If I survive the games, thought Ender. He put on the mask. It closed him in like a hand pressed tight against his face. But this isn’t how it feels to be a bugger, thought Ender. They don’t wear this face like a mask, it is their face. On their home worlds, do the buggers put on human masks, and play? And what do they call us? Slimies, because we’re so soft and oily compared to them?
“Watch out, Slimy,” Ender said.
He could barely see Peter through the eyeholes. Peter smiled at him. “Slimy, huh? Well, bugger-wugger, let’s see how to break that face of yours.”
Ender couldn’t see it coming, except a slight shift of Peter’s weight; the mask cut out his peripheral vision. Suddenly there was the pain and pressure of a blow to the side of his head; he lost balance, fell that way.
“Don’t see too well, do you, bugger?” said Peter.
Ender began to take off the mask. Peter put his toe against Ender’s groin. “Don’t take off the mask,” Peter said.
Ender pulled the mask down into place, took his hands away.
Peter pressed with his foot. Pain shot through Ender; he doubled up.
“Lie flat, bugger. We’re gonna vivisect you, bugger. At long last we’ve got one of you alive, and we’re going to see how you work.”
“Peter, stop it,” Ender said.
“Peter, stop it. Very good. So you buggers can guess our names. You can make yourselves sound like pathetic, cute little children so we’ll love you and be nice to you. But it doesn’t work. I can see you for what you really are. They meant you to be human, little Third, but you’re really a bugger, and now it shows.”
He lifted his foot, took a step, and then knelt on Ender, his knee pressing into Ender’s belly just below the breastbone. He put more and more of his weight on Ender. It became hard to breathe.
“I could kill you like this,” Peter whispered. “Just press and press until you’re dead. And I could say that I didn’t know it would hurt you, that we were just playing, and they’d believe me, and everything would be fine. And you’d be dead. Everything would be fine.”
Ender could not speak; the breath was being forced from his lungs. Peter might mean it. Probably didn’t mean it, but then he might.
“I do mean it,” Peter said. “Whatever you think, I mean it. They only authorized you because I was so promising. But I didn’t pan out. You did better. They think you’re better. But I don’t want a better little brother, Ender. I don’t want a Third.”
“I’ll tell,” Valentine said from the doorway.
“No one would believe you.”
“They’d believe me.”
“Then you’re dead, too, sweet little sister.”
“Oh, yes,” said Valentine. “They’ll believe that. ‘I didn’t know it would kill Andrew. And when he was dead, I didn’t know it would kill Valentine too.’ ”
The pressure let up a little.
“So. Not today. But someday you two won’t be together. And there’ll be an accident.”
“You’re all talk,” Valentine said. “You don’t mean any of it.”
“I don’t?”
“And do you know why you don’t mean it?” Valentine asked. “Because you want to be in government someday. You want to be elected. And they won’t elect you if your opponents can dig up the fact that your brother and sister both died in suspicious accidents when they were little. Especially because of the letter I’ve put in my secret file in the city library, which will be opened in the event of my death.”
“Don’t give me that kind of crap,” Peter said.
“It says, I didn’t die a natural death. Peter killed me, and if he hasn’t already killed Andrew, he will soon. Not enough to convict you, but enough to keep you from ever getting elected.”
“You’re his monitor now,” said Peter. “You better watch him, day and night. You better be there.”
“Ender and I aren’t stupid. We scored as well as you did on everything. Better on some things. We’re all such wonderfully bright children. You’re not the smartest, Peter, just the biggest.”
“Oh, I know. But there’ll come a day when you aren’t there with him, when you forget. And suddenly you’ll remember, and you’ll rush to him, and there he’ll be, perfectly all right. And the next time you won’t worry so much, and you won’t come so fast. And every time, he’ll be all right. And you’ll think that I forgot. Even though you’ll remember that I said this, you’ll think that I forgot. And years will pass. And then there’ll be a terrible accident, and I’ll find his body, and I’ll cry and cry over him, and you’ll remember this conversation, Vally, but you’ll be ashamed of yourself for remembering, because you’ll know that I changed, that it really was an accident, that it’s cruel of you even to remember what I said in a childhood quarrel. Except that it’ll be true. I’m gonna save this up, and he’s gonna die, and you won’t do a thing, not a thing. But you go on believing that I’m just the biggest.”
“The biggest asshole,” Valentine said.
Peter leaped to his feet and started for her. She shied away. Ender pried off his mask. Peter flopped back on his bed and started to laugh. Loud, but with real mirth, tears coming to his eyes. “Oh, you guys are just super, just the biggest suckers on the planet earth.”
“Now he’s going to tell us it was all a joke,” Valentine said.
“Not a joke, a game. I can make you guys believe anything. I can make you dance around like puppets.” In a phony monster voice he said, “I’m going to kill you and chop you into little pieces and put you into the garbage hole.” He laughed again. “Biggest suckers in the solar system.”
Ender stood there watching him laugh and thought of Stilson, thought of how it felt to crunch into his body. This is who needed it. This is who should have got it.
As if she could read his mind, Valentine whispered, “No, Ender.”
