Bill grinned. “But solid. Being able to cut those stone blocks smoothly makes for some fine fitting.” He sighed and moved off. “Well, there’s still a lot left to be done…”
* * *
Mungwort was crammed into the back of a troop-carrier truck, along with the rest of his squad. Sergeant Brutar rode in the cab with the driver, sheltered from the sun and dust. Kork was on one side of Mungwort and Trommo had wedged his bulk in on the other. Neither of them seemed to care, or even be aware, that Mungwort was squeezed between them. Elbows had never really seemed so much like weapons to Mungwort before.
When they hit a bump and both of the bigger apes lurched toward Mungwort in the middle, he groaned.
“What’s the matter, Mungwort?” Trommo grinned. “Things too tough for you? Maybe you oughta ask for a transfer to the ballet corps!”
Trommo’s humor brought dusty grins from several of the gorillas, but Mungwort stayed quiet. I’ll suffer in silence, he told himself. They’ll not get me to react.
The truck jostled them again and Kork laughed raucously. “Bumpy enough for you?” the big gorilla asked.
“You cliché-ridden imbecile!” Mungwort mumbled.
“What’s that, Mungwort?” Kork asked, a touch of menace in his voice. “You say something to me, Mungwort?”
“I said, Kork, that if you read a book you might learn to insult people even better. Of course, first you’d have to learn to read…”
“Aw, what do I want with reading, anyway?” The dusty gorilla wiped his face with a sweaty hand. “I know the numbers of money, I know the serial number of my rifle here, and my own number. Whadda I want to learn to read for? That’d only take up time I need for the opposite sex!”
“How much further do we have to go?” Mungwort asked.
“How do I know, Mungwort? I ain’t no general like you!” Kork’s humor made him and Trommo roar.
Mungwort closed his eyes and tried to sleep, but he wasn’t very successful.
* * *
Ron Brent pulled at the rope and the stone block lifted easily.
“Not bad!” Bill said, looking up at the crude pulley arrangement Ron had fashioned.
“These grass ropes won’t last long—not with those crude pulleys. But they’ll help considerably as we get to the higher-levels.”
“This first one won’t be so heavy,” Bill said. “I just want to get a roof over everyone’s head; then we’ll start expanding, and eventually every family will have a house—or at least an apartment—in the pueblo.”
“And there will be rooms for manufacturing, storage, cooking,” Ron. Added. He grinned, at Bill. “We’re building a city, Bill!”
* * *
A scout jeep came up the side of a ridge at the south end of the savannah, and braked. Below was the line of trucks, tanks, and jeeps commanded by General Urko.
The scout stood up in the jeep’s seat and waved. Below, a command jeep pulled out of line as the column halted. The general’s vehicle scrambled up the sandy slope and came to a stop next to the scout.
“What’s the trouble, Lieutenant Samic?” the general demanded.
Samic saluted. “We’ve scouted both sides of the river all the way up to these ridges, sir. No sign of the humanoids’ leaving. Only Dead Ape’s Canyon lies beyond, and to the east and west of the canyon and ridges is only the Southern Desert!”
Urko nodded. “I understand. We can’t take the troops into that narrow canyon. It was difficult enough circling that cursed swamp! Well, lieutenant, we’ll go around the ridges to the west.”
As the lieutenant drove away, Urko flopped back heavily into his seat and glanced over at his aide-de-camp, “Mulla, that desert area hasn’t even been explored yet! I wonder what they’re up to?”
Mulla didn’t answer, and in a moment Urko directed the driver to rejoin the column below. The long armored column swung west around the ridges and canyons.
* * *
Jeff sat down and Nova brought him a gourd of stew, which the tired astronaut ate eagerly. Judy and Bill came into the campfire area and dropped a bundle of long, sturdy poles.
“We’ll make those into ladders tomorrow,” Bill said. He grinned at Jeff. “We’re building our primitive skyscraper pretty fast, thanks to you!”
“Thanks to whoever at NASA thought we ought to have a laser drill to take ore samples,” Jeff answered. He looked around at the pueblo, which the last workers were leaving now to come to the huge campfire. “It really is going up pretty fast. Crude, but fast.”
