Planet of the Apes Omnibus 3

by Titan Books

  Perdix, Virdon, Galen, and the rest of the Dragoons came down toward the edge of the cliffs, watching Burke as he swam laboriously toward the spot where Fauna had gone under.

  Burke reached her limp body, grabbed her, and began pulling her toward the shore. Fighting the heavy sea, the astronaut was near exhaustion himself; only his determination kept him swimming with his burden. He struggled toward a sandy beach, just away from the cliff where Fauna fell. Seeing where Burke was heading, the group above him on the cliff top hurried down a trail to the beach.

  Burke carried Fauna in his arms out of the water. He stumbled in the sand, wearily trudging up the beach as the others drew near. Burke lowered Fauna slowly and carefully down on the sand. Then he, too, fell back in utter fatigue. Sestus came forward. Virdon took a blanket he had grabbed from a horse’s saddlebag and covered Fauna with it. She began to recover consciousness and moaned slightly. The sound made Burke sit up and smile. “It’s all right, Fauna,” he said gently. “It’s all right now.”

  “Pago?” asked Fauna in a weak, distant voice. “Pago… is that you?”

  “Yes, Fauna.”

  She shivered, relieved and happy that he had come back to her, after all. She reached out and touched his face. There was an instant of contact with his human flesh; she pulled her hand back as though it had been burned. “No—no—” she cried, confused and horrified. “You’re not Pago. You’re…” she could barely bring herself to say it, “human.” She uttered the word as if she were spitting out poison.

  Burke thought of the Biblical story he had told her. “It was a… deception born of desperate need, Fauna,” he said imploringly. “It was not meant to harm.”

  But the combined shock of the near-fatal accident and the revelation of Burke’s true identity were more than Fauna could take. She almost went into hysteria at the thought of being so close to a human. Shocked, revolted, she recoiled from him in abject terror. “Get away from me,” she shrieked. “Get away!”

  Burke was shaken. He retreated from her, not wanting to upset her further. Sestus stepped in to try and placate her. “Fauna,” he said, “it’s your uncle, it’s Sestus. I’m here. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  “He’s human!” murmured Fauna. “Human!”

  “But he isn’t going to hurt you,” said Sestus.

  “Get him away, get him away,” said Fauna angrily. “He tricked me, like the others tricked my father! They’re treacherous, just as you said, Uncle Sestus. Like animals. They must be treated like animals…” She broke down into sobs, her body trembling violently.

  “Fauna, listen to me,” said Sestus pityingly. “The human saved your life, do you hear? It was not I who saved you from the ocean. It was the human.”

  “No,” said Fauna, shaking her head, “I don’t believe it.”

  “It’s true, Fauna!” said Sestus, taking hold of the young female ape’s shoulders. “I saw him! He risked his own life to save you!”

  “I hate him! A human killed my father. Killed him!”

  Virdon knelt beside Fauna and tried to speak with her. “Fauna, it’s Alar,” he said, as gently as he could. She did not respond. “Fauna. I don’t know who killed your father. But even if it was a human, that doesn’t mean all humans are bad. Just as all apes are not good.”

  “That’s a lie!” said Fauna, snarling. “I hate humans!”

  “Fauna,” said Sestus, unable to keep his secret any longer, “this Alar speaks the truth. It was not a human who caused your father’s death.”

  “Shut up, Sestus!” said Zon in a warning tone.

  Perdix looked suddenly interested. “What are you saying, Sestus?” he asked.

  Sestus turned back to Fauna; the aging chimpanzee was almost in tears, too. His voice was full of pain. “I… hated and feared humans, just as you do now. We all did. But your father… he was different. He didn’t fear the humans. He trusted them. He believed in them.” Sestus had to pause while he collected himself. “That night,” he said falteringly, “I was with Zon…”

  “No, Sestus!” shouted Zon.

