It's costing you, Virlomi. You attacked my father, and through him, me. You tried to exile me--hoping my troublesome mother would disappear along with me. Well, I have attacked Ender Wiggin, and through him, you--and you very kindly have taken him in as your honored guest at precisely the moment when it was most useful to me.
Three days after his public tagging of Ender Wiggin, Achilles made his next move. This time, he used a surrogate writer--one of his brighter supporters, who could actually put sentences together coherently--to put out the allegation, disguised as a denial, that Virlomi's plan was to have Ender Wiggin himself murder Randall Firth on the trip to Earth. He would be sent into exile, supposedly, but he would never be seen again.
Randall Firth has offended, not just the Wiggin stooge Virlomi, but the whole hegemonistic conspiracy. He has to be eliminated, or so the story goes. But we have found no evidence to corroborate this account, and therefore we must dismiss it as nothing but a rumor, a mere suspicion. How else can we explain Wiggin's multiple secret meetings with Virlomi?
Randall Firth himself, when questioned, asserted that Virlomi is too intelligent to consort openly with Wiggin if she were planning any violent action against Firth. Therefore he fears nothing.
But we wonder: Does Virlomi count on Firth making that assumption, so that his guard will be down? Will she insist that he goes into stasis, from which Wiggin, aboard the ship, will make sure he never wakes up? It would be so easy to call it an accident.
Firth is too brave for his own good. His friends are more worried about him than he is about himself.
This time Achilles' foray brought a response from Virlomi--which was, after all, what he wanted. "Andrew Wiggin's visit here is an obvious coincidence--he set out on his voyage when Randall Firth was still an infant on a starship and Ganges Colony had not even been founded."
"This is an obvious non denial denial," wrote Achilles' surrogate. "Virlomi says that it is a coincidence that Wiggin is here. She does not say that Randall Firth will not be at Wiggin's mercy on his voyage of 'exile'--or, as some assert, 'death.'"
The colony was now riven with heated arguments, and Achilles noted with delight that there were even Indians now on the side that said, "You can't send Randall out on the same ship with Wiggin." "Isn't Wiggin the one who already murdered two children?" "Randall Firth's crime is not worthy of the death penalty."
There was a groundswell building to commute Randall Firth's sentence and keep him on Ganges. Meanwhile, there was even talk of arresting Ender Wiggin for his crimes against humanity. Achilles publicized these proposals by making statements opposing them. "The statute of limitations has surely passed, even for the monstrous crime of xenocide," he wrote. "It has been sixty-one years since Ender Wiggin wiped out the hive queens. What court has jurisdiction now?"
By now the demand from Earth was so great that any writings of Achilles or his surrogates were being moved up to a higher priority in the queue. On Earth, there were open demands that the I.F. arrest Andrew Wiggin and bring him back to Earth for trial, and polls showing that a small but growing minority was demanding justice for the murder of the hive queens.
It was time for Randall Firth to meet Ender Wiggin face to face.
It was easy enough to arrange. Achilles' supporters kept watch on Wiggin, and when he, his sister, and the governor passed along the banks of the great river one morning, Achilles was there--alone.
Virlomi stiffened when she saw him, and tried to draw Ender away, but Wiggin strode forward to meet Achilles and held out his hand. "I've wanted to meet you, Mr. Firth," he said. "I'm Andrew Wiggin."
"I know who you are," said Achilles, letting scorn and amusement into his voice.
"Oh, I doubt that," said Ender, his apparent amusement even greater. "But I've been wanting to see you, and I think the governor has been trying to keep us apart. I know you have been aching for this moment."
Achilles wanted to say, What do you know about me? But he knew that's what Wiggin wanted him to say--that Wiggin wanted to determine the course of the conversation. So instead he asked, "Why would you want to see me? You're the celebrity, I think."
"Oh, we're both quite famous enough," said Ender, now chuckling outright. "Me for what I've done. You for what you've said."
And with that, Ender smiled. Mockingly?
