by IGMS
It was inevitable, of course, that they enlisted Ender himself to read the part of Lucentio, the handsome young suitor of Bianca -- played, of course, by Alessandra. Dorabella herself read Kate the shrew, while Valentine was relegated to the part of the Widow. Valentine didn't even pretend not to want to read the part -- this was the most interesting thing going on in the ship, and why not be at the heart of it? She was Ender's sister; let people hear her voice, especially in the ribald, exaggerated part of the widow.
It was entertaining for Valentine to see how the men and boys who were cast in the many other parts focused on Dorabella. The woman had an incredible laugh, rich and throaty and contagious. To earn a laugh from her in this comedy was a fine thing, and the men all vied to please her. It made Valentine wonder if getting Ender and Alessandra together was really Dorabella's agenda? Perhaps it's what she thought she was doing, but in fact Dorabella held the center of the stage herself, and seemed to love having all eyes on her. She flirted with them all, fell in love with them all, and yet always seemed to be in a world of her own, too.
Has Kate the Shrew ever been played like this before?
Does every woman have what this Dorabella has? Valentine searched in her heart to find that kind of ebullience. I know how to have fun, Valentine insisted to herself. I know how to be playful.
But she knew there was always irony in her wit, a kind of snottiness in her banter. Alessandra's timidity covered everything she did -- she was bold in what she said, but it was as if her own words surprised and embarrassed her after the fact. Dorabella, however, was neither ironic nor frightened. Here was a woman who had faced all her dragons and slain them; now she was ready for the accolades of the admiring throng. She cried out Kate's dialogue from the heart, her rage, her passion, her petulance, her frustration, and finally her love. The final monologue, in which she submits to her husband's will, was so beautiful it made Valentine cry a little, and she thought: I wonder what it would be like to love and trust a man so much that I'd be willing to abase myself as Kate did. Is there something in women that makes us long to be humbled? Or is it something in human beings, that when we are overmastered, we rejoice in our subjection? That would explain a lot of history.
Since everyone who was interested in the play was already in it, and attending the rehearsals, it's not as if the actual performance was going to surprise anyone. Valentine almost asked the whole group, at the last rehearsal, "Why bother to put it on? We just did it, and it was wonderful."
But there was still a kind of excitement throughout the ship about the coming performance, and Valentine realized that rehearsal was not performance, no matter how well it went. And there would be others there after all, who had not been at the last rehearsal: Dorabella was going around inviting members of the crew, many of whom promised to come. And passengers who weren't in the play seemed excited about coming, and some were openly rueful about having declined to take part. "Next time," they said.
When they got to the theater at the appointed time, they found Jarrko standing at the door, a stiff, formal expression on his face. No, the theater would not be opened; by order of the Admiral, the play reading had been canceled.
"Ah, Governor Wiggin," said Jarrko.
A bad sign, if the title was back, thought Valentine.
"Admiral Morgan would like to see you at once, if you please, sir."
Ender nodded and smiled. "Of course," he said.
So Ender had expected this? Or was he really that perfectly poised, so it seemed that nothing surprised him?
Valentine started to go with him, but Jarrko touched her shoulder. "Please, Val," he whispered. "Alone."
Ender grinned at her and took off with real bounce in his step, as if he was truly excited to be going to see the admiral.
"What's this about?" Valentine asked Jarrko quietly.
"I can't say," he said. "Truly. Just have my orders. No play, theater closed for the night, would the Governor please come see the Admiral immediately."
So Valentine stayed with Jarrko, helping soothe the players and other colonists, whose reactions ranged from disappointment to outrage to revolutionary fervor. Some of them even started reciting lines there in the corridor, until Valentine asked them not to. "Poor Colonel Kitunen will be in trouble if you keep this up, and he's too nice to stop you himself."
The result was that everyone was quite angry with Admiral Morgan for his arbitrary cancellation of a completely harmless event. And Valentine herself couldn't help but wonder: What was the man thinking? Hadn't he ever heard of morale? Maybe he'd heard of it, but was against it.
Something was going on here, and Valentine began to wonder if somehow Ender was behind it. Could it be that in his own way, Ender was just as sneaky and snaky as Peter?
No. Not possible. Especially because Valentine could always see through Peter. Ender wasn't devious at all. He always said what he meant and meant what he said.
What is the boy doing?
Admiral Morgan kept Ender waiting outside his office for two full hours. It was exactly what Ender expected, however, so he closed his eyes and used the time to take a long, refreshing nap. He awoke to hear someone shouting from the other side of a door: "Well, wake him up and send him in, I'm ready!"
Ender sat up immediately, instantly aware of his surroundings. Even though he had never knowingly been in combat, he had acquired the military habit of remaining alert even when asleep. By the time the ensign whose duty was to waken him arrived, Ender was already standing up and smiling. "I understand it's time for my meeting with Admiral Morgan."
"Yes sir, if you please sir." The poor kid (well, six or seven years older than Ender, but still young to have an admiral yelling at him all day) was all over himself with eagerness to please Ender. So Ender made it a point to be visibly pleased. "He's in a temper," the ensign whispered.
"Let's see if I can cheer him up a little," said Ender.
