Children of the Mind

by Orson Scott Card

  "Keep at it," said Olhado. "But don't give up on coming back home, either."

  "The shuttle really isn't good for a two-hundred-year flight," said Miro. "That's how far away we are, and this little vehicle can't even get close to the speeds necessary for relativistic flight. We'd have to play solitaire the whole two hundred years. The cards would wear out long before we got back home."

  Olhado laughed--too lightly and sincerely, Miro thought--and said, "The Hive Queen says that once Jane gets out of the trees, and once the Congress gets their new system up and running, she may be able to jump back in. At least enough to get into the ansible traffic. And if she does that, then maybe she can go back into the starflight business. It's not impossible."

  Val grew alert at that. "Is that what the Hive Queen guesses, or does she know?"

  "She's predicting the future," said Olhado. "Nobody knows the future. Not even really smart queen bees who bite their husbands' heads off when they mate."

  They had no answer to what he said, and certainly nothing to say to his jocular tone.

  "Well, if that's all right now," said Olhado, "back on your heads, everybody. We'll leave the station open and recording in triplicate for any reports you make."

  Olhado's face disappeared from the terminal space.

  Miro swiveled his chair and faced the others: Ela, Quara, Val, the pequenino Firequencher, and the nameless worker, who watched them in perpetual silence, only able to speak by typing into the terminal. Through him, though, Miro knew that the Hive Queen was watching everything they did, hearing everything they said. Waiting. She was orchestrating this, he knew. Whatever happened to Jane, the Hive Queen would be the catalyst to get it started. Yet the things she said, she had said to Olhado through some worker there in Milagre. This one had typed in nothing but ideas concerning the translation of the language of the descoladores.

  She isn't saying anything, Miro realized, because she doesn't want to be seen to push. Push what? Push whom?

  Val. She can't be seen to push Val, because . . . because the only way to let Jane have one of Ender's bodies was for him to freely give it up. And it had to be truly free--no pressure, no guilt, no persuasion--because it wasn't a decision that could be made consciously. Ender had decided that he wanted to share Mother's life in the monastery, but his unconscious mind was far more interested in the translation project here and in whatever it is Peter's doing. His unconscious choice reflected his true will. If Ender is to let go of Val, it has to be his desire to do it, all the way to the core of him. Not a decision out of duty, like his decision to stay with Mother. A decision because that is what he really wants.

  Miro looked at Val, at the beauty that came more from deep goodness than from regular features. He loved her, but was it the perfection of her that he loved? That perfect virtue might be the only thing that allowed her--allowed Ender in his Valentine mode--to willingly let go and invite Jane in. And yet once Jane arrived, the perfect virtue would be gone, wouldn't it? Jane was powerful and, Miro believed, good--certainly she had been good to him, a true friend. But even in his wildest imaginations he could not conceive of her as perfectly virtuous. If she started wearing Val, would she still be Val? The memories would linger, but the will behind the face would be more complicated than the simple script that Ender had created for her. Will I still love her when she's Jane?

  Why wouldn't I? I love Jane too, don't I?

  But will I love Jane when she's flesh and blood, and not just a voice in my ear? Will I look into those eyes and mourn for this lost Valentine?

  Why didn't I have these doubts before? I tried to bring this off myself, back before I even half understood how difficult it was. And yet now, when it's only the barest hope, I find myself--what, wishing it wouldn't happen? Hardly that. I don't want to die out here. I want Jane restored, if only to get starflight back again--now that's an altruistic motive! I want Jane restored, but I also want Val unchanged.

  I want all bad things to go away and everybody to be happy. I want my mommy. What kind of childish dolt have I become?

  Val was looking at him, he suddenly realized. "Hi," he said. The others were looking at him, too. Looking back and forth between him and Val. "What are we all voting on, whether I should grow a beard?"

  "Voting on nothing," said Quara. "I'm just depressed. I mean, I knew what I was doing when I got on this ship, but damn, it's really hard to get enthusiastic about working on these people's language when I can count my life by the gauge on the oxygen tanks."