"Are you trying to goad me into some ill-considered action, Mr. Wiggin?"
"Please," said Ender. "Call me Andrew."
"The name of a Christian saint," said Achilles. "I prefer to call you by the name of a monstrous war criminal...Ender."
"If there were some way to bring back the hive queens," said Ender, "and restore them to their former glory and power, would you do it, Mr. Firth?"
Achilles recognized the trap at once. It was one thing to read The Hive Queen and shed a tear for a vanished race. It was quite another to wish for them to return--it was an invitation for headlines saying, "Leader of Natives Movement would bring back formics," along with grisly pictures from the Scouring of China.
"I don't indulge in hypotheticals," said Achilles.
"Except the hypothetical charge that I plan to kill you in your sleep during the voyage back to Earth."
"Not my accusation," said Achilles. "I was quoted in your defense."
"Your 'defense' is the only reason anyone heard of the accusation," said Ender. "Please don't think that I'm fooled."
"Who would hope to fool a genius like you?"
"Well, we've sparred long enough. I just wanted to look at you."
Achilles made a flamboyant turn, so Ender could inspect him from all sides. "Is that enough?"
Suddenly tears came into Ender's eyes.
What game was he playing now?
"Thank you," Ender said. Then he turned away to rejoin his sister and the governor.
"Wait," said Achilles. He didn't understand what that teary-eyed thing meant, and it disconcerted him.
But Wiggin didn't wait, or turn back. He simply walked to the others and they turned away from the river, walking back into the city.
Achilles had meant this confrontation--which was being recorded by zoom lens and microphone--for a propaganda vid. He had expected to be able to goad Ender into some rash statement or absurd denial. Even a clip of Ender angry would have done the job. But he was unflappable, he had fallen into no traps, and with that last bit of maudlin emotion he may well have set or sprung one, though Achilles could not think of what the trap might be.
An unsatisfactory encounter in every way. And yet he could not explain to his followers why he didn't want to use the vid they had so painstakingly created. So he allowed them to post it, then waited for the other shoe to drop.
No one on Earth knew what to make of it, either. Commentators noticed the tears in Ender's eyes, of course, and speculated about it. Some Nativists proclaimed it to be crocodile tears--the weeping of the predator at the coming fate of his victim. But some saw something else. "Ender Wiggin did not look the part he's been cast in--the killer, the monster. Instead, he seemed to be a gentle young man, bemused at the obviously planned confrontation. At the end, those infamous tears seemed to me to be a kind of compassion. Perhaps even love for his challenger. Who is trying to pick the fight here?"
That was terrible--but it was only one voice among many. And Achilles' supporters on Earth quickly replied: Who would dare to pick a fight with Ender the Xenocide? It always turns out so badly for those who do.
All his life, Achilles had been able to control things. Even when unexpected things happened, he had adapted, analyzed, and learned. This time he had no idea what to learn.
"I don't know what he's doing, Mother," said Achilles.
She stroked his head. "Oh, my poor darling," she said. "Of course you don't, you're such an innocent. Just like your father. He never saw their plots. He trusted that Suriyawong monster."
Achilles didn't actually like it when she talked that way. "It's not our place to pity him, Mother."
"But I do. He had suc
h great gifts, but in the end, his trusting nature betrayed him. It was his tragic flaw, that he was too kind and good."
Achilles had studied his father's life and had seen strength and hardness, the willingness to do whatever was necessary. Compassion and a trusting nature were not obvious attributes of Achilles the Great, however.
Let Mother sentimentalize him as she wished. After all, didn't she now "remember" that Achilles the Great had actually visited her and slept with her in order to conceive a son? Yet when he was little she had made no such claim, and had talked of the messenger who arranged to have her ova fertilized with Achilles' precious sperm. From that--and many other examples of shifting memory--he knew that she was no longer a reliable witness.
Yet she was the only one who knew his true name. And she loved him with perfect devotion. He could talk to her without fear of censure.
"This Ender Wiggin," he said. "I can't read him."
