Planet of the Apes Omnibus 4

by William Arrow

  Mungwort climbed over the lower rocks, found himself a spot, and sat down, setting his rifle against a boulder.

  He watched the patrol resting itself. Dubark, Trommo, and Kork were gambling on the tailgate of the truck, out of sight of Sergeant Brutar. Corporal Morgo was looking at the engine of the second jeep, and Theka and Tritor were trading jokes. The rest were lying in whatever shade they could find, except for Sturbo, who was snoozing in the sun.

  Mungwort sighed. He didn’t care much for the army, though he never spoke of this to anyone, not even to his parents. A gorilla was supposed to like the army, and not liking it made Mungwort different. He cursed his chimpanzee grandmother, who had fallen in love with his gorilla grandpa and eloped to Wambo Province with him. His mixed background had to account for his dislike of the army.

  Of course, he liked to watch a lot of the television shows that his fellow recruits hated. “Chimp shows,” they called them derisively. But Mungwort liked “Exploring Our World” and the intellectual comedy “Living with Grunt” much better than “Bloodsports,” or The Growler’s “Tales of Gorilla Force Ten,” both of which dealt with the old humanoid hunts.

  Mungwort shook his head. He just couldn’t understand the fun of watching humanoids being torn limb from limb by a toothed biter beast, or the endless statistics of body count after battles.

  Just kill ’em quick and clean, he thought, and—

  Mungwort saw something in the rocks: a glint of metal.

  The black-furred soldier looked down at the patrol’s three vehicles. Everyone was as before. Mungwort looked again at the rocks. Yes, it was a gleam of some kind of metal, or something shiny. If he hadn’t been sitting away from the others, just where he was, he would never have spotted it.

  He rose, taking his rifle, and walked a few steps; then he squatted down and saw that someone had piled stones on top of whatever it was in order to hide it. The gorilla private set down his rifle and started moving the rocks away.

  Below, Sergeant Brutar heard the rumbling of falling stone and looked up to see Mungwort flinging rocks around. The sergeant groaned. That stupid fool Mungwort What the devil is he doing now? he asked himself.

  Brutar sighed. First Mungwort had refused to torture a living humanoid. Next, he had wanted to start a company garden so they could raise their own fresh vegetables. Then, he had gotten together a party to attend a performance given by some kind of chimp dance group.

  Brutar shook his head, watching the young gorilla rolling rocks around on the hill.

  “What is it now, Mungwort?” Brutar called. “You find a desert daisy?”

  The rough laughter of the other gorillas brought a wider smile to Brutar’s face. “Or did you lose your rifle again, Mungwort?”

  The sergeant saw Mungwort suddenly reach down into the rocks and come up with something shiny.

  “That looks like some kind of weapon!” Brutar said to himself, standing up quickly.

  On the hill, the private was holding the strange object in his gloved hands. “Looks like some kind of gun,” he muttered, and looked for a trigger.

  Below, Sergeant Brutar was yelling at him. “Mungwort! Dammit, Mungwort, you bring that thing down here!”

  Mungwort looked up. “Yes? Oh, sergeant, look at what I found. It’s some type of… I don’t know what. You see, sir, it has a trigger here—”

  “Don’t—” screamed Brutar.

  A ruby-red beam flashed out and sliced a nearby rock in two. Startled, Mungwort jerked around. Another rock, barely touched, exploded.

  “What!” Mungwort stared with astonishment as the flaring red beam continued to cut through the air toward the patrol vehicles.

  “No, Mungwort—!”

  The second jeep was hit, and its radio antenna neatly sliced off before the private took his finger off the trigger.

  Sergeant Brutar was staring at the fallen whip antenna. “That could have been my head,” he said softly. “MUNGWORT!”

  “Yes, Sergeant Brutar?”

  “Come down here! Bring that—whatever it is! Only don’t touch the trigger! You hear me?”

  “Yes, Sergeant Brutar. I hear you, Sergeant Brutar.”

  The entire patrol watched as Mungwort brought the strange weapon down from the slope. The sergeant gestured to Corporal Morgo. “You and Theka, get that thing away from him!”

