A War of Gifts (Ender's Saga 1.10)

She began with questions about the creation and Adam and Eve.

Zeck interrupted her, quoting Father. "The book of Genesis represents the best job that Moses could do, explaining evolution to people who didn't even know the Earth was round."

"You believe in evolution? Then what about Adam as the first man?"

"The name 'Adam' means 'many,'" said Zeck. "There were many males in that troop of primates, when God chose one of them and touched him with his Spirit and put the soul of a man inside. It was Adam who first had language and named the other primates, the ones that looked like him but were not human because God had not given them human souls. Thus it says, 'And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.' What Moses originally wrote was much simpler: 'Adam named all the beasts that were not in the image of God. None of them could speak to him, so he was utterly alone.'"

"You know what God originally wrote?" asked Agnes.

"You think we're fundamentalists," said Zeck. "But we're not. We're Puritans. We know that God can only teach us what we're prepared to understand. The Bible was written by men and women of earlier times, and it holds only as much as they were capable of understanding. We have a greater knowledge of science, and so God can clarify and tell us more. He would be an unloving Father if he insisted on telling us only as much as humans could understand back in the infancy of our species."

She leaned back in her chair. "So then why does your father call electricity 'lightning'?"

"Aren't they the same thing?" asked Zeck, trying to hide his contempt.

"Well, yes, of course, but--"

"So Father calls it 'lightning' to emphasize how dangerous it is, and how ephemeral," said Zeck. "Your word 'electricity' is a lie, convincing you that because it runs through wires and shifts the on-off state of semiconductors, the lightning has been tamed and no longer poses a danger. But God says that it is in your machines that lightning is at its most dangerous, for lightning that strikes you out of the sky can only harm your body, while the lightning that has tamed you and trained you through the machines can steal your soul."

"So God speaks to

your father," said Agnes.

"As he speaks to all men and women who purify themselves enough to hear his voice."

"Has God ever spoken to you?"

Zeck shook his head. "I'm not yet pure."

"And that's why your father whips you."

"My father is God's instrument in the purification of his children."

"And you trust your father always to do God's will?"

"My father is the purest man on Earth right now."

"Yet you have never trusted him enough to let him know you have a word-for-word memory."

Her words struck him like a blow. She was absolutely right. Zeck had heeded Mother and never let Father see his unnatural ability. And why? Not because Zeck was afraid. Because Mother was afraid. He had taken her faithlessness inside himself as if it were his own, and so Father could not purify him. Could never purify him, because he had been deceiving Father for all these years.

He rose to his feet.

"Where are you going?" asked Agnes.

"To Father."

"To tell him about your phenomenal memory?" she asked pleasantly.

Zeck had no reason to tell her anything, and so he didn't.

Bridegan was waiting in the other room, blocking the door. "No sir," he said. "You're going nowhere."

Zeck went back into the kitchen and sat back down at the table. "You're taking me into space, aren't you," he said.

"Yes, Zeck," she said. "You are one of the best we've ever tested."

"I'll go with you. But I'll never fight for you," he said. "Taking me is a waste of time."