Work Text:
"Precious! Eat time!"
Geeta called from the kitchen, although it was more out of habit than actually waiting for them to come, so almost immediately she headed to the living room of the house.
She was greeted by the sight of her beloved Gogoat sitting on the floor, watching Rika, who had woken up in a little mind this morning and now was playing with some plushies, a Clodsire, a Quadsire and two Paldean Wooper. Gogoat kept them close to him, so close that their body touched the bush around his neck.
Rika's reddish eyes fixed on her, a big smile on fell their face shortly after.
"Mama!"
Geeta gave a gentle smile, she approached Rika to pick them up, due to their mental age they couldn't really walk, the most they could do was crawl, and even that was difficult sometimes.
However, when she went to place her gloved hands on the other trainer's waist, she was stopped by her Gogoat's neighing, she laughed when she realized why he did it.
"I'll give them back to you in a moment, they need to eat," she stroked her loyal companion's head.
Gogoat stared at her for a few seconds, but in the end seemed to accept this, giving the little one a little goodbye lick, Rika gave an adorable giggle.
"Come here, beautiful," this time, without Gogoat's interruption, she was able to successfully lift Rika into her arms.
As she walked to the kitchen, she realized that Rika had been distracted by the gold ribbons on her suit, babbling happily, they looked like a Spritgatito. They took one of the ribbons and put it in their mouth.
Geeta didn't care, she could always change it, although unfortunately, she had to take it off their mouth, as it could get in the way when feeding them. She earned a small sad whine from them.
"Sorry, love, I'll give you your binky once I feed you, okay?" She received babbles in response.
Geeta took a rag in her hands and used it to take the bottle without burning herself. Normally she would have given them oran and pecha berry baby food, but it seemed like Rika was feeling too small that day, so she thought this would be enough.
She directed the bottle to her little one's lips, but they rejected it, turning their head away from it, something curious, that was not common at all.
"What is wrong, dear?" Geeta asked, concerned, were they sick? Could be, however they seemed perfectly fine before.
"Woopah," they whined, shaking their head when Geeta tried to feed them with the bottle again.
The champion thought about what the problem could be, she had heated the milk for exactly five minutes—they were quite picky with food, sometimes she had to prepare the same baby food again just because they didn't like the texture—so that couldn't be the problem, the bottle was not the same old one with Wooper's drawings, it was a—
Oh.
She had bought some bottles with drawings of different ground type pokemon, Numel, Turtwig, Trapinch, etc. She thought it was time to change that old bottle, they had used it for more than three years.
"Baby," Geeta kissed Rika's forehead, trying to calm them down, "I know how much you like your Wooper bottle, but it's too old, let's try something new!" she tried to convince in a soft voice.
Rika began to sob, seeing that their caregiver did not remove the bottle, but instead tried to put it in their lips again.
"Woopah!" They cried, turning their head away again.
"Shh, shh... I know, I know, change is hard, but I know you'll like this one as much as the other one."
"No!" They screamed, big tears now coming out of their reddish eyes, they began to squirm in their caregiver grasp.
The champion sighed tiredly as she left the bottle on the table so she could use her two arms and prevent Rika from falling. She tried to humming them a melody, she used a sweet voice, and she kissed them all over their face. But nothing worked, they continued crying.
A neigh was heard next to Geeta, her precious Gogoat, who had heard the cries and had decided to come and help.
"Goou..." the pokemon cooed as he gently caressed Rika's face with his snout, trying to calm them down.
It seemed to be successful, as little by little the Elite Four trainer cries were reduced to simple sobs.
The grass type pokemon gave a dirty look to his trainer, he was an intelligent pokemon, he knew why they were crying.
"Gogoat, I—"
"Gogou..." He didn't change his look, in fact, he narrowed his eyes even more when he saw she was trying to put up some resistance.
The champion had no choice but to sigh and go to the shelf to take down the bottle with Wooper drawings.
"Woopah!" Rika's teary eyes lit up when they saw the object they had been asking for so much.
"Yes, baby, woopah," Geeta gave them a tired smile.
The champion changed the milk from one bottle to the other, when she offered it to Rika they finally accepted it and started eating.
The champion sighed with relief when she was finally able to feed them, beside her, Gogoat also looked relieved, gently licking Rika's hair. She decided to write this event down in her mental notes, to avoid having a similar problem with any other object.
When the milk was gone, Geeta took the bottle from her little one's mouth. A giggle escaped her when she noticed how their lips were a little unclean because of the milk.
"Ah, precious," she took a small cloth, rubbing it gently on Rika's face to clean them, "you're really a picky baby, aren't you?"
Rika babbled happily, Geeta kissed them on the forehead.
"But it doesn't matter, because you're my picky baby."
