It was like driving into a memory - a slow, old, and broken down memory. The city was torn down and physically rotten: covered with moss and vines, but Haley's brown eyes followed the streets in habit. Haley's head turned in sync with Caesar's directions before Malcolm could even process them. When Haley had realized where they were going, she had no real reaction. She didn't know if she should feel excited or anxious, if she should remember the pain or joy she experienced there – so she found herself feeling neither and kept a vacant stare. Maybe that was why the drive to Pacific Heights felt so slow and dragged out; it was almost as if her mind wanted to keep her memories at bay for as long as possible. Yet, it was no help. The farther they went and the more the past resurfaced, the tighter Haley's chest felt, compelling her to rub it gently. But, with the city in a state of disrepair, her memories were fuzzy. She saw a ghost of her former self walking down the street to school, walking around the corner to the store, and quickly jogging to the park nearby, but it was flickering like the image on an old television set. And no matter from what angle Haley looked, it was always her back – nothing more. Then, with a sudden pang to her heart, Haley realized it wasn't her she was seeing. Haley was never healthy enough to move around that much.

It was Alice Hunsiker, her sister.

Haley was born as a sickly child. When her mother gave birth to her, Haley didn't move or cry - she was like a corpse. She barely breathed. Her parents were terrified at the idea of their child not surviving the night, but luckily she was spared by numerous injections and by spending the first year of her life in the hospital. Nevertheless, her state never really improved that much until many, many years later, which justified her to be caged in her house throughout her childhood, and which scheduled numerous trips to back to the hospital before she could even speak her first word. Alice, on the other hand, never had this problem, even if they were identical twins. Alice was screaming with life next to Haley when they took their first breath. Because of this, jealousy burned in Haley whenever she watched her sister run out of the house. But, now, as far as Haley knew, she was the only Hunsiker alive - everyone else was dead by the Simian Flu. The irony was not lost on Haley that she was the one to survive, and neither was the guilt whenever she thinks back on how much she hated Alice before she watched the young girl die right in front of her.

All those nauseating memories came rushing back when they arrived and she gazed, emotionlessly, up at her old house. The others climbed out of the Jeep behind her, but she didn't even notice. Malcolm helped Caesar out of the vehicle and quickly grew aware that she was clearly distracted, but before he had the chance to change this, Caesar stopped him with a grunt. Caesar, too, had noticed her blatant stare, but he, on the other hand, knew her reasons and knew to leave her be. Thus, he motioned to the neighboring home - his home - and did his best to move towards it with his own strength, just to ease the amount of trouble for Malcolm. Behind them, Alex and Ash helped Foster on his way, too. Before they all left the forest, Haley and the two apes remembered the man back under the bole with simultaneous, startled gasps and helped Malcolm place him in the Jeep with Caesar. By the time they were driving again, the vehicle was practically ripping at its seams. Ellie was horrified at the sight of his bleeding leg, and even more so when Haley confessed to the fact that the wound was inflicted by her arrow, but the doctor didn't say anything in response. She seemed more proud of Haley's patchwork that anything else. Foster, on the other hand, did say one thing before he hushed, "I'm just lucky she missed her target." Haley glared at him for his jab at her aim, but it quickly faded when she saw the significant look he was giving her. Just then, she recalled something: the reason the skin on her hands were sticky and hard. She unconsciously must have suppressed the fact that she killed Kemp, but Foster clearly hadn't, and yet, he told her without words that he won't say anything, 'Just take that jab as a gift in return to me keeping my mouth shut.'

"Haley?" Ellie questioned finally, not having seen the exchange between Malcolm and Caesar earlier. Blue Eyes paused at the door when he heard the new conversation start and turned to to eavesdrop. They were the last ones outside. "Are you coming?" She asked when Haley gave no response.

