Ender's Game (Ender's Saga, #1) - Orson Scott Card Page 0,6

“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