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"I don't remember your being commander of Dragon Army," said Graff. "I'll listen to a requisition for specific equipment from your commander."
"Not possible," said Bean. "He doesn't have time to waste on foolish bureaucratic procedures."
Foolish bureaucratic procedures. Graff had used that exact phrase in the argument just a few minutes ago. But Graff's voice had *not* been raised. How long *had* Bean been listening outside the door? Graff cursed himself silently. He had moved his office up here specifically because he knew Bean was a sneak and a spy, gathering intelligence however he could. And then he didn't even post a guard to stop the boy from simply walking up and listening at the door.
"And you do?" asked Graff.
"I'm the one he assigned to think of stupid things you might do to rig the game against us, and think of ways to deal with them."
"What do you think you're going to find?"
"I don't know," said Bean. "I just know that the only things we ever see are our uniforms and flash suits, our weapons and our desks. There are other supplies here. For instance, there's paper. We never get any except during written tests, when our desks are closed to us."
"What would you do with paper in the battleroom?"
"I don't know," said Bean. "Wad it up and throw it around. Shred it and make a cloud of dust out of it."
"And who would clean this up?"
"Not my problem," said Bean.
"Permission denied."
"That's not acceptable, sir," said Bean.
"I don't mean to hurt your feelings, Bean, but it matters less than a cockroach's fart whether you accept my decision or not."
"I don't mean to hurt *your* feelings, sir, but you clearly have no idea what you're doing. You're improvising. Screwing with the system. The damage you're doing is going to take years to undo, and you don't care. That means that it doesn't matter what condition this school is in a year from now. That means that everybody who matters is going to be graduated soon. Training is being accelerated because the Buggers are getting too close for delays. So you're pushing. And you're especially pushing Ender Wiggin."