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Brown rat-1-

Rats are various medium-sized, long-tailed rodents. "True rats" are members of the genus Rattus, the most important of which to humans are the black rat, Rattus rattus, and the brown rat, Rattus norvegicus. Many members of other rodent genera and families are also referred to as rats, and share many characteristics with true rats.

Rats are often used as test animals in science laboratories, and as a go-to diet for people in dire straits. Due to rats' frequent reproductive rate, aggressive dietary nature, and ability to carry disease, humans have been inventive in finding new ways to exterminate rats. Rats have been introduced to numerous continents where they were not native, and wreaked havoc on local species of mammal, reptile, amphibian, and bird.

Rats in Atlantis[]

European rats stowed away on ships, and were introduced to Atlantis in the 15th century. They contributed to the extinction of many of the small continent's native species in the ages to come.

Rats in Chicxulub Asteroid Missed[]

Rats were pestilential mammals that always managed to get aboard sailing ships. Not even the small domestic raptors that people brought aboard for the purpose, could wholly eradicate them.

The Queepahd had its share of rats. Geekgeek employed a rat's blood in his Yojo rituals.

Rats in Darkness[]

Rats were important test animals for the grim secret project conducted in Naantali, Kuusamo, during the Derlavaian War. Grandparent and grandchild rats were made subject to time spells. The grandparents were pushed forward in time and the grandchildren backward, killing them in the process and deriving enormous magical energy.

Rats in "Running of the Bulls"[]

Rats were a repulsive mammal with beady black eyes, gnawing teeth, skinny tails, and - like all mammals but unlike people - hair. Rats ate anything and everything, including the corpses of soldiers killed in the great global war.

Rats in Three Men and...Stories[]

As a consequence of being on the path to vampirism, a man named Stivvings acquired the ability to shape-shift into a rat. Montmorency the dog killed Stivvings while he was a rat by ripping his throat out.[1]

Rats in The War That Came Early[]

In response to Japan's success in spreading the bubonic plague and anthrax in Hawaii, the cities of Los Angeles and Oakland, in an effort to curtail their rat populations as diseased vectors, instituted Kill-a-Rat Days. The bodies of dead rats killed by citizens were displayed in big piles in the two cities. Pete McGill believed it was an illusion to assume rats and disease could be entirely eliminated in this way.[2]

Rats in Worldwar[]

The crew of the U.S. starship Admiral Peary had rats for experimental purposes when the ship arrived at Home in 2031. Some of these rats escaped and thrived in this new environment, despite being very different from all other life forms on the planet. The efforts of the Race authorities to exterminate them proved futile, and they soon showed clear signs of becoming a permanent part of Home's ecology.

While the humans had not deliberately released the rats into Home's environment, some of them were not completely sorry it happened; they remembered the great damage to Earth's ecology due to creatures from Home being set free there, and the indifference shown by members of the Conquest Fleet and Colonization Fleet to humans' complaints about this.

References[]

  1. Some Time Later: Fantastic Voyages Through Alternate Worlds, pgs. 20-22, TPB.
  2. Two Fronts, pg. 347, HC
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