Camouflage

changeling considered. “Best just tell her you dropped me off at a house in town. And . . . don’t come back to the airport tomorrow. That could be awkward.”
    “Yeah. I already figured that out.” He started the car, then shook his head. “This is crazy.”
    “Just keep an eye on the mailbox.” They exchanged stares for a moment, and the man drove off.
    The changeling had a few things to do, but there was no rush; the gate didn’t open till twelve. It went back inside and left passport and wallet in a storage locker, and then set out to find twenty pounds of flesh.
    In the daytime it would have been easy: just go into a supermarket and buy twenty pounds of meat. It didn’t want to chance taking someone’s dog or piglet, so it had to be the sea.
    It walked back to the road and headed away from town. Everyone had gone to bed and clouds covered the stars; between headlights the world was black as pitch. The changeling came to a path that led to a stone beach, and slipped quietly into the water.
    There was no need to masquerade as a fish. It just stretched its feet into something resembling swim fins, unhinged its jaws, and made its mouth and throat wide enough to accept a large fish. It glided out to the reef and looked around with nose and skin more than its large eyes—like a shark, it could sense the change in electric potential that meant a large fish in trouble.
    That was the meal ticket—it felt the slight tingling and went straight toward it, and came to a reef shark wrestling with a skipjack tuna half its size. The changeling killed the shark with a big bite, severing the notochord, and easily chased down the crippled tuna and ingested it in one gulp. Then it went back and consumed the shark.
    The two of them had provided plenty of mass. It swam back to the shore, grew feet inside shoes, and walked back toward the airport, a large white American, and took a cab into town.
    Bad Billy’s was still open—it advertised being the last bar to close in the Western Hemisphere—but the changeling didn’t want to attract attention, so it had the cab stop at the first vacant motel, the Klub Lodge, where it took a small room and lay thinking for some hours.
    It hated leaving the artifact, hated leaving Russ, and considered just presenting itself for what it was: obviously from another planet, and possibly related to that impossible machine. But it didn’t want to wind up a specimen to be examined, and they could probably infer enough about its abilities to build a cage from which it couldn’t escape.
    Would Russ protect it? If it returned as Rae? No; he knew by now that Rae wasn’t really a woman, and had tricked him.
    And could trick him again. After a cooling-off period, the changeling could show up as another woman, and win his love again. It wouldn’t even be acting.
    But it wouldn’t be smart to hang around Samoa. The island would be thick with U.S. government agents in another day or two, once they figured out what they had almost caught. Even if they didn’t figure it out, and thought the changeling was some sort of augmented human or spy machine, they’d still be all over the island trying to track it down. It hoped they were looking for a one-armed woman.
    It waited until almost ten to walk into town; the sidewalk was crowded enough that it didn’t stand out particularly, just another sunburnt tourist. It had earlier, as Rae, found a church charity store; it went straight there and bought a suitcase and a few changes of clothing. At a more touristy place, it bought a couple of bright shirts and a souvenir lavalava. An assortment of toiletries from a convenience store, and a couple of gift bottles of Robert Louis Stevenson liqueur. In a coffeehouse rest room it disposed of some of the toothpaste and shaving gel, so they wouldn’t look just-bought, and caught a cab to the airport.
    There were three uniformed policemen on duty, and one Samoan woman in a business suit pretty obviously surveying the crowd. It occurred to the changeling that its choice of identity might have been disastrous, if Scott Windsor Daniel, African-American hash hound, was known to the police.
    Best done quickly. The changeling went into a crowded men’s room and waited for a stall. Once behind the door, it went through the uncomfortable business of changing its face and hands to match Daniel’s. It also changed shirts, putting on a souvenir one that, under the circumstances, acted as protective coloration.
    The