A/N: Based on the script of Richard Collins
Zana couldn't say if she was getting slower with each day, or if the men were in an ever greater hurry, but the result was the same: she had trouble keeping up. Since Urko had attacked them in the ruined city, his lieutenant's promise hung over their heads like the storm clouds rolling over the horizon, a towering, black menace threatening to bear down on them at any moment. And like the silence before the storm, the tension had choked their usual banter; they were taking abandoned roads outside the Zone now, heads down, hearts pounding, but never making much headway from dusk to dawn, or at least that was how it seemed to her. Zana would have felt as if caught in a bad dream, if her body hadn't reminded her with constant aches and pains that this was all too real.
Like her feet. They weren't covered with blisters anymore, like in the beginning, but they felt swollen and tender all the time now. Everything felt swollen and tender, and she was always tired. And hungry, but mostly for things they neither had in their backpacks, nor were able to procure.
She could no longer hide from the fact that her body was changing to accommodate a baby. Even now, limping after her friends, Zana had to close her eyes for a moment at that thought. It was too early for her to show any outward signs yet, her belly flat as ever, and the presence of the humans kept Galen from getting close enough to her to notice the subtler changes, but she knew - and she had no idea how to break the news to the others.
She stopped to catch her breath. "Peet!"
The human turned around, saw how much she had fallen behind - again - and jogged back to her. Farther ahead, Galen and Alan turned, too, their postures indicating impatience.
Or perhaps that was just her imagination, fueled by her guilty conscience.
Peet's face didn't show impatience, at least, only worry. "You okay, Zana? I'm sorry - it's hard to keep up with those race horses."
She smiled weakly at his joke - of all of them, Peet was closest to a race horse; this had to be like an evening stroll to him. "I just..." her eyes fell on the little shrine at the side of the road.
"I haven't had an opportunity to make an offering to my parents ever since we had to run from the city." She gestured towards the stone column. Peet's gaze wandered to the shrine, then flicked back to her; his expression told her that he didn't believe for a moment that she had suddenly been overcome by filial piety, but the worry in his eyes only deepened.
"Yeah, sure, you do your thing." He waved in the shrine's general direction. "I'll wait." He retreated a few steps to give her privacy.
Zana shrugged off her backpack and bent down to retrieve the smudge sticks she had carried around the whole time - a farewell present from Lora; then she kept rummaging a bit longer than necessary, until the tears of shame were no longer pricking in the corners of her eyes. She selected three sticks, lit them, extinguished the flames, and waited a moment for the smoke to gather around her. The sweet, balsamic scent engulfed her like a soothing breeze; her shoulders relaxed in response to the familiar fragrance. Her breathing eased.
She would get through this.
Behind her, she heard Peet shifting on his feet, but when she glanced at him, she only saw curiosity in his eyes. She sent him a quick, apologetic smile. "I'll be finished in a moment."
Encouraged by her reaction, Peet came to her side. "So you have..." he made a show out of counting, "three parents?"
Zana's smile softened. "Some people also burn offerings for beloved mentors, or great teachers of their professional line. I like to burn one for the human that carried me out of our burning house when I was a baby. I wouldn't be here without him or her." She didn't add that most apes would have seen this as blasphemy; maybe Peet suspected as much, anyway.
She bowed before the shrine, the smudge sticks between her palms. When she straightened, she caught Peet's gaze. He looked taken aback, but pleased.
"You were rescued by a human? Huh. What happened to him... or her?"
Zana sighed. "I never found out, although I searched for a long time." She began to fit the smoldering bundles into their holders. "Do you honor your ancestors?"
Peet shrugged. "Sure, people visit the graves..."
"No, I mean you , Peet. Don't you acknowledge them somehow?"
He raked his hand through his hair, a sign that he felt uncomfortable. "My dad and I weren't even speaking with each other while he was alive. I wouldn't know what to talk about with him now."
"And your mother? Or is she still alive?" She had no idea why she was asking him all these things... maybe to distract him from the fact that she was still breathing too fast. When he didn't answer, her uneasiness deepened. She probably had violated some cultural taboo. He didn't return her questioning look, his face suddenly shuttered.
"At first, it hurt too much," he finally admitted. So his mother had died, too. "And then I was too busy with... stuff, and now..."