Peter suddenly rolled to the side, flipped off the bed, and got in position for a fight. “Oh, yes, Ender,” he said. “Any time, Ender.”
Ender lifted his right leg and took off his shoe. He held it up. “See there, on the toe? That’s blood, Peter. It’s not mine.”
“Ooh. Ooh, I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die. Ender squished a capper-tiller and now he’s gonna squish me.”
There was no getting to him. Peter was a murderer at heart, and nobody knew it but Valentine and Ender.
Mother came home and commiserated with Ender about the monitor. Father came home and kept saying it was such a wonderful surprise, they had such fantastic children that the government told them to have three, and now the government didn’t want to take any of them after all, so here they were with three, they still had a Third . . . until Ender wanted to scream at him, I know I’m a Third, I know it, if you want I’ll go away so you don’t have to be embarrassed in front of everybody, I’m sorry I lost the monitor and now you have three kids and no obvious explanation, so inconvenient for you, I’m sorry sorry sorry.
He lay in bed staring upward into the darkness. On the bunk above him, he could hear Peter turning and tossing restlessly. Then Peter slid off the bunk and walked out of the room. Ender heard the hushing sound of the toilet clearing; then Peter stood silhouetted in the doorway.
He thinks I’m asleep. He’s going to kill me.
Peter walked to the bed, and sure enough, he did not lift himself up to his bed. Instead he came and stood by Ender’s head.
But he did not reach for a pillow to smother Ender. He did not have a weapon.
He whispered, “Ender, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I know how it feels, I’m sorry, I’m your brother, I love you.”
A long time later, Peter’s even breathing said that he was asleep. Ender peeled the bandaid from his neck. And for the second time that day he cried.
3
GRAFF
“The sister is our weak link. He really loves her.”
“I know. She can undo it all, from the start. He won’t want to leave her.”
“So, what are you going to do?
”
“Persuade him that he wants to come with us more than he wants to stay with her.”
“How will you do that?”
“I’ll lie to him.”
“And if that doesn’t work?”
“Then I’ll tell the truth. We’re allowed to do that in emergencies. We can’t plan for everything, you know.”
Ender wasn’t very hungry during breakfast. He kept wondering what it would be like at school. Facing Stilson after yesterday’s fight. What Stilson’s friends would do. Probably nothing, but he couldn’t be sure. He didn’t want to go.
“You’re not eating, Andrew,” his mother said.
Peter came into the room. “Morning, Ender. Thanks for leaving your slimy washcloth in the middle of the shower.”
“Just for you,” Ender murmured.
“Andrew, you have to eat.”
Ender held out his wrists, a gesture that said, So feed it to me through a needle.
“Very funny,” Mother said. “I try to be concerned, but it makes no difference to my genius children.”
“It was all your genes that made us geniuses, Mom,” said Peter. “We sure didn’t get any from Dad.”
“I heard that,” Father said, not looking up from the news that was being displayed on the table while he ate.
“It would’ve been wasted if you hadn’t.”
The table beeped. Someone was at the door.
“Who is it?” Mother asked.
Father thumbed a key and a man appeared on his video. He was wearing the only military uniform that meant anything anymore, the I.F., the International Fleet.
“I thought it was over,” said Father.
Peter said nothing, just poured milk over his cereal.
And Ender thought, Maybe I won’t have to go to school today after all.
Father coded the door open and got up from the table. “I’ll see to it,” he said. “Stay and eat.”
They stayed, but they didn’t eat. A few moments later, Father came back into the room and beckoned to Mother.
“You’re in deep poo,” said Peter. “They found out what you did to that kid at school, and now they’re gonna make you do time out in the Belt.”
“I’m only six, moron, I’m a juvenile.”
“You’re a Third, turd. You’ve got no rights.”
Valentine came in, her hair in a sleepy halo around her face. “Where’s Mom and Dad? I’m too sick to go to school.”
“Another oral exam, huh?” Peter said.
“Shut up, Peter,” said Valentine.
“You should relax and enjoy it,” said Peter. “It could be worse.”
“I don’t know how.”
“It could be an anal exam.”
“Hyuk hyuk,” Valentine said. “Where are Mother and Father?”
“Talking to a guy from IF.”
Instinctively she looked at Ender. After all, for years they had expected someone to come and tell them that Ender had passed, that Ender was needed.
“That’s right, look at him,” Peter said. “But it might be me, you know. They might have realized I was the best of the lot after all.” Peter’s feelings were hurt, and so he was being a snot, as usual.
The door opened. “Ender,” said Father, “you better come in here.”
“Sorry, Peter,” Valentine taunted.
Father glowered. “Children, this is no laughing matter.”
Ender followed Father into the parlor. The I.F. officer rose to his feet when they entered, but he did not extend a hand to Ender.
Mother was twisting her wedding band on her finger. “Andrew,” she said, “I never thought you were the kind to get in a fight.”
“The Stilson boy is in the hospital,” Father said. “You really did a number on him. With your shoe, Ender. That wasn’t exactly fair.”
Ender shook his head. He had expected someone from the school to come about Stilson, not an officer of the fleet. This was more serious than he had thought. And yet he couldn’t think what else he could have done.
