Card, Orson Scott - Ender's Saga 1 - Ender's Game Page 4

  There was silence the rest of the launch. The boy sitting next to Ender was scrupulously careful not to touch him.

  I am not a killer, Ender said to himself over and over. I am not Peter. No matter what he says, I wouldn't. I'm not. I was defending myself. I bore it a long time. I was patient. I'm not what he said.

  A voice over the speaker told them they were approaching the school; it took twenty minutes to decelerate and dock. Ender lagged behind the others.

  They were not unwilling to let him be the last to leave the shuttle, climbing upward in the direction that had been down when they embarked. Graff was waiting at the end of the narrow tube that led from the shuttle into the heart of the Battle School.

  "Was it a good flight, Ender?" Graff asked cheerfully.

  "I thought you were my friend." Despite himself, Ender's voice trembled.

  Graff looked puzzled. "Whatever gave you that idea, Ender?"

  "Because you--" Because you spoke nicely to me, and honestly. "You didn't lie."

  "I won't lie now, either," said Graff. "My job isn't to be friends. My job is to produce the best soldiers in the world. In the whole history of the world. We need a Napoleon. An Alexander. Except that Napoleon lost in the end, and Alexander flamed out and died young. We need a Julius Caesar, except that he made himself dictator, and died for it. My job is to produce such a creature, and all the men and women he'll need to help him. Nowhere in that does it say I have to make friends with children."

  "You made them hate me."

  "So? What will you do about it? Crawl into a corner? Start kissing their little backsides so they'll love you again? There's only one thing that will make them stop hating you. And that's being so good at what you do that they can't ignore you. I told them you were the best. Now you damn well better be."

  "What if I can't?"

  "Then too bad. Look, Ender. I'm sorry if you're lonely and afraid. But the buggers are out there. Ten billion, a hundred billion, a million billion of them, for all we know. With as many ships, for all we know. With weapons we can't understand. And a willingness to use those weapons to wipe us out. It isn't the world at stake, Ender. Just us. Just humankind. As far as the rest of the earth is concerned, we could be wiped out and it would adjust, it would get on with the next step in evolution. But humanity doesn't want to die. As a species, we have evolved to survive. And the way we do it is by straining and straining and, at last, every few generations, giving birth to genius. The one who invents the wheel. And light. And flight. The one who builds a city, a nation, an empire. Do you understand any of this?"

  Ender thought he did, but wasn't sure, and so said nothing.

  "No. Of course not. So I'll put it bluntly. Human beings are free except when humanity needs them. Maybe humanity needs you. To do something. I think humanity needs me-- to find out what you're good for. We might both do despicable things, Ender, but if humankind survives, then we were good tools."

  "Is that all? Just tools?"

  "Individual human beings are all tools, that the others use to help us all survive."

  "That's a lie."

  "No. It's just a half truth. You can worry about the other half after we win this war."

  "It'll be over before I grow up," Ender said.

  "I hope you're wrong," said Grail. "By the way, you aren't helping yourself at all, talking to me. The other boys are no doubt telling each other that old Ender Wiggin is back there licking up to Graff. If word once gets around that you're a teachers' boy, you're iced for sure."

  In other words, go away and leave me alone. "Goodbye," Ender said. He pulled himself hand over hand along the tube where the other boys had gone.

  Graff watched him go.

  One of the teachers near him said, "Is that the one?"

  "God knows," said Graff. "If it isn't Ender, then he'd better show up soon."

  "Maybe it's nobody," said the teacher.

  "Maybe. But if that's the case, Anderson, then in my opinion God is a bugger. You can quote me on that."

  "I will."

  They stood in silence a while longer.

  "Anderson."

  "Mmm."

  "The kid's wrong. I am his friend."

  "I know."

  "He's clean. Right to the heart, he's good."

  "I've read the reports."

  "Anderson, think what we're going to do to him."

  Anderson was defiant. "We're going to make him the best military commander in history."

  "And then put the fate of the world on his shoulders. For his sake, I hope it isn't him. I do."