"Now you have put her into a box and sealed it." Zana nodded. "Sometimes that's how I feel when I light a prayer stick for my parents." She turned towards the shrine once more. "I don't remember them, I was too young - and sometimes this feels like going through the motions. But afterwards, I always feel better; more at peace."
Inspiration struck her; she took one of the unlit sticks and held it out to Peet. He took a step back, startled, his face showing the shock at that gesture that she felt inside.
"Sorry, I... that's a nice thought of you, Zana, but..." he shook his head, "that's not for me. I'm not the religious type at all."
She let her hand fall to her side, trying not to feel rebuffed. "That's alright, Peet. No need to apologize." She quickly put the rest of the bundle away and shouldered her backpack. At least she had recovered a bit, enough to feel up for another couple of miles of alternate jogging and walking.
They had almost caught up to Alan and Galen, when Peet suddenly whipped his head around to stare at the bend in the road behind them. He tensed, a moment before she heard it, too:
Hoofbeats on the road. Several riders, going at a trot...
Peet gave her a hard push, and she stumbled off the road and into the bushes. Ahead of her, the others were already running through the undergrowth, trying to get under the trees and hide. Zana fell into a run, too, but her feet seemed to be made of lead, and she was moving too slow... so slow! Her breath was loud in her ears, panicked and laboured, and the riders had to be coming round the bend any moment now-
A shout from the road - they had been seen. Fear snapped through her, but instead of energizing her, it drained all strength from her legs. Her fingertips were prickling, her arms felt like water. Alan and Galen had already vanished into the shadows under the trees, and Peet had reached the treeline, too. She was still stumbling down the slope. Behind her, she heard twigs rustle and snap as the first rider spurred his horse after them.
Peet turned around and raced back to her.
He was at her side in a moment, his face white and tense. "I'll distract them. Move!" he hissed. He bent down to pick up a stone.
Zana stared at him for a moment. What was he going to do? Hurl rocks at soldiers who had guns? That was suici-
"Move!"
Her paralysis suddenly lifted, and she ran down the slope towards the trees. Behind her, a horse whinnied, and when she threw a hasty glance back over her shoulder, it had thrown off its rider. Peet was racing away, parallel to the road now instead of down the slope, and the rest of the patrol took off after him, enraged by his attack on their comrade. Two of them were unfolding a net between them. Zana ducked behind a trunk and watched, unable to tear her eyes away from the scene.
Peet had now changed direction and was racing towards the trees in huge strides, and for a moment, Zana entertained the wild hope that he'd be able to outrun the horses at this short distance. The ground was treacherous under the dense foliage of the bushes, and the horses were unwilling to run at full speed, and Peet was their best runner...
A third chimp was whirling a net over his head. Zana watched, hypnotized, as the net unfolded and hovered in the air. Then it landed on top of Peet, ensnaring his legs. The riders surrounded him at once, bearing down on him like a pack of wolves. Zana couldn't see him anymore, only a mass of horses, and the black uniforms of the soldiers. They jerked back suddenly, and Zana thought she had caught a glimpse of Peet, slamming into one of them, but then another soldier raised his fist and brought it down, and the struggle stopped.
No, no, no!
Zana sank down into the underbrush behind her tree, too horrified for tears. She felt as if a huge hand had clamped around her ribcage; it hurt to even breathe. The soldiers dragged Peet upright and threw him across the back of their leader's horse. His head was lolling, that soldier's fist had knocked him unconscious. The patrol leader let his hand rest on his back as if Peet was a dead deer he'd shot, and took up the reins with his other hand.
Now they'll come for us...
But she didn't move. She couldn't. She'd be watching their search, frozen like a rabbit, until one of them would stumble over her and truss her up just like they had done with Peet.
Oh Peet. If I hadn't been so slow... this was my fault. My fault.
But the patrol leader just scanned the treeline with a cool glance before he turned his horse back towards the road. "Alert the local police to search the area for the rest. We'll cash in our reward for this one," Zana heard him say. He gave Peet's back a satisfied slap. "Urko will be pleased."
They vanished as quickly as they had appeared. Zana hurried over to where the soldiers had wrestled with Peet.
His backpack lay there, the strap torn. A few steps further, the little wooden horse head that he wore as a pendant around his neck. She bent to pick it up.
Then the tears did come.