  "I notice," said Ela dryly, "that you're already calling the descoladores 'people.' "

  "Shouldn't I? Do we even know what they look like?" Quara seemed confused. "I mean, they have a language, they--"

  "That's what we're here to decide, isn't it?" said Firequencher. "Whether the descoladores are raman or varelse. The translation problem is just a little step along that road."

  "Big step," corrected Ela. "And we don't have time enough to do it."

  "Since we don't know how long it's going to take," said Quara, "I don't see how you can be so sure of that."

  "I can be dead sure," said Ela. "Because all we're doing is sitting around talking and watching Miro and Val make soulful faces at each other. It doesn't take a genius to know that at this rate, our progress before running out of oxygen will be exactly zero."

  "In other words," said Quara, "we should stop wasting time." She turned back to the notes and printouts she was working on.

  "But we're not wasting time," said Val softly.

  "No?" asked Ela.

  "I'm waiting for Miro to tell me how easily Jane could be brought back into communication with the real world. A body waiting to receive her. Starflight restored. His old and loyal friend, suddenly a real girl. I'm waiting for that."

  Miro shook his head. "I don't want to lose you," he said.

  "That's not helping," said Val.

  "But it's true," said Miro. "The theory, that was easy. Thinking deep thoughts while riding on a hovercar back on Lusitania, sure, I could reason out that Jane in Val would be Jane and Val. But when you come right down to it, I can't say that--"

  "Shut up," said Val.

  It wasn't like her to talk like that. Miro shut up.

  "No more words like that," she said. "What I need from you is the words that will let me give up this body."

  Miro shook his head.

  "Put your money where your mouth is," she said. "Walk the walk. Talk the talk. Put up or shut up. Fish or cut bait."

  He knew what she wanted. He knew that she was saying that the only thing holding her to this body, to this life, was him. Was her love for him. Was their friendship and companionship. There were others here now to do the work of translation--Miro could see now that this was the plan, really, all along. To bring Ela and Quara so that Val could not possibly consider her life as indispensable. But Miro, she couldn't let go of him that easily. And she had to, had to let go.

  "Whatever aiua is in that body," Miro said, "you'll remember everything I say."

  "And you have to mean it, too," said Val. "It has to be the truth."

  "Well it can't be," said Miro. "Because the truth is that I--"

  "Shut up!" demanded Val. "Don't say that again. It's a lie!"

  "It's not a lie."

  "It's complete self-deception on your part, and you have to wake up and see the truth, Miro! You already made the choice between me and Jane. You're only backing out now because you don't like being the kind of man who makes that sort of ruthless choice. But you never loved me, Miro. You never loved me. You loved the companionship, yes--the only woman you were around, of course; there's a biological imperative playing a role here with a desperately lonely young man. But me? I think what you loved was your memory of your friendship with the real Valentine when she came back with you from space. And you loved how noble it made you feel to declare your love for me in the effort to save my life, back when Ender was ignoring me. But all of that was about you, not me. You never knew me, you never
loved me. It was Jane you loved, and Valentine, and Ender himself, the real Ender, not this plastic container that he created in order to compartmentalize all the virtues he wishes he had more of."

  The nastiness, the rage in her was palpable. This wasn't like her at all. Miro could see that the others were also stunned. And yet he also understood. This was exactly like her--for she was being hateful and angry in order to persuade herself to let go of this life. And she was doing that for the sake of others. It was perfect altruism. Only she would die, and, in exchange, perhaps the others in this ship would not die, they'd go back home when their work here was done. Jane would live, clothed in this new flesh, inheriting her memories. Val had to persuade herself that the life that she was living now was worthless, to her and everyone else; that the only value to her life would be to leave it.

  And she wanted Miro to help her. That was the sacrifice she asked of him. To help her let go. To help her want to go. To help her hate this life.

  "All right," said Miro. "You want the truth? You're completely empty, Val, and you always were. You just sit there spouting the exactly kindest thing, but there's never been any heart in it. Ender felt a need to make you, not because he actually has any of the virtues you supposedly represent, but because he doesn't have them. That's why he admires them so much. So when he made you, he didn't know what to put inside you. An empty script. Even now, you're just following the script. Perfect altruism my ass. How can it be a sacrifice to give up a life that was never a life?"

