Chapter 10 - Traitor

"Ah here, hurry up!" Paru shouted down at the frail, mainly white monkey who was struggling to make it to the top of a rather small incline.

"Yeah, mister monkey!" Yuki giggled, pacing behind the tall ape.

"I'm trying!" Ian called back, clearly a bit annoyed.

The young boy almost crawled onto the top of the small hill. But even as he stood up straight and got his breathing back in control, his legs seemed to never stop shaking. The young girl looked up at him with her usual radiant smile, and the older boy murmured as he began to walk forward on the faint dirt path.

The day was rather normal for that season. It was a few degrees below average and there seemed to be little to no wind. Cicadas seemed to be crackling nearby, but were always somehow farther than where you thought they would be. Clouds of various shades of grey went on forever in the sky, huddled on top of one another.

Underneath the noise of the nonsensical conversation that had begun between the young human and the older monkey, Ian's stomach grumbled. He hadn't eaten anything since they had gotten into the whole mess. He wasn't trusting anything Paru was giving to him or the girl either.

He thought to himself, he wouldn't be able to last much longer without passing out. His exhausted head fell to face the ground, not by any want of his own. Watching his feet was mesmerizing to his sleep deprived brain.

Ian caught a glimpse of his boots, and more importantly – the light on the steel band. It was no longer blue like it had been for the last couple of day. It now had a turquoise hue to it, and it was only turning greener the more he walked forward. As if someone had cleaned the gears in his head, his brain started to work on an answer to this change.

And it wasn't long until he came to the solution. Ian looked up to the others in the small group, both their backs were towards him. He wanted to run, but he knew that that was a terrible idea for so many reasons. He simply continued on as if nothing had changed, whilst in reality – it was all he could think of.

The young girl had once again started another seemingly random conversation, as energetic as always. Paru entertained the nonsensical interaction by smiling and saying "Yeah" after every few sentences.

Neither of the boys wanted to be the first to admit that they had no idea where they were going. They both had too much pride. Even then, as Paru had taken the lead, he'd be the one to take the blame – which was never going to happen.

They kept walking on the path that had been created by others who had walked, possibly in their own journey – with no idea where they were going. The issue with this way of direction, is that the path would never stay for long.

As they passed a fallen cedar tree that had been covered in moss and mushrooms, their path disappeared underneath fresh grass. Like the previous times, Paru stopped and held back the little girl.

"Great. Path's gone, and there's two ways to go" The taller monkey sighed. He looked towards Yuki, who was looking up at him. "You go look around while we sort this out."

"Okay!" The little girl cheered, and she walked over towards the nearby log.

Ian walked up and stopped next to the purple-clad monkey. He didn't speak and his legs were shaking with no signs of stopping. His eyes jumped from path to path, and occasionally to his boots. He tried to investigate the lights on each of his boots as subtly as possible.

"Why don't you choose where to go. Doesn't seem like it's going to make a difference anyway." Paru smirked, glancing towards the frail boy beside him.

If Ian's brain wasn't a mess beforehand, this new pressure had sent it into overdrive. It was as if his entire body and bones were shaking then. His eyes continuing to dash from both the pathways and his shoes.

"Uh…" He murmured, unknowingly.

"If you can't decide, I'll just do it now." The older boy said, his smirk becoming even more condescending.

"N-No!" Ian suddenly shouted, throwing everything in the immediately area off.

Paru's mouth had turned from a smirk into a frown that seemed to examine the younger boy's every move – to him at least. Every millisecond that passed was a step closer to failing.

"We're going this way!" Ian suddenly ordered, in a tone that didn't fit his usual diffident personality. He lifted his hand towards the left most path.

"Oh are we…" The older monkey's words petered out as he saw the younger boy take charge and walk in the very same direction.

Yuki looked up from her gaze on the fungi and saw the boy begin to stroll sternly. She got up to her feet and wiped down her knees with her hands, before running to catch up with Ian. As she made it a few feet behind the boy, she turned to her new friend.

