they actively seek out humans to kill and eat. It is unknown if this is for sport or nutritional reasons.
International law prohibits the study of live atomic raticate specimens and field research upon them is extremely difficult. The limited research conducted by professional battlers and biologists prior to the Motostoke and Toronto outbreaks suggested that the atomic raticate had a very powerful connection to elemental energy. This granted them effective dynakinesis, creating bursts of fire, radiation or electricity around their body. Their crossbred offspring exhibited exceptional elemental powers of the other species’ typing. All variations of the atomic raticate used their power to dampen incoming attacks of almost every nature, making them nigh-invulnerable to everything but some toxins.
In 1997 the United Nations Security Council designated the island of New Guinea as a nature preserve under U.N. administration and began to relocate the survivors. Australia was initially supposed to take the refugees, but the Australian government prevented the New Guineans from disembarking at the last minute. At present they are being held on the Solomon Islands in a state of legal limbo.
Drone expeditions and satellite imagery have confirmed that the atomic raticate population remains strong on New Guinea. A 2010 expedition the island found very little else there except for plants, birds and canopy-dwelling pokémon. It is unclear exactly what the raticate are eating.
If there is any silver lining it is that the atomic raticate are not adept swimmers. It is illegal under international law to possess a Caribbean raticate within 300 kilometers of New Guinea.