Identity Theft and other stories (collection)

It took that computer most of a smallyear to decipher all the different languages this species used, but, by the year—being a planet, not a moon, Earth had only one kind of year—the Earth people called 1958, I was able to follow everything that was happening there.

I was at once delighted and disgusted. Delighted, because I’d learned that in the years since that initial atomic test explosion had triggered our probe, the natives of this world had launched their first satellite. And disgusted, because almost immediately after developing fission, they had used those phenomenal energies as weapons against their own kind. Two cities had been destroyed, and bigger and more devastating bombs were still being developed.

Were they insane, I wondered? It had never occurred to me that a whole species could be unbalanced, but the initial fatal bombings, and the endless series of subsequent test explosions of bigger and bigger weapons, were the work not of crazed individuals but of the governments of this worlds most powerful nations.

I watched for two more Earth years, and was about to file my report— quarantine this world; avoid all contact—when my computer alerted me to an interesting signal coming from the planet. The leader of the most populous of the nations on the western shore of the worlds largest ocean was making a speech: “Now it is time,” he was saying, “to take longer strides”— apparently significant imagery lor a walking species—“time for a great new American enterprise; time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on Earth …”

Yes, I thought. Yes. I listened on, fascinated.

“I believe this nation should commit itself^- to achieving the goal, before this decade”—a cluster of ten Earth years—“is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth …”

Finally, some real progress for this species! I tapped the ERASE node with a talon, deleting my still-unsent report.

At home, these “Americans,” as their leader had called them, were struggling with the notion of equality for all citizens, regardless of the color of their skin. I know, I know—to beings such as us, with frayed scales ranging from gold to green to purple to ultraviolet, the idea of one’s coloration having any significance seems ridiculous, but for them it had been a major concern. I listened to hateful rhetoric: “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” And I listened to wonderful rhetoric: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’ ” And I watched as public sentiment shifted from supporting the former to supporting the latter, and 1 confess that my dorsal spines fluttered with emotion as I did so.

Meanwhile, Earth’s fledgling space program continued: single-person ships, double-person ships, the first dockings in space, a planned tripleperson ship, and then …

And then there was a fire at the liftoff facility. Three “humans”—one of the countless names this species gave itself—were dead. A tragic mistake: pressurized space vehicles have a tendency to explode in vacuum, of course, so someone had landed on the idea of pressurizing the habitat (the “command module,” they called it) at only one-fifth of normal, by eliminating all the gases except oxygen, normally a fifth part of Earth’s atmosphere …

Still, despite the horrible accident, the humans went on. How could they not ?

And, soon, they came here, to the moon.

I was present at that first landing, but remained hidden. I watched as a figure in a white suit hopped off the last rung of a ladder and fell at what must have seemed to it a slow rate. The words the human spoke echo with me still: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

And, indeed, it truly was. I could not approach closely, not until they’d departed, but after they had, I walked over—even in my environmental sack, it was easy to walk here on my wingclaws. I examined the lower, foil-wrapped stage of their landing craft, which had been abandoned here. My computer could read the principal languages of this world, having learned to do so with aid of educational broadcasts it had intercepted. It informed me that the plaque on the lander said, “Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the moon, July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind.”

My spines rippled. There was hope for this race. Indeed, during the time since that speech about longer strides, public opinion had turned overwhelmingly against what seemed to be a long, pointless conflict being fought in a tropical nation. They didn’t need quarantining; all they needed, surely, was a little time …

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