EGG HUNT #1

"Whose eggs?" Grookey squinted in the light of the sun.

"Does it matter?" Kath looked up from where she'd been rummaging through a pile of twigs and leaves. She blew her hair out of her face and stretched.

"I think it does, actually. I wouldn't want anyone stealing my eggs."

"You're a-"

"Ape."

"-mammal," Kath finished, shooting Bulby a look. "You don't have eggs."

"I have these ones," Grookey said, holding up a basket of eggs that he'd already stolen. "I'd hate to lose 'em."

Bulby laughed, then went back to focusing. Vines stretched from his back like antenna, sliding through the undergrowth. Bulby felt them with his eyes shut, grinning when a vine wrapped around something smooth and round. "Got one, man."

"You two are too good at this," Kath said, emerging again from the same pile, still empty-handed. "You find anything yet, Sarah Lee ? How much time do we have before it gets dangerous?"

"It's all Pokemon," Sarah said loudly, pouncing on Finnegan Fjord 's question with the enthusiasm of a well-meaning busybody. She strode over to him, pulling up the newly published guidebook page for the Rookery. "It says that all Pokemon lay eggs." She looked over at Kath Ulu and Tim. "Even Grookeys."

"There could be anything in these eggs. I'm hoping for another dragon. What about you?" she asked Kath and Finn.

Her Pokemon were returning in dribs and drabs now, each bringing back something that could be mistaken for a egg if you squinted and dropping them into a pile at her feet. She sorted through them with a long stick, pushing aside detritus, stones, empty cocoons, discarded water bottles, and finally: an egg.

Well, half an egg at least. "This is just an empty shell," she said to Shinx, who was looking far too proud at his find. "You know that right? We need a whole one." The Shinx's face crumpled like a wet soufflé. "It's fine. Good job. Maybe. Where did you find this one? Take us there."

"It's for simplicity," Sarah explained. "So they don't have to deal with twenty different kinds of gestation and birth. You just put two Pokemon in a room together, wait five minutes, and you'll have an Egg. Works for any Pokemon."
She looked down at Finn's Litten. "Even cats."

Sarah proudly sent out her Charmeleon and Treecko. "Two dragons! Once I unlock Mega Evolution of course."

Charmeleon looked like a dragon. It had scales and breathed fire and everything.

Treecko looking like a large, hungry gecko. Which he was. His large tongue wetly cleaned one eye as he looked up at Finn.

Kath, Grookey and Bulby crowded around the egg.

"Is it gonna hatch?"

"Quiet man, give it a second."

"Shh," said Kath, prompting a sultry look from both of her boys.

A thin crack appeared on the side of the egg.

Grookey gasped.

Then the crack grew bigger, as whatever was inside the egg was breaking it apart.

"Oh man, I hope they're cool," Bulby said apprehensively.

A small orange hand broke through the egg and tore apart of its own shell apart. The egg collapsed.

What was left behind could be best described as an orange pokeball-headed dinosaur with ill-fitting pants.

Scraggy looked at them expectantly.

"Baby, it's a scraggy!" Grookey yelled. "I love these guys!"

Scraggy frowned, suspicious now.

"Shut the hell up," Kath said, "you'll spook him."

Scraggy looked suspiciously at them both (one with each eye, which was a bit disconcerting).

"Hey man, you wanna chill out and look for more eggs?" Bulby said, already walking away.

"Ya!" Scraggy chirped and hopped after him, holding his pants with both hands.

"Ah," said Kath, as she watched them go. "Guess he's cool."

"Too cool for us, baby," Grookey said, trying to hold her hand.

"Ah, fuck, no."