"No." Haley stated without thinking, her stare never leaving the tall building, but she quickly realized her mistake. "I'll be there later - go ahead." She waved Ellie off, still not sparing a glance, and finally broke her legs free of their anxious lock. Just like Caesar's home, the quarantine tape around Haley's home was already broken - she had been the one who had done it many years earlier. So she stepped over the string-like ends where it had been torn and continued up the path. The small front gate squeaked louder than ever as she pulled it open on its underused hinges with the tips of her fingers. Haley wondered if it was because of the pitch of the sound or because of the passing of time that the white paint flecked off of the steel and stuck to her skin, but as she wiped her hands off on her coat, the importance was wiped away, too. She continued through the open front door and gulped as the dark, familiar hallway came into focus. The small table still stood on the same spot against the wall, the phone still on the same spot on top of it, and so did all the plants in the corners, though they were withered and leafless now. Everything was right where Haley left them when she left to find a new place to live - the furniture, the decor, and her babysitter's corpse. But the corpse was different now. The older woman's bloody lips were replaced with the view of all her teeth, her dead stare with two empty sockets, her reaching hand with hard white segments - the only thing still covering her skeleton was the clothing she wore when she died. Haley preferred it this way - she didn't want to see the filthy, decaying, rotting corpse of someone she used to know.

Someone she used to know.

Haley's eyes suddenly snapped up to the ceiling, away from the remains, and grew large at what she'll have to face soon. Quickly, she tore forward and moved over everything as if they were of equal importance - it didn't matter that one of those things was her babysitter. Quickly, she rushed upstairs. She hurried without really knowing why she needed to - it wasn't like the reality would change - but as soon as she spotted the door at the end of the hall, she stopped herself anyway. She could already see a glimpse of the room through the crack in the door and could make out the edge of an old bed inside, and that was enough to make her consider leaving. But she couldn't bring herself to go, and she couldn't figure out why. Clenching her fists until the pain from her nails sliced her statued state, she strutted on and closed the gap between her and the dreaded sight that will come. Unlike the front gate, it was as if the door was mutet when she pushed it open with her shaky hand. Immediately she saw what she was looking for, but strangely enough, when her brown eyes once again connected with two empty sockets, she felt no horrific reaction. Instead, she felt the tension in her body fade. Comfortably underneath a dirty blue duvet, the skeleton of a child laid, looking as if it was bathing in the beams of light that were peeking through the holes in the bleached curtains - caused by moths, no doubt. There were not a single feature left on the decayed body, but it was still as if Haley could see it was sleeping peacefully, eyes shut. Haley continued up to the dusty chair next to the bed.

Carefully, she placed herself down in it, no matter how filthy, and found it was so much lower than she remembered, or maybe she's just grown that much. Then, as if afraid she'll wake the remains, Haley gingerly reached and made to pick up its hand, but when she hooked her own hand underneath and lifted, the unstable structure crumbled and scattered abruptly. Phalanges rolled in every direction, clattering against the wooden floor and left Haley to stare in disbelief. That wasn't what she wanted - why did that happen? She's only been healthy enough to visit the museum once and those skeletons stayed together, didn't they? So did the skeletons that were showed in those biology books she used to read. Does thousands of years do that to bones - make them stick together? She quickly knew that was a ridiculous idea. 'But then… why?' She thought as she retracted her arm and stared down at the single bone left in her palm. The tip of her sister's thumb, she hypothesised. The doctors and anthropologist must put the bones together before displaying them. 'But why do they do that?' She continued to ponder like a child, still studying the segment, 'Is it for their own amusement? Did they want this to happen to someone when he or she found the remains of a loved one? Do they really have so little to do?' Then again, death never was as clean as people made it seem.

Clutching the bone in her hand, Haley redirected her attention onto her sister's scull while she thought about what death is really like. That should've been her, she knew. It shouldn't have been Alice - it should have been Haley who was reduced to such an ugly state. She was the sickly one, she was the one who everyone predicted to die early, she was the one who had less to live for, she was the one who didn't have that many people left to miss her - it was always Haley, not Alice. But something about that also felt wrong to Haley. Not because she shouldn't have been the one to die, but because, that... was her. She was Alice, in a sense. The only thing that made them different was that Haley was sickly as a child - nothing else. They grew up in the same house, had the same parents, had the same eyes, had the same nose, had the same hair, had the same lips, had the same bones, had the same minds - only, Haley was sick. It was because she was sick that Haley saw Caesar through the dormer window in her neighbor's attic; she was sick enough to watch it every day while Alice was on a school trip. She might've seen him eventually anyway, but would she have cared? She'd have had friends of her own - she wouldn't have been searching for something to make her life worthwhile. Caesar was her escape from who she thought she would always be - meeting with him every weekend gave her a mysterious energy and life.

