by Jerry
She silences in mid-shriek, not from control but a sudden wash of warmth and pleasure through her body. Is she dying? She is on her stomach, awkwardly, in the dirt. She levers herself around—ohgod, ohgod—and looks down. One leg is . . . surely it belongs to someone else? Something else? She looks away peripherally, surveying her person as though from a fearful distance. The wash of pleasure is explained: her bowels have surrendered and continue to do so. Not like this, pleaseplease. Not without dignity. Still at a distance from her own wreckage, she hears herself begin screaming again.
Why not? No more console. No more stinking, crowded EcoDome. No more Chuck. No more equality with a vengeance.
There is a small explosion nearby. Sara clears, scans. Overhead, the military module hangs burning greasily. Will it fall? On me? Scattered around are charred bits of meat, some with smouldering uniform parts glued redly to them. Is she alone? Is she alone? Isn’t there anyone left?
There is a period of jerkiness. The sun flits a degree of arc, then another. Five seconds unconscious? Five minutes? Do the blackouts get longer or shorter as you die/die/die/ . . .
In a hostile situation, command devolves by rank on surviving combatants—tedum, tedum, something, something—Combatant in charge will act in accord with the military code of justice and the best interests of the Corporate States of America. Am I in charge? Am I a combatant? Am I waiting, waiting? Will the Cheerios Kid save the maiden, or will the Tribers arrive and find that burnt body up there and come down on us like a plague, knowing that they’ve got the food, and the patience, and the numbers, and the boldness, and the pain, oh sweet jesus, the pain!
For a moment she is free of the piercing complaints of her ruined flesh as she transcends into nausea and vomits down the front of her uniform. No fucking dignity anywhere. She can stop it, she knows. The war. All she has to do is wait, be alive, keep breathing until either the Tribers or the army get here. Sworn live testimony, it says in the treaty. Big mistake, overanxious boy-soldier militia, not even a professional. He’s paid, we’ve paid, no war. Everything back to normal. Back to the console, back to Chuck, back to the Dome, yes.
A soft, muffled whump. The armored module shifts, slides, teeters. Beacons of charcoal-colored smoke rise in the still morning air. Burning plastic drips down around Sara. Is it going to fall? Deus ex machina with a pie in the face? Is it over, the waiting? Sara lifts her arms, though whether in welcome or warding she cannot tell, and watches the ton weights of oblivion burning their way to imbalance over her head.
On the rise, a very small movement. Sara’s concentration centers. Her hand moves in a gesture older than the gods of the rocks and clutches her pistol.
A figure stirs, rises, walks haltingly toward the blackened lump of the dead Triber.
The other one, Sara’s mind says reasonably. Of course. Apache? Hassayampa? Who was he originally? Some son of YorkPlex chasing his ideals into the wastelands, running from an identity tattoo and a life pledged to the Corporation? A loser from the sewers of now-dead PhiliPlex, hearing the whispered switchblade nightmares of the Mansonites and following them into red fulfillment? What if it’s him that’s waiting when the others arrive? It’s too fast, it’s too fast!
The figure is still, poised, almost as though filled with helium. At this distance, Sara can see no more than a hooded cloak billowing, baggy pants tucked in kneeboots. But she knows she is seen, and studied, and her fingers tighten on her pistol.
The Triber bends and rummages among the dead warrior’s remains, then stands holding a long, bulky object with a sling. Cautiously, silently, the Triber starts down the slope.
Maybe he won’t kill me. Maybe I can go live with him, be his woman or slave. Breathe real air, herd goats and laugh in the sun. Maybe . . . She catches herself brushing her hair back, trying to sit up straighter, and laughs. Crusted with dirt and blood, voiding at all orifices: how can a one-legged woman herd anything? All she can do is wait . . .
In hostile situations . . .
If it’s the Triber who survives . . .
The Triber is closer, passing under the rail. He lifts the slinged device.
Sara eases the pistol from its holster.
No more Dome. No more Chuck. No more pressures.