  She struggled for a moment, and a tear flowed down her cheek. "You told me that you loved me."

  "I was sorry for you. That day in Valentine's kitchen, all right? But the truth is I was probably just trying to impress Valentine. The other Valentine. Show her what a good guy I am. She actually has some of those virtues--I care a lot about what she thinks of me. So . . . I fell in love with being the kind of guy who was worthy of Valentine's respect. That's as close to loving you as I ever got. And then we found out what our real mission was and suddenly you aren't dying anymore and here I am, stuck with having said I loved you and now I've got to keep going and going to maintain the fiction even as it becomes clearer and clearer that I miss Jane, I miss her so desperately that it hurts, and the only reason I can't have her back is because you won't let go--"

  "Please," said Val. "It hurts too much. I didn't think you--I--"

  "Miro," said Quara, "this is the shittiest thing I've ever seen anybody do to anybody else and I've seen some doozies."

  "Shut up, Quara," said Ela.

  "Oh, who made you queen of the starship?" retorted Quara.

  "This isn't about you," said Ela.

  "I know, it's about Miro the complete bastard--"

  Firequencher launched himself gently from his seat and in a moment had his strong hand clamped over Quara's mouth. "This isn't the time," he said to her softly. "You understand nothing."

  She got her face free. "I understand enough to know that this is--"

  Firequencher turned to the Hive Queen's worker. "Help us," he said.

  The worker got up and with astonishing speed had Quara out of the main deck of the shuttle. Where the Hive Queen took Quara and how she restrained her were questions that didn't even interest Miro. Quara was too self-centered to understand the little play that Miro and Val were acting out. But the others understood.

  What mattered, though, was that Val not understand. Val had to believe that he meant what he was saying now. It had almost been working before Quara interrupted. But now they had lost the thread.

  "Val," said Miro wearily, "it doesn't matter what I say. Because you'll never let go. And you know why? Because you aren't Val. You're Ender. And even though Ender can wipe out whole planets in order to save the human race, his own life is sacred. He'll never give it up. Not one scrap. And that includes you--he'll never let go of you. Because you're the last and greatest of his delusions. If he gives you up, he'll lose his last hope of really being a good man."

  "That's nonsense," said Val. "The only way he can be a really good man is to give me up."

  "That's my point," said Miro. "He isn't a really good man. So he can't give you up. Even to attempt to prove his virtue. Because the tie of the aiua to the body can't be faked. He can fool everybody else, but he can't fool your body. He's just not good enough to let you go."

  "So it's Ender that you hate, not me."

  "No, Val, I don't hate Ender. He's an imperfect guy, that's all. Like me, like everybody else. Like the real Valentine, for that matter. Only you have the illusion of perfection--but that's fine, because you're not real. You're just Ender in drag, doing his Valentine bit. You come off the stage and there's nothing there, it comes off like makeup and a costume. And you really believed I was in love with that?"

  Val swiveled on her chair, turning her back to him. "I almost believe you mean these things," she said.

  "What I can't believe," said Miro, "is that I'm saying them out loud. But that's what you wanted me to do, wasn't it? For me to be honest with you for the first time, so maybe you could be honest with yourself and realize that what you have isn't a life at all, it's just a perpetual confession of Ender's inadequacy as a human being. You're the childhood innocence he thinks he lost, but here's the truth about that: Before they ever took him away from his parents, before he ever went up to that Battle School in the sky, before they made a perfect killing machine out of him, he was already the brutal, ruthless killer that he always feared he was. It's one of the things that even Ender tries to pretend isn't so: He killed a boy before he ever became a soldier. He kicked that boy's head in. Kicked him and kicked him and the kid never woke up. His parents never saw him alive again. The kid was a prick but he didn't deserve to die. Ender was a killer from the start. That's the thing that he can't live with. That's the reason he needs you. That's the reason he needs Peter. So he can take the ugly ruthless killer side of himself and put it all on Peter. And he can look at perfect you and say, 'See, that beautiful thing was inside me.' And we all play along. But you're not beautiful, Val. You're the pathetic apologia of a man whose whole life is a lie."

