The night of no moon

A rough planet, Boyd III--where survival of the fittest gave way to survival of the worst tempered!

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Infinity June 1957. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

The main trouble with the planet Boyd III was one satellite too many.

Had there been no third moon, large and close, the tides might have been less confused and the weather more predictable. Certain peaks of atmospheric wildness, recurrent coastal catastrophes, logical but distressing customs of the natives--lack of these factors would have made Boyd III a much more attractive world.

The same lack, however, would not have tempted Pete Guthrie to survey such conditions from the surface of the planet as part of his exploratory and mapping duties. But it was too late now to be sorry he had not secured his rocket properly against the incredible tides of the shoreline he had rashly chosen for a landing.

He mentioned this, for about the hundredth time, to Polf.

"Huh! Cables! Braces! No matter when wind-spirits want you," retorted the local humanoid, darting a cowed glance at the sky from beneath his heavy brow-ridge. "They want you stay, we will keep you."

"And I'll be stuck with you forever! Don't you have to make a living?"

"I am appointed. Like Retho, who sleeps at your door in the nights."

Guthrie scowled and examined the sky. It was a clear blue. One of the moons, named Jhux, was a yellow-white disk, faintly blurred at the edge by its thin envelope of air. The spacer wished he had remained on Jhux to do his observing. With an oxygen mask, a man could be fairly comfortable there.

The clear blue sky above him, on the other hand, would be a fearsome sight in a month or so when the storms closed in.

"It is good some spoke for you," said Polf, nodding in quiet satisfaction.

Guthrie frowned at him. Every so often, his companion's thought pattern eluded him. The Skirkhi, as they named themselves, used a typically developed humanoid language, and he had managed to learn enough for communication. It was the way they thought that baffled him.

"Last season was not as bad as some," continued Polf, staring over the flat plain from their trifling eminence on the hill. "Elders say living will be hard this storm. It is a time of heat."

Guthrie also stared off into the distance, toward the seacoast beyond the plain. He tried to show no expression, for he suspected that these people were cunning at reading faces.

His looks, to be sure, must be a handicap to them. He was long and lean of face where they tended to be round and pudgy. His reddish hair and blue eyes were certainly outside their experience, for they had aroused much frightened comment when he had first been discovered near his landing site.

He turned his head slowly to study Polf. The Skirkh crouched with bowed legs folded under him and his big head thrust forward. His profile was flat against the blue sky, for his nose was a wide-nostriled snout. The eyes that gazed moodily at the horizon were black glints between brow and cheek ridges.

The lower part of the native's face, though the chin receded, completed the design of blunt, durable strength. It symbolized, Guthrie reflected, Skirkhi life. The delicate had simply not survived on this world.

On the other hand, Polf was not very large compared to the Terran. Guthrie guessed him to be an inch or two over five feet, although his squat, straddling stance made the estimate a rough one.

I wouldn't have much trouble with him, Guthrie thought. Of course, the whole gang would be something else....

The village of two hundred was part of a tribe of six or seven times that number. There were other tribes in surrounding areas, but Guthrie had learned little about them. The Skirkhi said they were evil people. He assumed that that meant they treated prisoners with the same eager cruelty he had seen his captors display.

I should complain! he reproved himself. If not them, it might have been me. I wonder when the Service will check about the reports I'm not sending?

"_Gaah!_" exclaimed Polf, springing half erect and assuming a bare-toothed posture of defense.

His naturally tan face flushed to an alarming coppery hue, a process Guthrie had previously observed when village arguments came to blows.

The flaring light streaked deliberately across the sky, pulsing repeatedly, and descended in a direction Guthrie fancied was southeast.

He realized that he, too, had risen at the sight. He turned to follow the vapor trail in the sky, and noticed that the lower end wavered erratically.

"That's no meteor!" he muttered. "But look at the knot-heads! If they land that way, they'll spread like a ton of boiling butter and I'll never get away!"

He realized that Polf had scampered back after a few steps downhill, and was now crouched at Guthrie's feet more like an animal than a man. The Skirkh uttered a sound between a snarl and a whimper.

"Get up, Polf!" said Guthrie. "It's a spaceship. I told you what mine was like. Go tell the elders! They will think well of the bearer of such news."

Polf bobbed his thick head and took a step downhill. Then duty halted him.

"Oh, all right; I'll come with you," sighed Guthrie. "Maybe they'll appoint us to lead the search if you tell them there will be other Terrans."

He hoped that there would be other live Terrans. Even more, he hoped that their ship would be in good condition. He was good and tired of Boyd III.