Deryni: переводы

→Was it fear? Maybe. But Ender didn't think so. The hive queens had bred themselves for war. All the speculations of the scientists who had studied the anatomy and molecular structure of the formic corpses left over from the Second Formic War led to that conclusion: The formics were created, first and foremost, to fight and kill. That implied that they had evolved in a world where such fighting was necessary.

→But they had stayed. And died.

→Then we would have had to hunt them down, ship by ship, queen by queen. Their planets would still be inhabited by the formics, and so they could have fought us in bloody confrontations on every world, meanwhile building new ships, launching new fleets against us.

→So: Once they knew that the weapon existed, and that humans were willing to use it, why did they stay on that single planet? They must have known that the human fleet was coming. As Ender won battle after battle, they must have known that the possibility of their defeat existed. It would have been easy for them to get onto starships and disperse from their home planet. Before that last battle began, they could all have been out of range of the M.D. Device.

→But Ender had used the M.D. Device early on in the invasion of the formic worlds, to destroy a formation of ships. The hive queens had instantly understood the capabilities of the weapon and never allowed their ships to get close enough together for the M.D. Device to be able to set up a self-sustaining reaction.

→Yes, yes, Ender understood that.

→Mazer had explained that the hive queens must have gathered on their home planet years before they could have known that the human fleet had the M.D. Device. They knew—from the way Mazer had defeated their main expedition to Earth's star system—that their greatest weakness was that if you found the hive queen and killed her, you had killed the whole army. So they withdrew from all their forward positions, put the hive queens together on their home world, and then protected that world with everything they had.

→It made no sense, what the formics had done. They weren't stupid. Yet they had made the strategic mistake of grouping all their queens—not "their" queens, they were the queens, the queens were the formics—they had all gathered on their home planet, where Ender's use of the M.D. Device could—and did—destroy them utterly, all at once.

→The hive queens.

→So Ender had let go of them all. Even the ones who were still here. He saw how it hurt them—the ones who had wanted to be closer than mere pals—when he didn't let things change, didn't let them into his thoughts. He couldn't explain to them that he wasn't keeping them out, that there was simply no way they'd understand what it was that occupied him whenever he wasn't forced to think about something else:

→Once, knowing and understanding those kids had been part of his work, had been essential to victory. During that time he had even come to think of them as his friends. But he was never one of them; their relationship was too unequal. He had loved them so he could know them, and he had known them so he could use them. Now he had no use for them—not his choice, there simply wasn't a purpose to be served by keeping the group together. They didn't, as a group, exist. They were just a bunch of kids who had been on a long, difficult camping trip together, that's how Ender saw them now. They had pulled together to make it back to civilization, but now they'd all go home to their families. They weren't connected now. Except in memory.

→He didn't understand it himself. He had been able to let go of everything else, all the things he'd concentrated on so hard for so long. Military tactics? Strategy? Not even interesting to him now. Ways that he might have avoided antagonizing Bonzo or Stilson in the first place? He had strong feelings about that, but no rational ideas, so he didn't waste time trying to think it through. He let go of it, just the way he let go of his deep knowledge of everyone in his jeesh, his little army of brilliant kids whom he led through the training that turned out to be the war.

→None of that applied to Ender. He couldn't pretend that it did, or that he had a future. Least of all could he talk about what really preyed on his mind. They wouldn't understand.

→It wasn't a deliberate choice, he just wasn't interested in doing the things they did or talking about what they discussed. They were full of their studies, their return to Earth. What they'd do. How they'd find a way to get together again after they'd been home for a while. How much money they'd get as severance pay from the military. What they might choose as a career. How their families might have changed.

→One by one the other kids got their orders, each saying good-bye before they left. It was increasingly awkward with each one, because Ender was more and more a stranger to them. He didn't hang out with them. If he happened to join in a conversation, he didn't stay long and never really engaged.

→* * * * *

→And there it was: The tacit recognition that Ender wasn't going home. That he was never going to lead a normal life on Earth.

→"You've got to do something with your life," said Mazer.

→"I'm not sending anybody," said Ender. "Least of all myself."

→Mazer barked a laugh. "Oh, you'll send me, but you won't go yourself."