  Val broke down sobbing.

  Almost, almost Miro had compassion and stopped. Almost he shouted at her, No, Val, it's you I love, it's you I want! It's you I longed for all my life and Ender is a good man because all this nonsense about you being a pretense is impossible. Ender didn't create you consciously, the way hypocrites create their facades. You grew out of him. The virtues were there, are there, and you are the natural home for them. I already loved and admired Ender, but not until I met you did I know how beautiful he was inside.

  Her back was to him. She couldn't see the torment that he felt.

  "What is it, Val? Am I supposed to pity you again? Don't you understand that the only conceivable value that you have to any of us is if you just go away and let Jane have your body? We don't need you, we don't want you. Ender's aiua belongs in Peter's body because that's the only one that has a chance of acting out Ender's true character. Get lost, Val. When you're gone, we have a chance to live. While you're here, we're all dead. Do you think for one second that we'll miss you? Think again."

  I will never forgive myself for saying these things, Miro realized. Even though I know the necessity of helping Ender let go of this body by making this an unbearable place for him to stay, it doesn't change the fact that I'll remember saying it, I'll remember the way she looks now, weeping with despair and pain. How can I live with that? I thought I was deformed before. All I had wrong with me then was brain damage. But now--I couldn't have said any of these things to her if I hadn't thought of them. There's the rub. I thought of these terrible things to say. That's the kind of man I am.

  Ender opened his eyes again, then reached a hand up to touch Novinha's face, the bruises there. He moaned to see Valentine and Plikt, too. "What did I do to you?"

  "It wasn't you," said Novinha. "It was her."

  "It was me," he said. "I meant to let her have . . . something.
I meant to, but when it came right down to it, I was afraid. I couldn't do it." He looked away from them, closed his eyes. "She tried to kill me. She tried to drive me out."

  "You were both working way below the level of consciousness," said Valentine. "Two strong-willed aiuas, unable to back off from life. That's not so terrible."

  "What, and you were just standing too close?"

  "That's right," said Valentine.

  "I hurt you," said Ender. "I hurt all three of you."

  "We don't hold people responsible for convulsions," said Novinha.

  Ender shook his head. "I'm talking about . . . before. I lay there listening. Couldn't move my body, couldn't make a sound, but I could hear. I know what I did to you. All three of you. I'm sorry."

  "Don't be," said Valentine. "We all chose our lives. I could have stayed on Earth in the first place, you know. Didn't have to follow you. I proved that when I stayed with Jakt. You didn't cost me anything--I've had a brilliant career and a wonderful life, and much of that is because I was with you. As for Plikt, well, we finally saw--much to my relief, I might add--that she isn't always in complete control of herself. Still, you never asked her to follow you here. She chose what she chose. If her life is wasted, well, she wasted it the way she wanted to and that's none of your business. As for Novinha--"

  "Novinha is my wife," said Ender. "I said I wouldn't leave her. I tried not to leave her."

  "You haven't left me," Novinha said.

  "Then what am I doing in this bed?"

  "You're dying," said Novinha.

  "My point exactly," said Ender.

  "But you were dying before you came here," she said. "You were dying from the moment that I left you in anger and came here. That was when you realized, when we both realized, that we weren't building anything together anymore. Our children aren't young. One of them is dead. There'll be no others. Our work now doesn't coincide at any point."

  "That doesn't mean it's right to end the--"

  "As long as we both shall live," said Novinha. "I know that, Andrew. You keep the marriage alive for your children, and then when they're grown up you stay married for everybody else's children, so they grow up in a world where marriages are permanent. I know all that, Andrew. Permanent--until one of you dies. That's why you're here, Andrew. Because you have other lives that you want to live, and because of some miraculous fluke you actually have the bodies to live them in. Of course you're leaving me. Of course."