The day Alice died, so did Alice's sister - that was all Haley was. After that day, Haley changed - she became stronger, braver, freer - she became the Haley who visited Caesar every week. She became the only one of her kind. She became her. It wasn't just Alice who died in that room. That one body might've held one face, but that one face held two people. Carefully, Haley traced her fingertips over the stitched scar on the shaved side of her head. She had her own scars and her own wounds, now - she no longer looked like Alice.

Suddenly, the floorboards creaked by the door, making Haley jump up in alarm, even if only to see it was Malcolm and to sign in exasperation. However, his attention soon seemed stolen by the remains under the covers, eyes spread wide in horror. Soon enough, Ellie also slipped through the door and wore the same, exact expression. "That…" Ellie breathed and rose her gaze back to Haley's, "Who's that?"

Haley wondered if Ellie even knew that she had a twin. It might've said something in her file, but that's the only way she could've known. By the time Ellie became a doctor at the hospital, Haley's sister and father became either too bored or too busy to wait there with her. Directing her own attention onto the remains with Malcolm, she frowned in thought. "It's me." She hummed sincerely - in reality, it was, but she could also understand the confused looks that she felt seering into the back of her head. Something more important caught their attention, however.

"Haley?" Malcolm called quietly and gave Haley a serious look - a meaningful look that made her eyes narrow, "Are you alright?" Again, Ellie had the same look on her face, and both made Haley nervous for reasons she wasn't aware of just yet.

"I'm fine." She said simply and waited for them to say more, but silence followed. The silence felt almost nauseating. She had a terrible feeling already. "Why?" She pressed, suspicious eyes moving between them. Then she realized she didn't know another thing. "Why are you here?" She paused, "You should be taking care of Caesar!" But they didn't answer. Instead, they glanced towards each other and radiated a guilt that made the entire room tense. Haley felt as if she could suffocate under pressure of it. She silently wished she could open a window, for fresher air, but something told her that, if she walked away now, they'd never tell her what was going on. Of course, she had an inkling what the issue was about , but she didn't want to believe it. Nonetheless, just a moment later, as if purposefully cutting mercilessly through her denial, she spotted the hairy figure skulking right outside the door, hunched over to hide. "Blue Eyes," She seethed in a whisper and saw him flinch, "You told them?"

Knowing he was caught, Blue Eyes reluctantly moved inside with Ash following in tow, both still keeping low. "Help-" He signed slowly, "Humans could help where apes can't help Haley. Haley's hurting inside. Had to tell someone truth."

"It wasn't your truth to tell!" Haley snapped immediately without thinking, even if she wasn't quite sure if she was furious with him telling them or if she was furious by the fact that yet another ape felt the need to point out that she wasn't an ape - she was still just a human to every single one of them.

"So it is true," Ellie choked, sounding as if she had just been punched in her gut by the news, "That other ape - he raped you?"

Those words - they were such vile words - and Haley bit deep into her cheek at the mention of them, which rewarded her with the strong taste of iron as her canines pierced flesh. Never has she heard them so much as whispered, and hearing them said so abruptly - it took Haley grabbing her throat to stop her from vomiting. She wanted to throw up so badly. There was a reality to that statement that Haley always knew, but she's always insisted that it was her fault that Koba did what he did. So, she couldn't say yes to Ellie - a sense of fear stopped her - but she couldn't say no either, so she skipped ahead. "Does Caesar know?" She drawled pass the vise her fingers created around her neck, "Did he hear you telling them?"

"No." Ash signed behind Blue Eyes before the prince could have the chance.

"Good - keep it that way."

