names as "Rooter" and "Chupaceu" (sky-sucker) could be translations of their Male Language names or simply foreign nicknames they chose for our use.
They refer to each other as brothers. The females are always called wives, never sisters or mothers. They sometimes refer to fathers, but inevitably this term is used to refer to ancestral totem trees. As for what they call us, they do use human, of course, but they have also taken to using the new Demosthenian Hierarchy of Exclusion. They refer to humans as framlings, and to piggies of other tribes as utlannings. Oddly, though, they refer to themselves as ramen, showing that they either misunderstand the hierarchy or view themselves from the human perspective! And - quite an amazing turn - they have several times referred to the females as varelse!
- Joao Figueira Alvarez, "Notes on 'Piggy' Language and Nomenclature," in Semantics, 9/1948/15
The living quarters of Reykjavik were carved into the granite walls of the fjord. Ender's was high on the cliff, a tedious climb up stairs and ladderways. But it had a window. He had lived most of his childhood closed in behind metal walls. When he could, he lived where he could see the weathers of the world.
His room was hot and bright, with sunlight streaming in, blinding him after the cool darkness of the stone corridors. Jane did not wait for him to adjust his vision to the light. "I have a surprise for you on the terminal," she said. Her voice was a whisper from the jewel in his ear.
It was a piggy standing in the air over the terminal. He moved, scratching himself; then he reached out for something. When his hand came back, it held a shiny, dripping worm. He bit it, and the body juices drizzled out of his mouth, down onto his chest.
"Obviously an advanced civilization," said Jane.
Ender was annoyed. "Many a moral imbecile has good table manners, Jane."
The piggy turned and spoke. "Do you want to see how we killed him?"
"What are you doing, Jane?"
The piggy disappeared. In his place came a holo of Pipo's corpse as it lay on the hillside in the rain. "I've done a simulation of the vivisection process the piggies used, based on the information collected by the scan before the body was buried. Do you want to see it?"
Ender sat down on the room's only chair.
Now the terminal showed the hillside, with Pipo, still alive, lying on his back, his hands and feet tied to wooden stakes. A dozen piggies were gathered around him, one of them holding a bone knife. Jane's voice came from the jewel in his ear again. "We aren't sure whether it was like this." All the piggies disappeared except the one with the knife. "Or like this."
"Was the xenologer conscious?"
"Without doubt."
"Go on."
Relentlessly, Jane showed the opening of the chest cavity, the ritual removal and placement of body organs on the ground. Ender forced himself to watch, trying to understand what meaning this could possibly have to the piggies. At one point Jane whispered, "This is when he died." Ender felt himself relax; only then did he realize how all his muscles had been rigid with empathy for Pipo's suffering.
When it was over, Ender moved to his bed and lay down, staring at the ceiling.
"I've shown this simulation already to scientists on half a dozen worlds," said Jane. "It won't be long before the press gets their hands on it."
"It's worse than it ever was with the buggers," said Ender. "All the videos they showed when I was little, buggers and humans in combat, it was clean compared to this."
An evil laugh came from the terminal. Ender looked to see what Jane was doing. A full-sized piggy was sitting there, laughing grotesquely, and as he giggled Jane transformed him. It was very subtle, a slight exaggeration of the teeth, an elongation of the eyes, a bit of slavering, some redness in the eye, the tongue darting in and out. The beast of every child's nightmare. "Well done, Jane. The metamorphosis from raman to varelse."
"How soon will the piggies be accepted as the equals of humanity, after this?"
"Has all contact been cut off?"
"The Starways Council has told the new xenologer to restrict himself to visits of no more than one hour, not more frequently than every other day. He is forbidden to ask the piggies why they did what they did."
"But no quarantine."
"It wasn't even proposed."
"But it will be, Jane. Another incident like this, and