The psychiatrist turned red. Petra liked that. He was stupid, and he didn’t like hearing it, but he definitely needed to hear it because he clearly had built his whole life around the idea that he was smart, and now that he was playing with live ammunition, thinking he was smart was going to get him killed.

  “I suppose you’re right, that the driver does know where we’re going first, even if he doesn’t know where we plan to go from the first rendezvous.” The psychiatrist shrugged elaborately. “But that can’t be helped. You have to trust someone.”

  “And you decided to trust this driver because . . . ?”

  The psychiatrist looked away.

  Petra looked at the other man. “You’re talkative.”

  “I am think,” said the man in halting Common, “you make Battle School teachers crazy with talk.”

  “Ah,” said Petra. “You’re the brains of the outfit.”

  The man looked puzzled, but also offended—he wasn’t sure how he had been insulted, since he probably didn’t know the word outfit, but he knew an insult had been intended.

  “Petra Arkanian,” said the psychiatrist, “since you’re right that I don’t know the driver all that well, tell me what I should have done. You have a better plan than trusting him?”

  “Of course,” said Petra. “You tell him the rendezvous point, plan with him very carefully how he’ll drive there.”

  “I did that,” said the psychiatrist.

  “I know,” said Petra. “Then, at the last minute, just as you’re loading me into the van, you take the wheel and make him ride in one of the limousines. And then you drive to a different place entirely. Or better yet, you take me to the nearest town and turn me loose and let me take care of myself.”

  Again, the psychiatrist looked away. Petra was amused at how transparent his body language was. You’d think a shrink would know how to conceal his own tells.

  “These people who kidnapped you,” said the psychiatrist, “they are a tiny minority, even within the intelligence organizations they work for. They can’t be everywhere.”

  Petra shook her head. “You’re a Russian, you were taught Russian history, and you actually believe that the intelligence service can’t be everywhere and hear everything? What, did you spend your entire childhood watching American vids?”

  The psychiatrist had had enough. Putting on his finest medical airs, he delivered his ultimate put-down. “And you’re a child who never learned decent respect. You may be brilliant in your native abilities, but that doesn’t mean you understand a political situation you know nothing about.”

  “Ah,” said Petra. “The you’re-just-a-child, you-don’t-have-as-much-experience argument.”

  “Naming it doesn’t mean it’s untrue.”

  “I’m sure you understand the nuances of political speeches and maneuvers. But this is a military operation.”

  “It is a political operation,” the psychiatrist corrected her. “No shooting.”

  Again, Petra was stunned at the man’s ignorance. “Shooting is what happens when military operations fail to achieve their purposes through maneuver. Any operation that’s intended to physically deprive the enemy of a valued asset is military.”

  “This operation is about freeing an ungrateful little girl and sending her home to her mama and papa,” said the psychiatrist.

  “You want me to be grateful? Open the door and let me out.”

  “The discussion is over,” said the psychiatrist. “You can shut up now.”

  “Is that how you end your sessions with your patients?”

  “I never said I was a psychiatrist,” said the psychiatrist.

  “Psychiatry was your education,” said Petra. “And I know you had a practice for a while, because real people don’t talk like shrinks when they’re trying to reassure a frightened child. Just because you got involved in politics and changed careers doesn’t mean you aren’t still the kind of bonehead who goes to witch-doctor school and thinks he’s a scientist.”

  The man’s fury was barely contained. Petra enjoyed the momentary thrill of fear that ran through her. Would he slap her? Not likely. As a psychiatrist, he would probably fall back on his one limitless resource—professional arrogance.

  “Laymen usually sneer at sciences they don’t understand,” said the psychiatrist.

  “That,” said Petra, “is precisely my point. When it comes to military operations, you’re a complete novice. A layman. A bone-head. And I’m the expert. And you’re too stupid to listen to me even now.”

  “Everything is going smoothly,” said the psychiatrist. “And you’ll feel very foolish and apologize as you thank me when you get on the plane to return to Armenia.”

  Petra only smiled tightly. “You didn’t even look in the cab of this delivery van to make sure it was the same driver before we drove off.”

  “Someone else would have noticed if the driver changed,” said the psychiatrist. But Petra could tell she had finally made him uneasy.

  “Oh, yes, I forgot, we trust your fellow conspirators to see all and miss nothing, because, after all, they aren’t psychiatrists.”

  “I’m a psychologist,” he said.

  “Ouch,” said Petra. “That must have hurt, to admit you’re only half-educated.”

  The psychologist turned away from her. What was the term the shrinks in Ground School used for that behavior—avoidance? Denial? She almost asked him, but decided to leave well enough alone.

  And people thought she couldn’t control her tongue.

  They rode for a while in bristling silence.

  But the things she said must have been working on him, nagging at him. Because after a while he got up and walked to the front and opened the door between the cargo area and the cab.

  A deafening gunshot rang through the closed interior, and the psychiatrist fell back. Petra felt hot brains and stinging bits of bone spatter her face and arms. The man across from her started reaching for a weapon under his coat, but he was shot twice and slumped over dead without touching it.