Zana didn't react when Galen fell down beside her and pulled her into his arms. She was kneeling in the grass, hands clenched into fists, sobbing silently. When Alan caught up to them, Zana opened her hand and showed him Peet's pendant.
"It was my fault, Alan - I was too slow and he fell back and drew them to himself. It was my fault..." She buried her head in Galen's neck. Alan said nothing, his face unreadable; his gaze wandered over Peet's belongings that had partly poured out of his torn backpack.
"What will they do to him now?" Galen regretted his words as soon as they had left his mouth. Zana shuddered in his arms.
"I don't want to imagine what Urko will do to Peet," she whispered. "His death is on my hands..."
"They'll interrogate him before they kill him," Alan murmured. "They'll want to know the names of whoever helped us to evade Urko for so long."
Galen closed his eyes for a moment, as a long line of faces appeared before his mind's eye. Polar and his sons... little Remo... He swallowed. He didn't want to imagine what Urko would do to a child. Lora, Dolan, even Aken could fall victim to Urko's vengefulness. Not to mention the many humans that had helped them, given them food, directions, warnings about patrols and hints which paths were less controlled...
Zana had followed the same train of thoughts, apparently. "But he won't tell... would he?" she asked timidly.
Alan's face was grim. "Not for a while. But everyone breaks eventually. Unless..."
"Unless what?"
The men exchanged a look of complete understanding. "Unless Peet can provoke Urko into killing him before that point," Galen said softly.
"We have to do something!" Zana broke away from him and bolted to her feet. "We can't just sit here and wait for the police they sent for to come and collect us..."
Galen rose, too, alarmed. "The soldiers sent for police?" He turned to Alan. "Then we need to leave at once! They could be here any moment!"
"Haven't you heard what I just said?" Zana snapped. "We must help Peet!"
"But how? We'll never catch up with them on foot!" Much as he wanted to help the human, Galen had no taste for sacrificing himself as a noble, but ineffective gesture.
"I... I don't know!" Zana threw her hands up, frustrated. "We have to think of something!" She turned to Alan. "Don't you want to help Peet?"
Alan regarded her with a strange expression. Galen felt a funny knot building in his stomach as he watched the human's face.
Fear.
"You said they sent police after us?"
Galen wrapped the rope around his hands, because by now his palms were so sweaty that he feared it would slip through his fingers, and if that happened, Zana would be doomed. His nose twitched violently at that thought.
Zana was standing at the side of the road, a small figure under a dark sky. Birds and insects had fallen silent, and the air was heavy and unmoving. Galen strained his ears for the sound of hoofbeats, but nothing so far. Only a humming silence, thick with anticipation.
Then Zana turned and ran.
A moment later, he caught it, too - the rapid clatter of a patrol racing down the road, hurrying to catch the prey before it retreated too deeply into the wilderness.
They had seen her now - Galen held his breath as they spurred on their horses to run even faster, the first one already leaving the road to cut her off. Zana was more stumbling than running... she had been slower lately than in the beginning of their journey, Galen remembered, and always complained about being tired. What if she was too slow?
I should have been the bait, Galen thought desperately, and she should have lain in wait with the rope. Too late now...
She was racing towards him; Galen could see her wide, dark eyes, her open mouth, her pumping fists with painful clarity. Her breath came in wheezing gasps, twigs snapped with loud cracks under her feet. Just a bit closer, don't slow down now, Zana, run faster, faster... She was falling on all four now, using her arms to make up for her failing legs.
Then she passed him, two riders immediately behind her, their net already stretched between them. Galen jumped down from his branch, pulling at the rope that was fastened to a trunk on the other side of their path. If his timing was off just by a fraction of a-
A violent jerk as the soldiers ran at top speed into the taut rope smashed him against the trunk of his tree. Apparently his timing had been just fine. He came to his feet and winced as a shot thundered a few feet away from him. Then a ratcheting sound. He cautiously peeked around the tree.
Alan had taken cover behind another tree, but the two soldiers they had just thrown off their mounts were sitting ducks, and they knew it: they stood on the path with sullen looks on their faces, hands in the air. The rest of the patrol had brought their horses to a halt, unsure what to do.
"I'm pointing your rifle at a head," Galen heard Alan's calm voice. "I'm not telling you which head. If you do as I say, nobody needs to die today. Everyone dismount. Hands where I can see them."