"I'm glad you can't understand the mind of a devil."
But she had not called him a devil until Achilles' own propaganda campaign against him. She had ignored Ender Wiggin, because he had never actually fought against her precious Achilles Flandres, even if his brother had.
"I don't know what to do with him now, Mother."
"Well, you'll avenge your father, of course."
"Ender didn't kill him."
"He's a killer. He deserves to die."
"Not at my hands, Mother."
"The son of Achilles the Great slays the monster," said Mother. "No better hands than yours."
"They would call me a murderer."
"They called your father by that name as well," she said. "Are you better than him?"
"No, Mother."
She seemed to think that closed the discussion. He was disconcerted. Was she saying she wanted him to murder a man?
"Let the Hegemon's nearest blood pay for the murder of my Achilles," she said. "Let all the Wiggins be extinguished. All that vicious tribe."
Oh, no, she was in her bloody vengeance mood. Well, he had brought it on, hadn't he? He knew better. Now he'd have to hear her out.
On and on she went, about how great crimes could only be expunged by the shedding of blood. "Peter Wiggin outsmarted us by dying of his heart attack while we were on the voyage," she said. "But now his brother and sister have come to us. How can you pass up what fate has brought into your hands?"
"I'm not a murderer, Mother."
"Vengeance for your father's death is not murder. Who do you think you are, Hamlet?"
And on and on she went.
Usually when she went off like this, Achilles only half-listened. But now the words dug at him. It really did feel like some kind of portentous fate that brought Wiggin to him at this very time. It was irrational--but only mathematics was rational, and not always at that. In the real world, irrational things happened, impossible coincidences happened, because probability required that coincidences rarely, but not never, occur.
So instead of ignoring her, he found himself wondering: How could I arrange for Ender Wiggin to die without having to kill him myself?
And from there, he went on to a more subtle plan: I have already half destroyed Ender Wiggin--how could I complete the process?
To murder him would make a martyr of him. But if Wiggin could be provoked into killing again--killing another child--he would be destroyed forever. It was his pattern. He sensed a rival; he goaded him into making an attack; then he killed him in self-defense. Twice he had done it and been exonerated. But his protectors weren't here--they were almost certainly all dead. Only the facts remained.
Could I get him to follow the pattern again?
He told his idea to his mother.
"What are you talking about?" she said.
"If he murders again--this time a sixteen-year-old, but still a child, no matter how tall--then his reputation will be destroyed forever. They'll put him on trial, they'll convict him this time--they can't believe he just happened to kill in 'self-defense' three times!--and that will be a far more thorough destruction than a merely ending the life of his body. I'll destroy his name forever."
"You're talking about letting him kill you?"
"Mother, people don't have to let Ender Wiggin kill them. They just have to provide him with the pretext, and he does the rest quite nicely by himself."
"But--you? Die?"
"As you said, Mother. To destroy Father's enemies is worth any sacrifice."
She leapt to her feet. "I didn't give birth to you just so you could throw your life away! You're half a head taller than him--he's a dwarf compared to you. How could he possibly kill you?"
"He was trained as a soldier. And not that long ago, Mother. What have I been trained as? A farmer. A mechanic. Whatever odd jobs have been required of a teenager who happens to be preternaturally large and clever and strong. Not war. Not fighting. I haven't fought anyone since I was so tiny and had to battle constantly to keep them from picking on me."
"Your father and I did not conceive you so that you could die at the hands of a Wiggin, like your father did!"
"Technically, Father died at the hands of a Delphiki. Julian to be precise."
"Delphiki, Wiggin--sides of the same coin. I forbid you to let him kill you."
"I told you, Mother. He'll find a way. It's what he does. He's a warrior."
"No!"
It took two hours to calm her down, and before that he had to put up with crying and screaming--he knew the neighbors had to be listening and trying to make sense of it. But finally she was asleep.
He went to the stock control office and used the computer there to send Wiggin a message:
I believe that I've misjudged you. How can we end this?