  Sestus ignored him. “We warned your father not to trust them as you are warning me now. But he was stubborn. Zon became angry. There was a fight. Zon hit your father. Lucian fell and struck his head on a rock. Zon said we were both responsible for his death.” Sestus was overcome with anguish. “Fauna, I couldn’t bring myself to tell you the truth. So I made an agreement with Zon; we would blame it on the humans. Then Zon used this lie as an excuse to drive off and kill humans. But I can’t go on living like this any more. Not when I see how wrong I was in thinking they are all bad. This is a lie that we must not let continue. I have acted worse than any human.” He held Fauna tightly to him as the ape girl slowly accepted and absorbed the meaning of his words.

  Zon’s frenzy was growing during Sestus’ speech. “Sestus is a coward,” he said, trying to regain his swaggering dominance over the other apes. “What difference does it make who killed Lucian? The humans are our enemies. We must drive them from our land. We must rid ourselves of their evil!”

  During this speech, the Dragoons, one by one, removed their masks and dropped them to the ground. With looks of scorn and pity for Zon they slowly rode away.

  “Kill them!” screamed Zon. “Kill the humans!” He noticed that the Dragoons had left him behind. “Listen to me! Listen to me!” All the Dragoons were gone.

  There was a long silence. Everyone left on the narrow beach was lost in his own thoughts. Perdix stepped forward and put a hand on Zon’s shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said.

  Perdix gestured with his rifle. Zon cast a long look to the others who had remained, then moved away, followed by Perdix, his captor. Night was closing in on them all.

  * * *

  The next morning began bright and clear. It was a new day, a clean and fresh morning. Virdon, Burke, and Galen prepared to venture on. Burke helped Galen with his backpack. Sestus had his arm around Fauna. “You’re welcome to stay, of course,” said the chimpanzee.

  “No, thanks,” said Virdon. “We have to move on.”

  Burke stepped up close to Fauna. He spoke to her gently. “Fauna,” he said warmly, “I hope that you forgive me for deceiving you.”

  She was sheepish and uncertain. “I just can’t understand,” she said, her expression becoming even more confused. “How could I have thought that I loved… a human?”

  Burke smiled, understanding her feelings. He managed to overcome his own inner feelings about Fauna’s ugliness. He kissed her lightly, gently on the cheek. She was startled at the touch of his lips, her hand coming up to touch the spot.

  Not long afterward, Burke, Virdon, and Galen were marching away from the house toward the crest of the hill. Fauna, her head tilted, her ears listening to the sound of the travelers’ fading footsteps, waved gently to a man she could not see. Her eyes were bright and wet with tears.

  She could not sort out the feelings inside her that had caused those tears. That was a question she would try to answer on many dark nights through many long years.

  JOURNEY INTO

  TERROR

  “The Legacy”

  based on the teleplay by Robert Hamner

  “The Horse Race”

  based on the teleplay by David P. Lewis and Booker

  Bradshaw

  Based on characters from Planet of the Apes

  For Carol Antosiak, a supplementary Muse.

  THE LEGACY

  1

  Two human beings and a large chimpanzee moved slowly across the wilderness. The two human beings had once been astronauts. They had been, and still were, close friends. Their names were Pete Burke, a tall, lanky, dark-haired man, and Alan Virdon, who was more muscular, blond, and possessed of a drive and a will that motivated even his companions. The chimpanzee, whose name was Galen, followed the humans in a kind of hunched-over scuttle. He was better dressed—for the times—than the men, and, considering the times, he spoke the language better.

  The
se were strange times.

  Men had lost control of their world, and intelligent apes had taken their place. There were orangutans, the administrators; chimpanzees, the thinkers and doers; and gorillas, the brutish soldiers. Humans rated a mention in this list only by default of other types of ape, and by the fact that they were economically essential to the continued prosperity of the ape world. Humans were slaves, servants, or indigent village farmers. Every aspect of their lives was overseen by an ape in authority. There was no such thing as freedom for a human, nothing like dignity, either. That was why it was so odd that Burke, Virdon, and the chimpanzee Galen had become close allies. It was a thing that had never before happened in the ape world. It was a thing that would mean their deaths if they were ever recaptured by the gorillas.