"It's the human!" one of the officers said, incredulous. He had to be as shocked as if his horse had suddenly pulled a gun on him, Galen mused. And if Alan had been one of this world's humans, he'd probably never even have thought of such a thing, let alone been able to carry it out.
But he wasn't one of their humans. Galen thought that Alan and Peet might be this world's only genuinely wild humans. Not even strays sought out open confrontation with an ape anymore.
"Be a good boy and put that thing down before you hurt yourself," the patrol leader called into the shadows beneath the trees.
"Be a reasonable ape and don't push it," Alan called back. "Dismount before I make up my mind who I'll shoot."
"You're not going to shoot us," the leader retorted while his men flicked nervous glances towards the area where the human was hiding.
"Try me." The flatness in Alan's voice made Galen's fur rise.
It did seem to drive the message home to the chimps, too, because the first man dismounted, then the next, slowly, until finally, their leader followed suit. Perhaps it had dawned on him that being the only one still defying the armed human could turn him into the designated target.
"Step away from the horses, line up against the trees. One ape per trunk," Alan ordered. "Zana, collect the horses before they run off. Galen, tie these gentlemen to their trees."
"Since when does an ape obey the orders of a human?" the first ape hissed when Galen tied his hands behind the trunk. "Are you out of your mind?"
"That is a strange question coming from an ape who wanted to bring me home for hanging," Galen remarked and pulled the last knot tight.
"I'm an officer of the law!" the ape called after him when Galen moved to the next ape. "I'm just doing my duty."
"Good for you, officer," Galen said cheerfully, "I, on the other hand, am doing this here for purely selfish reasons." He sniffed. "I like my neck."
"We can't just leave them here," Zana said, worried. Galen had to admire her character for caring about men who had been out to deliver them to the same fate as Peet's. "They'll starve to death, or wild animals..."
"Their comrades will go looking for them soon enough when they don't return to the watch house," Alan cut her off. He had already mounted his horse and sat there with an ease that Galen had never seen in another human. Even Peet had complained about having to sit on a horse. On this world, humans didn't ride horses.
But Alan wasn't from this world. The longer Galen traveled with him, the more obvious it became.
He shook his head and reached for the pommel of his own horse. They had acquired five of them, so they could change the animals around before they were exhausted, which would help them to stay in hot pursuit of the patrol that had Peet - they would be exchanging horses at every waystation, and probably not rest at all until they had reached the city. Galen didn't know if Zana could take such a hard ride, and he wasn't exactly looking forward to it himself. But a look at Alan's stony face told him that the human wouldn't accommodate either of them.
"What are you doing? Don't put additional weight on the horse if it isn't necessary." Alan's voice wasn't harsh, but all his usual warmth was drained from it. Zana's shoulders tensed, but she didn't drop Peet's backpack as she climbed into the saddle herself.
"Those are Peet's things," she said, a hint of defiance in her voice. "And I'll give them back to him after we saved him."
Alan stared at her for a moment. Then he nodded. "You do that."
Thunder rolled when they steered their horses back to the road.
Urko didn't know whether to laugh or growl when he saw Zaius' newest acquisition hover at his desk, but he was in too high mood to let the old fool's taste in women exasperate him today. So he just closed the door a bit more forcefully than necessary.
"What is it with you and young, nubile Chimps?"
Zaius looked up from the scroll the girl was holding under his nose and gave him a crooked smile. "Do come in, Urko." The Chimp hastily rolled up her scroll and retreated into the shadow of one of the council eldest's beloved potted ferns.
Urko accepted the flint and steel that Zaius offered him and lowered himself into a seat. He didn't bother to hide his satisfied smile as he stuffed his pipe. "You heard the news."
"Burke has been captured." Zaius leaned back and took a long draw on his pipe.
"Yes." Urko lit his pipe and took a long draw himself. He smiled at the Orangutan through the smoke. "Just as I promised you."
Zaius didn't look impressed. "One out of four. The others are still at large."
Urko grinned and stretched his legs. "Worried about your book? They'll come to me, no worries - they'll try to free their friend." He chuckled. "Fools."
"Their loyalty is amazing," Zaius said mildly, and Urko frowned. The old man was alluding to his latest report about the incident in the ruined human city - where the humans had tricked his lieutenant into letting them run free in exchange for saving him... though Urko was under no illusions that they'd have been interested in his fate if the other human hadn't been trapped underground with him.