  The door from the cab opened the rest of the way. It was Achilles standing there, holding the gun in his hand. He said something.

  “I can’t hear you,” said Petra. “I can’t even hear my own voice.”

  Achilles shrugged. Speaking louder and mouthing the words carefully, he tried again. She refused to look at him.

  “I’m not going to try to listen to you,” she said, “while I still have his blood all over me.”

  Achilles set down the gun—far out of her reach—and pulled off his shirt. Bare-chested, he handed it to her, and when she refused to take it, he started wiping her face with it until she snatched it out of his hands and did the job herself.

  The ringing in her ears was fading, too. “I’m surprised you didn’t wait to kill them until you’d had a chance to tell them how smart you are,” said Petra.

  “I didn’t need to,” said Achilles. “You already told them how dumb they were.”

  “Oh, you were listening?”

  “Of course the compartment back here was wired for sound,” said Achilles. “And video.”

  “You didn’t have to kill them,” said Petra.

  “That guy was going for his gun,” said Achilles.

  “Only after his friend was dead.”

  “Come now,” said Achilles. “I thought Ender’s whole method was the preemptive use of ultimate force. I only do what I learned from your hero.”

  “I’m surprised you did this one yourself,” said Petra.

  “What do you mean, ‘this one’?” said Achilles.

  “I assumed you were stopping the other rescues, too.”

  “You forget,” said Achilles, “I’ve already had months to evaluate you. Why keep the others, when I can have the best?”

  “Are you flirting with me?” She said it with as much disdain as she could muster. Those words usually worked to shut down a boy who was being smug. But he only laughed.

  “I don’t flirt,” he said.

  “I forgot,” said Petra. “You shoot first, and then flirting isn’t necessary.”

  That got to him a little—made him pause a moment, brought the slightest hint of a quickening of breath. It occurred to Petra that her mouth was indeed going to get her killed. She had never actually seen someone get shot before, except in movies and vids. Just because she thought of herself as the protagonist of this biographical vid she was trapped in didn’t mean she was safe. For all she knew, Achilles meant to kill her, too.

  Or did he? Could he have really meant that she was the only one of the team he was keeping? Vlad would be so disappointed.

  “How did you happen to choose me?” she asked, changing the subject.

  “Like I said, you’re the best.”

  “That is such kuso,” said Petra. “The exercises I did for you weren’t any better than anyone else’s.”

  “Oh, those battle plans, those were just to keep you busy while the real tests were going on. Or rather, to make you think you were keeping us busy.”

  “What was this real test, then, since I supposedly succeeded at it better than anyone else?”

  “Your little dragon drawing,” said Achilles.

  She could feel the blood drain from her face. He saw it and laughed.

  “Don’t worry,” said Achilles. “You won’t be punished. That was the test, to see which of you would succeed in getting a message outside.”

  “And my prize is staying with you?” She said it with all the disgust she could put in her voice.

  “Your prize,” said Achilles, “is staying alive.”

  She felt sick at heart. “Even you wouldn’t kill all the others, for no reason.”

  “If they’re killed, there’s a reason. If there’s a reason, they’ll be killed. No, we suspected that your dragon drawing would have some meaning to someone. But we couldn’t find a code in it.”

  “There wasn’t a code in it,” said Petra.

  “Oh yes there was,” said Achilles. “You somehow encoded it in such a way that someone was able to recognize it and decode it. I know this because the news stories that suddenly appeared, triggering this whole crisis, had some specific information that was more or less correct. One of the messages you guys tried to send must have gotten through. So we went back over every email sent by every one of you, and the only thing that couldn’t be accounted for was your dragon clip art.”

  “If you can read a message in that,” said Petra, “then you’re smarter than I am.”

  “On the contrary,” said Achilles. “You’re smarter than I am, at least about strategy and tactics—like evading the enemy while keeping in close communication with allies. Well, not all that close, since it took them so long to publish the information you sent.”

  “You bet on the wrong horse,” said Petra. “It wasn’t a message, and therefore however they got the news it must have come from one of the other guys.”

  Achilles only laughed. “You’re a stubborn liar, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not lying when I tell you that if I have to keep riding with these corpses in this compartment, I’m going to get sick.”

  He smiled. “Vomit away.”

  “So your pathology includes a weird need to hang around with the dead,” said Petra. “You’d better be careful—you know where that leads. First you’ll start dating them, and then one day you’ll bring a dead person home to meet your mother and father. Oops. I forgot, you’re an orphan.”

  “So I brought them to show you.”

  “Why did you wait so long to shoot them?” asked Petra.

  “I wanted it set up just right. So I could shoot the one while he was standing in the doorway. So his body would block any returning fire from the other guy. And besides, I was also enjoying the way you took them apart. You know, arguing with them like you did. Sounded like you hate shrinks almost as much as I do. And you were never even committed to a mental institution. I would have applauded several of your best bon mots, only I might have been overheard.”

  “Who’s driving this van?” asked Petra, ignoring his flattery.

  “Not me,” said Achilles. “Are you?”

  “How long are you planning to keep me imprisoned?” asked Petra.

