“We were in a battle.”

  “I know—two armies at once. You won, right?”

  Bean nodded. “I bet Carn wasn’t the only one graduated early.”

  “A lot of commanders,” said Itú. “More than half.”

  “Including Bonzo Madrid? I mean, he graduated?”

  “That’s what the official notice said.” Itú shrugged. “Everybody knows that if anything, Bonzo was probably iced. I mean, they didn’t even list his assignment. Just ‘Cartagena.’ His hometown. Is that iced or what? But let the teachers call it what they want.”

  “I’ll bet the total who graduated was nine,” said Bean. “Neh?”

  “Eh,” said Itú. “Nine. So you know something?”

  “Bad news, I think,” said Bean. He showed Itú his transfer orders.

  “Santa merda,” said Itú. Then he saluted. Not sarcastically, but not enthusiastically, either.

  “Would you mind breaking it to the others? Give them a chance to get used to the idea before I show up for real? I’ve got to go talk to Ender. Maybe he already knows they’ve just taken his entire leadership and given them armies. But if he doesn’t, I’ve got to tell him.”

  “Every Dragon toon leader?”

  “And every second.” He thought of saying, Sorry Rabbit got stuck with me. But Ender would never have said anything self-belittling like that. And if Bean was going to be a commander, he couldn’t start out with an apology. “I think Carn Carby had a good organization,” said Bean, “so I don’t expect to change any of the toon leadership for the first week, anyway, till I see how things go in practice and decide what shape we’re in for the kind of battles we’re going to start having now that most of the commanders are kids trained in Dragon.”

  Itú understood immediately. “Man, that’s going to be strange, isn’t it? Ender trained all you guys, and now you’ve got to fight each other.”

  “One thing’s for sure,” said Bean. “I have no intention of trying to turn Rabbit into a copy of Ender’s Dragon. We’re not the same kids and we won’t be fighting the same opponents. Rabbit’s a good army. We don’t have to copy anybody.”

  Itú grinned. “Even if that’s just bullshit, sir, it’s first-rate bullshit. I’ll pass it on.” He saluted.

  Bean saluted back. Then he jogged to Ender’s quarters.

  Ender’s mattress and blankets and pillow had been thrown out into the corridor. For a moment Bean wondered why. Then he saw that the sheets and mattress were still damp and bloody. Water from Ender’s shower. Blood from Bonzo’s face. Apparently Ender didn’t want them in his room.

  Bean knocked on the door.

  “Go away,” said Ender softly.

  Bean knocked again. Then again.

  “Come in,” said Ender.

  Bean palmed the door open.

  “Go away, Bean,” said Ender.

  Bean nodded. He understood the sentiment. But he had to deliver his message. So he just looked at his shoes and waited for Ender to ask him his business. Or yell at him. Whatever Ender wanted to do. Because the other toon leaders were wrong. Bean didn’t have any special relationship with Ender. Not outside the game.

  Ender said nothing. And continued to say nothing.

  Bean looked up from the ground and saw Ender gazing at him. Not angry. Just . . . watching. What does he see in me, Bean wondered. How well does he know me? What does he think of me? What do I amount to in his eyes?

  That was something Bean would probably never know. And he had come here for another purpose. Time to carry it out.

  He took a step closer to Ender. He turned his hand so the transfer slip was visible. He didn’t offer it to Ender, but he knew Ender would see it.

  “You’re transferred?” asked Ender. His voice sounded dead. As if he’d been expecting it.

  “To Rabbit Army,” said Bean.

  Ender nodded. “Carn Carby’s a good man. I hope he recognizes what you’re worth.”

  The words came to Bean like a longed-for blessing. He swallowed the emotion that welled up inside him. He still had more of his message to deliver.

  “Carn Carby was graduated today,” said Bean. “He got his notice while we were fighting our battle.”

  “Well,” said Ender. “Who’s commanding Rabbit then?” He didn’t sound all that interested. The question was expected, so he asked it.

