The Moon Moth and Other Stories

by Jack Vance

  Sulwen Plain had been the site of a terrible battle between two space-faring races: so much was clear. Three questions occurred simultaneously to each of the commissioners:

  Where did these peoples originate?

  How long ago had the battle occurred?

  How did the technology of the ‘Wasps’ and ‘Sea Cows’ compare with that of Earth?

  There was no immediate answer to the first question. Sulwen’s Star controlled no other planets.

  As to the time of the battle, a first estimate, derived from the deposition of meteoric dust, suggested a figure of fifty thousand years. More accurate determinations ultimately put the time at sixty-two thousand years.

  The third question was more difficult to answer. In some cases Wasp, Sea Cow, and Man had come by different routes to similar ends. In other cases, no comparison was possible.

  There was endless speculation as to the course of the battle. The most popular theory envisioned the Sea Cow ships sweeping down upon Sulwen’s Plain to find Big Blue and Big Purple at rest. Big Blue had lifted perhaps half a mile, only to be crippled and plunge nose first to the surface. Big Purple, with a mortal gash down the back, apparently had never left the ground. Perhaps other ships had been present; there was no way of knowing. By one agency or another five Sea Cow ships had been destroyed.

  III

  The ships from Earth landed on a rise to the southeast of the battle-field, where James Sulwen originally had put down. The commissioners, debarking in their out-suits, walked out to the nearest Sea Cow ship: Sea Cow D, as it became known. Sulwen’s Star hung low to the horizon, casting a stark pallid light. Long black shadows lay across the putty-colored plain.

  The commissioners studied the ruptured ship, inspected the twisted Sea Cow corpses, then Sulwen’s Star dropped below the horizon. Instant darkness came to the plain, and the commissioners, looking often over their shoulders, returned to their own ship.

  After the evening meal, Director Drewe addressed the group: “This is a preliminary survey. I reiterate because we are scientists: we want to know! We are not so much interested in planning research as in the research itself. Well—we must practise restraint. For most of you, these wrecks will occupy many years to come. I myself, alas! am a formalist, a mathematical theorist, and as such will be denied your opportunity. Well, then, my personal problems aside: temporarily we must resign ourselves to ignorance. The mystery will remain a mystery, unless Professor Gench or Professor Kosmin instantly is able to read one of the languages.” Here Drewe chuckled; he had intended the remark jocularly. Noticing the quick suspicious glance exchanged by Gench and Kosmin he decided that the remark had not been tactful. “For a day or two I suggest a casual inspection of the project, to orient ourselves. There is no pressure on us; we will achieve more if we relax, and try to realize a wide-angle view of the situation. And by all means, everyone be careful of the big blue ship. It looks as if it might topple at a breath!”

  Professor Gench smiled bitterly. He was thin as a shrike, with a gaunt crooked face, a crag of a forehead, a black angry gaze. “‘No pressure on us’,” he thought. “What a joke!”

  “‘Relax’!” thought Kosmin, with a sardonic twitch of the lips. “With that preposterous Gench underfoot? Pah!” In contrast to Gench, Kosmin was massive, almost portly, with a big pale face, a tuft of yellow hair. His cheekbones were heavy, his forehead narrow and back-sloping. He made no effort to project an ingratiating personality; no more so did Gench. Of the two, Gench was perhaps the more gregarious, but his approach to any situation, social or professional, tended to be sharp and doctrinaire.

  “I will perform some quick and brilliant exposition,” Gench decided. “I must put Kosmin in his place.”

  “One man eventually will direct the linguistics program,” mused Kosmin. “Who but a comparative linguist?”

  Drewe concluded his remarks. “I need hardly urge all to caution. Be especially careful of your footing; do not venture into closed areas. You naturally will be wearing out-suits; check your regenerators and energy levels before leaving the ship; keep your communications channels open at all times. Another matter: let us try to disturb conditions as little as possible. This is a monumental job, there is no point rushing forth, worrying at it like a dog with a rag. Well, then: a good night’s rest and tomorrow, we’ll have at it!”

