away. He looked again into his desk. His figure was still there, staring into the mirror. He tried to pick up some of the furniture, to break the mirror, but it could not be moved. The mirror would not come off the wall, either. Finally Ender threw the snake at it. The mirror shattered, leaving a hole in the wall behind it. Out of the hole came dozens of tiny snakes, which quickly bit Ender’s figure again and again. Tearing the snakes frantically from itself, the figure collapsed and died in a writhing heap of small serpents.
The screen went blank, and words appeared.
PLAY AGAIN?
Ender signed off and put the desk away.
The next day, several commanders came to Ender or sent soldiers to tell him not to worry, most of them thought the extra practice sessions were a good idea, he should keep it up. And to make sure nobody bothered him, they were sending a few of their older soldiers who needed extra practice to come join him. “They’re as big as most of the buggers who attacked you last night. They’ll think twice.”
Instead of a dozen boys, there were forty-five that night, more than an army, and whether it was because of the presence of older boys on Ender’s side or because they had had enough the night before, none of their enemies came.
Ender didn’t go back to the fantasy game. But it lived in his dreams. He kept remembering how it felt to kill the snake, grinding it in, the way he tore the ear off that boy, the way he destroyed Stilson, the way he broke Bernard’s arm. And then to stand up, holding the corpse of his enemy, and find Peter’s face looking out at him from the mirror. This game knows too much about me. This game tells filthy lies. I am not Peter. I don’t have murder in my heart.
And then a worse fear, that he was a killer, only better at it than Peter ever was; that it was this very trait that pleased the teachers. It’s killers they need for the bugger wars. It’s people who can grind the enemy’s face into the dust and spatter their blood all over space.
Well, I’m your man. I’m the bloody bastard you wanted when you had me spawned. I’m your tool, and what difference does it make if I hate the part of me that you most need? What difference does it make that when the little serpents killed me in the game, I agreed with them, and was glad.
9
LOCKE AND DEMOSTHENES
“I didn’t call you in here to waste time. How in hell did the computer do that?”
“I don’t know.”
“How could it pick up a picture of Ender’s brother and put it into the graphics in this Fairyland routine?”
“Colonel Graff, I wasn’t there when it was programmed. All I know is that the computer’s never taken anyone to this place before. Fairyland was strange enough, but this isn’t Fairyland anymore. It’s beyond the End of the World, and—”
“I know the names of the places, I just don’t know what they mean.”
“Fairyland was programmed in. It’s mentioned in a few other places. But nothing talks about the End of the World. We don’t have any experience with it.”
“I don’t like having the computer screw around with Ender’s mind that way. Peter Wiggin is the most potent person in his life, except maybe his sister Valentine.”
“And the mind game is designed to help shape them, help them find worlds they can be comfortable in.”
“You don’t get it, do you, Major Imbu? I don’t want Ender being comfortable with the end of the world. Our business here is not to be comfortable with the end of the world!”
“The End of the World in the game isn’t necessarily the end of humanity in the bugger wars. It has a private meaning to Ender.”
“Good. What meaning?”
“I don’t know, sir. I’m not the kid. Ask him.”
“Major Imbu, I’m asking you.”
“There could be a thousand meanings.”
“Try one.”
“You’ve been isolating the boy. Maybe he’s wishing for the end of this world, the Battle School. Or maybe it’s about the end of the world he grew up with as a little boy, his home, coming here. Or maybe it’s his way of coping with having broken up so many other kids here. Ender’s a sensitive kid, you know, and he’s done some pretty bad things to people’s bodies, he might be wishing for the end of that world.”
“Or none of the above.”
“The mind game