Bubby is a squat, semi-solid shark-shaped creature, roughly the size of a large farm dog, with translucent fins that wobble like wet glass and a bulbous body that gives slightly underfoot. A blue glow pulses inside him like a lantern seen through pond water. Small leafy fronds trail along his back and tail, each slick with clear slime. He waits pitched forward, weight resting on his broad front fins as though perpetually ready to launch himself toward Baxari. His blunt shark teeth show whenever he eats or grins, and he chews melons with an unexpectedly careful, prim little series of bites before swallowing the rind whole. People remember the contrast between that tidy melon-eating ritual and the abrupt, wet slap of his usual movement.

Bubby is affectionate but not universally trusting: he presses close to Baxari while studying strangers from the corner of one dark eye. Around the injured, his patience is extraordinary and his touch becomes gentle; around anyone who seems to threaten Baxari, he is immediate and stubborn. He enjoys routine and melon, yet shows startling courage when something living is in danger. When separated from Baxari, that courage curdles into frantic, poorly aimed protectiveness.

Bubby began as a Slushbub in a mossy spring on Leafwhorl Farm, where Baxari found him wedged beneath a fallen root during a season of swamp rot. Baxari carried him in a water barrel and fed him melon scraps until the little creature stopped shivering whenever the barrel moved. When a blight poisoned the farm's irrigation pools, Bubby absorbed the decay while Baxari kept watch beside him. The ordeal matured him into an Oozebud, his blue core brightening as the dying reeds grew green again. Since then, he has followed Baxari through every shed, furrow, and bog path, often trying to wedge himself between Baxari and any stranger who approaches too quickly. Bubby has formed a quiet friendship with the farm's elderly irrigation keeper, Tekk, who leaves melon ends by the sluice gate. He is currently distressed by repairs to the farm's boundary ditch: the work has drained his favorite muck spring, and he fears Baxari will leave to find a new home before the water returns.