"Come on Paru, we're going this way!" She lifted her hand and waved, with her innocent smile from ear to ear.

He couldn't do anything but huff in response, and started to walk in the same direction. The little girl ran back to him and started another one of their conversations, this time about the local moss growing on the tree trunks. Unknown to her, Paru purposely made sure to stay a few feet back from the other boy.

Minutes passed, and Ian showed no signs of slowing down. Even when the make shift path suddenly ended and the trio had to push pass trees. He seemed keen on the direction he was going, not turning once. If he had to go around a tree, he made sure to go back to the place he would've been in without it.

It was as if bolts of lightning were surging through his blood, he felt an uncontrollable energy. He couldn't help but mumble the same phrase he said when he started his trek. He couldn't care less about what the other two were talking about.

Strangely enough, his decision seemed to be correct, as he walked out from between the tree line and into some sort of park. He was standing on a clear and defined gravel road, and a few meters away from him stood a black street lamp. It wasn't long until the other two made it to the end of their forest track.

"I-I remember this place!" The boy said, turning to face the human and the other monkey. He lifted his left hand again. "We need to go this way."

Ian started walking at a brisk pace once again, as if he was unaware that there may be humans around. Paru was much more apprehensive. He held the little girl's hand, who was oblivious as always, and stayed close to the tree line.

The area was oddly quiet, there weren't any birds chirping or bugs ringing. The loudest thing to be heard was the crunching of pebbles beneath the trio's feet. The clouds covered the sun and shaded the area. Yuki looked up towards the older boy.

"Isn't it cool that you're almost home?" She asked, smiling. "Are you going to hug your mommy first? Or your daddy?"

"Yeah, it is." Paru responded, not looking down. He stared at the back of Ian's head.

"And mister monkey is gonna get there first!" The girl giggled.

"Yeah, and that's very cool." He spoke clear and loudly, and started slowing his movement. "Especially since he knows the area…when this is his first time being outside."

The older monkey stopped in his place, and the girl stopped a second after. The other boy walked on for another few seconds before stopping and turning around. His face was as unembellished as it had been the days before.

"What are you hiding from us?"

What the other two didn't realize that Ian was staring at the other ape's boots, and it's flashing red light. He didn't speak up.

At that moment, rustling noises began from around them. The little girl whimpered and hugged the older boy's closest boot tightly. Paru continued to glare at the young boy, who could only stare back – his face not faltering.

That's when eight different pipo monkeys jumped out from the tree line, four on each side. They surrounded the duo on each side – both the blue pants on the right, green and white pants on the left and red and black pants behind them. The remaining two monkeys, the ones wearing yellow and pink pants respectively, stood next to Ian.

"Well, isn't it nice to see the entourage?"

Paru looked up into the sky above the other boy, and there in his iconic throne like hover chair was Specter. He descended with his usual smug grin on his face and hovered beside his child. The teenage ape's gaze moved from the father to his child.

"What the hell? I can't believe you- you're a traitor!" Paru chastised.

"Traitor?" Specter started. "Have you forgotten about your stowaway there?"

The older boy looked down to the young girl, who didn't even realize the danger she was in. She was still had slight smile on her face as she stared at the ape in the floating chair. His eyes moved back to the younger boy.

"Are you gonna say anything, or are you just going to continue staring with the same goddamn robotic face you've always had? Huh?" The teenage ape persisted.

Ian didn't respond. He stood silent and unfaltering, as he looked towards the duo. Yuki started to look between the three figures, feeling the tension and argument that was happening around her – even if she didn't understand it.

"Wow." Paru started to snicker. "You really are a freak, you know. I'm not even being an ass, I'm right. They won't tell you, but you are."

Even the teenager's malicious grin didn't change the boy's posture. Though it clear that the younger boy's father took more offense, as he lifted his left arm in the air and the surrounding pipo monkeys began to move closer to the children.

