Ender's Game (Ender's Saga, #1) - Orson Scott Card Page 0,9

on Colonel Graff. The man looked far away and very small, as if Ender could pick him up with tweezers and drop him in a pocket. To leave everything here, and go to a place that was very hard, with no Valentine, no Mom and Dad.

And then he thought of the films of the buggers that everyone had to see at least once a year. The Scathing of China. The Battle of the Belt. Death and suffering and terror. And Mazer Rackham and his brilliant maneuvers, destroying an enemy fleet twice his size and twice his firepower, using the little human ships that seemed so frail and weak. Like children fighting with grown-ups. And we won.

“I’m afraid,” said Ender quietly. “But I’ll go with you.”

“Tell me again,” said Graff.

“It’s what I was born for, isn’t it? If I don’t go, why am I alive?”

“Not good enough,” said Graff.

“I don’t want to go,” said Ender, “but I will.”

Graff nodded. “You can change your mind. Up until the time you get in my car with me, you can change your mind. After that, you stay at the pleasure of the International Fleet. Do you understand that?”

Ender nodded.

“All right. Let’s tell them.”

Mother cried. Father held Ender tight. Peter shook his hand and said, “You lucky little pinheaded fart-eater.” Valentine kissed him and left her tears on his cheek.

There was nothing to pack. No belongings to take. “The school provides everything you need, from uniforms to school supplies. And as for toys—there’s only one game.”

“Good-bye,” Ender said to his family. He reached up and took Colonel Graff’s hand and walked out the door with him.

“Kill some buggers for me!” Peter shouted.

“I love you, Andrew!” Mother called.

“We’ll write to you!” Father said.

And as he got into the car that waited silently in the corridor, he heard Valentine’s anguished cry. “Come back to me! I love you forever!”

4

LAUNCH

“With Ender, we have to strike a delicate balance. Isolate him enough that he remains creative—otherwise he’ll adopt the system here and we’ll lose him. At the same time, we need to make sure he keeps a strong ability to lead.”

“If he earns rank, he’ll lead.”

“It isn’t that simple. Mazer Rackham could handle his little fleet and win. By the time this war happens, there’ll be too much, even for a genius. Too many little boats. He has to work smoothly with his subordinates.”

“Oh, good. He has to be a genius and nice, too.”

“Not nice. Nice will let the buggers have us all.”

“So you’re going to isolate him.”

“I’ll have him completely separated from the rest of the boys by the time we get to the School.”

“I have no doubt of it. I’ll be waiting for you to get here. I watched the vids of what he did to the Stilson boy. This is not a sweet little kid you’re bringing up here.”

“That’s where you’re mistaken. He’s even sweeter than he looks. But don’t worry. We’ll purge that in a hurry.”

“Sometimes I think you enjoy breaking these little geniuses.”

“There is an art to it, and I’m very, very good at it. But enjoy? Well, maybe. When they put back the pieces afterward, and it makes them better.”

“You’re a monster.”

“Thanks. Does this mean I get a raise?”

“Just a medal. The budget isn’t inexhaustible.”

They say that weightlessness can cause disorientation, especially in children, whose sense of direction isn’t yet secure. But Ender was disoriented before he left Earth’s gravity. Before the shuttle launch even began.

There were nineteen other boys in his launch. They filed out of the bus and into the elevator. They talked and joked and bragged and laughed. Ender kept his silence. He noticed how Graff and the other officers were watching them. Analyzing. Everything we do means something, Ender realized. Them laughing. Me not laughing.

He toyed with the idea of trying to be like the other boys. But he couldn’t think of any jokes, and none of theirs seemed funny. Wherever their laughter came from, Ender couldn’t find such a place in himself. He was afraid, and fear made him serious.

They had dressed him in a uniform, all in a single piece; it felt funny not to have a belt cinched around his waist. He felt baggy and naked, dressed like that. There were TV cameras going, perched like animals on the shoulders of crouching, prowling men. The men moved slowly, catlike, so the camera motion would be smooth. Ender caught himself moving smoothly, too.

He imagined himself being on TV, in an interview. The announcer asking him, How do