Children of the Mind (Ender's Saga 4)

"The least interesting one, I fear. The least loved and valued. One of the people on the ship was a fellow named Miro, who through a tragic accident some years ago had been left somewhat crippled. Neurologically damaged. Thick of speech, clumsy with his hands, lame when he walked. He held within his mind the powerful, treasured image of himself as he used to be. So--with that perfect self-image, a vast number of aiuas assembled themselves into an exact copy, not of how he was, but of how he once was and longed to be again. Complete with all his memories--a perfect replication of him. So perfect that it had the same utter loathing for his crippled body that he himself had. So . . . the new, improved Miro--or rather the copy of the old, undamaged Miro--whatever--he stood there as the ultimate rebuke of the crippled one. And before their very eyes, that old rejected body crumbled away into nothing."

Wang-mu gasped, imagining it. "He died!"

"No, that's the point, don't you see? He lived. It was Miro. His own aiua--not the trillions of aiuas making up the atoms and molecules of his body, but the one that controlled them all, the one that was himself, his will--his aiua simply moved to the new and perfect body. That was his true self. And the old one . . ."

"Had no use."

"Had nothing to give it shape. You see, I think our bodies are held together by love. The love of the master aiua for the glorious powerful body that obeys it, that gives the self all its experience of the world. Even Miro, even with all his self-loathing when he was crippled, even he must have loved whatever pathetic remnant of his body was left to him. Until the moment that he had a new one."

"And then he moved."

"Without even knowing that he had done so," said Peter. "He followed his love."

Wang-mu heard this fanciful tale and knew that it must be true, for she had overheard many a mention of aiuas in the conversations between Han Fei-tzu and Jane, and now with Peter Wiggin's story, it made sense. It had to be true, if only because this starship really had appeared as if from nowhere on the bank of the river behind Han Fei-tzu's house.

"But now you must wonder," said Peter, "how I, unloved and unlovable as I know I am, came into existence."

"You already said. Ender's mind."

"Miro's most intensely held image was of his own younger, healthier, stronger self. But Ender, the images that mattered most in his mind were of his older sister Valentine and his older brother Peter. Not as they became, though, for his real older brother Peter was long dead, and Valentine--she has accompanied or followed Ender on all his hops through space, so she is still alive, but aged as he has aged. Mature. A real person. Yet on that starship, during that time Outside, he conjured up a copy of her youthful self. Young Valentine. Poor Old Valentine! She didn't know she was so old until she saw this younger self, this perfect being, this angel that had dwelt in Ender's twisted little mind from childhood on. I must say, she's the most put-upon victim in all this little drama. To know that your brother carries around such an image of you, instead of loving you as you really are--well, one can see that Old Valentine--she hates it, but that's how everyone thinks of her now, including, poor thing, herself--one can see that Old Valentine is really having her patience tried."

"But if the original Valentine is still alive," said Wang-mu, puzzled, "then who is the young Valentine? Who is she really? You can be Peter because he's dead and no one is using his name, but . . ."

"Quite puzzling, isn't it?" said Peter. "But my point is that whether he's dead or not, I'm not Peter Wiggin. As I said before, I'm not myself."

He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling. The hologram above the terminal turned to look at him. He had not touched the controls.

"Jane is with us," said Wang-mu.

"Jane is always with us," said Peter. "Ender's spy."

The hologram spoke. "Ender doesn't need a spy. He needs friends, if he can get them. Allies at least."

Peter reached idly for the terminal and turned it off. The hologram disappeared.

This disturbed Wang-mu very much. Almost as if he had slapped a child. Or beaten a servant. "Jane is a very noble creature, to treat her with such disrespect."

"Jane is a computer program with a bug in the id routines."

He was in a dark mood, this boy who had come to take her into his starship and spirit her away from the world of Path. But dark as his mood might be, she understood now, with the hologram gone from the terminal, what she had seen. "It isn't just because you're so young and the holograms of Peter Wiggin the Hegemon are of a mature man," said Wang-mu.

"What," he said impatiently. "What isn't what?"

"The physical difference between you and the Hegemon."

"What is it, then?"

"He looks--satisfied."

"He conquered the world," said Peter.

"So when you have done the same, you will get that look of satisfaction?"

"I suppose so," said Peter. "It's what passes for a purpose in my life. It's the mission Ender has sent me on."

"Don't lie to me," said Wang-mu. "On the riverbank you spoke of the terrible things I did for the sake of my ambition. I admit it--I was ambitious, desperate to rise out of my terrible lowborn state. I know the taste of it, and the smell of it, and I smell it coming from you, like the smell of tar on a hot day, you stink of it."

"Ambition? Has a stench?"