The two monkeys wearing blue pants stayed closer to the tree line while the rest were up next to the human and monkey. The monkey wearing black pants lifted its signature gun and poked Paru's back with it – as if to direct him. The two had no other choice but to follow their orders.

Specter and Ian stood and watched the escort happen. But Ian was the only one to catch the two oddities. As Paru was also obscured by the trees, he turned and whispered something. After a few seconds, the boy was able to put together what he had been told.

"You know where to look."

He only caught a glimpse of the young girl before she disappeared behind the trees, but it was enough to scare him. Her smile was gone, and was replaced with an emotionless frown. The way her head was facing made it seem like she was trying to look at him, even though her body was facing where she was walking.

As the footsteps from the group faded into the distance, the boy was left on the path with his father – with nothing left to think about except for what he had been told. Even when a helicopter landed only a few meters in front of him and he was told to climb into the back of it, it was the only thing his mind couldn't get away from.

When his body gave into his exhaustion and made him pass out while lying across multiple seats, it was still the only thing he was interested in. He was never one for having dreams in the first place, in fact – it was usual for him to wake up without remembering he had even gone asleep.

So it made sense why, after sitting up and looking around, he was so confused. He…was in his bedroom. Everything seemed almost the same as how he had left it days earlier. The book that had been on his bed had been moved to be with the rest of his books. Moonlight poured in from the window, the curtains weren't closed.

Did someone carry him in there? He thought to himself, and as uncomfortable as that idea made him – it was the only reasonable answer. He also realized that he had no idea if it was the same day or not. But as his brain created logical answers to his questions, the same sentence wouldn't leave him alone.

"You know where to look."

No matter how hard he tried to tell himself that Paru was only saying those things to be defiant, his curiosity wanted more. He wanted a black and white answer, a yes or no – even if he had no idea what the answer entailed.

Within his mind, he tried to make an outline map of the entire facility. He knew the majority of it off by heart, though many places were blurry. He could only imagine the places he would go to in his daily routine perfectly.

He thought to himself more – if he knew where to look, it would mean that it was somewhere he knew well and knew something was being hidden. The issue came from the fact that all those rooms had no secrets. He had inspected every single room from top to bottom over the years, and had gone through every exit.

And as if someone had flipped a switch in his brain, he remembered something he hadn't thought about in years. All that time, he had ignored it as just another rule he wouldn't question.

In the monitor room, there was a seemingly random door on one of the side walls, next to the computers. He had tried to waddle over wires to reach it, as a young monkey. But he was picked up and taken outside of the room entirely, before being ordered to never go near it again by his father. Until that day, he never questioned it.

He turned and placed his feet on the ground. Was he really about to go against his father's wishes, right after he was back home after doing it the fist time? He kept thinking, but his body and mind seemed to have different ideas.

He stood up and walked out of his room. The entire place was silent, which was to be expected – but it still felt strange to the boy after the nights in the restless woods. He started to walk down the hallway towards the stairs, taking his time and trying to be quiet. He tip toed down the four flights of stairs.

The clanking of the steel soles of his shoes rang out in every direction. The ceiling lights were dim, and Ian could feel his eyes becoming tired. He just kept hoping to see the black outline of the door. And when he finally saw it, he sighed in relief.

As he entered the room, he noticed its big change. There was a defined walkway instead of the jungle of wires. Though, the wires were simply pushed to the side and outlined the path. It lead to the monitors and the door at the other side of the room. But there was no indication of the other door.

Ian went a few steps in before looking towards the left wall. Beside the remains of a severely dented computer was a rotting, unkept door. It was real, and it was there. He maneuvered around the wire landscape and stopped in front of the entrance.

Unlike every other door in the building, this was more traditional. One where you had to pull down a handle and pull it towards you. It only furthered his want to know more.

His mind and body seemed to realign at that moment. Ian was in complete control. He stood in front of the door, still, for a minute or so. He pondered on the thoughts crashing about in his brain.

