The three of us rode out behind the dormitory to a hiking trail long abandoned and closed up. Trees and grass back here were overgrown, with no maintenance of the path for what has possibly been years. Who knew if mountain lions could be lurking behind the curtain of waist-high shrubs.

"You know what I'm really liking about Earth?" Ivory asked. "At least you guys got a sky up here. Like, damn. I haven't seen stars in years."

"Hopefully it stays this way if we humans know what's good for us," I replied, acknowledging that pollution was a huge problem.

We came to a rest area overlooking the city of Vandice in all its glory. There were dusty tables and benches for us to sit down at, and Ivory transformed back into their humanoid form. They raced up to the fence which separated them from a steep fall into the cluster of trees.

I joined Ivory with Remmy still a blob in my arms and gazed up at the stars. It was quite the sight. A blanket of stars above and a sea of lights below. Bringing the others up here every now and then would make for a nice trip.

Ivory gripped the fence and rested their chin on the wooden plank. "Sorry about making you worried earlier. I was just… I dunno. Hiding is kind of my go-to. Makes me a world-class hider in a game of hide-and-seek!"

"Well, you hid because you were frustrated, right? I know a certain someone that tends to hide themselves in their room a lot," I said, pinching and pulling Remmy's slime form to her chagrin.

Remmy bounced out of my hands and into Ivory's instead. The mimic patted the blob of slime, causing ripples to travel down the amorphous body.

"You guys, my name isn't Ivory and this isn't my body," Ivory began with a somber sigh. "Ivory was once a real elven woman with this appearance, but I kind of stole her identity after she died."

"Did you… kill her?" I hesitantly asked.

"I'm not that kinda mimic, I swear! Don't even have the guts. Literally, I actually don't have guts!" The living mimic turned around and pressed their back to the fence to stare up at the sky instead. "Ivory was someone who… Well, let's just say she was the only one to ever find me."

Come to think of it, mimics were the kind of creatures that laid in wait. Wasn't there a possibility that they might never be chanced upon. No way would they just sit there waiting forever?

"You're telling me that you stayed as an object until Ivory found you?" I pressed further.

"That's right! I mean, what else am I supposed to do? We mimics were specifically created to ambush people. So I waited… and waited… and waited… Things get kind of weird after sitting still for a while. Like the world starts distorting. I sometimes wondered if I was really alive?" Ivory's pendant seemed to lose its lustre even under the starlight.

"Y-You are alive!" Remmy declared, then hopped off to take a humanoid form in front of the mimic who was taken aback. "Even if you start thinking that isn't true… The rest of us know that for fact."

In a way, both of them were cut from the same cloth. One was created from experiments, and the other was used in experiments. It was good that Remmy was able to find kinship in Ivory. They were probably the quickest she had ever become friendly with.

I placed a hand on top of Remmy's head. "That's right. I don't know what made Ivory special enough to find you, but count on us to find you no matter what you turn into."

"Heh. I'll take that as a challenge then!" Ivory smirked.

The following day, I brought the incident up to Ines in her room when she had time to spare.

"That sounds to me like a case of identity crisis," Ines said.

"Is that something treatable or Ivory's just gotta work it out on their own?" I asked, skimming over the articles on her computer.

"Hard to say. This isn't like a mid-life crisis or existential dread. From what you told me and what was on the dossier, Ivory was first and foremost created to transform into things from the very start. I imagine this wouldn't be a problem if mimics weren't intelligent, but being smart enough to be conscious of themselves brings a whole host of problems," she explained, and then navigated to a disorder called 'body dysmorphia'.

The disorder was characterized as perception of flaws in one's body, whether real or imagined. At a glance, this only seemed related to an uneducated fellow like me, but I wasn't exactly sure how it involved Ivory.

"You're going to have to fill in the blanks for me, buddy." I squinted at the psycho jargon on the screen which were hieroglyphs to me.

"From a young age, we're constantly forming perceptions about ourselves. Things stay relatively static and change is gradual, like hair color, body shape, your dick size, and the like. If you were to shave your head bald, you would feel like something is off looking in the mirror, right?" Ines asked.

"You got the point across without needing one of those examples… Okay, sure. So you're saying that because Ivory changes all the time, they haven't been able to solidify their own perception or sense of self?" I answered confidently.

She nodded, impressed that I followed along. "The problem with shapeshifting into inanimate objects for too long carries an inherent risk of identifying as an unliving entity. Which is why they mostly stay in the form of the elven woman named Ivory—"

"Because Ivory was the closest living thing they can be," I concluded.

"Bingo, mister!"

Ivory wanted to be a living thing despite already being alive? This was sort of like a Pinnochio story without the growing nose part.

"Wait a minute… It just occurred to me that Ivory changing into a humanoid is unique to that particular form. Couldn't they take the body of any one of us?" I wondered out loud.

"Taking the shape of inanimate things might still hold true." Ines frowned. "How do you think our resident mimic took Ivory's form?"

"That's right. The original Ivory died, so then…" I swallowed hard as the blood drained from my face upon realization.

Ivory's first real friend was probably that elf.

I thanked Ines and was about to leave the room until she grabbed my hand. A worried look fell across her face.

"What about yourself? You doing alright?" Ines pressed a hand to my forehead.

"M-Me? I'm fine! Do I not look fine?" I asked.

She chuckled. "You worry about everyone else too much, you're going to forget about your own health. The whole forest in the dorm, parents' day at Tamara's school, and Val's thing last month… You should just take a day off and lie in bed before it catches up to you. Don't hesitate to say something if you need help, okay?"

Was I not looking so well? I assured Ines that I was alright and went downstairs.

The tenants were outside playing volleyball with a makeshift net on two wooden posts and a Remmy clone as the ball. She had another clone playing alongside Ivory on one team against Cresta and Irapesha on the other. A rather stacked team, if you asked me.

I wasn't sure how Ivory's psychological issue would manifest going forward, but we had good dorm mates around to help.

"Get in on this!" Ivory waved to me. "Three versus three. Me and all the Remmys will take you guys on!"