Abra.
When Ender had scrambled up the slope — displacing a few turves in the process, since he was bigger than Abra and weighed more — Abra gestured to the body-like structure of the artificial hills. 'Can you believe this?'
Apparently Ender didn't see it the way Abra did. He simply looked, and said nothing.
'It's like a giant died here,' said Abra, 'and the earth grew up to cover his carcass.'
Abra heard a sharp intake of breath from Ender, so he knew now that he had seen.
Ender looked around and pointed wordlessly at some of the smaller, vine-covered structures. He pulled out his binoculars and looked for a long time. 'Impossible,' he muttered.
'What? What are they?'
Ender didn't answer. Instead he walked the length of the hill, toward the 'head.' Abra scrambled down onto the neck and up the chin. 'Somebody had to build this,' Abra said. He scratched at the white surface. 'Look, this skull place, it's not rock, look at it. This is concrete.'
'I know,' said Ender. 'They built it for me.'
'What?'
'I know this place, Abra. The buggers built it for me.'
'They were all dead before Grandpa and Grandma even got here,' said Abra.
'You're right, it's impossible, but I know what I know.' Ender put a hand on Abra's shoulder. 'Abra, I shouldn't take you with me.'
'Where?'
'Over there.' Ender pointed. 'It might be dangerous. If they knew me well enough to build this place, they might be planning to —»
'To get even with you,' said Abra.
'For killing them,' said Ender.
'So don't go, Ender. Don't do what they want you to do.'
'If they want to get revenge, Abra, I don't mind. But perhaps they don't. Perhaps this is the closest they could come to talking. To writing me a note.'
'They didn't know how to read and write.' They didn't even know the idea of reading and writing — that's what Father said. So how would they know about leaving notes?
'Maybe they were learning when they died,' said Ender.
'Well I'm sure as hell not sticking around here if you're taking off somewhere. I'm going with you.'
Ender looked amused when Abra said 'hell.' He shook his head, smiling. 'No. You're too young to take the risk of —»
'Come on!' said Abra with disgust. 'You're Ender Wiggin. Don't tell me what eleven-year-old kids can do!'
So they rode in the skimmer together until they got to the first set of structures. Ender stopped and they got off. The shape of the structures came from metal frameworks underlying and supporting the vines. Now Abra realized they were swings and slides, just like those in the town park in Miranda. The ones in Miranda were smaller, because they were just for the little kids. But there was no mistaking what they were.
But formics didn't have babies, they had larvae. Worms would hardly needs swings and slides.
'They made human stuff,' said Abra.
Ender only nodded.
'They really were taking stuff out of your head,' said Abra.
'That's one explanation,' said Ender. Then they got on the skimmer and went on. Ender seemed to know the way.
They neared the farthest structure. It was a thick tower and some lower walls, all covered with ivy. There was a window near the top of the tower.
'You knew this would be here,' said Abra.
'It was my nightmare,' said Ender. 'My memory of the fantasy game.'
Abra had no idea what 'the fantasy game' was, but he understood that this place represented one of those dreams that the formics were taking out of Ender when they vivisected him in that nightmare he had talked about.
Ender got out of the skimmer. 'Don't come after me,' he said. 'If I'm not back in an hour, it means it's dangerous here, and you must go home at once and tell them everything.'
'Eat it, Ender, I'm coming with you,' said Abra.
Ender looked at him coldly. 'Eat it yourself, Abra, or I'll stuff you with mud.'
His words were jocular, and so was his tone. But his eyes were not joking, and Abra knew that he meant it.
So Abra stayed with the skimmer and watched Ender jog over to the castle — for that's what it was. And then Ender climbed up the outside of the tower and went in through the window.
Abra stayed, watching the tower, for a long time. He checked the skimmer's clock now and then. And finally his gaze began to wander. He watched birds and insects, small animals in the grass, clouds moving across the sky.
That's why he didn't see Ender come out of the tower. He only saw him walking toward the skimmer, carrying his jacket in a wad under his arm.
Only it wasn't a wad. There was something inside the jacket. But Abra didn't ask what Ender had found. He figured that if Ender wanted him to know, he'd tell him.
'We aren't building the new colony here,' said Ender.
'OK,' said Abra.
'Let's go back and strike camp,' said Ender.
They searched for five more days, well to the east and south of the place they had first found, until they had another colony site. It was a bigger formic settlement, with a much larger area of fields and all the signs of a much larger annual rainfall. 'This is the right place,' said Ender. 'Better climate, warmer. Good, rich soil.'
They spent a week laying out the new site.
Then it was time to go home. The night before they left, lying out on the open ground — it was too hot at night inside the tent — Abra finally asked. Not what it was that Ender brought back from the tower — he would never ask that — but the deeper question.
'Ender, what did they mean? Building this for you?'
Ender was silent for a long time. 'I'm not going to tell you the whole truth, Abra. Because I don't want anyone to know. I don't even want them to know what we found there. I hope it's all decayed and crumbled away before people go back there. But even if it's not, nobody else will understand it. And in the far future, nobody will believe that the formics made that place. They'll think it's something that human colonists did.'
'You don't have to tell me everything,' said Abra. 'And I won't tell anybody else what we found.'
'I know you won't,' said Ender. He hesitated again. 'I don't want to lie to you. So I'll only tell you true things. I found the answer, Abra.'
'To what?'
'My question.'
'Can't you tell me any of it?'
'You've never asked the question. I hope to God you never know what it is.'
'But the message really was for you.'
'Yes, Abra. They left a message that told me why they died.'
'Why?'
'No, Abra. It's my burden, truly. Mine alone.' Ender reached out a hand, gripped Abra by the arm. 'Let there be no rumors of what Ender Wiggin found when he came to this place.'
'There never will be,' said Abra.
'You mean that at the age of eleven, you're prepared to take a secret to your grave?'
'Yes,' said Abra without hesitation. 'But I hope I don't have to do that very soon.'
Ender laughed. 'I hope the same. I hope you live a long, long time.'
'I'll keep the secret all my life. Even though I don't actually know what it is.'