“We’ll make heavy wooden shutters for the windows,” Judy said, “and the ladders will pull up so that no one can climb in. The few openings we have on ground level will have really thick doors on them, backed with deadfalls.”
“We’ll rig a watchtower, too—on the highest level,” Bill suggested, “to overlook the clifftops and the valley. Ron thinks he can rig a heliograph for communication with the guard at the rock bridge and for any scouts we have along the valley.”
“We’ll have to keep a good watch,” Ron added, coming into the firelight from the darkness. Nova quickly served him a gourd of stew. “Lookouts, sentries on duty twenty-four hours a day. It will eat up our manpower.”
“Woman- and child-power, too,” Judy said. “WE can do that, too, you know.”
“We’ll all have to do our part,” Bill said. “I just hope that it’s enough…”
* * *
“It’s Lieutenant Samic, sir,” Captain Mulla told the general, handing him the radio mike and headset.
Urko took the headset and pressed one of the cups to his ear, tipping his leather helmet slightly.
“What is it, Samic?” he barked. “You find them yet?”
Samic’s voice was faint, but clear enough. “Our advance scouts have picked up the humanoids’ trail, sir.”
“Good!” Urko snapped. “Where are they?”
“They seem to have been moving far into the Southern Desert—”
“Any idea what they’re after?”
“We don’t know, sir. The tracks are faint. There was a sandstorm, sir, and—”
“Why don’t you know? Why can’t I get a straight answer from anybody? Is there a conspiracy against me?”
“No, sir…” Samic said faintly, and meekly.
“You have no idea at all?” Urko shouted.
“Sir, we have their tracks now, and will do our best to catch sight of them.”
“Well, find them!” Urko commanded angrily. He threw the headset and microphone back to Mulla. “Speed up the convoy!” he shouted.
* * *
The four astronauts stood outside the pueblo complex. “It’s almost complete,” Ron said, satisfied. “All that remains are a few finishing touches.”
“The pueblo seems pretty solid, all right,” Judy commented.
“Just like the ones the Indians in Arizona and New Mexico had,” Jeff remarked. “And their pueblos lasted for hundreds of years.”
“I wonder if these will be granted as much time?” Bill wondered quietly.
“Only the centuries will tell,” Judy said.
“It’s a good thing we’re about finished!” Jeff sighed. “The laser is out of commission for a while. I used it just a bit too long today and it overheated. Fused a circuit on the pulse cycle.”
Bill looked alarmed. “It’s useless?”
“For now, anyway. I can fix it, but it will take me a couple of days. I can pick the circuit apart, then rebuild it by cannibalizing the heat alarm system. We won’t know when the laser is overheating after this, but at least it’ll work. I’m sorry about half ruining it like that, but I wanted to get just one more stone cut. I had it three-quarters finished and—”
“Oh, don’t blame yourself, Jeff,” Ron said. “You were working hard out there at some pretty tough precision work. As long as you can fix it.”
“Yeah, but as I say, we won’t be able to use it for two days…”
“Well, there’s, plenty we have to do that d
oesn’t require the laser,” Bill consoled him: “I’d like to put a layer of gravel over the dirt floor, after we pack it down more. Then another thin layer of dirt, for smoothness. Or sand.”
“We have beds to make, fireplaces to build, crops to start planting… A primitive woman’s work is never done.”
“Neither is a primitive man’s,” Ron scolded her. “It’s surprising that the cavemen ever had a chance to create any art, like the cave paintings or carved sculpture…”
“Art is awfully nice, all right,” Judy said, “but sheer survival takes precedence most of the time.”
“Speaking of which,” Bill added, “I’m going to check on the guards we posted.”
“And I’ll start repairing the laser,” Jeff put in.
* * *
Urko’s command jeep slid to a dusty stop next to Samic’s scout car. “Which way?” the gorilla general demanded of his chief scout.
“That way, sir!”