  "Cheer up. The buggers may kill us all before he graduates."

  Graff smiled. "You're right. I feel better already."

  Chapter 5 -- Games

  "You have my admiration. Breaking an arm-- that was a master stroke."

  "That was an accident."

  "Really? And I've already commended you in your official report."

  "It's too strong. It makes that other little bastard into a hero. It could screw up training for a lot of kids. I thought he might call for help."

  "Call for help? I thought that was what you valued most in him that he settles his own problems. When he's out there surrounded by an enemy fleet, there ain't gonna be nobody to help him if he calls."

  "Who would have guessed the little sucker'd be out of his seat? And that he'd land just wrong against the bulkhead?"

  "Just one more example of the stupidity of the military. If you had any brains, you'd be in a real career, like selling life insurance."

  "You, too, mastermind."

  "We've just got to face the fact that we're second rate. With the fate of humanity in our hands. Gives you a delicious feeling of power, doesn't it? Especially because this time if we lose there won't be any criticism of us at all."

  "I never thought of it that way. But let's not lose."

  "See how Ender handles it. If we've already lost him, if he can't handle this, who next? Who else?"

  "I'll make up a list."

  "In the meantime, figure out how to un-lose Ender."

  "I told you. His isolation can't be broken. He can never come to believe that anybody will ever help him out. Ever. If he once thinks there's an easy way out, he's wrecked."

  "You're right. That would be terrible, if he believed he had a friend."

  "He can have friends. It's parents he can't have."

  ***

  The other boys had already chosen their bunks when Ender arrived. Ender stopped in the doorway of the dormitory, looking for the sole remaining bed. The ceiling was so low Ender could reach up and touch it. A child-size room, with the bottom bunk resting on the floor. The other boys were watching him, corner-wise. Sure enough, the bottom bunk right by the door was the only empty bed. For a moment it occurred to Ender that by letting the others put him in the worst place, he was inviting later bullying. Yet he couldn't very well oust someone else.

  So he smiled broadly. "Hey, thanks," he said. Not sarcastically at all. He said it as sincerely as if they had reserved for him the best position. "I thought I was going to have to ask for low bunk by the door."

  He sat down and looked in the locker that stood open at the foot of the bunk. There was a paper taped to the inside of the door.

  Place your hand on the scanner at the head of your bunk

  and speak your name twice.

  Ender found the scanner, a sheet of opaque plastic. He put his left hand on it and said, "Ender Wiggin. Ender Wiggin."

  The scanner glowed green for a moment. Ender closed his locker and tried to reopen it. He couldn't. Then he put his hand on the scanner and said, "Ender Wiggin." The locker popped open. So did three other compartments.

  One of them contained four jumpsuits like the one he was wearing, and one white one. Another compartment contained a small desk, just like the ones at school. So they weren't through with studies yet.

  It was the largest compartment that contained the prize. It looked like a spacesuit at first glance, complet
e with helmet and gloves. But it wasn't. There was no airtight seal. Still, it would effectively cover the whole body. It was thickly padded. It was also a little stiff.

  And there was a pistol with it. A laser gun, it looked like, since the end was solid, clear glass. But surely they wouldn't let children have lethal weapons--

  "Not laser," said a man. Ender looked up. It was one he hadn't seen before. A young and kind-looking man. "But it has a tight enough beam. Well-focused. You can aim it and make a three-inch circle of light on a wall a hundred meters off."

  "What's it for?" Ender asked.

  "One of the games we play during recreation. Does anyone else have his locker open?" The man looked around. "I mean, have you followed directions and coded in your voices and hands? You can't get into the lockers until you do. This room is your home for the first year or so here at the Battle School, so get the bunk you want and stay with it. Ordinarily we let you elect your chief officer and install him in the lower bunk by the door, but apparently that position has been taken. Can't recode the lockers now. So think about whom you want to choose. Dinner in seven minutes. Follow the lighted dots on the floor. Your colour code is red yellow yellow-- whenever you're assigned a path to follow, it will be red yellow yellow, three dots side by side-- go where those lights indicate. What's your colour code, boys?"

