~ These Creatures Are Friend-Shaped ~

Geralt was trying to tune out the bard as Jaskier composed a new song... An Ode to Kricketune.

"Krickey, Krickey, Kricketune,
Jumping out of the grass at you,
Going deedle-deedle-deedle
WHOOOOOOOOOOOP!*
He's got a little mustache, too~"

In the middle of his trial run of the first draft of the lyrics, he was distracted by a wild Pokemon.

"Is that a singing frog? Oh no, he went in the lake! Geralt, help me catch him!" Jaskier said, tugging on Geralt's arm the whole time to get the witcher's attention.

Geralt sighed. It figured that Jaskier was only interested in Pokemon that could sing.

The witcher could only imagine what would happen if he didn't help Jaskier catch the Pokemon he wanted. He would be in for weeks (if not months) of pouting and whining ("I wanted that froggy and he got away because you wouldn't help me catch him!"), so he did what anyone would do in order to avoid such a fate... he went and got a fishing net and helped Jaskier search the lake for the elusive frog Pokemon.

However, they didn't find anything, not even a tadpole Pokemon, until-

"What's this weird bottle?"

"Don't open it!"

But the warning was too late, for Jaskier had already pulled the stopper from the bottle, and an enraged Legendary Pokemon emerged in a cloud of smoke and attacked the bard.

It took the combine attacks of all of Jaskier's Pokemon - including the Politoed, who had suddenly decided he did like the bard after all and came out of hiding - as well as Dunior, Sword 3, and Roach to drive the Legendary Pokemon away.

"Why didn't you listen to me?" Geralt asked as he quickly packed Jaskier's Pokemon into Roach's saddlebags. (They were all out of the bottles, the new Politoed not even being bound to a vessel yet, but they seemed to grasp the severity of the situation and remained still and quiet.)

Jaskier, who was bleeding from his throat, tried to answer the witcher's question, but choked out more blood than syllables of speech.

"Don't try to talk!"

And, with that, the witcher mounted Roach and pulled his bard up behind him in the saddle, and they rode off in desperate search of a physician.

Geralt would not realize until much later that, in his panic, he'd forgotten about Booger and the poor baby had been left behind at the lake...

~oOo~

*Yes, this is a joke about Kricketune's cry from the video games.

Pokemon team recap:

Geralt: Mudsdale (Roach), Honedge (Sword 3), Igglybuff (Booger), Sandslash (Dunior)

Jaskier: Jigglypuff, Wigglytuff, Kricketune, Chatot, Politoed