When I woke up, I stretched in comfortable delight. And boy, do I mean stretched. I wasn't sure exactly how tall I was now, aside from knowing I was pretty small, but my height all but doubled as I put effort in reaching upward to express my pleasure after a good night's sleep. It had been the entire night, too, despite falling asleep right after dinner. The day must have taken more out of me than I expected, as I nestled into the soft cotton-texture underneath me. Something about that tickled my mind for a moment as I rubbed at my eyes, taking a look around.

I assessed my surroundings, and realized I was in the middle of what looked like an oversized dog-bed, and I can only assume that Mable had brought me in the house when she found me asleep last night. I was lying next to the back door in the kitchen, and though the lights were off, the light of sunrise was coming in through the windows and was more than enough for me to see through. I didn't see Mable out and about, but if it was anything like a traditional farm in my memory, she was likely already out and about doing something on the pasture. That left me with a conundrum, though, as I eyed the closed back door and wondered how I was going to get back out there.

Sure, I could wait for Mable to come into the kitchen, but that didn't sound very fun. And I didn't want to explore around the house without her permission, lest I make her upset. The door was an interesting problem, and I figured I could probably get it open if I was able to transform into Bibarel again. At least he was tall enough to reach the doorknob and had hands. I tensed my body and hopped up onto the countertop to peer out the window in search of him, but no dice. I didn't see Bibarel anywhere. In fact, the only Pokémon I could see from here at the moment were the Dunsparce, and they weren't going to be much help.

Disappointed, I dropped back down to the floor, eyeing the crack beneath the door. Sure, I was pretty sure I didn't have any bones or anything in me now, but squishing myself flat was more of a side effect I had been subjected to, rather than something I did myself. Trying to slide under the door like a puddle didn't sound like the best idea to me. Hm. Suddenly, I smacked myself in the head. I was thinking too much about the videogame representation of Pokémon. After all, in the shows or other media, Ditto hadn't only been able to transform into Pokémon they were facing in battle!

I closed my eyes and tried to focus my thoughts on Bibarel and what it looked like. The goofy buck-toothed face, the puffy cheeks, the big, flat beaver tail and his stubby little legs. Eventually, I felt a pulse of white energy course through me, and my body grew outward. Success! I looked down at my hands and, smug as could be at my success, opened the back door. When I strode outside, I actually noticed Mable was just a few feet away, sorting different kinds of berries on the countertop out back and separating them into different containers. "Oh, good morning, Ditto!" I saw her lips twitch upward in amusement, and she was clearly struggling to keep her voice level. "You know, you might have slept in Bibi's house-bed, but you didn't need to turn into him to do it! Pretty close, I'll admit, though."

'Pretty close'? What did she mean by that. Her stifled laughter was only growing louder as the confusion slipped into my expression, and she eventually let it out in a hearty laugh, "Come here and I'll show you." I waddled over, and she hooked her hands under my front legs and picked me up in a fashion that left my lower body just sort of dangling, holding me higher so I could see my reflection in the glass of the window. Oh. Right. I managed to make myself look almost exactly the same as Bibarel, however I still had my trademark little dots where his eyes were supposed to be. Looks like I still needed work on transforming into things. That, or was it an issue with my mental image when I did the transformation?

This might actually be harder to get used to than I thought, if I wanted to transform freely. After all, it was easy when I had an example right in front of me, but if I had to picture every detail perfectly otherwise... man, I didn't want to have to study as a Ditto! Hopefully it got easier as I got more experienced, or got older, or both.

Mable set me down on the ground after letting me examine my reflection, smiling brightly. "Oh, that was a good laugh, thank you Ditto. Breakfast isn't for a while yet, but since you're here, if you come up and help me sort berries like a good little fella, then I suppose I won't mind if a few just happen to go missing in the Oran pile, hmm?" I nodded at the deal, as it seemed easy enough given how the berries were all so vastly different in appearance, and she helped me up onto a stool next to the counter. Pushing some of the pile of berries closer to me, I began to sort them into their different containers, 'sneaking' an Oran berry here and there.

I could have been adventurous and tried other berries, but after seeing the spicy one that actual Bibarel had been eating last night, I wasn't sure I wanted to experiment with different flavors. Plus, this was technically food supplies for a whole lot of various Pokémon. I spent a while working through the pile with Mable, doing a good enough job I finished with the lesser pile she had given me to start and she had to slide more over for me to sort. "Goodness! If you do too good a job as a helper, I might start expecting you to help me with this every morning, Ditto." She teased, shooing me away to go into the pasture once we finished. "Go on and go play for now. Since you're new, I'll let you know that we're going to have guests around lunch time, so if you don't want any of the little 'uns to make a fuss over you, stay away from the house until closer to dinner."