  They fled across miles of unmapped wasteland. Ancient human cities were forbidden to the apes; humans went there sometimes, to avoid the constant scrutiny of their masters. But the humans who lived in the forbidden areas led a harsher existence than their fellows who remained slaves. These city dwellers were the ones who could truly define the price of liberty, such as it was.

  Burke and Virdon had crash-landed back on Earth some two thousand years after their takeoff on an interstellar mission. The Earth they found had nothing in common with the one they had left; their families, their friends, even their society, had all been dead for twenty centuries. Galen, a renegade ape who was guilty of thinking too much, had joined them, and the three fugitives had fashioned an interdependent life together. Each had things to learn and teach; this they did, but their primary concern was just staying alive. This they had done, also, but as for tomorrow…

  The countryside they were crossing looked like much of the landscape they had seen in the many months of their adventures. They knew that they were in what had been North America, for occasionally a landmark was unmistakable. But the ape civilization centered in North America, and the two millennia that had passed, had effectively erased any vestige of their old lives. Galen listened with amazement and his eager scientific curiosity when Burke and Virdon described the land as they had known it. At first, Galen found it difficult to accept the premise that human beings had created a culture that was in many ways superior to his own. If that was true, where was it now? Why were human beings now slaves? To answer these questions, Galen would have to make certain assumptions about his own race, assumptions that were painful even for him to accept.

  Low hills stretched ahead of them all the way to the horizon. The sky above was blue, with scattered tatters of clouds. The sun beat down upon them. They had been marching since before dawn, and the two humans and the chimpanzee were beginning to show the first signs of fatigue.

  “We have to keep going,” said Virdon.

  “We always have to keep going,” said Burke. “We all know that. But do we have to keep going now?”

  “Let’s get to the top of this next rise,” said Virdon. “We can rest up there, and see the neighborhood without being spotted ourselves. We can take a break up there.”

  “That says a lot about you,” said Burke tiredly. “You never suggest a rest stop down here. It’s always up there.”

  “Good, sound strategy,” said Galen. “I approve.”

  “Well, in theory, so do I,” said Burke. “But I can’t get the message across to my tired old bones.”

  “Come on, tired old bones,” said Virdon, smiling. “One more rise, after all of the traveling we’ve done in the last couple of weeks. One more rise.”

  “Sure,” said Burke, following his blond leader, “but that last rise… Isn’t that where you always spot the next one?”

  “I can’t help that,” said Virdon, not turning around.

  “My guiding motto used to be, ‘Let well enough alone’,” said Burke with mock displeasure. “I had to fall in with a couple of scientific investigators. Remind me next time to get stranded with a few home-loving starlets.”

  “Starlet?” asked Galen, never having heard the word before.

  “They were like, uh, beautiful works of art,” said Burke. “They didn’t do anything much, and they enjoyed sitting around. Unlike today’s ambitious leader, Alan Virdon of the Mounties.”

  “But why ‘starlets’?” asked Galen.

  “Because they brightened up your life,” said Virdon. Galen nodded; it seemed like a rational explanation. The three continued on in silence.

  They climbed the hill. Before they reached the summit, Galen signalled that he was too weary to go on. He stopped abruptly. Virdon and Burke halted as a result. They were tired, too.

  “I was just thinking,” said Galen, smiling, “until I met you two, I had a comfortable house, I ate excellent food—every day—and I was living a good life. Now look at me!” He laughed softly to show his friends that he really had no regrets.

  “You’re hard to please,” said Burke. “After all, don’t you like being on the run with a fair chance of being killed by that gorilla General Urko? Out of all the apes in the world, you alone have that wonderful opportunity. I would have thought that you’d be humble.”

  Galen could not tell whether the dark-haired astronaut was serious or not. “I’d like a few minutes to think before I answer that question,” he said.

  “What about the excitement and stimulation we provide?” asked Virdon. “And all the fun things you’ve learned?”

  Galen’s eyebrows raised. “I’ve learned that the world is made up of a series of hills which I can climb up so I then get a chance of climbing down.”