"Not bloody likely," whispered the ensign. Then he had the door open. "Admiral Andrew Wiggin, sir." Ender stepped in as he was announced; the ensign beat a hasty retreat and shut the door behind him.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" demanded Admiral Morgan, his face livid. Since Ender had been napping for two hours, that meant either that Morgan had maintained his lividity throughout the interim, or he was able to switch it on at will, for effect. Ender was betting on the latter.
"I'm meeting with the captain of the ship, at his request."
"Sir," said Admiral Morgan.
"Oh, you don't need to call me sir," said Ender. "Andrew will do. I don't like to insist on the privileges of rank." Ender sat down in a comfortable chair beside Morgan's desk, instead of the stiff chair directly in front of it.
"On my ship you have no rank," said Morgan.
"I have no authority," said Ender. "But my rank travels with me."
"You are fomenting rebellion on my ship, coopting vital resources, subverting a mission whose primary purpose is to deliver you to the colony that you purport to be ready to govern."
"Rebellion? We're reading Taming of the Shrew, not Richard II."
"I'm still talking, boy! You may think you're toguro personified because you and your little chums played a videogame that turned out to be real, but I won't put up with this kind of subversion on my own ship! Whatever you did that made you famous and got you that ridiculous rank is over. You're in the real world now, and you're just a snot-nosed boy with delusions of grandeur."
Ender sat in silence, regarding him calmly.
"Now you can answer."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," said Ender.
Whereupon Morgan let fly with a string of obscenities and vulgarities that it sounded like he had collected the favorite sayings of the entire fleet. If he had been red-faced before, he was purple now. And through it all, Ender struggled to figure out what it was about a play reading that had the man so insanely angry.
When Morgan paused for breath, leaning -- no, slumping -- on the d
esk, Ender rose to his feet. "I think you had better prepare the charges for my court martial, Admiral Morgan."
"Court martial! I'm not going to court martial you, boy! I don't have to! I can have you put in stasis for the duration of the voyage on the authority of my signature alone!"
"Not a person of admiralty rank, I'm afraid," said Ender. "And it seems that formal charges in a court martial are the only way I'm going to get a coherent statement from you about what I have supposedly done to offend your dignity and cause such alarm."
"Oh, you want a formal statement? How about this: Hijacking all ansible communications for three hours so that we are effectively cut off from the rest of the known universe, how about that? Three hours means more than two days back in real time -- for all I know there's been a revolution, or my orders have changed, or any number of things might be happening and I can't even send a message to inquire!"
"That's a problem, certainly," said Ender. "But why would you think I have anything to do with it?"
"Because it's got your name all over it," said Morgan. "The message is addressed to you. And it's still coming in, coopting our entire ansible bandwidth."
"Doesn't it occur to you," said Ender gently, "that the message is to me, not from me?"
"From Wiggin, to Wiggin, eyes only, so deeply encrypted that none of the shipboard computers can crack it."
"You tried to crack a secure communication addressed to a ranking officer, without first asking the permission of that officer?"
"It's a subversive communication, boy, that's why I tried to crack it!"
"You know it's subversive because you can't crack it, and you tried to crack it because you know it's subversive," said Ender. He kept his voice soft and cheerful. Not because he knew that it would drive Morgan crazy that Ender remained unflappable -- that was just a bonus. He simply assumed that the entire exchange was being recorded to be used as evidence later, and Ender was not going to say a word or reveal an emotion that would not redound to his credit in some later court proceeding. So Morgan could be as abusive as he pleased -- Ender was not going to make a single statement that could be excerpted and used to make him look subversive or angry.
"I don't have to justify my actions to you," said Morgan. "I brought you here and canceled your supposed play reading so that you could open the transmission in front of me."
"Eyes only, secure communication -- I'm not sure it's proper for you to insist on watching."
"Either you open it right now, in front of me, or you go into stasis and you never get off this ship until it returns to Eros for your court martial."
Someone's court martial, thought Ender, but probably not mine.
"Let me have a look at it," said Ender. "Though I can't promise to open it, since I have no idea what it is or who it's from."
"It's from you," said Morgan acidly. "You arranged this before you left."
"I did not do so, Admiral Morgan," said Ender. "I assume you have a secure access point here in your office?"
"Come around here and open it now," said Morgan.
"I suggest you rotate the terminal, Admiral Morgan," said Ender.
"I said come sit here!"
"Respectfully, Admiral Morgan, there will be no vid of me sitting at your desk."
Morgan stared at him, his face growing redder again. Then he reached down and rotated the holodisplay on his desk so it faced Ender.
Ender leaned forward and poked a couple of menu choices in the holodisplay as Admiral Morgan came around behind him to watch. "Move slowly so I can see what you're doing."
"I'm doing nothing," said Ender.
"Then you're going into stasis, boy. You were never fit to be governor of anything. Just a child who's been praised way too much and completely spoiled. Nobody on that colony is going to pay any attention to you! The only way you could ever survive as governor would be if I backed you up -- and after this, you can be sure I'll do no such thing. You're finished in this game of let's pretend."
