.Zigzagoon Line
Morphs [Oak Catalog #]
- Zigzagoon [#263]
- Linoone [#264]
Zigzagoon and Linoone are very common and lively Pokémon. They are well known for their particular habit to inspect any interesting place as well as retrieve and collect all sorts of objects. They are also very curious and versatile in battle. It is known that they can try and learn a large variety of attacks that makes facing a focused Linoone a complicated and lengthy affair.
Notable Biology
Zigzagoon's incredible sense of smell and sensitive memory are two of its most important assets. Zigzagging across the ground, from one tree or dirt spot to the next, Zigzagoon will rub its nose against any object that may seem of interest, or against the ground if it seems there is something buried, and will not stop smelling, scratching and searching until he either retrieves the object or decides that there is another object nearby that is more worth of their attention, which given their endless curiosity happens a lot.
They also have a strong sensitive memory. A long-lived Linoone can remember the exact spot where they retrieved an important fruit (maybe the one that got them a mate) when coming back to the general area after some years. It is believed that some of those Pokémon may "teach" the significance of particular odors and objects to their offspring, as experiments with cages and human food indicate a young Zigzagoon, born from a trained Linoone who lived between city restaurants, can venture into a specific one, approach a dish with food a chef is preparing and reject it because it's not "like daddy liked it".
While Zigzagoon has a compact body adapted to wandering and exploration, Linoone has a longer and slender body with short legs. Due to this change in physiological configuration, Linoone are good trotters and can leap and reach to close distances with strong headbutts and claw attacks, however they have great difficulty curling, braking or turning around. Linoone are known to gather in a spread formation around their foes, brace and reorient themselves directly towards their nearest enemy and engage in pursuits based in long, periodical streaks where they attempt to redirect themselves by using features of the terrain such as rocks and trees.
Habitat
Zigzagoon and Linoone live in the grasslands and the wooded areas, in particular when there are cities nearby. They form packs that venture regularly into territories of high activity, forming literal wild swarms that wander around and across the city outskirts, the industrial areas and water courses, to sate their instinctive drive to lookout and examine. Check the Social Structure section for more information on the structure of their packs.
Linoone live in small groups, however they spend the majority of their time alone wandering across the grasslands, inspecting the several safe spots they dig and where they hide food or other treasures. They mostly gather to inspect on higher levels of activity (such as a human caravan going across their territory) and to lookout on the young. Is in this respect that they are sometimes seen as similar to Furret‹#162›, who also stand up and do group lookouts.
Packs of Zigzagoon can be found in places like southern Hoenn where the climate is (usually) stable whereas their evolved form can be occasionally found in the areas near Fortree city, characterized by the tall grass and plenty of secret spots to investigate.
Diet
Zigzagoon and Linoone are both primarily herbivorous, but Zigzagoon in particular can substitute important parts of their diet by berries and some human food (particularly that derived from wheat) when in need. Linoone, albeit capable, are more demanding and since they can usually collect, hide and transport their own food they don't make much fuss about scarcity issues. Both members of the evolutionary line do resort to fish or small Water-type Pokémon such as Poliwag when living near water courses, with Linoone the more experienced and capable of catching such sort of prey.
Hazards
Zigzagoon are playful and mischievous creatures who understand and challenge their own limitations and do not mean harm (unless in a fight). Most importantly, they define their "personality" and their relation to their peers according to the mischiefs they can successfully pull off. As such, they don't usually represent direct hazard to a Trainer or owner; their customs and their interpretation of ownership, however, may lead their Trainers to run into hazards of their own.
A wild Zigzagoon considers anything they can see from their nest or resting spot as fair game for exploring, fighting or "acquiring". That may eventually include a wandering Trainer's camping spot and any (or all) food cans left around. They also consider any object that is acquired and "exhibited" as a property of the group, meaning that any other friendly Zigzagoon can come around and examine or handle the object. Because of this, Zigzagoon need to be taught not to bring their collections to their Trainer as soon as possible after capture; otherwise, uncomfortable moments will follow when a Zigzagoon publicly "gifts" a Trainer with a stolen object, which also results in the Pokémon's self-image being damaged when he is chastised for it. It is important however that the Pokémon are left to collect things for themselves, although under scrutiny as collection is their means to establish their social value.
As noted below, Zigzagoon and Linoone are always on the look for interesting objects that can be handled or operated with. If you are lucky enough to own a Pokédex, be particularly wary of your Pokémon behaving suspiciously well — this since your Pokémon may get the (not very wrong) idea that for any female an object that can take a picture of her and "sing" to her (essentially blurt out information about her, no matter she can not understand it) would be very, very valuable.
Courting and Childrearing
Early every spring, the members of this species gather for a large-scale courting ritual that consists of the males swarming nearby forests and villages in search for the rarest food, fruit or instruments they can find in order to host "exhibitions". This is the only time of the year when a Zigzagoon or Linoone will definitively not share their collections with their peers. In these events a female will pick the male with the most interesting and handleable object. The female will then retrieve the object and taunt the male to retrieve it back from her; only if he manages to do that (which in and of itself is an incredibly difficult task) will they proceed to the mating. The couple will remain together for some time after the birth of their offspring.
After a couple of months a litter of two to six individuals is born. The mother will take care of them only for the first few weeks where she will teach them to eat the grass and some flowers; after that she will leave to hunt and continue her everyday life, whereas it will be up to the male to educate the pups on the arts of thieving, collecting and in the case of trained ones, looking innocent. The juvenile remain with the father for a month or two at most.
Social Structure
Zigzagoon live in packs of around fifty individuals with even gender distribution. Those packs form and maintain a movable, sparse structure around spots of interest and resources and that can be mapped as projected forms of the Julia Set. Such streaks sometimes make easy for Trainers to run into brief "streaks" where they will repeatedly find similar, and possibly blood-related, wild Zigzagoon.
Linoone group by blood traits and "attach" themselves to an existing pack. A male Linoone will move around slowly and stay in the border of the thickets if he is still taking care of his offspring.
Written by Silent Reverence.