  IV

  The commissioners stepped out upon the dreary surface of the plain, approached the wrecked ships. The closest at hand was Sea Cow D, a black and white vessel, battered, broken, littered with pale corpses. The metallurgists touched analyzers to various sections of hull and machinery, reading off alloy compositions; the biologists examined the corpses; the physicists and technicians peered into the engine compartments, marveling at the unfamiliar engineering of an alien race. Gench, walking under the hulk, found a strip of white fiber covered with rows of queer smears. As he lifted it, the fiber, brittle from cold and age, fell to pieces.

  Kosmin, noticing, shook his head critically. “Precisely what you must not do!” he told Gench. “A valuable piece of information is lost forever.”

  Gench drew his lips back across his teeth. “That much is self-evident. Since the basic responsibility is mine, you need not trouble yourself with doubts or anxieties.”

  Kosmin ignored Gench’s remarks as if he had never spoken. “In the future, please do not move or disturb an important item without consulting me.”

  Gench turned a withering glare upon his ponderous colleague. “As I interpret the scope of your work, you are to compare the languages after I have deciphered them. You are thus happily able to indulge your curiosity without incurring any immediate responsibility.”

  Kosmin did not trouble to refute Gench’s proposition. “Please disturb no further data. You have carelessly destroyed an artifact. Consult me before you touch anything.” And he moved off across the plain toward Big Purple.

  Gench, hissing between his teeth, hesitated, then hastened in pursuit. Left to his own devices, Kosmin was capable of any excess. Gench told himself, “Two can play that game!”

  Most of the group now stood about Big Purple, which, enormous and almost undamaged, dominated Sulwen Plain. The hull was a rough-textured lavender substance striped with four horizontal bands of corroded metal: apparently a component of the drive-system. Only a powdering of dust and crystals of frozen gas gave an intimation of its great age.

  The commissioners walked around the hull, but the ports were sealed. The only access was by the gash along the top surface. A metallurgist found an exterior ladder welded to the hull: he tested the rungs: they seemed sound. While all watched he climbed to the ruptured spine of the ship, gave a jaunty wave of the hand and disappeared.

  Gench glanced covertly at Kosmin, who was considering the handholds with lips pursed in distaste. Gench marched forward and climbed the ladder. Kosmin started as if he had been stung. He grimaced, took a step forward, put one of his big legs on the first rung.

  Drewe came forward to counsel caution. “Better not risk it, Professor Kosmin; why take chances? I’ll have technicians open the port, then we all can enter in safety. We are in no haste, none whatever.”

  Kosmin thought, “You’re in no haste, of course not! And while you dither, that stick-insect walks inside pre-empting the best of everything!”

  This indeed was Gench’s intent. Clambering down through the torn hull with his dome-light on he found himself in a marvelous environment of shapes and colors which could only be characterized, if tritely, by the word ‘weird’.* Certain functional details resembled those of Earth ships, but with odd distortions and differences of proportion that were subtly jarring. “Naturally, and to be expected,” Gench told himself. “We alter environment to the convenience of our needs: the length of our tread, the reach of our arms, the sensitivity of our retinas, many other considerations. And these other races, likewise…Fascinating…I suspect that a man confined for any length of time in this strange ship might become seriously disturbed,
if not deranged.” With great interest Gench inspected the Wasp corpses which lay sprawled along the corridors: blue-black husks, chitinous surfaces still glossy where dust had not settled. How long would corpses remain unaltered, Gench wondered. Forever? Why not? At 100 degrees K, in an inert atmosphere, it was difficult to imagine changes occurring except those stimulated by cosmic rays…But to work. No time now for speculation! He had stolen a march on the torpid Kosmin, and he meant to make the most of it.

  One encouraging matter: there was no lack of writing. Everywhere were signs, plaques, notices in angular interweaving lines which at first glance offered no hope of decipherment. Gench was pleased rather than otherwise. The task would be challenging, but with the aid of computers, pattern-recognizing devices, keys and correlations derived from a study of the context in which the symbols occurred (here indeed lay the decipherer’s basic contribution to the process) the language eventually would be elucidated. Another matter: aboard a ship of this size there might well exist not only a library, but rosters, inventories, service manuals pertaining to the various mechanisms: a wealth of material! And Gench saw his problem to be, not the decipherment, but the presence of Professor Kosmin.