  Burke laughed. “It isn’t our fault,” said the dark man. “You apes should have built your world with an eye for level ground. Anyway, you’re jumping to conclusions. How can you be sure there’s another hill on the far side of this one? There might be a river, a canyon, or a village with beautiful girls to welcome us.”

  “Want to bet?” asked Galen. “That kind of thing hasn’t happened too frequently in our travels. If we had spent as much time going across the land as we have going up and down it, we’d be I don’t know where by now.”

  “You’re I don’t know where right now,” said Virdon. Galen only grimaced.

  “I’ll bet you,” said Burke, turning back to the chimpanzee. “How about my back pay as an astronaut? The government owes me for two thousand, three hundred fifty years. Not even counting the interest on it all. Match that!”

  “Your government owes you that,” said Galen. “Your government doesn’t have an embassy in Central City. Not even a tiny record that it ever existed. My government does exist.”

  “That’s why we’re climbing hills,” said Burke softly. He stared at Galen, who suddenly felt that he had carried the joke too far.

  “I know exactly how to tell what’s on the other side of this hill,” said Virdon, trying to break up the mood of depression and loneliness that was quickly forming.

  Galen nodded and Burke laughed humorlessly. “We know,” said the chimpanzee. “We know, we know. Climb to the top and see. With all your imaginative tricks, that’s always the only way.”

  “Right,” said Virdon.

  Burke groaned aloud. The three companions shouldered their packs and resumed the climb to the top of the hill. “It’s marvelous the way you figure these things out!” said Burke. “I wish I had your talent for delving right to the solution of the world’s mysteries.”

  Virdon was several paces ahead of the other two, hefting his heavy gear into a more comfortable position on his back. He did not reply or react to Burke’s words; if he had to think up a clever retort to every one of Burke’s sarcasms, they would still be standing beside their crashed spacecraft, prisoners of the gorilla army. When Virdon reached the top of the rise, he raised a hand, beckoning the others to join him quickly. Burke scrambled up the last few yards, and Galen brought up the rear, puffing and panting from the exertion. When they reached Virdon’s position, they followed his gaze downward. “You lose,” said Virdon.

  Burke and Virdon stared off into the distance. Not fa
r away, by their standards, within easy marching, were the blue-gray ruins of a city. A city of the human world, part of the forbidden area, a piece of Burke’s and Virdon’s lost lives.

  Virdon and Burke were, of course, excited. Galen, too, felt a strange and unfamiliar thrill as he stared down at the mass of twisted architecture that filled the low-lying area. But the chimpanzee’s feelings were scientifically detached, while the astronauts felt a resurgence of hope, an emotion that had served them cruelly in the months past, but which they could no more stifle than they could their breathing.

  “Oh, man,” said the usually unexcitable Burke, “I’ve forgotten what a city looked like!” No one moved for several moments more.

  “It means that we’ll be able to pinpoint our location exactly,” said Burke thoughtfully. “For weeks now, we’ve been climbing hills blindly. Now we can proceed with a bit more sureness.”

  “I like that,” said Galen. “I’m in favor of certainty.”

  They continued to stare toward the city for another few seconds. Then, without a signal from their nominal leader, Virdon, the two men and the chimpanzee moved forward down the far side of the hill, hurrying toward the city as quickly as their tired bodies could push them.

  They reached the city itself about an hour later. They walked along its rubble-filled streets in awe and fear. Here had been one of the greatest communities of the human world, and it was now nothing more than a junkyard. They walked past ancient, crumbling department stores, all of which had long ago been looted of anything valuable or useful. In the ape world, those two words had become synonymous. Great display windows had shattered and even the shards had been scattered far away in the preceding two thousand years. Statues had corroded beyond recognition. Buildings had decayed and collapsed, falling upon their neighbors, causing avalanches of brick to fall into the highways and main streets. The smaller side streets were almost impossible to walk along, with their towering mounds of debris and the constant threat of more danger from above. Galen inspected everything with open-mouthed curiosity. Virdon’s reaction was the same as Burke’s: disappointment.