  The two took the device from the stunned Mungwort, and Sergeant Brutar carefully set it down on the hood of the jeep and examined it.

  He shook his head. “Scratch my tail if I know what this is! Never saw anything like it before. Morgo!”

  “Yes, sergeant!”

  “Radio headquarters! Tell them to inform General Urko we’ve found something and are bringing it in.”

  “Oh, sergeant, sir?”

  “Yeah, Mungwort?”

  “Do you think you could find time to tell the general that it was I who found it?”

  Brutar nodded. “Oh, I’ll tell ’im, Mungwort. Right after you replace that antenna out of your paycheck.”

  Mungwort saddened. “I just wanted him to know I was fulfilling my responsibilities.”

  “Fill—your what?” Brutar sputtered. Sarcasm replaced anger in his voice as he added, “Oh, he knows, Mungwort, he knows. I get a call from him almost every day. ‘How’s Mungwort doing?’ he asks.”

  “Really, sergeant?”

  “Every day, Mungwort. Except his mother’s birthday and Kerchak’s Day. Honest, Mungwort.”

  Mungwort nodded. But nothing had changed. They still didn’t like him.

  * * *

  Sun and dust. Sand and rock. Empty blue sky and trickles of sweat.

  Sergeant Brutar stood at attention in the wall-less tent of burly General Urko at Red Leader One, the temporary command post Urko had just established within the Forbidden Zone to implement one of his periodic—and always futile—attempts to invade the Below World. The general and several high-ranking officers were gathered around a map table, examining the strange object Brutar had brought in.

  The gorilla general turned to the dusty desert noncom. “Good work, Sergeant, uh, Brutar, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Quick thinking, soldier. Now, if we can just figure out what it is—”

  “Well, sir, when Private Mungwort found it, he—”

  “Yes, thank you, sergeant. And thank Morgwhump, too.”

  “Sir, I—”

  “That is all, Sergeant Brutar. We’ll handle it from here.”

  The dust-covered noncom saluted Urko’s back and walked quickly to his jeep. “Get going, Tritor!”

  “What’s the hurry, sergeant? Let’s hang around, have a few laughs, get some cool drinks, and—”

  “Tritor! Move your rump! Get us back to the patrol!”

  The driver slammed the jeep into gear and took off. “By the eyes of Kerchak, sergeant, I don’t understand why you—”

  “Shut up and drive, Private Tritor! Do you want to be around when those officers do what Mungwort did?”

  Tritor gave his sergeant a panicked look. “But didn’t you—”

  “They wouldn’t listen. Now move this pile of junk!”

  “Yessir!”

  The jeep accelerated swiftly, and Sergeant Brutar looked back over the seat at the general’s tent, its sides lifted to catch the breeze. He could see Urko and his staff standing around the table, and he waited for the fun to start.

  * * *

  Captain Mulla spoke up. “It is definitely not from our culture, General.” He stood up and added, “No ape made that.”

  A colonel looked up, his eyes glittering angrily. “That leaves… the Underdwellers.”

  “Or the humanoids,” said a major next to him.

  Most of the officers gave the major a pitying look. Colonel Trafuna snorted, leaving no confusion about his thoughts regarding the possibility of the humanoid beasts having any scientific or even mechanical ability.

  “Major Surga, this is a serious matter,” the colonel
said haughtily. “Kindly keep ridiculous theories to yourself.”

  “All right, all right!” General Urko said moodily. His words cut the conversation, and the officers watched their brooding commander with the alertness that comes from close and continuous contact with ruthless power. “The Underdwellers never leave the Below World,” he mused aloud. “And no humanoid could have built this…” Urko’s thick lips set in a hard line. “At least no humanoid from this planet!”

  The gorilla general struck the map table with a gloved fist. The laser drill bounced, but Major Surga grabbed it.

  “Wait a minute!” Urko’s eyes flashed. “There is one humanoid we know about who is unusual—Blue-Eyes!” Urko’s voice shifted to a low growl. “This could be his handiwork. He must be in this area!”

  Urko looked around the table of officers. “And if he is, this time”—he struck the table again—“I will have him!”