  “As long as it takes.”

  “As long as it takes to do what?”

  “Conquer the world together, you and I. Isn’t that romantic? Or, well, it will be romantic, when it happens.”

  “It will never be romantic,” said Petra. “Nor will I help you conquer your dandruff problem, let alone the world.”

  “Oh, you’ll cooperate,” said Achilles. “I’ll kill the other members of Ender’s jeesh, one by one, until you give in.”

  “You don’t have them,” said Petra. “And you don’t know where they are. They’re safe from you.”

  Achilles grinned mock-sheepishly. “There’s just no fooling Genius Girl, is there? But, you see, they’re bound to surface somewhere, and when they do, they’ll die. I don’t forget.”

  “That’s one way to conquer the world,” said Petra. “Kill everybody one by one until you’re the only one left.”

  “Your first job,” said Achilles, “is to decode that message you sent out.”

  “What message?”

  Achilles picked up his gun and pointed it at her.

  “Kill me and you’ll always wonder if I really sent out a message at all,” said Petra.

  “But at least I won’t have to listen to your smug voice lying to me,” said Achilles. “That would almost be a consolation.”

  “You seem to be forgetting that I wasn’t a volunteer on this expedition. If you don’t like listening to me, let me go.”

  “You’re so sure of yourself,” said Achilles. “But I know you better than you know yourself.”

  “And what is it you think you know about me?” asked Petra.

  “I know that you’ll eventually give in and help me,”

  “Well, I know you better than you know yourself, too,” said Petra.

  “Oh, really?”

  “I know that eventually you’ll kill me. Because you always do. So let’s just skip all the boring stuff in between. Kill me now. End the suspense.”

  “No,” said Achilles. “Things like that are much better as a surprise. Don’t you think? At least, that’s the way God always did it.”

  “Why am I even talking to you?” asked Petra.

  “Because you’re so lonely after being in solitary for all these months that you’d do anything for human company. Even talk to me.”

  She hated that he was probably right. “Human company—apparently you’re under the delusion that you qualify.”

  “Oh, you’re mean,” said Achilles, laughing. “Look, I’m bleeding.”

  “You’ve got blood on your hands, all right.”

  “And you’ve got it all over your face,” said Achilles. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

  “And here I thought nothing would ever be more tedious than solitary confinement.”

  “You’re the best, Petra,” said Achilles. “Except for one.”

  “Bean,” said Petra.

  “Ender,” said Achilles. “Bean is nothing. Bean is dead.”

  Petra said nothing.

  Achilles looked at her searchingly. “No smart remarks?”

  “Bean is dead and you’re alive,” said Petra. “There’s no justice.”

  The van slowed down and stopped.

  “There,” said Achilles. “Our lively conversation made the time fly by.”

  Fly. She heard an airplane overhead. Landing or taking off?

  “Where are we flying?” she asked.

  “Who says we’re flying anywhere?”

  “I think we’re flying out of the country,” said Petra, speaking the ideas as they came to her. “I think you realized that you were going to lose your cushy job here in Russia, and you’re sneaking out of the country.”

  “You’re really very good. You keep setting a new standard for cleverness,” said Achilles.

  “And you keep setting a new standard for failure.”

  He hesitated a moment, then went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “They’re going to pit the other kids against me,” he said. “You already know them. You know their weaknesses. Whoever I’m up against, you’re going to advise me.”

  “Never.”

  “We’re in this together,” said Achilles. “I’m a nice guy. You’ll like me, eventually.”

  “Oh, I know,” said Petra. “What’s not to like?”

  “Your message,” said Achilles. “You wrote it to Bean, didn’t you?”

  “What message?” said Petra.

  “That’s why you don’t believe he’s dead.”

  “I believe he’s dead,” said Petra. But she knew her earlier hesitation had given her away.

  “Or else you wonder—if he got your message before I had him killed, why did it take so long after he died to have it hit the news? And here’s the obvious answer, Pet. Somebody else figured it out. Somebody else decoded it. And that really pisses me off. So don’t tell me what the message said. I’m going to decode it myself. It can’t be that hard.”

  “Downright easy,” said Petra. “After all, I’m dumb enough to end up as your prisoner. So dumb, in fact, that I never sent anybody a message.”

  “When I do decode it, though, I hope it won’t say anything disparaging about me. Because then I’d have to beat the shit out of you.”

  “You’re right,” said Petra. “You are a charmer.”

  Fifteen minutes later, they were on a small private jet, flying south by southeast. It was a luxurious vehicle, for its size, and Petra wondered if it belonged to one of the intelligence services or to some faction in the military or maybe to some crime lord. Or maybe all three at once.

  She wanted to study Achilles, watch his face, his body language. But she didn’t want him to see her showing interest in him. So she looked out the window, wondering as she did so whether she wasn’t just doing the same thing the dead psychologist had done—looking away to avoid facing bitter truth.

  When the chime announced that they could unbelt themselves, Petra got up and headed for the bathroom. It was small, but compared to commercial airplane toilets it was downright commodious. And it had cloth towels and real soap.