Chapter 75: The Little Blue Fuzzball
The next day, just as Will had expected, the egg he had been keeping was about to hatch.
"Scyther?" the old Alpha asked, looking expectantly at the Pokémon egg, which was now flashing in Will's embrace. The other five Scyther had gathered around to watch, whispering amongst themselves and guessing what kind of Pokémon it would be.
"It will probably be born today," Will said, observing the frequency of the flashing. He estimated that the egg had probably started flashing sometime last night while they were all asleep.
A Pokémon egg will begin to rhythmically flash with a white light in the 24 hours before it hatches. The frequency of the flashing increases as time goes on.
To be honest, Will didn't really want to stay here right now. But he had to be the one to watch over it. The Scythers' arms were sharp scythes; they couldn't even do something as basic as holding an egg, let alone take care of a newborn Pokémon. Even within their own clan, Scyther would not easily touch their own eggs or infant-stage young. They would typically place the eggs or babies in a grass nest and let them play and grow on their own. Only after the baby Scyther had left its infant stage and its exoskeleton had begun to harden would they engage in more intimate interactions with their children.
It was a good thing that the Scyther species was not one that required a lot of care. If it had been an Eevee, a Togepi, or a Smoochum—Pokémon that are extremely needy—they would have died from neglect in a Scyther clan.
Time passed, and it was gradually getting to be afternoon. The Scyther had gone to the nearby forest to sharpen their scythes. This daily training helped them maintain their sharpness so their combat ability wouldn't decline.
Will stayed in the cave alone, swishing his tail in frustration. The temperature of the egg in his arms was gradually rising, and the frequency of its flashing was also increasing.
Suddenly, the light became continuous. The entire egg was glowing like a lightbulb.
Will immediately lifted his head. He knew the egg was about to hatch. The oval-shaped egg began to change shape, and the blinding light started to dim.
"Zubat!"
Pat, pat.
A strange cry came first, followed by the sound of something slapping against the ground.
"Huh? This is..."
Will squinted, waiting for the light to dissipate, and then he got a clear look at the little one in his arms.
A Zubat.
A Zubat with a height of only 0.4 meters was truly tiny. Like a Gligar, half of its height was in its tail; from head to rear, it was only about 20 centimeters long. Because it was a newborn, its height was only half the Pokédex standard. It would likely grow to far exceed that value in the future.
Zubat have no eyes; they rely on ultrasonic waves to detect their surroundings. At this moment, the Zubat was emitting sound waves to perceive the environment in the cave and Will's own presence.
A Zubat, huh...
Will looked down at the not-exactly-handsome little thing and fell into deep thought. The final evolution of the Zubat line is Crobat. If you were to ask what Crobat is most famous for, it would have to be its unique "Poison + Flying" type combination. Gliscor's "Flying + Ground" typing is unique among all non-Legendary Pokémon (if you include them, you have to add Landorus).
But Crobat's typing is truly, absolutely unique. Even including Legendary and Ultra Beasts, there is no other with this combination. And this typing is quite strong. It's 2x weak to 4 types, with no 4x weakness. It 4x resists 3 types, 2x resists 2 types, and is immune to Ground. To have such a defensive profile without the Steel type is extremely good.
Crobat has a base stat total of 535, which is very high among ordinary Pokémon, even 10 points higher than a fully evolved starter. Its most outstanding feature is its speed, with 130 points allocated to that stat, only 15 points lower than a Mega Beedrill.
But those were its only advantages. Its other five stats were extremely balanced, and balance is not always a good thing. Crobat was a classic glass cannon without the cannon.
In generations 7 and earlier, Crobat was a superb utility Pokémon. Its high speed gave it a good niche, making it a popular choice on the competitive scene. But after generation 8, with the appearance of ultra-fast Pokémon like Regieleki, formerly fast Pokémon like Crobat began to be outclassed and gradually lost their place in the meta.
But that was all from a game perspective. From a practical, real-world perspective, a Crobat was definitely a Pokémon worth raising. The biggest difference between reality and the games is that battles are not turn-based!
High speed and high mobility is strength. In the time it takes a Beedrill to attack once, a Crobat might have already launched its third attack. Not only could it attack multiple times in a row, but it could also greatly increase its evasion rate, allowing it to dodge moves that were marked as "100% accuracy" in the games. You could see this from how Ash especially loved to train his Pokémon's speed. He was so focused on speed that during his Sinnoh journey, he trained his Turtwig, a Pokémon with great potential as a defender, in the wrong direction, causing it to suffer for a long time after it evolved into Grotle.
Famous trainers like Brock, Janine, and even Giovanni had all raised a Crobat.
"Zubat~"
The Zubat seemed to have now perceived and memorized Will's presence, accepting him in its heart as its most important family member.
"...Hello there, little one," Will sighed, lowering his head to gently touch the little blue fuzzball.
Although becoming this Zubat's foster parent was not his intention, and he had been reluctant to take on this little burden, there was nothing more to be said now. Since he had accepted this responsibility by a twist of fate, he would do his best to raise this little one.
And then... dump it on Liz to raise.
"Bat~" the Zubat snuggled against Will's abdomen and let out a pitiful little cry.
"Hungry? Hmm... how about you try sucking on this?"
Will looked at the four tender baby teeth in the Zubat's mouth, then frowned and took out a soft-skinned berry. He was a little at a loss as to how to raise this kind of Pokémon. The Zubat line was different from others.
Wild Zubat basically survive by sucking the blood of animals or other Pokémon. Their blood-sucking ability is quite formidable; their fangs can pierce a prey's body without the prey even feeling any pain, so it's not discovered right away.
Although domesticated Zubat will eat specially made food or even solid objects, a newborn like this one clearly couldn't eat something like a berry. Its teeth were too small and couldn't handle the job of "chewing."
Will could only try to get the Zubat to suck the juice from the berry.
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