The only part of school that she truly loved was physical education. To have sky over her head as she ran, to have the track lie flat before her, to be able to run and run for the sheer joy of it and without a clock ticking out her allotted time for aerobic exercise -- such a luxury. She could not compete, physically, with most of the other girls. It would take time for her body to reconstruct itself for high gravity, for despite the great pains that the IF went to to make sure that soldiers' bodies did not deteriorate too much during long months and years in space, nothing trained you for living on a planet's surface except living there. But Petra didn't care that she was one of the last to complete every race, that she couldn't leap even the lowest hurdle. It felt good simply to run freely, and her weakness gave her goals to meet. She would be competitive soon enough. That was one of the aspects of her innate personality that had taken her to Battle School in the first place -- that she had no particular interest in competition because she always started from the assumption that, if it mattered, she would find a way to win.
And so she settled in to her new life. Within weeks she was fluent in Armenian and had mastered the local slang. As she had expected, the popular girls dropped her in about the same amount of time, and a few weeks later, the brainy girls had cooled toward her as well. It was among the rebels and misfits that she found her friends, and soon she had a circle of confidants and co-conspirators that she called her "jeesh," her private army. Not that she was the commander or anything, but they were all loyal to each other and amused at the antics of the teachers and the other students, and when a school counselor called her in to tell her that the administration was growing concerned about the fact that Petra seemed to be associating with an anti-social element in school, she knew that she was truly at home in Maralik.
Then one day she came home from school to find the front door locked. She carried no house key -- no one did in their neighborhood because no one locked up, or even, in good weather, closed their doors. She could hear the baby crying inside the house, so instead of making her mother come to the front door to let her in, she walked around back and came into the kitchen to find that her mother was tied to a chair, gagged, her eyes wide and frantic with fear.
Before Petra had time to react, a hypostick was slapped against her arm and, without ever seeing who had done it, she slipped into darkness.
Bean
To: Locke%[email protected]
From: Chamrajnagar%%@ifcom.gov
Re: Do not write to me again
Mr. Peter Wiggin,
Did you really think I would not have the resources to know who you are? You may be the author of the "Locke Proposal," giving you a reputation as a peacemaker, but you are also partly responsible for the world's present instability by your jingoist use of your sister's identity as Demosthenes. I have no illusions about your motives.
It is outrageous of you to suggest that I jeopardize the neutrality of the International Fleet in order to take control of children who have completed their military service with the IF. If you attempt to manipulate public opinion to force me to do so, I will expose your identity as both Locke and Demosthenes.
I have changed my idname and have informed our mutual friend that he is not to attempt to relay communication between you and me again. The only comfort you are entitled to take from my letter is this: The IF will not interfere with those trying to assert hegemony over other nations and peoples -- not even you.
Chamrajnagar
The disappearance of Petra Arkanian from her home in Armenia was worldwide news. The headlines were full of accusations hurled by Armenia against Turkey, Azerbaijan, and every other Turkish-speaking nation, and the stiff or fiery denials and counter-accusations that came in reply. There were the tearful interviews with her mother, the only witness, who was sure the kidnappers were Azerbaijani. "I know the language, I know the accent, and that's who took my little girl!"
Bean was with his family on the second day of their vacation at the beach on the island of Ithaca, but this was Petra, and he read the nets and watched the vids avidly, along with his brother, Nikolai. They both reached the same conclusion right away. "It wasn't any of the Turkish nations," Nikolai announced to their parents. "That's obvious."
Father, who had been working in government for many years, agreed. "Real Turks would have made sure to speak only Russian."
"Or Armenian," said Nikolai.
"No Turk speaks Armenian," said Mother. She was right, of course, since real Turks would never deign to learn it, and those in Turkish countries who did speak Armenian were, by definition, not really Turks and would never be trusted with a delicate assignment like kidnapping a military genius.
"So who was it?" said Father. "Agents provocateurs, trying to start a war?"
"My bet is on the Armenian government," said Nikolai. "Put her in charge of their military."
"Why kidnap her when they could employ her openly?" asked Father.
"Taking her out of school openly," said Nikolai, "would be an announcement of Armenia's military intentions. It might provoke preemptive actions by surrounding Turkey or Azerbaijan."