  Gench shook his head fretfully. A damnable nuisance! He must have a word with Director Drewe. Kosmin perhaps could be assigned to another task: indexing material to be transshipped to Earth, something of the sort.

  Gench proceeded through the corridors and levels of Big Purple, trying to locate either a central repository of written materials, or failing this, the control center. But the ship’s architecture was not instantly comprehensible and Gench was initially unsuccessful. Wandering back and forth, he found himself in what appeared to be a storage hold, stacked with cases and cartons, then, descending a ramp, he came to the base level and an entry foyer. The port had been forced; commissioners and technicians were passing in and out. Gench halted in disgust, then returned the way he had come: through the storage hold, along corridors, up and down ramps. He began meeting other members of the commission, and hurried his steps to such an extent that his colleagues turned to look after him in surprise. At last he came to the control room, though it bore no resemblance to the corresponding office of any Earth ship, and in fact Gench had passed through before without recognizing its function.

  Professor Kosmin, already on hand, glanced around at Gench, then resumed the examination of what appeared to be a large book.

  Gench marched indignantly forward. “Professor Kosmin, I prefer that you do not disturb the source materials, or move them, as the context in which they are found may be important.”

  Kosmin gave Gench a mild glance and returned to his scrutiny of the book.

  “Please be extremely careful,” said Professor Gench. “If any materials are damaged through mishandling—well, they are irreplaceable.” Gench stepped forward. Kosmin moved slightly but somehow contrived to thrust his ample haunch into Gench, and thus barred his way.

  Gench glared at his colleague’s back, then swung around and departed the chamber in an ill-concealed huff.

  He sought out Director Drewe. “Director, may I have a word with you?”

  “Certainly.”

  “I fear that my investigations, and indeed the success of the entire translation program, are being compromised by the conduct of Professor Kosmin, who insists upon intruding into my scope of operation. I am sorry to trouble you with a complaint of this sort, but I feel that a decisive act now on your part will enormously facilitate my work.”

  Director Drewe sighed. “Professor Kosmin has taken a similar position. Something must be done. Where is he now?”

  “In the control chamber, thumbing through an absolutely vital element of the investigation, as if it were a discarded magazine.”

  Drewe and Gench walked toward the control chamber. Gench said, “I suggest that you use Professor Kosmin in some administrative capacity: logging, indexing, compilation, or the like, until the translation program is sufficiently advanced that he may employ his specialized talents. As of now—ha ha!—there are no languages for him to compare!”

  Drewe made no comment. In the control room they found Kosmin still absorbed in the book.

  “What have we here?” inquired Drewe.

  “Hmm. Umph…A highly important find. It appears to be—I may be over-optimistic—a dictionary, a word-book, a correspondence between the languages of the two races.”

  “If this is the case,” declared Gench, “I had better take charge of it at once.”

  Drewe heaved a deep sigh. “Gentlemen, temporarily, at any rate, we must arrange a division of function so that neither you, Professor Kosmin, nor you, Professor Gench, are hampered. There are two races here, two languages. Professor Kosmin, which of the two interests you the more profoundly?”

  “That is difficult to say,” rumbled Kosmin. “I am not yet acquainted with either.”

  “What about you, Professor Gench?”

  With his eyes fixed on the book, Gench said, “My first emphasis will be upon the records of this ship, though naturally, when the inquiry is expanded and I assemble a staff, I will devote equal effort to the other ships.”

  “Bah!” declared Kosmin, with as much emphasis as he ever permitted himself. “I will work first at this ship,” he told Drewe. “It is more convenient. On the other hand, I would wish to ensure that source material elsewhere is handled competently. I have already reported the loss of one irreplaceable record.”

  Drewe nodded. “It seems that there is no possibility of agreement, let alone cooperation. Very well.” He picked up a small metal disk. “We will consider this a coin. This side with the two nicks we will call heads. The other will be tails. Professor Gench, be so good as to call heads or tails while the disk is in the air. If you call correctly you may concentrate your research on the two large ships.”