Urko stood and waved to the trucks and tanks and jeeps behind; then his own vehicle started through the mountain pass. But in less than a mile, it was obvious that the heavy tanks were not going to be able to navigate the laser-cut humanoid trail. “Send them back!” Urko snapped to Captain Mulla. “We don’t heed tanks to wipe up a few cringing humanoids! But keep this column moving!”
The tanks were left behind as the lighter trucks and jeeps picked their way through the tortuous valleys and up the steep mountainside as they wound their way northwestward. All they could see ahead, now, was mountains and more mountains. Some of the mountaintops east of them were ice-covered; one of them might be famed Mount Garr, on which sat the fearsome temple and statue of Kygoor, god of the ice apes. Even thinking of that made every gorilla shudder.
“Hurry!” Urko shouted to his officers through his walkie-talkie. “The sooner we find them, the sooner I can wring their necks!”
* * *
A tall young humanoid, dressed in a fur wrap and clutching a primitive spear, suddenly straightened, his heart beginning to pump faster. He stood up slowly, his eyes on a moving column to the south of New Valley. He knew the kind of smoke and dust that the machines of the Gorilla Army made, and he watched the line of vehicles for several minutes to be certain it was really coming toward the valley.
At last he was certain.
Wheeling, the humanoid started to run down the natural stone bridge into the valley. Pausing, he took one final look; then he ran as fast as his hide-covered feet could carry him.
* * *
“Our scouts report a valley—a large one, sir!” Captain Mulla lowered the radio headset and shouted to his commander. “Almost straight ahead, general!”
Urko’s sharp tusks gleamed in the sunlight. “Excellent! Continue the advance!”
A few moments later Mulla reported again. “There is humanoid activity in the valley, sir!”
Urko’s tusks grew even more prominent. “Sound the charge!” he cried.
* * *
Bill stared at the gestures of the grunting humanoid. “How many…?” Wearing a questioning expression, the astronaut held up his fingers, opening and closing his fist.
The humanoid guard opened and closed his fist a great number of times, then made an expansive gesture.
Bill groaned. “Urko has followed us here! Quick! Get everyone inside the pueblo!” Bill whirled and questioned Ron. “Where’s Jeff and that laser?”
Ron looked crestfallen. “He’s nowhere near ready to use it as a weapon! It’s all in pieces!”
“All right! We’ll do our best! Judy!”
“Yes, Bill?” She had run up at the first signals from the scout.
“Get up that ladder and check to be certain all the shutters are closed, then pull up the ladder after the last person is inside!”
“What about you?”
“I’ll be all right. I’m rigging the deadfall rocks against the lower doors. Ron, will you help me?”
Some of the humanoids, staggering in from a berry hunt and from setting traps farther down the valley, seemed dazed and confused. Bill sent them toward the ladders with shouts of encouragement and open-handed shoves.
“Get up there! Hurry! Hurry!”
Then he ran in and helped Ron close up the heavy doors and move the heavy boulders against them. Afterward, they ran together up the narrow interior ladders to the upper levels.
Jeff dashed over to Bill and crouched down by a window slit, speaking breathlessly. “Can’t get that laser into shape for a day and a half more! It sure broke down at the wrong time! We’ll have to hope our other strategy works.”
Ron spoke up from the next observation slit. “Let’s all keep our fingers crossed.”
* * *
Urko looked down at the natural stone bridge, watching his first foot troops crossing it. “A good defensive position, yes, but only if their weapons equal ours—and they don’t! Rocks against rifles? hah! Even if they had the spirit to fight—which they don’t—they’re nothing but scared rabbits!”
With a bridgehead secured, Urko descended, followed by the rest of the gorillas on foot.
“There’s no way we can get those vehicles down here, sir,” his aide-de-camp asserted, “unless we rig some kind of crane. And we don’t have the materials for that.”
“It’s all right, Mulla. We won’t need the jeeps unless they run. But by the hair of Kerchak’s beard, what’s that?”
“Some kind of building, sir—almost like a fort!”
“Maybe some old relic they holed up in. See there, outside, those baskets and skins, those gourds. The humanoids are here, all right!”