He should've killed Virdon then, while he had the chance.
"Well," Zaius said briskly, "his capture couldn't have come at a better time. We have an experiment-"
"Experiment?" He should've known that the Orangutan would needlessly complicate things. "We don't need no 'experiments'. We'll simply flay that creature in the main place to get our message across. No more alien humans, no more problems." No more dangerous ideas. But there was no need to let Zaius know what he knew by now. Let them think that the dumb Gorilla was just hating the human's guts.
Zaius' eyes were cold. "They've been on the run for more than a month now. Clearly they had help. Don't you think it's important to know who helped them? Who they talked to?"
Urko grunted noncommittally.
"I can almost guarantee you I'll get those answers."
Urko turned slowly to stare at the fern that had dared to speak up. "Who's that?" he growled.
The Chimp shriveled under his glare.
Zaius waved the girl to come closer. "This is Vanda. One of our brightest young scientists-"
Urko snorted. "May I remind you of the clusterfuck that your last 'bright young scientist' produced? Maybe you should give up on them young Chimp wimmin'..."
The girl straightened, clearly annoyed. "I assure you I don't suffer from Zana's... sentimental afflictions. I have no special love for humans." She smiled cheekily. "I'm more a horse girl myself."
"Fascinating," Urko muttered.
"You shouldn't be so dismissive of young Vanda," Zaius said dryly. "She's one of your people - she works for the Cesarian Intelligence Agency. Her topic of research is interrogation techniques. Surely you've read her latest papers."
He hadn't. He was a soldier, and although he was technically also the head of the armed forces' intelligence, he preferred to ignore the secret police. Their work was political, as far as Urko was concerned, and as such, was Zaius' domain. He glared at Zaius, who smiled thinly in response.
"So what does that experiment have to do with Burke?" Urko said gruffly. Vanda stepped closer, her eyes gleaming with excitement.
"An old human technique..."
"Human?" Urko leaned forward. "Is ape now imitating man?" He turned to Zaius. "Shouldn't that be considered blasphemy, oh venerable Defender of the Faith?"
"They did it to each other, and with great success," Vanda said, undaunted by his sarcasm. "Burke is a human, so why wouldn't I experiment with methods tailored to his species' weaknesses? What we're going to do to Burke was called 'brainwashing' by the humans of old..."
"Brain washing," Urko repeated flatly.
"Yes. The psychological method of washing out of the human brain old ideas and inserting new ones. We're going to do that with Burke - it'll be my next paper." Vanda beamed at him. "We'll get you your answers and promote scientific progress at the same time."
"Ah. Brain washing. Now I remember," Urko deadpanned. "Isn't that where the brain is removed from the skull and then rinsed thoroughly with cool water until the grey disappears?"
Vanda frowned, annoyed. "No. No. The brain is not removed from the skull!"
"Ah, yes, you're right." Urko fought to keep the amusement out of his voice. "I must've confused it with the baked calf brain that you Chimps love so much. That's where you also remove all those veins..."
"Vanda has the backing of the council," Zaius cut him short. "She'll interrogate Burke according to this new procedure."
The tension under his amusement flared into rage. "All interrogation is strictly under my supervision. That is the law, Zaius!"
"You may supervise, but Vanda will control the experiment." Zaius didn't even raise his voice. Urko felt his lips peel back over his teeth despite his attempt to control his anger.
Vanda quickly stepped between them. "I'd be pleased if you'd participate in the experiment, General - in fact, you'd be indispensable."
Urko flared his nostrils, taking deep breaths to tamp down his fury. "How?"
"I've been told that you prefer a more... hands-on approach to interrogation," Vanda said. "That could offer a useful contrast to the subtler methods I will employ. In short, the more fearsome you appear to the captive, the more benign I will seem to him - and that will make him more willing to open up to me."
Urko regarded her with narrowed eyes. "You want me to roughen him up?"
Vanda nodded. "Within limits. You can't cause permanent or debilitating damage, as that would make him useless to me, but otherwise feel free to be creative in how you put pressure on him."
Urko pursed his lips as he considered her offer. He'd be close by, and if she took too long without delivering results... well, accidents could happen, right?
