Back on Lusitania, Ender is looking over some disturbing evidence. A recent crop of experimental potatoes, bio-engineered to withstand the descolada, has been wiped out by the virus. What is more disturbing is that the descolada seems to be getting more virulent. When Lusitanian scientists invent new strains of virus resistant potatoes, the descolada is able to adapt and kill them quicker and quicker. Initially, the scientists were able to get several years from a new strain, then months, and this most recent strain: six weeks. Ender reviews the situation. The colonists could spray the entire planet to eradicate the virus but in doing so they would exterminate the piggies who need the virus in order to move into their third life (becoming trees, at which point their reproduction occurs). Killing of the descolada.....
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