  "Red, yellow, yellow."

  "Very good. My name is Dap. I'm your mum for the next few months."

  The boys laughed.

  "Laugh all you like, but keep it in mind. If you get lost in the school, which is quite possible, don't go opening doors. Some of them lead outside." More laughter. "Instead just tell someone that your mum is Dap, and they'll call me. Or tell them your colour, and they'll light up a path for you to get home. If you have a problem, come talk to me. Remember, I'm the only person here who's paid to be nice to you, but not too nice. Give me any lip and I'll break your face, OK?"

  They laughed again. Dap had a room full of friends, Frightened children are so easy to win.

  "Which way is down, anybody tell me?"

  They told him.

  "OK, that's true. But that direction is toward the outside. The ship is spinning, and that's what makes it feel like that is down. The floor actually curves around in that direction. Keep going long enough that way, and you come back to where you started. Except don't try it. Because up that way is teachers' quarters, and up that way is the bigger kids. And the bigger kids don't like Launchies butting in. You might get pushed around. In fact, you will get pushed around. And when you do, don't come crying to me. Got it? This is Battle School, not nursery school."

  "What are we supposed to do, then?" asked a boy, a really small black kid who had a top hunk near Ender's.

  "If you don't like getting pushed around, figure out for yourself what to do about it, but I warn you-- murder is strictly against the rules. So is any deliberate injury. I understand there was one attempted murder on the way up here. A broken arm. That kind of thing happens again, somebody ices out. You got it?"

  "What's icing out?" asked the boy with his arm puffed up in a splint.

  "Ice. Put out in the cold. Sent Earthside. Finished at Battle School."

  Nobody looked at Ender.

  "So, boys, if any of you are thinking of being troublemakers, at least be clever about it. OK?"

  Dap left. They still didn't look at Ender.

  Ender felt the fear growing in his belly. The kid whose arm he broke-- Ender didn't feel sorry for him. He was a Stilson. And like Stilson, he was already gathering a gang. A little knot of kids, several of the bigger ones, they were laughing at the far end of the room, and every now and then one of them would turn to look at Ender.

  With all his heart, Ender wanted to go home. What did any of this have to do with saving the world? There was no monitor now. It was Ender against the gang again, only they were right in his room. Peter again, but without Valentine.

  The fear stayed, all through dinner as no one sat by him in the mess hall. The other boys were talking about things-- the big scoreboard on one wall, the food, the bigger kids. Ender could only watch in isolation.

  The scoreboards were team standings. Won-loss records, with the most recent scores. Some of the bigger boy's apparently had bets on the most recent games. Two teams, Manticore and Asp, had no recent score-- that box was flashing. Ender decided they must be playing right now.

  He noticed that the older boys were divided into groups, according to the uniforms they wore. Some with different uniforms were talking together, but generally the groups each had their own area. Launchies-- their own group, and the two or three next older groups all had plain blue uniforms. But the big kids, the ones that were on teams, they were wearing much more flamboyant clothing. Ender tried to guess which ones went with which name. Scorpion and Spider were easy. So were Flame and Tide.

  A bigger boy came to sit by him. Not just a little bigger- he looked to be twelve or thirteen. Getting his man's growth started.

  "Hi," he said.

  "Hi," Ender said.

  "I'm Mick."

  "Ender."

  "That's a name?"

  "Since I was little. It's what my sister called me."

  "Not a bad name here. Ender. Finisher. Hey."

  "Hope so."

  "Ender, you the bugger in your launch?"

  Ender shrugged.

  "I noticed you eating all alone. Every launch has one like that. Kid that nobody takes to right away. Sometimes I think the teachers do it on purpose. The teachers aren't very nice. You'll notice that."

  "Yeah."

  "So you the bugger?"

  "I guess so."

  "Hey. Nothing to cry about, you know?" He gave Ender his roll, and took Ender's pudding. "Eat nutritious stuff. It'll keep you strong." Mick dug into the pudding.

  "What about you?" asked Ender.