“Do you have any explanation for your behavior, young man?” asked the officer.
Ender shook his head again. He didn’t know what to say, and he was afraid to reveal himself to be any more monstrous than his actions had made him out to be. I’ll take it, whatever the punishment is, he thought. Let’s get it over with.
“We’re willing to consider extenuating circumstances,” the officer said. “But I must tell you it doesn’t look good. Kicking him in the groin, kicking him repeatedly in the face and body when he was down—it sounds like you really enjoyed it.”
“I didn’t,” Ender whispered.
“Then why did you do it?”
“He had his gang there,” Ender said.
“So? This excuses anything?”
“No.”
“Tell me why you kept on kicking him. You had already won.”
“Knocking him down won the first fight. I wanted to win all the next ones, too. So they’d leave me alone.” Ender couldn’t help it, he was too afraid, too ashamed of his own acts; though he tried not to, he cried again. Ender did not like to cry and rarely did; now, in less than a day, he had done it three times. And each time was worse. To cry in front of his mother and father and this military man, that was shameful. “You took away the monitor,” Ender said. “I had to take care of myself, didn’t I?”
“Ender, you should have asked a grown-up for help,” Father began.
But the officer stood up and stepped across the room to Ender. He held out his hand. “My name is Graff, Ender. Colonel Hyrum Graff. I’m director of primary training at Battle School in the Belt. I’ve come to invite you to enter the school.”
After all. “But the monitor—”
“The final step in your testing was to see what would happen when the monitor came off. We don’t always do it that way, but in your case—”
“And he passed?” Mother was incredulous. “Putting the Stilson boy in the hospital? What would you have done if Andrew had killed him, given him a medal?”
“It isn’t what he did, Mrs. Wiggin. It’s why.” Colonel Graff handed her a folder full of papers. “Here are the requisitions. Your son has been cleared by the I.F. Selective Service. Of course we already have your consent, granted in writing at the time conception was confirmed, or he could not have been born. He has been ours from then, if he qualified.”
Father’s voice was trembling as he spoke. “It’s not very kind of you, to let us think you didn’t want him, and then to take him after all.”
“And this charade about the Stilson boy,” Mother said.
“It wasn’t a charade, Mrs. Wiggin. Until we knew what Ender’s motivation was, we couldn’t be sure he wasn’t another—we had to know what the action meant. Or at least what Ender believed that it meant.”
“Must you call him that stupid nickname?” Mother began to cry.
“That’s the name he calls himself.”
“What are you going to do, Colonel Graff?” Father asked. “Walk out the door with him now?”
“That depends,” said Graff.
“On what?”
“On whether Ender wants to come.”
Mother’s weeping turned to bitter laughter. “Oh, so it’s voluntary after all, how sweet!”
“For the two of you, the choice was made when Ender was conceived. But for Ender, the choice has not been made at all. Conscripts make good cannon fodder, but for officers we need volunteers.”
“Officers?” Ender asked. At the sound of his voice, the others fell silent.
“Yes,” said Graff. “Battle School is for training future starship captains and commodores of flotillas and admirals of the fleet.”
“Let’s not have any deception here!” Father said angrily. “How many of the boys at the Battle School actually end up in command of ships!”
“Unfortunately, Mr. Wiggin, that is classified information. But I can say that none of our boys who makes it through the first year has ever failed
to receive a commission as an officer. And none has retired from a position of lower rank than chief executive officer of an interplanetary vessel. Even in the domestic defense forces within our own solar system, there’s honor to be had.”
“How many make it through the first year?” asked Ender.
“All who want to,” said Graff.
Ender almost said, I want to. But he held his tongue. This would keep him out of school, but that was stupid, that was just a problem for a few days. It would keep him away from Peter—that was more important, that might be a matter of life itself. But to leave Mother and Father, and above all, to leave Valentine. And become a soldier. Ender didn’t like fighting. He didn’t like Peter’s kind, the strong against the weak, and he didn’t like his own kind either, the smart against the stupid.
“I think,” Graff said, “that Ender and I should have a private conversation.”
“No,” Father said.
“I won’t take him without letting you speak to him again,” Graff said. “And you really can’t stop me.”
Father glared at Graff a moment longer, then got up and left the room. Mother paused to squeeze Ender’s hand. She closed the door behind her when she left.
“Ender,” Graff said, “if you come with me, you won’t be back here for a long time. There aren’t any vacations from Battle School. No visitors, either. A full course of training lasts until you’re sixteen years old—you get your first leave, under certain circumstances, when you’re twelve. Believe me, Ender, people change in six years, in ten years. Your sister Valentine will be a woman when you see her again, if you come with me. You’ll be strangers. You’ll still love her, Ender, but you won’t know her. You see I’m not pretending it’s easy.”
“Mom and Daddy?”
“I know you, Ender. I’ve been watching the monitor disks for some time. You won’t miss your mother and father, not much, not for long. And they won’t miss you long, either.”
Tears came to Ender’s eyes, in spite of himself. He turned his face away, but would not reach up to wipe them.
The Ender Quintet (Omnibus) Page 4
