“So you want to be rid of us all,” said Dink. “And that’s why you brought us here. We’re not leaving here alive, are we?”

“Lighten up, Dink,” said Graff. “You can all go home as soon as this meeting is over. ColMin doesn’t assassinate people.”

“Now, that’s an interesting point,” said Crazy Tom. “What does ColMin do? It packs people into starships like sardines, and then it sends them off to colony worlds. And they’ll never come back, not to the world they left. Fifty years out, fifty years back. The world would have forgotten all of us by then, even if we went to a colony and came right home. Which of course he wouldn’t let us do.”

“So this isn’t an assassination,” said Dink, “it’s another damn kidnapping.”

“It’s an offer,” said Rackham, “which you can accept or decline.”

“I decline,” said Dink.

“Hear the offer,” said Rackham.

“Hear this,” said Dink, with a gesture.

“I offer you command of a colony. Each one of you. No rivals. We don’t know of any enemy armies for you to face, but there will be worlds full of danger and uncertainty, and your abilities will be highly adaptable. People will follow you—people older than you—partly because you are Ender’s Jeesh, and partly because—mostly because—of your own abilities. They’ll see how quickly to grasp important information, rank it by priority, foresee consequences, and make correct decisions. You’ll be the founders of new human worlds.”

Crazy Tom put on a babytalk voice. “Wiw dey name da pwanets aftew us?”

“Don’t be such a dullbob,” said Carn.

“Sowwy.”

“Look, gents,” said Graff. “We saw what happened to the Hive Queens. They bunched up on one planet and they got wiped out in a single blow. Any weapon we can invent, an enemy can also invent and use against us.”

“Come on,” said Dink. “The Hive Queens spread out and colonized as many planets as you’re colonizing—in fact, all you’re doing is sending ships to colonize the worlds they already settled because they’re the only ones you know about that have an atmosphere we can breathe and flora and fauna we can eat.”

“Actually, we’re taking our own flora and fauna with us,” said Graff.

“Dink’s right,” said Shen. “Dispersal didn’t work for the Hive Queens.”

“Because they didn’t disperse,” said Graff. “They had Buggers on all the planets, but when you boys blew up their home world, all the Hive Queens were there. They put all their eggs in one basket. We’re not going to do that. Partly because the human race isn’t just a handful of queens and a whole bunch of workers and drones, every damn one of us is a Hive Queen and has the seeds of recapitulating the whole of human history. So dispersing humanity will work.”

“Like coughing in a crowd spreads the flu,” said Crazy Tom cheerfully.

“Exactly,” said Graff. “Call us a disease, I don’t care—I am a human, and I want us to spread everywhere like an epidemic, so we can never be stamped out.”