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"The final step in your testing was to see what would happen when the monitor came off. We don't always do it that way, but in your case--"
"And he passed?" Mother was incredulous. "Putting the Stilson boy in the hospital? What would you have done if Andrew had killed him, given him a medal?"
"It isn't what he did, Mrs. Wiggin. It's why." Colonel Graff handed her a folder full of papers. "Here are the requisitions. Your son has been cleared by the I.F. Selective Service. Of course we already have your consent, granted in writing at the time conception was confirmed, or he could not have been born. He has been ours from then, if he qualified."
Father's voice was trembling as he spoke. "It's not very kind of you, to let us think you didn't want him, and then to take him after all."
"And this charade about the Stilson boy," Mother said.
"It wasn't a charade, Mrs. Wiggin. Until we knew what Ender's motivation was, we couldn't be sure he wasn't another--we had to know what the action meant. Or at least what Ender believed that it meant."
"Must you call him that stupid nickname?" Mother began to cry. "That's the name he calls himself."
"What are you going to do, Colonel Graff?" Father asked. "Walk out the door with him now?"
"That depends," said Graff.
"On what?"
"On whether Ender wants to come."
Mother's weeping turned to bitter laughter. "Oh, so it's voluntary after all, how sweet!"
"For the two of you, the choice was made when Ender was conceived. But for Ender, the choice has not been made at all. Conscripts make good cannon fodder, but for officers we need volunteers."
"Officers?" Ender asked. At the sound of his voice, the others fell silent. "Yes," said Graff. "Battle School is for training future starship captains and commodores of flotillas and admirals of the fleet."
"Let's not have any deception here!" Father said angrily. "How many of the boys at the Battle School actually end up in command of ships!"
"Unfortunately, Mr. Wiggin, that is classified information. But I can say that none of our boys who makes it through the first year has ever failed to receive a commission as an officer. And none has retired from a position of lower rank than chief executive officer of an interplanetary vessel. Even in the domestic defense forces within our own solar system, there's honor to be had."
"How many make it through the first year?" asked Ender.
"All who want to," said Graff.
Ender almost said, I want to. But he held his tongue. This would keep him out of school, but that was stupid, that was just a problem for a few days. It would keep him away from Peter--that was more important, that might be a matter of life itself. But to leave Mother and Father, and above all, to leave Valentine. And become a soldier. Ender didn't like fighting. He didn't like Peter's kind, the strong against the weak, and he didn't like his own kind either, the smart against the stupid.
"I think," Graff said, "that Ender and I should have a private conversation."
"No," Father said.
"I won't take him without letting you speak to him again," Graff said. "And you really can't
stop me."
Father glared at Graff a moment longer, then got up and left the room. Mother paused to squeeze Ender's hand. She closed the door behind her when she left.
"Ender," Graff said, "if you come with me, you won't be back here for a long time. There aren't any vacations from Battle School. No visitors, either. A full course of training lasts until you're sixteen years old--you get your first leave, under certain circumstances, when you're twelve. Believe me, Ender, people change in six years, in ten years. Your sister Valentine will be a woman when you see her again, if you come with me. You'll be strangers. You'll still love her, Ender, but you won't know her. You see I'm not pretending it's easy."
"Mom and Daddy?"
"I know you, Ender. I've been watching the monitor disks for some time. You won't miss your mother and father, not much, not for long. And they won't miss you long, either."
Tears came to Ender's eyes, in spite of himself. He turned his face away, but would not reach up to wipe them.
"They do love you, Ender. But you have to understand what your life has cost them. They were born religious, you know. Your father was baptized with the name John Paul Wieczorek. Catholic. The seventh of nine children."
Nine children. That was unthinkable. Criminal.