"As you wish, Admiral," said Ender. "But I'm doing nothing with this message because there's nothing I can do. It isn't addressed to me and I have no way of opening a secure comm that isn't mine."
"Do you think I'm a fool? Your name is all over it!"
"On the outside," said Ender, "it specifies Admiral Wiggin, which is me, because it was send from IFCom through a secure military channel and the intended recipient has no standing in the fleet. But as soon as you open it -- and this is a level of opening that your techs did immediately, I'm sure -- you'll see that the Wiggin to whom the secure portion of the message is addressed is not A. Wiggin or E. Wiggin, which would be me, but V. Wiggin, which is my sister, Valentine."
"Your sister?"
"Didn't your techs tell you that? And while the actual authority for the message is the Minister of Colonization himself, again, the real sender is P. Wiggin, and his title is given as Hegemon. I find that interesting. The only P. Wiggin I'm personally acquainted with is my older brother, Peter, and this would seem to imply that my brother is now Hegemon. Did you know that? I certainly didn't. He wasn't when I left."
A long silence came from Admiral Morgan behind him. Ender finally turned and looked at him -- again, doing his best to keep any hint of triumph from showing in his face. "I think my brother, the Hegemon, is writing a private communication to my sister, with whom he had a long collaborative relationship. Perhaps he seeks her counsel. But it has nothing to do with me. You know that I haven't seen my brother or communicated with him in any way since I first entered Battle School at the age of six. And I only entered into communication with my sister for a few weeks before our ship was launched. I'm sorry that it tied up your communications, but as I said, I don't know anything about it, and it has nothing to do with me."
Morgan walked back and sat down behind his desk. "I am astonished," said Morgan.
Ender waited.
"I am embarrassed," said Morgan. "It seemed to me that my ship's communications were under attack, and that the agent of this attack was Admiral Wiggin. In that light, your repeated meetings with a subset of the colonists, to which you have been inviting members of my crew, looked suspiciously like mutiny. So I treated it as mutiny. Now I find that my fundamental premise was incorrect."
"Mutiny is a serious business," said Ender. "Of course you were alarmed."
"It happens that your brother is Hegemon. Word came to me a week ago. Two weeks ago. A year ago Earth time, anyway."
"It's perfectly all right that you didn't tell me," said Ender. "I'm sure you thought I would have found out by other means."
"It did not cross my mind that this communication might be from him, and not to you."
"It's easy to overlook Valentine. She keeps to the background. It's just the way she is."
Morgan looked at Ender gratefully. "So you understand."
I understand you're a paranoid, power-hungry idiot, said Ender silently. "Of course I do," said Ender.
"Do you mind if I send for your sister?"
Suddenly it was "do you mind" -- but Ender had no interest in making Morgan squirm. "Please do. I'm as curious about this message as you are."
Morgan sent an ensign to bring her, and then sat down and tried to make small talk while they waited. He told two ostensibly amusing stories from his own training days -- he was never Battle School material, he came up "the hard way, through the ranks." It was clear that he resented Battle School and the implied inferiority of anyone who wasn't invited to attend.
Is that all this is? Ender wondered. The traditional rivalry between graduates of a service academy and those who didn't have such a head start?
Valentine came in to find Ender laughing at Morgan's story. "Val," said Ender, still chuckling. "We need you to help us with something." In a few moments he explained about the message that had preempted hours of ansible time, shutting everything else out. "It caused a lot of consternation, and naturally, Admiral Morgan has been concerned. It'll put our minds at ease if you can open the messa
ge right here and give us some idea of what it's about."
"I'll need to watch you open it," said Morgan.
"No you won't," said Valentine.
They looked at each other for a long moment.
"What Valentine meant to say," said Ender, "is that she doesn't want you to see her actual security procedures -- on a message from the Hegemon, you can understand her caution. But I'm sure that she'll let us know the contents of the message in some readily verifiable way." Ender looked at Valentine and gave her a mockingly cute smile and shrug. "For me, Val?"
He knew she would recognize this as a mockery of their relationship, put on entirely for Morgan's benefit; of course she played along. "For you, Mr. Potato Head. Where's the access?"
In moments, Valentine was sitting at the end of the desk, poking her way through the holodisplay. "Oh, this is only semi-secure," she said. "Just a fingerprint. Anybody could have gotten into it just by cutting off my finger. I'll have to tell Peter to use full security -- retina, DNA, heartbeat -- so that they have to keep me alive in order to get in. He just doesn't value me highly enough."
She sat there reading for a little while, then sighed. "I can't believe what an idiot Peter is. And Graff, for that matter. There's nothing in here that couldn't have been sent unsecured, and there's no reason why it couldn't have been sent piecemeal instead of in a single uninterruptible top-priority flow. It's just a bunch of articles and summaries and so on about events on Earth for the past couple of years. It seems that there are wars and rumors of wars." She glanced at Ender.
He got the King James Version reference -- he had memorized long passages of it as part of his strategy for dealing with a minor crisis in Battle School several years back. "Well, transmitting it certainly took time, and times, and half a time," he said.
"I'll need to -- I'd like to see some evidence that this is what you say," said Morgan. "You have to understand that anything that seemed to threaten the security of my ship and my mission must be verified."