  “Me,” said Bean. He was embarrassed; a smile came inadvertently to his lips.

  Ender looked at the ceiling and nodded. “Of course. After all, you’re only four years younger than the regular age.”

  “It isn’t funny,” said Bean. “I don’t know what’s going on here.” Except that the system seems to be running on sheer panic. “All the changes in the game. And now this. I wasn’t the only one transferred, you know. They graduated half the commanders, and transferred a lot of our guys to command their armies.”

  “Which guys?” Now Ender did sound interested.

  “It looks like—every toon leader and every assistant.”

  “Of course. If they decide to wreck my army, they’ll cut it to the ground. Whatever they’re doing, they’re thorough.”

  “You’ll still win, Ender. We all know that. Crazy Tom, he said, ‘You mean I’m supposed to figure out how to beat Dragon Army?’ Everybody knows you’re the best.” His words sounded empty even to himself. He wanted to be encouraging, but he knew that Ender knew better. Still he babbled on. “They can’t break you down, no matter what they—”

  “They already have.”

  They’ve broken trust, Bean wanted to say. That’s not the same thing. You aren’t broken. They’re broken. But all that came out of his mouth were empty, limping words. “No, Ender, they can’t—”

  “I don’t care about their game anymore, Bean,” said Ender. “I’m not going to play it anymore. No more practices. No more battles. They can put their little slips of paper on the floor all they want, but I won’t go. I decided that before I went through the door today. That’s why I had you go for the gate. I didn’t think it would work, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to go out in style.”

  I know that, thought Bean. You think I didn’t know that? But if it comes down to style, you certainly got that. “You should’ve seen William Bee’s face. He just stood there trying to figure out how he had lost when you only had seven boys who could wiggle their toes and he only had three who couldn’t.”

  “Why should I want to see William Bee’s face?” said Ender. “Why should I want to beat anybody?”

  Bean felt the heat of embarrassment in his face. He’d said the wrong thing. Only . . . he didn’t know what the right thing was. Something to make Ender feel better. Something to make him understand how much he was loved and honored.

  Only that love and honor were part of the burden Ender bore. There was nothing Bean could say that would not make it all the heavier on Ender. So he said nothing.

  Ender pressed his palms against his eyes. “I hurt Bonzo really bad today, Bean. I really hurt him bad.”

  Of course. All this other stuff, that’s nothing. What weighs on Ender is that terrible fight in the bathroom. The fight that your friends, your army, did nothing to prevent. And what hurts you is not the danger you were in, but the harm you did in protecting yourself.

  “He had it coming,” said Bean. He winced at his own words. Was that the best he could come up with? But what else could he say? No problem, Ender. Of course, he looked dead to me, and I’m probably the only kid in this school who actually knows what death looks like, but . . . no problem! Nothing to worry about! He had it coming!

  “I knocked him out standing up,” said Ender. “It was like he was dead, standing there. And I kept hurting him.”

  So he did know. And yet . . . he didn’t actually know. And Bean wasn’t about to tell him. There were times for absolute honesty between friends, but this wasn’t one of them.

  “I just wanted to make sure he never hurt me again.”

  “He won’t,” said Bean. “They sent him home.”

  “Already?”

  Bean told him what Itú had said. All the while, he felt like Ender could see that he was concealing something. Surely it was impossible to deceive Ender Wiggin.

  “I’m glad they graduated him,” said Ender.

  Some graduation. They’re going to bury him, or cremate him, or whatever they’re doing with corpses in Spain this year.

  Spain. Pablo de Noches, who saved his life, came from Spain. And now a body was going back there, a boy who turned killer in his heart, and died for it.

  I must be losing it, thought Bean. What does it matter that Bonzo was Spanish and Pablo de Noches was Spanish? What does it matter that anybody is anything?

  And while these thoughts ran through Bean’s mind, he babbled, trying to talk like someone who didn’t know anything, trying to reassure Ender but knowing that if Ender believed that he knew nothing, then his words were meaningless, and if Ender realized that Bean was only faking ignorance, then his words were all lies. “Was it true he had a whole bunch of guys gang up on you?” Bean wanted to run from the room, he sounded so lame, even to himself.

