Disclaimer: None of the OSC characters belong to me (obviously. Why else would I be writing a disclaimer?), nor do I claim they do. Additionally, I do not make money off my writings (pity. Cash is good, especially for jobless fourteen-year-olds like me). In fact, I do not make money, period, so _please_ don't sue.

Author's Note: The fanfic you're about to read is one-third of a "trilogy" of short stories, each about one of the Wiggin children- Ender, Valentine, or Peter. You should be able to tell which of the three the speaker is in each fic. If you can't, then either a) you have no deductive skills whatsoever or b) I'm a failure as a writer. Sorry for all the formal talk in my story- have a tendency to do that in my more "philosophical" works. Now, without further ado, I present to you...


Family Portrait

BROKEN

Everyone stares at me now. I suppose they have to right to, but still....

It becomes a pattern after a while: First come the aforementioned stares, then open-mouthed recognition, a brief bout of disbelief, and finally, the whispers. Always the same pattern, paraphrased and repeated and _seen_ so often that it has fallen into the void of meaninglessness, shaped by an indistinct blur of eyes and lips and awe and words.

"Oh look there's Ender he's standing right there why doesn't he smile what makes you think he'd smile for _you_, dumbass take a picture, quick, ask for his autograph before he leaves look at him he looks much younger than he did in the news vids and...."

Sometimes it makes me want to laugh. I mean, it's almost funny, watching them exclaim over me with that light in their eyes, murmur between themselves, giggling, watching, triumphant in being "privileged enough to meet Ender Wiggin," like I'm some...

Like I'm some _hero_.

That thought comes as a slap in the face, even now on this ship, two hours away from Earth (from the little lake in North Carolina...), two hours away from my past (Bonzo's eyes still haunt me in my dreams, along with his bloodied face), two hours away from the things I never want to be again.

Hero. Who gave me that title anyway? Because I'm not a hero. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I'm a mass-murderer.

I suppose I'm a very _special_ murderer. I mean, how many of us xenocidal maniacs get a worldwide holiday on their birthdays? How many of us get assemblies and admiration, fiestas and fanmail? How many of us are given authority, respect, power beyond any belief?

And yet, despite the glitter of false fronts and distorting veils of public opinion, the fact remains that I'm a murderer, a gun that the IF trained to point at the buggers. Not a hero.

God, not a hero.

I think Peter hates me for this. Hates me for holding the same prestige, the same status that he's been after forever, hates me for lacking the strength of mind, strength of heart, to do anything with it.

And Valentine.... Valentine loves me for the same reason, but through a different line of reasoning- she believes that I refrain from improper use of power because of an active sense of morality, when the truth is I simply don't have the energy to care.

Val. Sweet, gentle, childlike Val, still so innocent despite years of living with Peter. She practically raised me, you know. Taught me arithmetic. Cleaned up my orange juice spills. Made me cake for my birthday (it tasted horrendous- she'd added too much baking soda- but it's the thought that counts).

Maybe that's why.

Maybe that's why she can't bear to believe that I've changed.

Because more than anyone else, more than Graff, who broke me, more than Mazer, who put me together again into a flawed whole, Val sees the differences between who I was and who I am, simply because she knew me before Battle School.

And who I am now scares her.

So, in order to ignore the monster I've become, she distorts me. She describes me in glowing terms to whoever'll listen, rattles off baby stories about me, smiles and laughs and makes me look a little better, a little less like a soldier and a little more like a _human_ in everyone's eyes.

Hell, maybe she even believes her own words once in a while.

And most of the time I can accept this, I can accept that she wants to pretend to others that I'm still Andrew "Ender" Wiggin, five years old and unscathed by Battle School, but sometimes...

Sometimes I want to scream.

What about me? I want to ask. Who's going to distort me for me?

Who's going to hold my hand when I look in the mirror and tell me that yes, you're _that_ little boy standing there, wide-eyed and young, not the little boy who killed two humans and thousands of Formics before his thirteenth birthday, not the little boy who stupidly obeyed his teachers up to the point of near death, and most certainly not a murderer?

Who's going to tell me that it wasn't my fault that Stiltson wouldn't leave me alone, that Bonzo wouldn't let me surpass him, that I didn't even bother to guess that I was killing the buggers from my safe little commander's chair on Eros?

Who's going to tell me that I will someday find redemption on this Formic planet I'm going to, someday find a place to set down these memories I carry around, someday find a way to reduce this mind-numbing burden that wears away at my mind, tears at my conscience?

And for the love of God, who's going to tell me that, despite the blood on my hands, despite the incriminating guilt, despite the utter _wrongness_ of what I did...

Who's going to tell me that I'm still human...?

...

Everyone stares at me now. I guess they have a right to, but still....














Short Author's Note: In a nutshell: please REVIEW! I need it. Thank you.