Enders In Exile

him.
In a good way. Whenever he wasn't actually busy with a meeting, he
would find himself thinking about her. The woman was simply amazing. So
willing. So eager to please. It was as if Morgan only had to think of
something and she was doing it. Morgan found himself looking for
excuses to go back to his quarters, and she was always there, always
happy to see him, always eager to listen, and her hands, touching him,
making it impossible for him to ignore her or leave as quickly as he
should.
    He'd heard from other
people that marriage was hellish. The honeymoon lasts a day, they said,
and then she starts demanding, insisting, complaining. All lies.
    Maybe it was only like
this with Dorabella. But if so, he was glad he had waited, so he could
marry the one in a million who could make a man truly happy.
    For he was besotted. He
knew the men joked about it behind his back—he caught their
smirks whenever he came back from a rendezvous with Dorabella for an
hour or two in the middle of the working day. Let them have their
laughs! It was all about envy.
    "Sir?" asked Wiggin.
    "Oh, yes," said Morgan.
It had happened again—in the middle of a conversation, he had
drifted off into thinking about Dorabella. "I have a lot on my mind,
and I think we're through here. Just be in the shuttle at
0800—that's when we're closing the doors, everything loaded
by the dawn watch. The descent will take several
hours, the shuttle pilot tells me, but nobody will be able to
sleep—you'll want to get to bed early to-night so you're well
rested. And it's better to enter the atmosphere on an empty stomach, if
you know what I mean."
    "Yes sir," said Wiggin.
    "Dismissed, then," said
Morgan.
    Wiggin saluted and
left. Morgan almost laughed out loud. The kid didn't realize that even
on Morgan's ship, Wiggin's seniority as a rear admiral entitled him to
courtesies, including the right to leave when he felt like it instead
of being dismissed like a subordinate. But it was good to keep the boy
in his place. Just because he had the office of admiral bestowed on him
before Morgan actually
earned
his didn't mean
Morgan had to pretend to show respect to an ignorant teenager.
    Wiggin was in his place
before Morgan got there, dressed in civilian clothes instead of
military uniform—which was all to the good, since it would
not be helpful for people to see that they had identical dress uniforms
and rank insignias, while Ender had markedly more battle decorations.
Morgan merely nodded to Wiggin and went to his own seat, in the front
of the shuttle with a communications array at his disposal.
    At first the shuttle
flight was normal space travel—smooth, perfectly controlled.
But as they orbited the planet and then dipped down into their point of
entry, the shuttle reoriented itself to have the shield meet and
dissipate the heat, which is when the bouncing and yawing and rolling
began. As the pilot told him beforehand, "Roll and yaw mean nothing. If
we start to pitch,
then
we've got problems."
    Morgan found himself
quite nauseated by the time they steadied out into smooth flight at ten
thousand meters. But poor Wiggin—the boy practically
flew
back to the head, where he was no doubt retching his poor head off.
Unless the kid had forgotten not to eat and really had something to
puke up.
    The landing went
smoothly, but Wiggin hadn't returned to his seat—he took the
landing in the head. And when the marines reported that the people were
gathering, Wiggin was still inside.
    Morgan went to the door
of the head himself and rapped on it. "Wiggin," he said, "it's time."
    "Just a few more
minutes, sir," said Wiggin. His voice sounded weak and
shaky. "Really. Looking at the skimmers will keep them busy for a few
minutes, and then they'll meet us with a cheer."
    It hadn't crossed
Morgan's mind to send the skimmers out ahead of his own entrance, but
Wiggin was right. If the people had already seen something wonderful
from Earth technology, it would make them all the more enthusiastic
when he came out himself. "They can't watch the skimmers forever,
Wiggin," said Morgan. "When it's time to go out, I hope you're ready to
join me."
    "I will," said Wiggin.
But then another retching sound gave the lie to that statement.
    Of course, retching
sounds could be made with or without nausea. Morgan had a momentary
suspicion and so he acted on it, opening the door without any warning.
    There was Wiggin,
kneeling in front of the john, his belly convulsing as his body arched
with