Ender's Game (Ender Wiggins Saga)

wanted to get back indoors. Everything was far away and flat; the ground, lacking the upward curve of Battle School floors, seemed instead to fall away, so that on level ground Ender felt as though he were on a pinnacle. The pull of real gravity felt different and he scuffed his feet when he walked. He hated it. He wanted to go back home, back to the Battle School, the only place in the universe where he belonged.
     
      "Arrested?”
      "Well, it's a natural thought. General Pace is the head of the military police. There was a death in the Battle School.”
      "They didn't tell me whether Colonel Graff was being promoted or court-martialed. Just transferred, with orders to report to the Polemarch.”
      "Is that a good sign or bad?”
      "Who knows? On the one hand, Ender Wiggin not only survived, he passed a threshold, he graduated in dazzlingly good shape, you have to give old Graff credit for that. On the other hand, there's the fourth passenger on the shuttle. The one traveling in a bag.”
      "Only the second death in the history of the school. At least it wasn't a suicide this time.”
      "How is murder better, Major Imbu?”
      "It wasn't murder, Colonel. We have it on video from two angles. No one can blame Ender.”
      "But they might blame Graff. After all this is over, the civilians can rake over our files and decide what was right and what was not. Give us medals where they think we were right, take away our pensions and put us in jail where they decide we were wrong. At least they had the good sense not to tell Ender that the boy died.”
      "Its the second time, too.”
      "They didn't tell him about Stilson, either.”
      "The kid is scary.”
      "Ender Wiggin isn't a killer. He just wins -- thoroughly. If anybody's going to be scared, let it be the buggers”
      "Makes you almost feel sorry for them, knowing Ender's going to be coming after them.”
      "The only one I feel sorry for is Ender. But not sorry enough to suggest they ought to let up on him. I just got access to the material that Graff's been getting all this time. About fleet movements, that sort of thing. I used to sleep easy at night.”
      "Time's getting short?”
      "I shouldn't have mentioned it. I can't tell you secured information.”
      "I know.”
      "Let's leave it at this: they didn't get him to Command School a day too soon. And maybe a couple of years too late.”

13
     
Valentine
     
     
      "Children?”
      "Brother and sister. They had layered themselves five times through the nets -- writing for companies that paid for their memberships, that sort of thing. Devil of a time tracking them down.”
      "What are they hiding?”
      "Could be anything. The most obvious thing to hide, though, is their ages. The boy is fourteen, the girl is twelve.”
      "Which one is Demosthenes?”
      "The girl. The twelve-year-old.”
      "Pardon me. I don't really think it's funny, but I can't help but laugh. All this time we've been worried, all the time we've been trying to persuade the Russians not to take Demosthenes too seriously, we held up Locke as proof that Americans weren't all crazy warmongers. Brother and sister, prepubescent--”
      "And their last name is Wiggin.”
      "Ah. Coincidence?”
      " The Wiggin is a third. They are one and two.”
      "Oh, excellent. The Russians will never believe--”
      "That Demosthenes and Locke aren't as much under our control as the Wiggin.”
      "Is there a conspiracy? Is someone controlling them?”
      "We have been able to detect no contact between these two children and any adult who might be directing them.”
      "That is not to say that someone might not have invented some method you can't detect. It's hard to believe that two children--”
      "I interviewed Colonel Graff when he arrived from the Battle School. It is his best judgment that nothing these children have done is out of their reach. Their abilities are virtually identical with -- the Wiggin. Only their temperaments are different. What surprised him, however, was the orientation of the two personas. Demosthenes is definitely the girl, but Graff says the girl was rejected for Battle School because she was too pacific, too conciliatory, and above all, too empathic.”
      "Definitely not Demosthenes.”
      "And the boy has the soul of a jackal.”
      "Wasn't it Locke that was recently praised as 'The only truly open mind in America'?”
      "It's hard to know what's really happening. But Graff