There was superficial plausibility in what Nikolai was saying, but Bean knew better. He had already foreseen this possibility back when all the militarily gifted children were still in space. At that time the main danger had come from the Polemarch, and Bean wrote an anonymous letter to a couple of opinion leaders on Earth, Locke and Demosthenes, urging them to get all the Battle School children back to Earth so they couldn't be seized or killed by the Polemarch's forces in the League War. The warning had worked, but now that the League War was over, too many governments had begun to think and act complacently, as if the world now had peace instead of a fragile ceasefire. Bean's original analysis still held. It was Russia that was behind the Polemarch's coup attempt in the League War, and it was likely to be Russia that was behind the kidnapping of Petra Arkanian.
Still, he didn't have any hard evidence of this and knew of no way to get it -- now that he wasn't inside a Fleet installation, he had no access to military computer systems. So he kept his skepticism to himself, and made a joke out of it. "I don't know, Nikolai," he said. "Since staging this kidnapping is having an even more destabilizing effect, I'd have to say that if she was taken by her own government, it proves they really really need her, because it was a deeply dumb thing to do."
"If they're not dumb," said Father, "who did it?"
"Somebody who's ambitious to fight and win wars and smart enough to know they need a brilliant commander," said Bean. "And either big enough or invisible enough or far enough away from Armenia not to care about the consequences of kidnaping her. In fact, I'll bet that whoever took her would be perfectly delighted if war broke out in the Caucasus."
"So you think it's some large and powerful nation close by?" asked Father. Of course, there was only one large and powerful nation close to Armenia.
"Could be, but there's no telling," said Bean. "Anybody who needs a commander like Petra wants a world in turmoil. Enough turmoil, and anybody might emerge on top. Plenty of sides to play off against each other." And now that Bean had said it, he began to believe it. Just because Russia was the most aggressive nation before the League War didn't mean that other nations weren't going to get into the game.
"In a world in chaos," said Nikolai, "the army with the best commander wins."
"If you want to find the kidnapper, look for the country that talks most about peace and conciliation," said Bean, playing with the idea and saying whatever came to mind.
"You're too cynical," said Nikolai. "Some who talk about peace and conciliation merely want peace and conciliation."
"You watch -- the nations that offer to arbitrate are the ones that think they should rule the world, and this is just one more move in the game."
Father laughed. "Don't read too much into that," he said. "Most of the nations that are always offering to arbitrate are trying to recover lost status, not gain new power. France. America. Japan. They're always meddling just because they used to have the power to back it up and they haven't caught on yet that they don't anymore."
Bean smiled. "You never know, do you, Papa. The very fact that you dismiss the possibility that they could be the kidnappers makes me regard them as all the more likely candidates."
Nikolai laughed and agreed.
"That's the problem with having two Battle School graduates in the house," said Father. "You think because you understand military thinking that you understand political thinking, too."
"It's all maneuver and avoiding battle until you have overwhelming superiority," said Bean.
"But it's also about the will to power," said Father. "And even if individuals in America and France and Japan have the will to power, the people don't. Their leaders will never get them moving. You have to look at nations on the make. Aggressive peoples who think they have a grievance, who think they're undervalued. Belligerent, snappish."
"A whole nation of belligerent, snappish people?" asked Nikolai.
"Sounds like Athens," said Bean.
"A nation that takes that attitude toward other nations," said Father. "Several self-consciously Islamic nations have the character to make such a play, but they'd never kidnap a Christian girl to lead their armies."
"They might kidnap her to prevent her own nation from using her," said Nikolai. "Which brings us back to Armenia's neighbors."
"It's an interesting puzzle," said Bean, "which we can figure out later, after we get to wherever we're going."
Father and Nikolai looked at him as if he were crazy. "Going?" asked Father.
It was Mother who understood. "They're kidnaping Battle School graduates. Not just that, but a member of Ender's team from the actual battles."
"And one of the best," said Bean.
Father was skeptical. "One incident doesn't make a pattern."
"Let's not wait to see who's next," said Mother. "I'd rather feel silly later for overreacting than grieve because we dismissed the possibility."
"Give it a few days," said Father. "It will all blow over."