Ender's Shadow

though I warned you.”
      "Didn't you notice that you telephoned me on a regular exchange? I'm on Earth. Someone else is running Battle School.”
      "He's a serial murderer now, you know. Not just the girl in Rotterdam. There was a boy there, too, the one Helga called Ulysses. They found his body a few weeks ago.”
      "Achilles has been in medical care for the past year.”
      "The coroner estimates that the killing took place at least that long ago. The body was hidden behind some long-term storage near the fish market. It covered the smell, you see. And it goes on. A teacher at the school I put him in.”
      "Ah. That's right. You put him in a school long before I did.”
      "The teacher fell to his death from an upper story.”
      "No witnesses. No evidence.”
      "Exactly.”
      "You see a trend here?”
      "But that's my point. Achilles does not kill carelessly. Nor does he choose his victims at random. Anyone who has seen him helpless, crippled, beaten -- he can't bear the shame. He has to expunge it by getting absolute power over the person who dared to humiliate him.”
      "You're a psychologist now?”
      "I laid the facts before an expert.”
      "The supposed facts.”
      "I'm not in court, Colonel. I'm talking to the man who put this killer in school with the child who came up with the original plan to humiliate him. Who called for his death. My expert assured me that the chance of Achilles not striking against Bean is zero.”
      "It's not as easy as you think, in space. No dock, you see.”
      "Do you know how I knew you had taken him into space?”
      "I'm sure you have your sources, both mortal and heavenly.”
      "My dear friend, Dr. Vivian Delamar, was the surgeon who reconstructed Achilles's leg.”
      "As I recall, you recommended her.”
      "Before I knew what Achilles really was. When I found out, I called her. Warned her to be careful. Because my expert also said that she was in danger.”
      "The one who restored his leg? Why?”
      "No one has seen him more helpless than the surgeon who cuts into him as he lies there drugged to the gills. Rationally, I'm sure he knew it was wrong to harm this woman who did him so much good. But then, the some would apply to Poke, the first time he killed. If it was the first time.”
      "So ... Dr. Vivian Delamar. You alerted her. What did she see? Did he murmur a confession under anaesthetic?”
      "We'll never know. He killed her.”
      "You're joking.”
      "I'm in Cairo. Her funeral is tomorrow. They were calling it a heart attack until I urged them to look for a hypodermic insertion mark. Indeed they found one, and now it's on the books as a murder. Achilles does know how to read. He learned which drugs would do the job. How he got her to sit still for it, I don't know.”
      "How can I believe this, Sister Carlotta? The boy is generous, gracious, people are drawn to him, he's a born leader. People like that don't kill.”
      "Who are the dead? The teacher who mocked him for his ignorance when he first arrived in the school, showed him up in front of the class. The doctor who saw him laid out under anaesthetic. The street girl whose crew took him down. The street boy who vowed to kill him and made him go into hiding. Maybe the coincidence argument would sway a jury, but it shouldn't sway you.”
      "Yes, you've convinced me that the danger might well be real. But I already alerted the teachers at Battle School that there might be some danger. And now I really am not in charge of Battle School.”
      "You're still in touch . If you give them a more urgent warning, they'll take steps.”
      "I'll give the appropriate warning.”
      "You're lying to me.”
      "You can tell that over the phone?”
      "You want Bean exposed to danger!”
      "Sister ... yes, I do. But not this much of it. Whatever I can do, I'll do.”
      "If you let Bean come to harm, God will have an accounting from you.”
      "He'll have to get in line, Sister Carlotta. The I.F. court-martial takes precedence.”
     
      Bean looked down into the air vent in his quarters and marveled that he had ever been small enough to fit in there. What was he then, the size of a rat?
      Fortunately, with a room of his own now he wasn't limited to the outflow vents. He put his chair on top of his table and climbed up to the long, thin intake vents along the wall on the corridor side of his room. The vent trim pried out as several long sections. The paneling above