"You're kidding," Malcolm spoke up. Of course, he knew why it made sense that Haley wouldn't want Caesar to know the truth, even if it was a twisted and heart-wrenching mindset she had. He realized quite a while back that Haley felt a love for Caesar that surpassed that of friendship, and he promised himself he would keep quiet, but this was ridiculous. The only reason Haley wouldn't want Caesar to know what his second did was either to spare their friendship or to keep Caesar from thinking she was damaged, or both - and they were both ridiculous reasons. She wasn't damaged and whatever friendship Caesar had with the half-blind bonobo was shattered by the very bullet he shot Caesar with. Promptly, Malcolm reminded himself that Haley doesn't know this yet.

"No, I am not," Haley growled, "I don't want Caesar to know. This is my truth to tell, no matter when I decide that may be, and you best remember that fact. It may be now, it may be ten years from now, but I get to decide!" Anger was starting to replace Haley's nausea. She was angry at Blue Eyes for telling them, angry at Ellie for looking as if it was her who had been hurt, angry at Ash for just following along with this, angry at Malcolm for so obviously seeing pass her facade - she was angry at herself for ever letting anyone find out about what had happened. She was growing with such rage that she couldn't think. She didn't have enough focus left to see a sudden awareness flicker to life in Blue Eyes' eyes; in an instant, the young ape knew what Malcolm knew, and just by something as simple as the compassionate look the human man was giving Haley in regards to his father. The moment he thought about how her behavior fit so perfectly with her hiding a deeper affection for their leader, he couldn't comprehend how he didn't became aware of it a long time ago.

"We're just worried, Haley," Ellie tried to explain, "We-"

"I killed Kemp." Haley blurted. She didn't know what compelled her to do it - she just needed to shut Ellie up and she needed even more horrific news to do it. And clearly, it worked. Haley was sure she would regret her decision later, but quickly, a weight rose from her shoulders. It felt as if she could soar with the truth out in the open. Before, she didn't even realize how much her kill was weighing her down. Ellie and Malcolm didn't look so relieved, however - they looked petrified. It definitely did work. 'I'm sorry Foster,' Haley thought, 'Thank you for keeping it secret for a while, though.'

"So maybe," Haley continued when the quiet grew too uncertain to bare, "instead of focussing on my condition, focus on the danger Foster is facing." An empty threat, Haley knew, but she didn't stop to find out if they were conscious of this, too, and immediately stomped pass the four intruders, heading back downstairs. She was ready to leave that ghastly building as soon as possible. Yet, the single sight of another face made Haley stop in the hallway, immediately alert again. There, in the front door, a pair of dark brown eyes were staring back at Haley - openly. The person was staring so freely that Haley was almost hesitant as she reached for the bow on her back, wondering if the woman meant harm. But, when the stranger reached for her own weapon at the same time, Haley stopped and swallowed, their eyes never breaking from one another. There was something else that bothered Haley and left her frozen for what felt like forever. Those eyes - they were unfamiliar, and yet they seemed so incredibly familiar at the same time.

It took her awhile before she registered that the figure was also moving in unison to her swaying, walking, shifting, and blinking - it was her reflection. She remembered now: they had a mirror on the back of their front door. She couldn't even recognize her own reflection. With great distaste, she studied her blonde dreadlocks, the gash on her forehead, the badly sewn coat on her shoulders, the weapon on her back, and her strong legs and arms, though everything was camouflaged by a layer of dirt and dried blood - Haley wondered if Ellie and Malcolm have realized that the red splodges on her face was Kemp's blood. It was her eyes, however, that really tried convincing Haley that she was looking at an entirely different person. Her eyes looked dark, tired, and haunted with nightmares of the past - nothing like what they used to be. The thought made her fists clench once more, knowing who was to blame, but only until she fully felt the small pebble-like structure in her palm and got distracted. 'The bone,' She recalled and studied it again, 'I didn't even realize…'

Signing softly when she heard footsteps on the staircase behind her, Haley slipped the bone in between her small breasts for safekeeping and exited her old home with no intention of ever going back again. Now that everything was settled, she can ask Caesar what happened.


I hope you all enjoyed this chapter! And I hope I got at least most of the mistakes! Remember, if you guys want, go take a look at my YouTube Channel: Geeky Fanatic.

Also, I don't know if I will be able to upload for the next two weeks, because I'm pretty busy with designing the set for my college musical and with rehearsals, but I shall try! ^^