This story is a continuation of the January 9th story, An Experiment in Green & Grey. Click to read that first story, then read on below.

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo-of-the-day/meerkats-morning-upclose/

A small group of police officers sat in a small conference room. The lights were turned off. One white wall had been commandeered as a video screen. The projector itself was on a central table, propped up on a pair of books. On the wall, images of the desert appeared.

“This video was taken five days ago,” said a man in a polo and grey pants. The other three people in the room were all uniformed police officers.

“This video of meerkats,” the least patient of them said.

“Correct.”

“Why do we care?”

The plain-clothes officer ignored the tone. “These meerkats are very representative of meerkats the world over. At least, the desert over. They live in a big community, share the daily workload, alert each other to predators, frolic, breed, sleep, and so on.”

“Not dissimilar to what happens out there,” one officer quipped, motioning toward the door and the precinct beyond.

“In the course of regular police work, it’s rare to see meerkats come up,” the plain-clothes’ boss mentioned with an impatient tone.

“Regular police work is for catching regular criminals,” the man answered. “I’m after the Scientist, so irregular police work is the only worthwhile tool I’ve got.”

“The Scientist? Capital S now, like he’s a comic book villain?”

“After Hamburg? Yeah.” The plain-clothes officer was entirely serious.

His boss nodded, conceding. “Carry on.”

On the wall, a family of meerkats ran around the desert. They chirped at one another, ducked in and out of holes leading to their burrow, and stood on their hind legs. The video stopped with three meerkats up on their haunches, gazing out over the red landscape.

“Here’s our problem,” the plain-clothes said.

“Why are three meerkats our problem?”

“Because there are only two meerkats here.” He stepped to the wall and pointed at the two bigger ones. Then he tapped his finger on the third. “This one is not a meerkat.”

“An imposter!” one of the uniforms quipped.

“It’s a rat.”

“A rat?” his boss asked.

“The Scientist has succeeded in making his formula,” the plain-clothes said. “This meerkat was born and lived as a normal rat for we estimate about 2 years. It was captured by the Scientist, given his chameleon serum, and at some point after that, it stopped being a rat and it became a meerkat.”

The boss rubbed his stubbled chin with his expertly manicured hand. For a long moment, he allowed all the information he had in his head about the man they called the Scientist to circulate.

“The others, the meerkats, have no idea one of them is a fake?” he finally asked. The plain-clothes shook his head. “And if it works as well on humans?”

“Someone who would look, would for all intents and purposes actually be, the President of the United States, could walk into a strip club, slap a few butts, shotgun a beer and walk out on the front door without anyone, secret service included, knowing the difference.”

His boss nodded. “We know someone, probably rich, hired the Scientist to create this formula. But we have no idea what person that employer wants to impersonate.”

“We don’t,” the plain-clothes admitted. “But we know it’s someone important, and we know that whoever takes the serum & carries out the job will be someone expendable.”

He raised his eyebrows at this boss, who nodded in recognition. They’d been given a recording a few months earlier by an informant. On it, the employer’s representative had made it clear that the death of test subjects shortly after ingesting the chameleon serum wasn’t necessarily a dealbreaker.

“So the rat-cum-meerkat…?”

“Died this morning, sir.”

“And Hamburg?”

“Related, but we don’t yet know how,” the plain-clothes admitted. “Though it’s becoming clear that the Scientist’s employer wants something stolen, something that is surely behind a great deal of security. And that security must be tied to a person or persons, and the serum-“

“Will be used as the tool to jimmy the lock,” his boss finished. He looked at the other two uniforms sitting at the table. Each held a grim look.

“How do we catch him?”

“Figure out what they’re going to try to steal. Follow the people related to it, follow them to the Scientist, and torture the maniac until he gives up the man paying him,” the plain-clothes officer said with an icy tone.

“How will we know we’ve found the Scientist?” one of the uniforms asked.

The plain-clothes visibly deflated. He shook his head. “I have no idea. And if he finds a way to make the serum non-fatal, he wouldn’t hesitate to take it himself.”

“At which point…”

“How could we catch a man who looks different every single day?”