  The laser drill bounced again, and Major Surga quickly put both hands on it to steady the strange device. His eyes, as well as those of the other officers, were on Urko. None of them noticed that Surga’s grip had unknowingly depressed a stud that caused the power cell chamber to flop open. A gray cell rolled out, fell to the soft boot-churned sand below, and rolled beneath the table.

  The faint plop of the cell landing on the sand was covered by General Urko’s snarling prophecy.

  “The future of the Gorilla Army depends on it!”

  As the assembled officers snapped to attention, hands to their chests, their shifting feet kicked sand over the power cell, almost completely covering it.

  * * *

  Jeff climbed up out of the collapsed tunnel and reached back to give Bill a hand. They scrambled up the loose rocks and sand and into the flat of the desert. Without a word they trotted across the hot sand toward the ridge where they had hidden the laser drill.

  “Hey!” Jeff stopped short and pointed down at the sand.

  Vehicle tracks had pocked the smooth, wind-swept surface of the sands!

  “A gorilla patrol,” Bill said, his eyes scanning the horizon quickly. “Don’t see anything now.”

  Jeff examined the tracks critically. “I think they just took a rest stop here. See that? Looks like the remains of a gorilla ration box.”

  “Well, come on,” Bill urged, “we better get the laser and get back.”

  The two astronauts trotted to the rock ridge and quickly climbed toward the hiding place.

  Bill pointed to the rock Mungwort had sliced with the laser. “Uh-oh!”

  Jeff looked at the hiding place and at the scattered rocks around it. “The laser’s gone!”

  “The gorilla patrol!” Bill exclaimed. “They found it!”

  “But how? I mean, we hid it pretty well.”

  Bill shrugged. “I don’t know. Accident, maybe. But those apes have the laser.”

  Jeff sat down on a rock. “How are we going to find it now—and in time?”

  “The tracks,” Bill said. “We follow the tracks.” He started down the rocky slope. “We’ll follow the tracks!”

  Jeff got up and followed his friend. “Okay, but it’s just got to lead us right into danger!”

  Bill jumped down from the last rock onto the desert sand. “Yup,” he said. “But no one said life was going to be easy.”

  “That’s all I need,” Jeff muttered as they began trotting along in the path created by the three patrol vehicles, “a corny philosopher.”

  * * *

  Krador crossed the room and activated the television monitor that was keeping track of the lava flow and the reactor room.

  “We must check the reactor area.”

  The reactor room was empty. The technicians who had been dismantling the reactor were gone. The temperature had become too high for them to work, even in protective suits.

  Judy peered at the screen. “It looks safe, Krador… for the moment anyway.”

  Krador put his finger to the screen. “Does it? Look more closely, Oosa.”

  Judy watched as Krador manipulated the controls. The armored television camera in the reactor room zoomed in on a crack in the stone floor. A tiny trickle of lava was inching through, creating a small, steaming puddle. As they watched, a piece of the stone broke away and a bubble of lava burst into the room.

  “If your friends do not hurry, our world is doomed.”

  Judy gulped, watching the slow but inexorable flow of the molten rock. She felt so helpless. But there was nothing she could do.

  * * *

  General Urko turned to his aide-de-camp. “Mulla, tell our communications officer to radio Doctor Zaius. Tell him Blue-Eyes is somewhere in this area and that we will have him soon.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  The jeeps and troop carrier trucks would soon prepare to move on.

  * * *

  Bill was still panting as he lay flat at the top of the ridge overlooking Red Leader One. Jeff was sitting downslope, pouring sand out of his boot.

  “Boy, that was some run,” he said.

  “We didn’t have time to dog it,” Bill answered.

  Suddenly he stiffened as he saw a group of apes moving about the general’s wall-less tent. It was in shadow, but he recognized the laser drill sitting on a portable table.

  “Get up here!” he whispered to Jeff.

  The black astronaut tugged on his boot and scrambled up to lie next to his partner. Bill pointed. “It’s on that table in the tent. See?”

  Jeff nodded. “It’s there, all right. But how do we get it back?”

  He looked around at the ring of army trucks, jeeps, and gorilla guards. There were tents in which soldiers lay at rest, and a mess tent where some were eating. Here and there, in the shade of the trucks, gorilla soldiers lay sleeping or resting. Beyond the ape encampment was a half-circle of rocks, some of which were quite large. At one side was a spire of lava, sheer and tall.