Urko strode behind his troops until he was able to look across the meadow at the pueblo. “Sturdily built. I’d swear it looked new, if I didn’t know it was some old pre-cataclysmic relic.” He turned to Captain Mulla. “All right, order the gas attack.”
“Gas attack! Gas attack!”
“Gas squads for’ard!” the sergeants yelled.
The grenades spun through the air and thudded against the stone walls and heavy shutters. The choking gas hissed out, and almost at once the pueblo was shrouded in it.
“Gas masks!” Urko commanded.
“Gas masks!” Captain Mulla ordered.
“Attack!”
Urko was being very casual, suppressing his hot emotions in a deliberate imitation of his father, the great general who had routed the gibbons at Fort Warro and cleaned up the Barbary apes at Point Tuska.
“Attack!” echoed Mulla.
The gas masks went on and the first squads charged. One squad carried a portable ladder and another had some ropes. Still another squad charged in bearing a partially built ladder they had found in the bushes.
The ladders slammed against the walls and the ropes sailed up to snag on the rough corners of stones. Husky young gorillas vied for the opportunity to be first over the ramparts, right under the nose of their much-feared and worshiped general.
It was hard to see, for the gas was considerable, but one sergeant heard some choking sounds from inside the pueblo and called out gleefully, “They’re in there, sir!”
Suddenly a pole shot out from a slit in one of the shutters, pushing against the first ladder. It tipped back and the surprised apes waved their arms frantically. The heavily laden ladder stood in a straight vertical, then plummeted backward, slamming the gorillas into the ground with sickening thuds.
A thin branch with a hook-like stub, of a limb at one end poked through a slit and snagged the climbing rope of the next group, pulling it close enough for a knife to slice through it. That group of apes, too, collapsed to the hard ground. Two more ladder attempts were made; one ladder was tipped sideways and slid down the wall, catapulting its frantic occupants into the second, which also crashed to the ground in splinters.
Another, fresh squad was brought in, and they, picked up the one usable ladder and tried a scaling point between two windows. In their frantic efforts to gain the wall, however, they overloaded the weakened ladder
, and it broke under their weight.
Gas masks were knocked awry or lost, and several blinded gorillas staggered out of the clouds of gas and collapsed on the ground, retching and gasping.
“Attack the lower floors, you fools!” Urko ordered.
A lieutenant took in a squad, using a tree trunk as a battering ram, but they, too, failed. Just as they struck the solid door for the third time, a shower of boiling water shot out of flues directly above it. The scalded troopers dropped their tree trunk and fled, screaming in pain.
“Impossible!” Urko raged as he looked with horror at his retreating soldiers. “Those humanoid idiots have always been too stupid to know how to defend themselves!”
“Our grenades can’t penetrate their shutters, general.” Mulla looked at the pueblo-fort through his field glasses. “Some gas must be getting through the slits and cracks, of course, but not enough to hurt them.”
Another of Urko’s officers, the side of his head bloody from a fall, spoke up. “And ladders aren’t long enough—”
Urko cut the ape short. “Then order the artillery to be brought up!”
“The—?” the officer began, then looked for other gorilla officers. None of them were about to help him. He looked uncomfortable, then blurted out, “Sir, we—we didn’t bring the howitzers with us!”
Urko stared at him with bulging eyes for a long moment, then exploded with a great shout. “What?” The general grabbed for the wounded gorilla’s tunic and bunched it up in his meaty fist. “You mean we came all this way without the proper weapons?”
The officer was quivering before the wrath of his commander. “We didn’t think we’d need them, sir. After all, they are only humanoids and every time before—”
Urko shoved the officer away. The bulky, leather-clad officer staggered and held a gloved hand to his bloody head. “You ordered the tanks left behind, sir, when they couldn’t travel in mountains, and the howitzers are with them—”
“Idiots!” Urko screamed, ignoring the officer. He gestured around him. “You are all idiots! I can’t rely on any of you for anything!”
Most of the men hung their heads in shame. A couple pretended to be watching the gas drift away from the pueblo. Urko paced up and down, his angry voice, rising and falling.
Planet of the Apes Omnibus 4 Page 46