Page 1260 - Enders_Game_Full_Book

"Normally your reports on a launch group are brief. A few troublemakers, an incident report, or -- best of all -- nothing."
"You're free to disregard any portion of my report, sir." "Sir? My, but aren't we the prickly martinet today." "What part of my report did you think was excessive?" "I think this report is a love song."
"I realize that it might seem like sucking up, to use with every launch the technique you used with Ender Wiggin --"
"You use it with every launch?"
"As you noticed yourself, sir, it has interesting results. It causes an immediate sorting out."
"A sorting out into categories that might not otherwise exist. Nevertheless, I accept the compliment implied by your action. But seven pages about Bean -- really, did you actually learn that much from a response that was primarily silent compliance?"
"That is just my point, sir. It was not compliance at all. It was -- I was performing the experiment, but it felt as though his were the big eye looking down the microscope, and I were the specimen on the slide."
"So he unnerved you."
"He would unnerve anyone. He's cold, sir. And yet"
"And yet hot. Yes, I read your report. Every scintillating page of it."
"Yes sir."
"I think you know that it is considered good advice for us not to get crushes on our students." "Sir?"
"In this case, however, I am delighted that you are so interested in Bean. Because, you see, I am not. I already have the boy I think gives us our best chance. Yet there is considerable pressure, because of Bean's damnable faked-up test scores, to give him special attention. Very well, he shall have it. And you shall give it to him."
"But sir ..."