  “No,” said Ender. “It was just him and me. He fought with honor.”

  Bean was relieved. Ender was turned so deeply inward right now that he didn’t even register what Bean was saying, how false it was.

  “I didn’t fight with honor,” said Ender. “I fought to win.”

  Yes, that’s right, thought Bean. Fought the only way that’s worth fighting, the only way that has any point. “And you did. Kicked him right out of orbit.” It was as close as Bean could come to telling him the truth.

  There was a knock on the door. Then it opened, immediately, without waiting for an answer. Before Bean could turn to see who it was, he knew it was a teacher—Ender looked up too high for it to be a kid.

  Major Anderson and Colonel Graff.

  “Ender Wiggin,” said Graff.

  Ender rose to his feet. “Yes sir.” The deadness had returned to his voice.

  “Your display of temper in the battleroom today was insubordinate and is not to be repeated.”

  Bean couldn’t believe the stupidity of it. After what Ender had been through—what the teachers had put him through—and they have to keep playing this oppressive game with him? Making him feel utterly alone even now? These guys were relentless.

  Ender’s only answer was another lifeless “Yes sir.” But Bean was fed up. “I think it was about time somebody told a teacher how we felt about what you’ve been doing.”

  Anderson and Graff didn’t show a sign they’d even heard him. Instead, Anderson handed Ender a full sheet of paper. Not a transfer slip. A full-fledged set of orders. Ender was being transferred out of the school.

  “Graduated?” Bean asked.

  Ender nodded.

  “What took them so long?” asked Bean. “You’re only two or three years early. You’ve already learned how to walk and talk and dress yourself. What will they have left to teach you?” The whole thing was such a joke. Did they really think anybody was fooled? You reprimand Ender for insubordination, but then you graduate him because you’ve got a war coming and you don’t have a lot of time to get him ready. He’s your hope of victory, and you treat him like something you scrape off your shoe.

  “All I know is, the game’s over,” said Ender. He folded the paper. “None too soon. Can I tell my army?”

  “There isn’t time,” said Graff. “Your shuttle leaves in twenty minutes. Besides, it’s better not to talk to them after you get your orders. It makes it easier.”

  “For them or for you?” Ender asked.

  He turned to Bean, took his hand. To Bean, it was like the touch of the finger of God. It sent light all through him. Maybe I am his friend. Maybe he feels toward me some small part of the . . . feeling I have for him.

  And then it was over. Ender let go of his hand. He turned toward the door.

  “Wait,” said Bean. “Where are you going? Tactical? Navigational? Support?”

  “Command School,” said Ender.

  “Pre-command?”

  “Command.” Ender was out the door.

  Straight to Command School. The elite school whose location was even a secret. Adults went to Command School. The battle must be coming very soon, to skip right past all the things they were supposed to learn in Tactical and Pre-Command.

  He caught Graff by the sleeve. “Nobody goes to Command School until they’re sixteen!” he said.

  Graff shook off Bean’s hand and left. If he caught Bean’s sarcasm, he gave no sign of it.

  The door closed. Bean was alone in Ender’s quarters.

  He looked around. Without Ender in it, the room was nothing. Being here meant nothing. Yet it was only a few days ago, not even a week, when Bean had stood here and Ender told him he was getting a toon after all.

  For some reason what came into Bean’s mind was the moment when Poke handed him six peanuts. It was life that she handed to him then.

  Was it life that Ender gave to Bean? Was it the same thing?

  No. Poke gave him life. Ender gave it meaning.

  When Ender was here, this was the most important room in Battle School. Now it was no more than a broom closet.

  Bean walked back down the corridor to the room that had been Carn Carby’s until today. Until an hour ago. He palmed it—it opened. Already programmed in.

  The room was empty. Nothing in it.

  This room is mine, thought Bean.

  Mine, and yet still empty.