If he went through the door, then he really wasn't able to come back. What if he saw nothing? Then he'd be in trouble for going into the room. But what if he saw something he wasn't expecting? Despite the scales weighing in the direction of a bad outcome, he couldn't help himself.

He grabbed the door's handle and slowly pushed it down. As softly as he could, he pulled back the door. In its old place was nothing more than a hole, that was almost completely black.

The light from the monitor room revealed the wooden stairs leading down into the room. The same light revealed that the room was bigger than the fraction that could be seen from the doorway. The young monkey took a deep breath, before stepping onto the stairs.

The old dark wood creaked beneath his body weight, and there seemed to be no way of stopping it. It was soft, though, and wouldn't be heard by anyone unless they were close. As he continued down the stairs, the room became clearer.

It was wide and covered from head to toe in spider webs. It was as if no one had even remembered of its existence in years. It was unusually cold and the dust masked most of the room.

At the far side of the room, there seemed to be several huge test tubes connected to the wall on top of a platform. All of them except for one was broken. But any glass from the time of their destruction was gone. Faded red and blue wires ran from them and up the outside of the stairs, possibly connecting to computers in the main room.

There were many cardboard boxes, clustering in the sharp turns of the room's corners. There was an outlier, however. A single small box, it was sitting isolated in the corner between the wall and the outside of the far platform.

This oddity intrigued the boy.

He stopped and waited at the bottom of the stairs for a minute. He wanted to hear…anything coming from the room. But nothing ever came. The rats and mice had left the area years ago, much like all other forms of life here. He took another deep breath.

He slowly walked near the box, carefully attempting to not scratch the ground. When he was a few feet from it, he swiftly kneeled down. The young boy bent forward and placed his hands on the sides of the box. His finger left an unmissable indent in the dust.

He dragged it over to himself and stopped for another minute. If he wanted to go back, this could've been his last chance. He sat there there breathing, before moving his hands up and opening the box.

Inside, there seemed to be multiple yellow document folders stacked on top of each other. They didn't fill the box by any means, barely reaching the middle of it. The boy reached in and grabbed the top folder, and took his other hand off the box to open it.

Nothing could've prepared him for what he saw next. It was some sort of medical information sheet. Attached to it via a paper clip was a black and white picture of…something in a fluid. He looked over to the listed information.

Name: Vision
Status: Incomplete, Deceased
Days Reached: 15

The boy didn't know if he was upset or confused. Had…someone died? He had never been told of someone dying, but it seemed like something you don't hide from people.

He closed the document and placed it to the left of him. After sighing in apprehension, he reached into the box again and took out the next document. As he opened it, he realized it was the same format as the last.

The photo this time seemed to be of an incredibly small baby ape attached to a sack, but still seemed to be suspended in some sort of fluid. Despite his better judgement, he looked at the information again.

Name: Spirit
Status: Incomplete, Deceased
Days Reached: 103

Another one that was "incomplete". He placed the folder next to the first one. The boy felt himself begin to go numb. The feelings of dread and turmoil were still there, but they seemed to be becoming blocked by an incomprehensible, fuzzy feeling.

His hand went back into the box and grabbed two more folders, leaving the final one alone. He left the bottom most folder on his lap, as he slowly began to open the third yellow booklet.

The same structure. A picture of something suspended in a fluid matrix, small but slightly larger than the last. Information at the side, in stark black typing.

Name: Aura
Status: Incomplete, Deceased
Days Reached: 146

He accidentally flung the document to his right side. At that point, he didn't care about keeping them in tact. He grabbed the one on his lap and opened it. The format was identical.

Name: Mirage
Status: Incomplete, Deceased
Days Reached: 182

Shaking, he placed the folder down next to the one he had flung before. His breath quivered. He swore he could feel a chill run through his bones, and yet, the numbness still stayed strong.

A victim of his own curiousity, he brought his two hands back up to the box. His right one went in and grasped the final document.