On the other hand, he had to assert his authority. He wouldn't sneak in an execution if he could demand one. "How long until you get results?"
Vanda shrugged. "We don't have that data yet, obviously, but our sources speak of no more than four or five days."
He nodded. "You have five days, then. After that, he'll be lobotomized. That procedure also makes them docile and cooperative-"
"Or turns them into vegetables," Vanda pointed out.
Urko spread his arms and smiled. "In either event, we won't have to worry about him anymore." He glanced to Zaius. "I strongly advise the council to follow my suggestion, Eldest. It would be too bad if another failed experiment of yours raised doubts about your judgment."
Zaius gave him a sour look. "What you suggest is our last resort." But he turned to the young scientist.
"You have five days and five nights. After that, Urko will take over."
The bag over his head made it impossible to take a deep breath, and it stank. Burke didn't know if he'd rather hold his breath or suck in whatever oxygen made it through the thick fabric, and settled for intermittent shallow breaths that made him dizzy and nauseous. He was too busy fighting against the blackout hovering at the edges of his vision to care where he was dragged and shoved to, but he did notice that the air against his chest was suddenly much cooler, and that the sound of his captor's boots was louder and had a certain echo.
They had entered some underground construction - a tunnel or something.
Their secret dungeon. Ain't that great? I'll never get out of here again.
The last thought had sneaked in before he had a chance to suppress it. He had been pretty good at staying away from this sort of defeatism for the last days, but then he had been thrown over a horse like a sack of potatoes - a galloping horse. That kind of thing did help to keep you distracted.
Burke sucked in another mouthful of hot, lint-saturated air and fought against the instinct to overbreathe. The bag was meant to disorient him as much as torture him with the threat of asphyxiation, and he'd be damned if he'd play into his captors' hands by reacting mindlessly to their triggers.
The problem was... the problem was, he was already tired. And sore from that damn horse. And thirsty. And hungry, but the thirst was the bigger problem. All done deliberately to him to put him under stress, soften him up. Too bad that the knowledge didn't do one bit to relieve any of those sensations. Burke began to sort through them, trying to put them out of his awareness one by one. Dried sweat and dust making him itch all over - Done and gone . Nausea from slowly suffocating under that damn-
The bag was ripped off and he gasped for air. Blessed, fresh, cool, moist air. Burke blinked watery eyes against the bright light blinding him after the enforced darkness under the bag. The room he was in looked like a bomb shelter, and for a moment he wondered if the apes had a penchant for repurposing old human sites. Gas lamps were lined up along the walls in such a way that their cold light threw no shadows. He was getting dizzy from hyperventilating, but he just couldn't help it after almost suffocating under his hood.
He had been positioned in front of a dark, wooden desk; its surface was bare save for a thick folder, and a tray with a pitcher of water and a glass. Burke swallowed involuntarily at the sight; his tongue was sticking to the roof of his mouth. He couldn't remember when the guards had given him something to drink the last time.
He sniffed and tore his gaze away from the water.
I know how this works, you fucking monkeys. We invented this stuff when you were still figuring out how to peel a banana.
"Thank you guard - you can return to your post."
Burke half turned to see who had entered the room behind them, and flinched. The young woman who had dismissed his warden was... a chimp. She wore a white lab coat, though; and glasses.
She didn't look at all like Zana.
The chimp rounded him with a slight smile and an open, curious expression; she gave him an unabashed once over that he'd have teased Zana for, but the eyes of this one were cold.
Clinical.
She sat down behind the desk and gestured to the chair in front of him. "Please, sit down, Burke."
Slowly, he sank into the chair, keeping his eyes on the ape, who continued to smile at him. "Allow me to introduce myself: I am Vanda, and I'm assigned to be your interrogation officer."
Hello - I'm Zana, and I will be taking care of you from now on.
Burke shook his head to get rid of that memory; he only half-listened to the chimp woman's next words. "Let me explain what the procedure will be- oh, but have a glass of water first! I can see that you're thirsty, and I wouldn't want you to be uncomfortable."
Yeah, right.
But he did accept the water. Get your relief when the opportunity presents itself, right? And she hadn't asked him anything yet. The water was cool and, and... just good. Wonderful. He sighed and put the glass back on the table. Vanda watched him with that slight smile that never left her face.
