#ender's shadow

- Communication and mutual respect is absolutely critical - Actions taken out of fear or hatred pretty generally ended up being regretted - Just because you don't understand someone's way of life doesn't mean it is wrong - Arbitrary power structures invariably hurt people more than they help - Have fucking empathy. Beating you over the head with this have some damn fucking empathy

Peter Wiggins character development across all the stories was so well done and it's rare to see so many facets of a single, non primary character. He is imbedded across both Ender's and Bean's storylines yet each one reflects different traits. While Ender's storyline goes into Peter as his baseline, cunning self (Ender's own experience of his brother) while Bean's storyline shows him as human, with the need to be considered by his parents as something more than 'Ender's brother'.

Also, it's interesting to see how the Wiggin parents interact with Peter. It's almost funny how there's a little spite to it all, even through they clearly support him as Hegemon. They're also great characters who are built across the story it's so well done

This is the funniest fucking typo I've ever seen in my life:

I'm sorting Bean from Ender's Game. I'm going to mostly be focusing on the book Ender's Shadow, since it's a retelling of Ender's Game from Bean's perspective. A basic explanation of the system that I'm using by @wisteria-lodge be found here.

Bean would be a villain in any other story. He has low empathy, and he's a Burnt Snake who doesn't care about anything but his own survival. He grew up homeless on the streets, and when he finds a gang he immediately tells the leader of it, Poke, to kill a bully.

He's even treated like a villain in-universe. He has to tell people that he's not a machine and that he has emotions. A teacher believed that Bean was lying to them no matter what he said, because of his Snake secondary. Petra tells Bean that it's a relief that he has feelings, or that he "thinks it's worth pretending to have them, nobody's sure about that yet."

He has a strong Snake primary, even though it burned before the beginning of the book. He says that it's a mistake to think of anyone but himself. He doesn't understand it when people are homesick, or why anyone would be nice to him without an ulterior motive. When a nun saves him from the streets and gives him a home, he doesn't trust her, or love her. He was on guard all the time, and he didn't think that he was safe. When he left, she hugged him, and he couldn't understand why. His only goal is to survive, and he doesn't care what he has to do to achieve it. He wants to "kill someone who is helpless, just because they might pose a danger later".

He unburns his Snake primary as he makes friends that don't leave him or die, like his brother Nikolai and Ender. He liked Nikolai even though he was "nothing special, except to me", which is a big improvement over Bean not understanding why hugs exist. He puts Nikolai into the army with him because of nepotism (and his Snake Primary). He says that Ender gives his life meaning, and that serving with Ender is its own reward.

Bean has a very strong Snake secondary. He crawls through the air vents to spy on the teachers, he pretends that he's a drunk guy's son so that he can talk to him alone, and he uses his power as the smallest kid to be able to get soup from the homeless shelter. He says that it feels terrible to be cornered. If he "thought of something that might get him some advantage later, he did it." Soldiers, at least in Battle School, where they tend to have more agency than in the real military because they're being trained to lead armies, are practically made for Snake secondaries. Bean says it himself. "Soldiers shoot in the back, lay traps and ambushes, lie to the enemy and outnumber the other bastard every chance they get."

When he first hears about Ender (a Badger Snake), he doesn't understand him at all, which is only made worse by his low empathy and his Burned Snake primary. He doesn't understand why Ender's practicing with people who can't do anything for him, and he sees Ender as more human than he is. The teachers are suspicious of Bean hiding all of the things that he's not supposed to know, so to throw off their suspicion he decides to act like their favorite student (Ender). He creates a Badger Primary model so that the teachers would like him more. Granted, this could be Bean using Actor Bird from his Bird secondary model, or face-switching as a Snake secondary. He's creating a persona for the teachers, which seems like he might be modeling an Exploded Badger. He wants to "become what they hoped their perfect commander would be" and "make himself into the kind of child that the teachers would trust, would rely on". He realizes that the only way to advance in the military is to please his superior officers, fitting into the system and thinking in ways that they're comfortable with.

His Badger Primary model becomes less Exploded and something that he likes using for himself throughout the book. He says that everyone should be "learning from each other, sharing information and ideas." They should work together to "explain what they were thinking, why they did what they did." This could also be from his Bird Primary model, but given the focus on cooperation, I feel safe using it as a Badger primary example. He "used his inside information to give himself the illusion of belonging to the community." He slowly changes his worldview to match Ender's, culminating in Bean not wanting to kill the villian anymore. He "hadn't realized how much he needed the honor of others until he finally got it."

He also has a Bird Primary model. He "never fully trusted his own guesses." He "acted on them, but always kept himself open to the possibility that his interpretations might be wrong." He wants "as much control over his own future as possible" (which could also be his Snake secondary). His Bird Primary model is probably immature, since he calls people stupid a lot, and part of his character development is Bean realizing that other people's perspectives are valuable. He seeks out other people's opinions because "it was hard to break free of his own assumptions. One mind can think only of its own questions; it rarely surprises itself."

He also has a Lion Primary model, which means that he's collected them all. He gets emotional pings (explained by Bean unconsciously noticing things, or survival instincts). He follows the pings when he notices them. His "heart was still jumping; something is wrong". I considered that he was a Lion Primary, but he's so Snake that he couldn't be anything else. He also acts like a Glory Hound Lion sometimes. He purposefully created Ender's army so that Bean himself would have the greatest chance of success. He's doing it more for Ender to notice him than anything, but one of the teachers does say that he has a vain streak.

Bean stands back and watches before jumping in most of the time, indicative of a Bird secondary model. He even has a list that he follows: "know, think, choose, do." He's prideful about how he doesn't let his feelings influence his decisions. He wants "order, finding out how things worked, getting a grasp on the world around him." This could also be his Snake secondary, but they generally don't want order (even though it could also be his Bird Primary model). He "had to get more information in order to have some hope that his analysis was correct and that his choices would be valid." He says that he should "follow the script" in a conversation, indicative of an Actor Bird (and his autism).

He feels proud of himself for making bold decisions, which could be a Lion secondary model. He has fun goading bullies. He tells a teacher to "swallow hard and back down", and that he needs Bean's cooperation more than Bean needs his. He does all of that for Ender, not for himself, but he feels cowardly for choosing to run away from everything.