Before opening it, he looked at its plain outside. Somewhat ironic, that something you could find lying on a table and think nothing more could hold something so much stranger and horrific.

Carefully, he opened the document. He didn't bother to look at whatever picture was there, he went straight for the biography.

Name: Phantom
Status: Complete

He waited, and read it again. Then he read it a third time. His eyes moved over to the photos, in which there were two.

In the black and white photo, was a full term baby monkey within a fluid that seemed to be the same as before. Next to it was a coloured photo. It was…him, when he was younger. With the same anxious face and his burgundy scarf wrapped in a way that covered the bottom half of his face.

He didn't even have time to take it in even more, before someone started to talk. He hadn't noticed the shadow of a figure standing in the door, just as he had read the final biography.

"What do you think, Phantom?"

He turned his head. It was his father. The light casted a sinister shadow on his father's front, but this began to lift while he made his decent down the stairs.

"What does this mean?" The young boy whispered.

"Why, you were made to be the perfect leader of course," Specter started. "Take my genetics and fix the component for intelligence – allowing it to be accessible without the need for a Pipo Helmet."

The phrasing he had heard for his entire life took on a different, scarier meaning. This wasn't helped by the echoing of the comments "freak of nature" swirling in his head. And yet, at this moment, the numb emptiness engulfed his entire being. Any new emotion that tried to start was sucked into its pit.

He realized something. Those words weren't just insults made by a frustrated subordinate. They were reality. Every other ape in the facility had a million different ways of growing and developing, from their internal and external features. He didn't.

"And though it took a few times to get right…"

He wasn't their first attempt. Others were before him. And if any of them had made it to a point of survival, he wouldn't be there. They worked so hard and so long to get him to exist, and he had put them through so much the previous few days.

"Now you're here."

His father was on the same ground as him, and he was only a meter away. Phantom stood up straight, facing him.

"You're ready to take the role as next in line as king of the entire ape civilization!" A proud smirk. That's all the boy could see on his father's face.

And like a train, everything hit him at that moment. Whilst Paru was made so that there could be a happy family, and that could be the same for the young human who had come to grow fond of – he wasn't. He had one meaning in life – to rule over the monkeys.

Even though he had been raised with that expectation, it never really clicked for him that it would be his entire life – and what he would be remembered for. He was trapped, and if he was to fail – there would be nothing and no one waiting for him on the other side.

The two stood there for a minute or so in silence.

"I…I think I'm going to go to bed." The boy whispered.

With that, he walked towards the stairs – leaving the documents scattered on the floor. He didn't speak another word, he just walked up the stairs at a brisk pace. He didn't question why he couldn't hear or feel his father going up the stairs after him, nor did he turn around and look when he got to the top of the crooked stairs.

The overwhelming numbness never seemed to leave him. Even as he entered his room, pulled over his curtains and grabbed one of the multiple biology books he had lying around – it stayed, like a parasite.

As he opened the book on one of the plant based chapters, his eyes wouldn't focus correctly. Any words he read didn't stick in his mind. They went in and out in the blink of an eye. Even the diagrams didn't light anything in him, like they would've previously. He was forced to put the book on the floor and simply lie in bed.

Staring at the ceiling, he couldn't help but overthink everything. Was this the reason why he was always in the presence of his father – except for in his room? Was that why he was isolated? Why he wasn't allowed to do anything that could hurt him?

Even if half the things he thought of wouldn't have any barring on whether or not he'd take the role of being the leader, they counted to him. Everyone had done so much to make sure that he would be the best king possible – and yet he wasn't sure if he wanted to do it.

The wall of numbness broke to let it a single feeling, guilt. His mind and his being seemed to separate, it was a different entity – an enemy. How dare he even think like that, they've done so much for him, his mind whispered. He was made for the sole purpose of it, it was his meaning in life and he wasn't there for anything else – it wouldn't stop. This was the only thing they ever asked for from him.

It was there, in his bed, that he made his final decision.

No matter what it took, he would win against the humans.

Losing wasn't an option.