The Triber halts, face lost in the hood, and raises a quick hand. And, no more art. No more books. No more theater. And, Sara raises the pistol and . . . fires.
The Triber staggers forward, fingers clutching spasmodically at the sling of the goatskin waterbag, and falls, nearly at Sara’s feet. Long blond hair spills from beneath the hood. Already-glazing blue eyes look around frantically, as if trying to find something small and precious recently misplaced. The cloak falls open. Lemon-sized pubescent breasts, the nipples ringed, shudder once and are still.
Thirteen, Sara’s mind computes? Eleven? She notes details with great interest while her fingers claw futilely at her own breasts. Worn boots. Ohgodinheaven she looks like Cheryl. Curious little silver buckle at the waist. Cheryl will look just like that in six or seven years, if only they wait. If only I wait. If only it waits/waits/waits/
Overhead, the module shifts slightly, patiently.
ENDER’S GAME
Orson Scott Card
No simulator can reproduce all the elements of battle.
“Whatever your gravity is when you get to the door, remember—the enemy’s gate is down. If you step through your own door like you’re out for a stroll, you’re a big target and you deserve to get hit. With more than a flasher.” Ender Wiggins paused and looked over the group. Most were just watching him nervously. A few understanding. A few sullen and resisting.
First day with this army, all fresh from the teacher squads, and Ender had forgotten how young new kids could be. He’d been in it for three years, they’d had six months—nobody over nine years old in the whole bunch. But they were his. At eleven, he was half a year early to be a commander. He’d had a toon of his own and knew a few tricks, but there were forty in his new army. Green. All marksmen with a flasher, all in top shape, or they wouldn’t be here—but they were all just as likely as not to get wiped out first time into battle.
“Remember,” he went on, “they can’t see you till you get through that door. But the second you’re out, they’ll be on you. So hit that door the way you want to be when they shoot at you. Legs up under you, going straight down.” He pointed at a sullen kid who looked like he was only seven, the smallest of them all. “Which way is down, greenoh!”
“Toward the enemy door.” The answer was quick. It was also surly, as if to say, Yeah, yeah, now get on with the important stuff.
“Name, kid?”
“Bean.”
“Get that for size or for brains?”
Bean didn’t answer. The rest laughed a little. Ender had chosen right. This kid was younger than the rest, must have been advanced because he was sharp. The others didn’t like him much, they were happy to see him taken down a little. Like Ender’s first commander had taken him down.
“Well, Bean, you’re right onto things. Now I tell you this, nobody’s gonna get through that door without a good chance of getting hit. A lot of you are going to be turned into cement somewhere. Make sure it’s your legs. Right? If only your legs get hit, then only your legs get frozen, and in nullo that’s no sweat.” Ender turned to one of the dazed ones. “What’re legs for? Hmmm?”
Blank stare. Confusion. Stammer.
“Forget it. Guess I’ll have to ask Bean here.”
“Legs are for pushing off walls.” Still bored.
“Thanks, Bean. Get that, everybody?” They all got it, and didn’t like getting it from Bean. “Right. You can’t see with legs, you can’t shoot with legs, and most of the time they just get in the way. If they get frozen sticking straight out you’ve turned yourself into a blimp. No way to hide. So how do legs go?”
A few answered this time, to prove that Bean wasn’t the only one who knew anything. “Under you. Tucked up under.”
�
��Right. A shield. You’re kneeling on a shield, and the shield is your own legs. And there’s a trick to the suits. Even when your legs are flashed you can still kick off. I’ve never seen anybody do it but me—but you’re all gonna learn it.”
Ender Wiggins turned on his flasher. It glowed faintly green in his hand. Then he let himself rise in the weightless workout room, pulled his legs under him as though he were kneeling, and flashed both of them. Immediately his suit stiffened at the knees and ankles, so that he couldn’t bend at all.
“Okay, I’m frozen, see?”
He was floating a meter above them. They all looked up at him, puzzled. He leaned back and caught one of the handholds on the wall behind him, and pulled himself flush against the wall.