  He felt powerful emotions welling up inside him. He should be excited, proud to have his own command. But he didn’t really care about it. As Ender said, the game was nothing. Bean would do a decent job, but the reason he’d have the respect of his soldiers was because he would carry some of Ender’s reflected glory with him, a shrimpy little Napoleon flumping around wearing a man’s shoes while he barked commands in a little tiny child’s voice. Cute little Caligula, “Little Boot,” the pride of Germanicus’s army. But when he was wearing his father’s boots, those boots were empty, and Caligula knew it, and nothing he ever did could change that. Was that his madness?

  It won’t drive me mad, thought Bean. Because I don’t covet what Ender has or what he is. It’s enough that he is Ender Wiggin. I don’t have to be.

  He understood what this feeling was, welling up in him, filling his throat, making tears stand out in his eyes, making his face burn, forcing a gasp, a silent sob. He bit on his lip, trying to let pain force the emotion away. It didn’t help. Ender was gone.

  Now that he knew what the feeling was, he could control it. He lay down on the bunk and went into the relaxing routine until the need to cry had passed. Ender had taken his hand to say good-bye. Ender had said, “I hope he recognizes what you’re worth.” Bean didn’t really have anything left to prove. He’d do his best with Rabbit Army because maybe at some point in the future, when Ender was at the bridge of the flagship of the human fleet, Bean might have some role to play, some way to help. Some stunt that Ender might need him to pull to dazzle the Buggers. So he’d please the teachers, impress the hell out of them, so that they would keep opening doors for him, until one day a door would open and his friend Ender would be on the other side of it, and he could be in Ender’s army once again.

  19

  REBEL

  “Putting in Achilles was Graff’s last act, and we know there were grave concerns. Why not play it safe and at least change Achilles to another army?”

  “This is not necessarily a Bonzo Madrid situation for Bean.”

  “But we have no assurance that it’s not, sir. Colonel Graff kept a lot of information to himself. A lot of conversations with Sister Carlotta, for instance, with no memo of what was said. Graff knows things about Bean and, I can promise you, about Achilles as well. I think he’s laid a trap for us.”

  “Wrong, Captain Dimak. If Graff laid a trap, it was not for us.”

  “You’re sure of that?”

  “Graff doesn’t play bureaucratic games. He doesn’t give a damn about you and me. If he laid a trap, it’s for Bean.”

  “Well that’s my point!”

  “I understand your point. But Achilles stays.”

  “Why?”

  “Achilles’ tests show him to be of a remarkably even temperament. He is no Bonzo Madrid. Therefore Bean is in no physical danger. The stress seems to be psychological. A test of character. And that is precisely the area where we have the very least data about Bean, given his refusal to play the mind game and the ambiguity of the information we got from his playing with his teacher log-in. Therefore I think this forced relationship with his bugbear is worth pursuing.”

  “Bugbear or nemesis, sir?”

  “We will monitor closely. I will not be keeping adults so far removed that we can’t get there to intervene in time, the way Graff arranged it with Ender and Bonzo. Every precaution will be taken. I am not playing Russian roulette the way Graff was.”

  “Yes you are, sir. The only difference is that he knew he had only one empty chamber, and you don’t know how many chambers are empty because he loaded the gun.”

  On his first morning as commander of Rabbit Army, Bean woke to see a paper lying on his floor. For a moment he was stunned at the thought that he would be given a battle before he even met his army, but to his relief the note was about something much more mundane.

  Because of the number of new commanders, the tradition of not joining the commanders’ mess until after the first victory is abolished. You are to dine in the commanders’ mess starting immediately.

  It made sense. Since they were going to accelerate the battle schedule for everyone, they wanted to have the commanders in a position to share information right from the start. And to be under social pressure from their peers, as well.

  Holding the paper in his hand, Bean remembered how Ender had held his orders, each impossible new permutation of the game. Just because this order made sense did not make it a good thing. There was nothing sacred about the game itself that made Bean resent changes in the rules and customs, but the way the teachers were manipulating them did bother him.