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Oh? The kids that Bibarel had kept mentioning were coming over? That could be... an experience. Still, I felt like I would be able to handle having some kids around me as I had already dealt with the Bidoof gang. When Mable started walking off toward the trees in the back of the pasture, though, I tagged along with her. She raised a brow at me following along, but didn't object, taking my continued presence as a reason to keep talking. "We're going to try and show off some Metapod evolution this afternoon! Some of them have been looking ready for a while now, maybe even holding back to show off. If you're willing to hang around the kids, you'll be able to see the evolution yourself!"

When we reached the trees, Pansage hopped down from the branches to land on Mable's back, and she reached over her shoulder to ruffle around the top of its head. "Morning to you, too, Pansage. Be a dear and go fetch down the Metapod closest to evolving, will you? Only one at a time, mind you, I don't need you dropping any of them because you're trying to show off for me." She wagged a finger at the grass-monkey in mock chiding, and they rubbed the back of their neck with a hesitant smile that seemed to reveal being caught out.

When they brought the green, hardened carapace of the cocoon Pokémon down, Mable gestured to me and I took it gently in my arms, cradling it like a hard-skinned baby. It didn't say anything, but it's lazy-looking half-lidded eyes flicked around as if examining me, before staring vacantly off into space again. Man, being a Metapod must be one of the most boring things in the world. Not even able to move by yourself, just waiting to pop out as a Butterfree. Then again, they did get to fly, so that might be worth the wait.

I idly considered transforming into one myself after seeing the evolution later today, if everything happened as planned, and getting to cheat the whole process. Hah! You had to sit around as a boring cocoon and wait to fly, and I just get to copy your work like I'm cheating on a test! By the time my inner monologue had finished, Pansage had climbed back down twice more, once to hand a Metapod to Mable, and then again to carry a third one himself. I was actually pretty impressed at how he was able to handle the cocoons without dropping them when they were almost as big as he was! I was only able to carry one at all because I was transformed into Bibarel.

As a group, we moved back across the pasture, warily eyeing some Pidgey who spotted the bug Pokémon being ferried across the open and seemed to be weighing their chances of swooping over to steal one. Some fierce warning from Mable seemed to dissuade them, as they turned back to pecking at the grassy ground instead. When we reached the counter, the Metapod were lain flat atop it. Having settled the Metapod, Mable began to move in extra stools from another side-door and circle them around the outdoor countertop. I wandered in after her to try and help once again, but even as big as Bibarel was compared to me, I just wasn't built to move furniture.

Mable patted me atop the head, and made a more aggressive shooing gesture at me than earlier. "Look now, I appreciate the help, but you can't just shadow me around all day. You don't want to grow up to be too much of a needy, dependent Pokémon do you? Go play and have fun, do what you want to do for a while!" Firmly dissuading me from helping further, she pointed out at the pasture. "As a matter of fact, you're not allowed around the house until the kids show up this afternoon! Go meet other Pokémon, make some new friends!"

Under her firm stare, I nodded and wandered off toward the pasture and decided to wrap up my tour from the other day, as I never did manage to get back to the rocky area last time. In fact, I hadn't seen any Pokémon that looked like they would live on a little mini-mountain show up for dinner last night, either. So who lived over there?

When I approached the rocky outcropping, a glint of shining caught my attention, staring at a little steel-grey Pokémon that vaguely resembled a land-bound ladybug with a bumpy metal exterior. 'Aron?' "Bibarel?" When I realized I was still transformed, and poorly at that, I let it drop and returned to my normal blobby form. The little Aron scooted closer, seemingly intrigued, and I merely offered a grin, "Nope, sorry! I'm Ditto, and I just got here yesterday. Hi!"

"Oh. Nice to meet you, Ditto. Seen any ore lying around?"

"Ore?" I tipped my head aside at the question, not really putting two and two together.

"Yeah, Mable likes to hide the food with other rocks and stuff. She says that we're supposed to be able to sniff it out ourselves, so that we don't get too used to getting hand-fed. So we have to compete with each other when we go. Sometimes it's buried, but other times she just hides it around other rocks." The Aron explained, but I no longer had his undivided attention as he went back to bumping his head off rocks. He casually crushed rocks in his way with bashes of his head, looking for ore hidden in cracks and fractures, examining nooks and crannies in the rock surface.

"Oh, for you to eat! I sort of forgot what Aron eat. I haven't seen any, but I'll let you know if I stumble over any!" The Aron nodded as he trundled away, paying me little mind as I climbed up the small hill of rocks. I wonder who else might be hiding up here?