"What"s the fuss?" he asked.
"Somebody"s been writing messages using my name." Bernard was sullen.
"What message."
"It doesn"t matter what message!"
"It does to me." Dap picked up the nearest desk, which happened to belong to the boy" who bunked above Ender. Dap read it, smiled very slightly, gave back the desk.
"Interesting," he said.
"Aren"t you going to find out who did it?" demanded Bernard.
"Oh, I know who did it," Dap said.
Yes, Ender thought. The system was too easily broken. They mean us to break it, or sections of it. They know it was me.
"Well, who, then?" Bernard shouted.
"Are you shouting at me, soldier?" asked Dap, very softly.
At once the mood in the room changed. From rage on the part of Bernard"s closest friends and barely contained mirth among the rest, all became somber. Authority was about to speak.
"No, sir," said Bernard.
"Everybody knows that the system automatically puts on the name of the sender."
"I didn"t write that!" Bernard said.
"Shouting?" asked Dap.
"Yesterday someone sent a message that was signed G.o.d," Bernard said.
"Really?" said Dap. "I didn"t know he was signed onto the system." Dap turned and left, and the room filled with laughter.
Bernard"s attempt to be ruler of the room was broken-- only a few stayed with him now. But they were the most vicious. And Ender knew that until he was through watching, it would go hard on him. Still, the tampering with the system had done its work, Bernard was contained, and all the boys who had some quality were free of him. Best of all, Ender had done it without sending him to the hospital. Much better this way.
Then he settled down to the serious business of designing a security system for his own desk, since the safeguards built into the system were obviously inadequate. If a six-year-old could break them down, they were obviously put there as a plaything, not serious security. Just another game that the teachers set up for us. And this is one I"m good at.
"How did you do that?" Shen asked him at breakfast.
Ender noted quietly that this was the first time another Launchy from his own cla.s.s had sat with him at a meal. "Do what?" he asked.
"Send a message with a fake name. And Bernard"s name! That was great. They"re calling him b.u.t.t.w.a.tcher now. Just Watcher in front of the teachers, but everybody knows what he"s watching."
"Poor Bernard," Ender murmured. "And he"s so sensitive."
"Come on, Ender. You broke into the system. How"d you do it?"
Ender shook his head and smiled. "Thanks for thinking I"m bright enough to do that. I just happened to see it first, that"s all."
"OK, you don"t have to tell me," said Shen. "Still, it was great." They ate in silence for a moment. "Do I wiggle my b.u.t.t when I walk?"
"Naw." Ender said. "Just a little. Just don"t take such big long steps, that"s all."
Shen nodded.
"The only person who"d ever notice was Bernard."
"He"s a pig." said Shen.
Ender shrugged. "On the whole, pigs aren"t so bad."
Shen laughed. "You"re right. I wasn"t being fair to the pigs."
They laughed together, and two other Launchies joined them. Ender"s isolation was over. The war was just beginning.
CHAPTER 6
The Giant"s Drink
"We"ve had our disappointments in the past, hanging on for years, hoping they"ll pull through, and then they don"t. Nice thing about Ender, he"s determined to ice within the first six months."
"Oh?"
"Don"t you see what"s going on here? He"s stuck at the Giant"s Drink in the mind game. Is the boy suicidal? You never mentioned it."
"Everybody gets the Giant sometime."
"But Ender won"t leave it alone. Like Pinual."
"Everybody looks like Pinual at one time or another. But he"s the only one who killed himself. I don"t think it had anything to do with the Giant"s Drink."
"You"re betting my life on that. And look what he"s done with his launch group."
"Wasn"t his fault, you know."
"I don"t care. His fault or not, he"s poisoning that group. They"re supposed to bond, and right where he stands there"s a chasm a mile wide."
"I don"t plan to leave him there very long, anyway."
"Then you"d better plan again. That launch is sick, and he"s the source of the disease. He stays till it"s cured."