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It was one of the easiest but also hardest rules to follow - don’t fall for false equivalencies. Even after years of field experience as a xenobiologist, Taehyung still fell for the trap more often than he liked. Sometimes it was easy, especially for non-sentient lifeforms. On others... his current study object was the only sentient species on the planet, and he had already spent a few cycles studying them. First contact was always tricky, but their translator had finally figured out the language and he had enough data to feel secure in his attempt.
They had started calling them Mayflies. Their lifecycle was eerily similar to the Earth insects, but the larvae swimming in the myriad of swamps spread over the planets surface were large and capable of complex communication, though Taehyung hadn’t quite figured out how they did it. Yet. And once they transformed, after months in the larvae state, they came out as humans. They looked so much like it that Taehyung didn’t believe his eyes at first. They had come across species with similar built, evolutionary paths, cultures even, but none had ever looked quite like a perfect copy.
Though severe differences showed themselves during observation, their short lifespan the most significant one. Only a day on the planet, roughly 45 Earth hours, during which the Mayflies found a partner, mated, laid their eggs and inevitably died. They buried themselves into the mud, leaving behind a mass grave for their offspring’s first meal, and it was one of the rare occasions that Taehyung had to remind himself of his objective. His heart ached nonetheless.
This time... he would figure out what the Mayflies themselves thought about it. Taehyung had picked a pair, naming them Namjoon and Jimin. They had a certain likeness to one of his colleagues and his best friend he had had to leave behind on Earth. The reminder was bittersweet, which... was somehow appropriate.
He sat up his equipment in plain sight, and he did his best to get the attention of the pair on the edge of the swarm. They were curious and came over shortly after hatching. They had no genitalia, not human ones at least. Another good reminder.
“Hello?” Jimin said, his eyes a little too big, a little too green. “What are you?”
“A person from far away,” Taehyung said. “I’m interested in how you live your life.” He smiled, and Namjoon tried to mimick him. Taehyung couldn’t help but giggle, an expression they obviously didn’t know, judging by the confused stares they were sending each other.
“What do you want to know?” Namjoon asked, sitting down in the mud. “We’re in mating right now.”
“I know that,” Taehyung said. “I’ve been watching a few cycles.”
“We can show you, what we do. How we mate. How do you mate?” Jimin eyed him curiously, reaching out to gently touch his clothes.
“It’s different. We don’t lay eggs, our offspring is already in larvae state when they leave our bodies.”
“Interesting,” Namjoon hummed. “Inconvenient. What is this?” He poked Taehyung’s glove, pulling on it.
“We wear additional layers, to protect our bodies. They are soft and vulnerable.”
“We don’t have that,” Namjoon said. Taehyung pressed his lips together, trying not to blurt out that they didn’t live long enough for that.
“Maybe show me? Your mating? Shouldn’t you... start?”
Namjoon and Jimin both shrugged and it was so human that Taehyung’s heart ached. One of their rules was not to dissect dead bodies from any species they encountered. They couldn’t know the cultural rites, or the purpose in the ecosystem. This time, Taehyung didn’t need a reminder. He sat back when they started, their spines a lot more flexible than humans. Fertilization happened over the mouth, and they had a retractable tube at the bottom that helped them deposit the eggs deep in the mud. No discernible gender, both laid eggs.
They seemed to be familiar with each other, in the way they acted, and Taehyung wondered again how much sentience they had in their larvae state. If... they had a life long enough to be worth living.
“It’s sad, isn’t it?” He whispered, when evening came along. Only a few hours left. Namjoon and Jimin had mated a couple of times, no intake of food, simple instinct taking over. They were humming, taking a break, and Jimin looked at Taehyung with his pretty eyes.
“What is?” He asked.
“All this time to prepare and it all ends in just a day. Aren’t you sad about it?”
Namjoon rolled over, a thoughtful expression on his face. “We live so long. This is just the last part. What do you mean?”
“Are you...?” Taehyung stopped, trying to phrase it right. “What do you do, as larvae?”
“Oh!” Jimin jumped up, spraying mud everywhere. “We sing, we explore, we listen to poems! We find our partner and I got the most handsome one. Isn’t he still pretty, even in this weird shape?” Jimin flopped back down, patting his hands over Namjoon’s face all excited.
“Poems? But how do you save them? For your children?” He tried not to think about all the implications, he could do that later.
“They will create their own ones, why would they need ours?” Namjoon said and before Taehyung could react, Jimin crawled into his lap. He was cold, wet, a bit squishy.
“Isn’t it sad, though, that your people live so far in the future that they forget to be beautiful for themselves?”
Taehyung smiled hesitantly, thinking back about who he left behind, all those people he could never see again due to time dilation. Humans needed to share, but maybe the Mayflies weren’t completely wrong, enjoying their creations more because they were temporary.
“Maybe,” he said, and listened to them reciting everything they knew until the sun went up and they started their last mating cycle.
He would remember for them, even if it was just a speck of dust in the vast ocean.