  "Me? I'm nothing. I'm a fart in the air conditioning. I'm always there, but most of the time nobody knows it."

  Ender smiled tentatively.

  "Yeah, funny, but no joke. I got nowhere here. I'm getting big now. They're going to send me to my next school pretty soon. No way it'll be Tactical School for me. I've never been a leader, you see. Only the guys who get to be leaders have a shot at it."

  "How do you get to be a leader?"

  "Hey, if I knew, you think I'd be like this? How many guys my size you see in here?"

  Not many. Ender didn't say it.

  "A few. I'm not the only half-iced bugger-fodder. A few of us. The other guys-- they're all commanders. All the guys from my launch have their own teams now. Not me."

  Ender nodded.

  "Listen, little guy. I'm doing you a favour. Make friends. Be a leader. Kiss butts if you've got to, but if the other guys despise you-- you know what I mean?"

  Ender nodded again.

  "Naw, you don't know anything. You Launchies are all alike. You don't know nothing. Minds like space. Nothing there. And if anything hits you, you fall apart. Look, when you end up like me, don't forget that somebody warned you. It's the last nice thing anybody's going to do for you."

  "So why did you tell me?" asked Ender.

  "What are you, a smart mouth? Shut up and eat."

  Ender shut up and ate. He didn't like Mick. And he knew there was no chance he would end up like that. Maybe that was what the teachers were planning, but Ender didn't intend to fit in with their plans.

  I will not be the bugger of my group, Ender thought. I didn't leave Valentine and Mother and Father to come here just to be iced.

  As he lifted the fork to his mouth, he could feel his family around him, as they always had been. He knew just which way to turn his head to look up and see Mother, trying to get Valentine not to slurp. He knew just where Father would be, scanning the news on the table while pretending to be part of the dinner conversation. Peter, pretending to take a crushed pea out of his nose-- even Peter could he funny.

  It was a mistake to think of them. He felt a sob rise in his throat and
swallowed it down; he could not see his plate.

  He could not cry. There was no chance that he would be treated with compassion. Dap was not Mother. Any sign of weakness would tell the Stilsons and Peters that this boy could be broken. Ender did what he always did when Peter tormented him. He began to count doubles. One, two, four, eight. sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four. And on, as high as he could hold the numbers in his head: 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16384, 32768, 65536, 131072, 262144. At 67108864 he began to be unsure-- had he slipped out a digit? Should he be in the ten millions or the hundred millions or just the millions? He tried doubling again and lost it. 1342 something. 16? Or 17738? It was gone. Start over again. All the doubling he could hold. The pain was gone. The tears were gone. He would not cry.

  Until that night, when the lights went dim, and in the distance he could hear several boys whimpering for their mothers or fathers or dogs. He could not help himself. His lips formed Valentine's name. He could hear her voice laughing in the distance, just down the hall. He could see Mother passing his door, looking in to he sure he was all right. He could hear Father laughing at the video. It was all so clear, and it would never he that way again. I'll be old when I ever see them again, twelve at the earliest. Why did I say yes? What was I such a fool for? Going to school would have been nothing. Facing Stilson every day. And Peter. He was a piss ant. Ender wasn't afraid of him.

  I want to go home, he whispered.

  But his whisper was the whisper he used when he cried out in pain when Peter tormented him. The sound didn't travel farther than his own ears, and sometimes not that far.

  And his tears could fall unwanted on his sheet, but his sobs were so gentle that they did not shake the bed; so quiet they could not be heard. But the ache was there, thick in his throat and the front of his face, hot in his chest and in his eyes. I want to go home.

  Dap came to the door that night and moved quietly among the beds, touching a hand here. Where he went there was more crying, not less. The touch of kindness in this frightening place was enough to push some over the edge into tears. Not Ender, though. When Dap came, his crying was over, and his face was dry. It was the lying face he presented to Mother and Father, when Peter had been cruel to him and he dared not let it show. Thank you for this, Peter. For dry eyes and silent weeping. You taught me how to hide anything I felt. More than ever, I need that now.