a heightened intensity that Bean didn't like. Peter had the seducer's gift. Dangerous.
"I'll walk home with you," said Peter. "I'm not hungry. Have you already paid?"
"Of course," said Sister Carlotta. "This is my grandson, by the way. Delfino."
Peter turned to notice Bean for the first time-though Bean was quite sure Peter had sized him up thoroughly before he sat down. "Cute kid," he said. "How old is he? Does he go to school yet?"
"I'm little," said Bean cheerfully, "but at least I'm not a yelda."
"All those vids of Battle School life," said Peter. "Even little kids are picking up that stupid polyglot slang."
"Now, children, you must get along, I insist on it." Sister Carlotta led the way to the door. "My grandson is visiting this country for the first time, young man, so he doesn't understand American banter."
"Yes I do," said Bean, trying to sound like a petulant child and finding it quite easy, since he really was annoyed.
"He speaks English pretty well. But you better hold his hand crossing this street, the campus trams zoom through here like Daytona."
Bean rolled his eyes and submitted to having Carlotta hold his hand across the street. Peter was obviously trying to provoke him, but why? Surely he wasn't so shallow as to think humiliating Bean would give him some advantage. Maybe he took pleasure in making other people feel small.
Finally, though, they were away from campus and had taken enough twists and turns to make sure they weren't being followed.
"So you're the great Julian Delphiki," said Peter.
"And you're Locke. They're touting you for Hegemon when Sakata's term is over. Too bad you're only virtual."
"I'm thinking of going public soon," said Peter.
"Ah, that's why you got the plastic surgery to make you so pretty," said Bean.
"This old face?" said Peter. "I only wear it when I don't care how I look."
"Boys," said Sister Carlotta. "Must you display like baby chimps?"
Peter laughed easily. "Come on, Mom, we was just playin'. Can't we still go to the movies?"
"Off to bed without supper, the lot of you," said Sister Carlotta.
Bean had had enough of this. "Where's Petra?" he demanded.
Peter looked at him as if he were insane. "I don't have her."
"You have sources," said Bean. "You know more than you're telling me."
"You know more than you're telling me, too," said Peter. "I thought we were working on trusting each other, and then we open the floodgates of wisdom."
"Is she dead?" said Bean, not willing to be deflected.
Peter looked at his watch. "At this moment. I don't know."
Bean stopped walking. Disgusted, he turned to Sister Carlotta. "We wasted a trip," he said. "And risked our lives for nothing."
"Are you sure?" said Sister Carlotta.
Bean looked back at Peter, who seemed genuinely bemused. "He wants to be Hegemon," said Bean, "but he's nothing." Bean walked away. He had memorized the route, of course, and knew how to get to the bus station without Sister Carlotta's help. Ender had ridden these buses as a child younger than Bean. It was the only consolation for the bitter disappointment of finding out that Peter was a gameplaying fool.
No one called after him, and he did not look back.
Bean took, not the bus to the hotel, but the one that passed nearest the school Ender had attended just before being taken into Battle School. The whole story of Ender's life had come out in the inquiry into Graff's conduct: Ender's first killing had taken place here, a boy named Stilson who had set on Ender with his gang. Bean had been there for Ender's second killing, which was pretty much the same situation as the first. Ender-alone, outnumbered, surroundedtalked his way into single combat and then fought to destroy his enemy so no will to fight would remain. But he had known it here, at the age of six.
I knew things at that age, thought Bean. And younger, too. Not how to killthat was beyond me, I was too small. But how to live, that was hard.
For me it was hard, but not for Ender. Bean walked through the neighborhoods of modest old houses and even more modest new ones-but to him they were all miracles. Not that he hadn't had plenty of chances, living with his family in Greece after the war, to see how most children grew up. But this was different. This was the place that had spawned Ender Wiggin.
I had more native talent for war than Ender had. But he was still the better commander. Was this the difference?