  He tossed the disk.

  “Heads,” called Gench.

  “The coin is ‘tails’,” said Drewe. “Professor Gench, you will survey the five black and white ships. Professor Kosmin, your responsibility will be the two larger ships. This seems a fair division of effort, and neither will inconvenience the other.”

  Kosmin made a guttural sound. Gench scowled and bit his lip. Neither was satisfied with the decision. With each familiar with only half of the program, a third man might be appointed to supervise and coordinate the labors of both.

  Drewe said, “You both must remember that this is a survey expedition. What is required are suggestions as to how the research should be performed, not the research itself.”

  Kosmin turned to examine the book he had found. Gench threw his hands in the air and strode furiously away.

  V

  The season seemed to be summer. Sulwen’s Star, a glittering sequin, rose far to the southeast, slanted up into the northern sky, slanted back down into the southwest, and black shadows shifted in consonance around the wrecked hulks. The construction crews erected a pair of polyhedric bubbles and the commission moved into more comfortable quarters.

  On the fourth evening, as Sulwen’s Star touched the edge of the plain, Drewe called his fellow-commissioners together.

  “By now,” he said, “I think we all have come to grips with the situation. I myself have done little but wander here and there. In fact I fear I am but excess baggage on the expedition. Well—as I have said before—enough of my personal hopes and fears. What have we learned? There seems a consensus that both races were technically more advanced than ourselves, though this may only be an intuition, a guess. As to their relative level—who knows? But let us have an inventory, an assessment of our mutual findings.”

  The physicists expressed astonishment at the radically different solutions to the problem of space-drive reached by the three races: Man, Sea Cow and Wasp. The chemists speculated as to the probable atmosphere breathed by Wasp and Sea Cow, and commented upon some of the new metallurgic compounds they had encountered aboard the ships. The engineers were somewhat non-plussed, having noticed
unorthodox systems not readily susceptible to analysis which could not be dismissed out of hand as the result of incompetence. The biochemists could provide no immediate insight into the metabolic processes of either Wasp or Sea Cow.

  Drewe called for an opinion on the languages, and the possibility of translation. Professor Gench rose to his feet, cleared his throat, only to hear the hated voice of Professor Kosmin issuing from another quarter of the room. “As of yet,” said Kosmin, “I have given little attention to the Sea Cow language or system of writing. The Wasps, so I have learned from Professor Hideman and Dr. Miller, lack vocal cords, or equivalent organs. They seem to have produced sound by a scraping of certain bony parts behind a resonating membrane. Their conversation, it has been suggested, sounded like a cheap violin played by an idiot child.” And Kosmin gave one of his rare oily chuckles. “The writing corresponds to this ‘speech’ as much as human writing corresponds to human speech. In other words, a vibrating, fluctuating sound is transcribed by a vibrating, fluctuating line: a difficult language to decipher. Naturally, not impossible. I have made one very important find: a compendium or dictionary of Sea Cow pictographs referred to their equivalent in the Wasp written system—a proof, incidentally, that the work of translating both languages must be entrusted to a single agency, and I will formulate a scheme to this end. I welcome the help of all of you; if anyone notices a clear-cut correspondence between symbol and idea, please call it to my attention. I have entrusted to Professor Gench the first cursory examination of the Sea Cow ships, but as of yet I have not checked through his findings.” Kosmin continued a few minutes longer, then Drewe called on Professor Gench for his report. Gench leapt to his feet, lips twitching. He spoke with great care. “The program Professor Kosmin mentions is standard procedure. Professor Kosmin, a comparator of known languages, may well be excused for ignorance of deciphering techniques. With two such difficult languages no one need feel shame—ha, ha!—for working beyond his depth. The dictionary mentioned by Professor Kosmin is a valuable item indeed and I suggest that Director Drewe put it into safe custody or entrust it into my care. We cannot risk its abuse by untrained amateurs and dilettantes. I am pressing my search for a similar compendium aboard the Sea Cow ships.