“I’m stuck at a wall. If I had legs, I’d use legs, and string myself out like a string bean, right?”
They laughed.
“But I don’t have legs, and that’s better, got it? Because of this.” Ender jackknifed at the waist, then straightened out violently. He was across the workout room in only a moment. From the other side he called to them. “Got that? I didn’t use hands, so I still had use of my flasher. And I didn’t have my legs floating five feet behind me. Now watch it again.”
He repeated the jackknife, and caught a handhold on the wall near them. “Now, I don’t just want you to do that when they’ve flashed your legs. I want you to do that when you’ve still got legs, because it’s better. And because they’ll never be expecting it. All right now, everybody up in the air and kneeling.”
Most were up in a few seconds. Ender flashed the stragglers, and they dangled, helplessly frozen, while the others laughed. “When I give an order, you move. Got it? When we’re at a door and they clear it, I’ll be giving you orders in two seconds, as soon as I see the setup. And when I give the order you better be out there, because whoever’s out there first is going to win, unless he’s a fool. I’m not. And you better not be, or I’ll have you back in the teacher squads.” He saw more than a few of them gulp, and the frozen ones looked at him with fear. “You guys who are hanging there. You watch. You’ll thaw out in about fifteen minutes, and let’s see if you can catch up to the others.”
For the next half hour Ender had them jackknifing off walls. He called a stop when he saw that they all had the basic idea. They were a good group, maybe. They’d get better.
“Now you’re warmed up,” he said to them, “we’ll start working.”
Ender was the last one out after practice, since he stayed to help some of the slower ones improve on technique. They’d had good teachers, but like all armies they were uneven, and some of them could be a real drawback in battle. Their first battle might be weeks away. It might be tomorrow. A schedule was never printed. The commander just woke up and found a note by his bunk, giving him the time of his battle and the name of his opponent. So for the first while he was going to drive his boys until they were in top shape—all of them. Ready for anything, at any time. Strategy was nice, but it was worth nothing if the soldiers couldn’t hold up under the strain.
He turned the corner into the residence wing and found himself face to face with Bean, the seven-year-old he had picked on all through practice that day. Problems. Ender didn’t want problems right now.
“Ho, Bean.”
“Ho, Ender.”
Pause.
“Sir,” Ender said softly.
“We’re not on duty.”
“In my army, Bean, we’re always on duty.” Ender brushed past him.
Bean’s high voice piped up behind him. “I know what you’re doing, Ender, sir, and I’m warning you.”
Ender turned slowly and looked at him. “Warning me?”
“I’m the best man you’ve got. But I’d better be treated like it.”
“Or what?” Ender smiled menacingly.
“Or I’ll be the worst man you’ve got. One or the other.”
“And what do you want? Love and kisses?” Ender was getting angry now.
Bean was unworried. “I want a toon.”
Ender walked back to him and stood looking down into his eyes. “I’ll give a toon,” he said, “to the boys who prove they’re worth something. They’ve got to be good soldiers, they’ve got to know how to take orders, they’ve got to be able to think for themselves in a pinch, and they’ve got to be able to keep respect. That’s how I got to be a commander. That’s how you’ll get to be a toon leader. Got it?”
Bean smiled. “That’s fair. If you actually work that way, I’ll be a toon leader in a month.”
Ender reached down and grabbed the front of his uniform and shoved him into the wall. “When I say I work a certain way, Bean, then that’s the way I work.”
Bean just smiled. Ender let go of him and walked away, and didn’t look back. He was sure, without looking, that Bean was still watching, still smiling, still just a little contemptuous. He might make a good toon leader at that. Ender would keep an eye on him.
Captain Graff, six foot two and a little chubby, stroked his belly as he leaned back in his chair. Across his desk sat Lieutenant Anderson, who was earnestly pointing out high points on a chart.
“Here it is, Captain,” Anderson said. “Ender’s already got them doing a tactic that’s going to throw off everyone who meets it. Doubled their speed.”
Graff nodded.
“And you know his test scores. He thinks well, too.”