"That's better, isn't it? I'm sorry you had such a rough journey here, but your captors are General Urko's men and they have been bred after his example." She leaned forward and refilled his glass; Burke took it without being prompted and emptied it in one draw. A moment later it occurred to him that the water could have been drugged, but he hadn't smelled or tasted anything...
Didn't mean anything. They could have drugs in their possession that were completely neutral.
Too late now.
"I hope you don't hold their treatment of you against me," Vanda said. "Believe me, if you had been under my supervision from the beginning, I'd have made sure that you'd have been fed and transported strictly after regulations. Tell you what." She smiled sweetly at him. "I'll give you a written permission to take a daily bath if you'll promise me not to blame me for your sores and bumps from the transfer."
"'m not blaming you for them anyways." His voice was rough; he hadn't spoken since that monkey had knocked his lights out in the woods. He wondered how far away that place was from here - had they raced back all the way to the apes' city?
Vanda beamed. "I'm so relieved! I wouldn't have wanted for us to start on the wrong foot! Now," she opened the folder and took out a piece of greenish paper - or what they used for paper here, "our bureaucrats want to know all kinds of things, nothing important, you see, just lots of blank lines I have to fill so that they can feel important, I'm sure."
"Sorry, but my mom taught me not to talk to strangers." It was a weak quip, but he wasn't relaxed enough to come up with something more original. He didn't buy the woman's chit chat for a second.
"Oh." Vanda froze for a moment, pen in mid-air. Then she put it down with exaggerated care. She laced her fingers on the paper before her and leaned forward, giving him a sympathetic smile.
"I understand - you want to protect your friends. But be reasonable." She glanced down at the form. "They want to know your age, whether you are in good health, when and where you were taken prisoner - do you really think answering those silly questions would be telling me anything worthwhile? Or that I'd ask you to spill any secrets in exchange for a bath?
"Now Urko is convinced that you and your friends have been roaming the countryside, inciting rebellion in your fellow humans - and probably had a Gorilla baby for breakfast every day - but I know you did nothing of the kind." Her smile became a bit more vicious. "Because if you had, I can assure you that our intelligence would've known even before you."
Burke's heart had begun to race at the mentioning of the gorilla's name, but he carefully kept his face blank. "So if you already know that, why 'm I here?"
Vanda sighed, shrugged, and leaned back in her chair. "I have to make sure that you are, indeed, no danger to our society, you see? It's my job. All I want from you is a tiny bit of cooperation so I can fill out these lines on this form. I must convince my superiors that your unauthorized vacation to the countryside didn't do any damage to our humans, and then you'll go back to the institute to live out your days in peace. I heard they are building a new and bigger open-air enclosure, with more stimuli for an enhanced experience. Humans get bored so easily and then they're up to all kinds of shenanigans."
Vanda's eyes were sparkling with amusement. Burke had seen the same light glowing in the eyes of another ape, not too long ago.
Urko's.
"The sooner you tell me what I need to know, the less time you have to spend here," Vanda said.
"Oh, I like it here." Burke smiled and poured himself another glass of water. He toasted her. "You're a very nice lady. And I'm afraid I can't help you with your forms."
Vanda's smile didn't waver. "Very well," she said softly. "I'm looking forward to spending more time with you, too. I think it will be a very interesting experience.
"For both of us."
The hood was pulled down over his head again.
Night had not yet melted into dawn when Virdon returned from the village, fresh horses in tow; the meadows were plated silver in the weak light of the waning moon, heavy with dew. He tiredly thought that he was getting all too acquainted with the hour of the wolf.
They had to ride by night - while two apes on horseback wouldn't have raised a brow, a human on a horse would've immediately attracted a mob. As a result, they had to hide by day, a necessity that was driving him crazy. While Galen and Zana hit their bedrolls as soon as they had eaten, Virdon - invariably volunteering for first watch - was prowling the perimeter, unable to sit still for a minute. Speeds, times, distances were relentlessly ticking in his mind. Pete's captors weren't fettered by his own group's constraints: they could exchange the horses at every way station, and exchange the riders, too. They would be headed straight back to the apes' central city, to Urko.
Virdon's hands stilled at the knot he was tying to keep the last horse from wandering into the forest surrounding their hiding spot; for a moment he could feel Pete racing away from him, like a moving dot on the map hovering before his mind's eye, a tiny, fierce flame of life and defiance pulling at some undefined line of connection to him.
