Going along with our last quote, we can see that Ender’s friendships are still complicated: Graff may be his friend (in some way), yet he can’t, you know, go out and see a movie with him. Meanwhile, Alai may be Ender’s friend for ever, but they’re still separated here. So even when Ender has friends, those friendships are complicated.

Here’s a curious thing: Ender is a super smart and super skilled kid but most of this book details how he destroys things. (And by “things” we mean people and an entire alien species.) At least Peter (maybe with some help from Val) comes up with a peace treaty, the Locke Proposal. It’s interesting to keep in mind that, for most of the book, all of Ender’s smarts and skills – all stored in his own head and hands – are used to take things apart. Maybe that's one reason why he doesn’t need to take anything with him when he goes to Rat Army – because he hasn’t actually made anything.

This is a complex thought here, so let’s break down what’s going on: Bonzo gave Ender an order that he couldn’t give – he tried to tell Ender what to do during free play. But why is that order not allowed? Because the school administrators made it so. So, Bonzo tries to confine Ender, but Bonzo himself is confined by the school rules, which means Ender has to challenge Bonzo’s authority. Also notice how Ender thinks about his action: “he had no choice.” There’s some way in which Ender himself feels constrained here – he’s not free to challenge his commander, but he <em>has to</em> challenge his commander. It’s like no one is free here.