Graff smiled. “All true, all true, Anderson, he’s a fine student, shows real promise.”
They waited.
Graff sighed. “So what do you want me to do?”
“Ender’s the one. He’s got to be.”
“He’ll never be ready in time, Lieutenant. He’s eleven, for heaven’s sake, man, what do you want, a miracle?”
“I want him into battles, every day starting tomorrow. I want him to have a year’s worth of battles in a month.”
Graff shook his head. “That would have his army in the hospital.”
“No, sir. He’s getting them into form. And we need Ender.”
“Correction, Lieutenant. We need somebody. You think it’s Ender.”
“All right, I think it’s Ender. Which of the commanders if it isn’t him?”
“I don’t know, Lieutenant.” Graff ran his hands over his slightly fuzzy bald head. “These are children, Anderson. Do you realize that? Ender’s army is nine years old. Are we going to put them against the older kids? Are we going to put them through hell for a month like that?”
Lieutenant Anderson leaned even farther over Graff’s desk.
“Ender’s test scores, Captain!”
“I’ve seen his bloody test scores! I’ve watched him in battle, I’ve listened to tapes of his training sessions, I’ve watched his sleep patterns, I’ve heard tapes of his conversations in the corridors and in the bathrooms, I’m more aware of Ender Wiggins than you could possibly imagine! And against all the arguments, against his obvious qualities, I’m weighing one thing. I have this picture of Ender a year from now, if you have your way. I see him completely useless, worn down, a failure, because he was pushed farther than he or any living person could go. But it doesn’t weigh enough, does it, Lieutenant, because there’s a war on, and our best talent is gone, and the biggest battles are ahead. So give Ender a battle every day this week. And then bring me a report.”
Anderson stood and saluted. “Thank you, sir.”
He had almost reached the door when Graff called his name. He turned and faced the captain.
“Anderson,” Captain Graff said. “Have you been outside, lately I mean?”
“Not since last leave, six months ago.”
“I didn’t think so. Not that it makes any difference. But have you ever been to Beaman Park, there in the city? Hmm? Beautiful park. Trees. Grass. No nullo, no battles, no worries. Do you know what else there is in Beaman Park?”
“What, sir?” Lieutenant Anderson asked.
“Children,” Graff answered.
“Of c
ourse children,” said Anderson.
“I mean children. I mean kids who get up in the morning when their mothers call them and they go to school and then in the afternoons they go to Beaman Park and play. They’re happy, they smile a lot, they laugh, they have fun. Hmmm?”
“I’m sure they do, sir.”
“Is that all you can say, Anderson?”
Anderson cleared his throat. “It’s good for children to have fun, I think, sir. I know I did when I was a boy. But right now the world needs soldiers. And this is the way to get them.”
Graff nodded and closed his eyes. “Oh, indeed, you’re right, by statistical proof and by all the important theories, and dammit they work and the system is right but all the same Ender’s older than I am. He’s not a child. He’s barely a person.”
“If that’s true, sir, then at least we all know that Ender is making it possible for the others of his age to be playing in the park.”
“And Jesus died to save all men, of course.” Graff sat up and looked at Anderson almost sadly. “But we’re the ones,” Graff said, “we’re the ones who are driving in the nails.”
Ender Wiggins lay on his bed staring at the ceiling. He never slept more than five hours a night—but the lights went off at 2200 and didn’t come on again until 0600. So he stared at the ceiling and thought.
He’d had his army for three and a half weeks. Dragon Army. The name was assigned, and it wasn’t a lucky one. Oh, the charts said that about nine years ago a Dragon Army had done fairly well. But for the next six years the name had been attached to inferior armies, and finally, because of the superstition that was beginning to play about the name, Dragon Army was retired. Until now. And now, Ender thought, smiling, Dragon Army was going to take them by surprise.
The door opened quietly. Ender did not turn his head. Someone stepped softly into his room, then left with the sound of the door shutting. When soft steps died away Ender rolled over and saw a white slip of paper lying on the floor. He reached down and picked it up.