He did not expect an answer until the next day. But it came before he could log off.
When and where would you like to meet?
Was it really going to be this easy?
The time and place didn't matter much. It had to be a time and place where they couldn't be stopped by Virlomi and her minions; but there had to be enough light to make a vid. What good would it be to die for his father's sake, only to have the deed unrecorded, so that Wiggin could spin it however he wanted, and thus get away with yet another murder?
They made the appointment. Achilles logged off.
And then he sat there, trembling. What have I done? This really is Ender Wiggin. I really have set up my own death. I'm bigger and stronger than he is--but so were the two boys he already killed. The hive queens were stronger, too, and look what that got them. Ender Wiggin did not lose.
This is what I was born for. This is what Mother has instilled in me from infancy. I exist to vindicate my father. To destroy the Hegemony, to bring down all the works of Peter Wiggin. Well, maybe that's not possible. But bringing down Ender Wiggin--I can do that merely by getting him to kill me and letting the world see how it happened. Mother will grieve--but grief is her lifeblood anyway.
If he's so smart, he must know what I'm planning. He can't believe that I'd suddenly change my mind. How could I fool Ender Wiggin with such an obvious plan? He must guess that I'll be having everything recorded.
But maybe he doesn't think he'll have to kill me. Maybe he thinks I'm such an easy opponent that he can defeat me without killing me. Maybe he thinks I'm such a giant oaf that I'll never even land a blow.
Or maybe I'm overestimating his cleverness. After all, he went through a whole war against an alien enemy and never once suspected that it wasn't a computer or his teachers playing a simulation with him. How dumb is that?
I'll go. I'll see what happens. I'm ready to die, but only if it will bring him down.
They met two days later, at first light, behind the composting bins. No one would come here--the smell made people avoid it when they didn't have to go there, and vegetative waste was dumped only at the end of a day's work.
His friends had rigged the cameras to cover the whole area. Every word would be recorded. Ender probably guessed that this w
ould be the case--hadn't Achilles done all his work with propaganda on the nets?--but even if Ender walked away, the confrontation would probably be rancorous and work against him. And if he didn't, Achilles simply wouldn't use it.
Several times during the previous day, Achilles had thought of the possibility of dying and each time it was like a different person was hearing the news. Sometimes it seemed almost funny--Achilles was so strong, so much taller, with so much greater a mass and reach. Other times it seemed inevitable but pointless, and he thought: How stupid am I, to throw my life away on an empty gesture toward the dead.
But by the end of the day, he realized: I'm not doing this for my father. I'm not doing it because my mother raised me for vengeance. I'm doing it for the sake of the human race as a whole. The great monsters of history were almost never held accountable. They died of old age, or lived out their lives in pampered exile, or--faced with defeat--they killed themselves.
Being Ender Wiggin's last victim is worth it, not for some private family quarrel, but because the world must see that great criminals like Ender Wiggin did not go unpunished. Eventually they committed one crime too many and they were brought to account.
And I will be the last victim, the one whose death brought down Ender the Xenocide.
Another part of him said, Don't believe your own propaganda.
Another part of him said, Live!
But he answered them: If there's one true thing about Ender Wiggin, it's that he cannot bear to lose. That's how I will tempt him--I will make him stare defeat in the face, and he will lash out to avoid it--and when he kills me, then he really will be defeated. It is his fatal flaw--that he can be manipulated by facing him with defeat.
Deep inside him, a question tried to surface where he would have to deal with it: Doesn't this mean that it's not his fault, because he really had no choice but to destroy his enemies?
But Achilles immediately tamped down that quibble. We're all just the product of our genes and upbringing, combined with the random events of our lifetime. "Fault" and "blame" are childish concepts. What matters is that Ender's actions have been monstrous, and will continue to be monstrous unless he is stopped. As it is, he might live forever, surfacing here and there to stir up trouble. But I will put an end to it. Not vengeance, but prevention. And because he will be an example, perhaps other monsters will be stopped before they have killed so often, and so many.