  “They have half the army here,” Jeff said.

  Bill smiled. “No, it’s really just a company or so. The rest must be out on patrol.”

  “Well, there are more of them than there are of us,” Jeff said moodily.

  “All we need is a diversion, old friend.” He thought a moment. “They’re looking for me. So I think I might give them a hand.”

  “Huh? How? What are you planning?”

  Bill smiled again. “I don’t think it’s grand enough to be called a ‘plan.’ It’s just an idea. See that spire over there? The one above that little pass through the rocks?”

  Jeff nodded, his eyes squinting against the sun.

  “If I can get inside that pass… without them seeing me…”

  “Be careful, Bill.”

  “Look, I’ll make a fuss. As soon as they start chasing me—and believe me, they will—you watch and see if the laser is unguarded. You grab it and use it to undercut that pencil rock overlooking the pass.”

  Jeff bit at his lip, appraising the distance and angle. Then he nodded. “Right.”

  Bill slid down the slope and started to move toward the pass on an angle. “Give me about ten minutes.”

  The black astronaut watched his friend disappear into the rocks, then turned his attention to the tent where the laser still lay in plain sight.

  Ten minutes, Jeff thought. They could move it away in ten minutes… He looked around for a rock and hefted it in his hand.

  Primitive, but effective, he thought. And silent.

  * * *

  Wallo crossed the sandy bottom of the pass and leaned against the rock next to his friend, Girk.

  “You’re supposed to stay on that side, Wallo,” Girk rebuked him.

  “It’s hot over there. You have the shade.”

  “Yeah, but Sergeant Kukar put you there and me here.”

  “Wanna trade?”

  Girk shook his hairy head. “Naw.”

  “Half and half?”

  “Naw, why should I?”

  “Some friend,” Wallo grumbled, sitting down on the sand and putting his ba
ck against the rock.

  “I hate the sun, too, Wallo, when it’s this hot.”

  “I hate being in the field,” his friend said, wiping his face.

  Girk nodded. “At least if you’re stationed around Ape City you can go to the movies. Hey, have you seen that new one. The Apefather?”

  Wallo shook his head. “I wanted to, but everybody says it’s not violent enough!”

  Girk nodded. “Yeah, I know what you mean. That horror movie about the chimpanzee that turns into a gorilla, what was its name?”

  “Doctor Hydo and Mister Jekkill.”

  “Yeah, that’s the one. Really horrible! Really good!”

  “Not as good as that creepy one, though a coupla years ago when the mad chimp comes up with this formula that turns a gorilla into a chimpanzee!”

  “No kidding? I missed that.”

  “Really crawly stuff, seeing that big bruiser shrink into a scrawny little chimp nothing.” Wallo shivered in recollection.

  “Well, there’s always girls in Ape City, anyway.”

  Wallo shook his head. “What am I gonna do with you, Girk. You’ll wake up married some morning, with your next re-enlistment bonus signed over.”

  “Aw, come on. I’m not that stupid!”

  * * *

  In the dimness of a shaded crevice, Bill Hudson dropped to the floor of the pass. He had bypassed the chatting gorillas by moving quietly over the heaped stones above them. Now he came to the path through the pass itself. He crept out and peered at the two sentries. He could hear their murmuring voices, but they were hidden by a protruding rock.

  He looked up, gauging the position of the lava spire over his head. Watchful of the rock spire, he moved up the pass, putting more distance between himself and the sentries.

  Then the blond astronaut stepped into the center of the rock-lined pass and shouted, “Hey! Hey, you clowns!”

  His voice echoed eerily, and the two sentries scrambled to their feet.

  Wallo clutched his rifle and squinted up the pass belligerently. “Hey,” he rumbled. “It’s that—?”

  “It’s the humanoid, Blue-Eyes!” Girk cried.

  Wallo threw his rifle to his shoulder and fired. The explosion echoed and made the rifle shot seem as loud as a cannon in the narrow pass. The bullet ricocheted off the rock ten feet from Bill, but he stood his ground.