Please give him strength, he prayed, give him hope. He must know that we won't abandon him.
He jerked the knot tight and absently patted the horse's neck before he made his way to the campfire. At least Galen had mastered the art of making a smokeless fire by now; he had even taken the time to dig a small hole that would conceal the glow of the flames. At other times, Virdon would've made some approving noise, but now he just hunkered down and silently accepted the cup of hot broth that Zana handed him.
"How did it go?" Galen asked, nodding towards the horses.
"Smoothly." Nobody had batted an eye when he had led their exhausted mounts through the village - he was just another slave, barefoot and docile, gaze downcast. It hadn't been difficult to take on the body language of defeat... it was exactly how he felt as soon as they were forced to interrupt their pursuit. Every dawn was another punch this world delivered to him, another reminder that he belonged to the conquered race.
"The officers didn't hear you leading them away?" Galen pressed on, and Virdon frowned. He might not be a professional horse thief, but did Galen really think he'd jeopardize Pete's rescue by being sloppy?
"I kept the rest of the herd occupied with a sack of carrots I... found." He hadn't just turned into a thief of horses; what a career jump for Colonel Alan Virdon, former Air Force pilot, former spaceship commander...
Zana blew an amused sniff. "Peet would've bowled over laughing if he'd seen you with a sack of carrots on your back - remember how he'd laughed when I bought you that straw hat?"
Virdon's lips twitched; oh yes, he could imagine the reaction. Damn, Al, I didn't know you'd play Santa for the beasties, too!
He closed his eyes for a second and forced himself to focus on the heat of the cup in his hands, the blaring of bird calls from the trees, and the pressure of a piece of gravel boring into his backside. He took another sip from his broth.
They were on their way back to the city. Back to square one. All the miles of cobblestone, deer trail, underbrush, and grassland they had traversed, all the dangers and struggles, the slave work on Polar's farm, the mad race to snatch him away from Aken's execution platform at the very last second... and they were not a single step closer to safety. On the contrary - he was leading the rest of their group straight back to Urko's home base.
I lost Pete, and now I'm endangering Zana and Galen. But he couldn't turn his back on his friend, he just... He knew about "enhanced interrogation," and during the war, his comrades had gladly filled him in on the gruesome details, one story about someone who knew someone who had fallen into the hands of the Chinese more gory than the next. It had all been a game of who could keep a straight face then.
I'm emotionally compromised. I'm not fit to lead. But who'd be able to take the reins? Zana was even more determined to wrest Pete from Urko's clutches than himself, and she could be as reckless as Burke...
Galen was cautious, and his attitude towards them was friendly, but detached. He wanted to bring his fiancée out of the danger zone, without detours to explore ancient ruins, or mad plans to rescue someone who was probably beyond help by now...
Virdon swallowed. Galen had his priorities straight. He'd-
"Here, Alan, you mustn't forget your medicine." Another cup appeared inches from his nose, tickling him with the scent of licorice and something tart. He looked up and into Zana's worried eyes and forced a weak smile on his lips.
"Thanks, Zana." The tea didn't taste too bad, and it did ease the pain in his chest and the coughing bouts that had plagued him ever since they had pulled him out of the ruins of the subway station. He didn't want to calculate how much dust and toxic fumes he had inhaled down there, or speculate about the long-term damage his lungs had suffered. He took another sip from the tea - it was the only help this world had to offer him.
Not "this world." This time. His thoughts lingered against his will on the memory of that subway station. On the flyer he had found down there. The name of the station. Latin letters, English words - and the date of the last Olympic games.
Had those been the last Olympics they'd ever held? What had happened after that year?
It was his own world, his own world! Everything after his rescue had been a frantic race, first away from Urko, now after him, and he hadn't ever had a quiet moment to truly grasp the reality of what he had found down there. But now it snaked around him, squeezing the breath from his throat.
Sal...
She was dead. She was... she was gone, maybe for centuries, maybe even longer. Everything had crumbled away, vanished from the face of the Earth he'd known. Even these ruins they were hiding in now had been some temple for the apes, not humans. Sally's body had turned to dust, her smile, the sparkle in her eyes, the scent of her skin...
Dust in his throat and in his eyes, making them water.
There was a baby daughter he had never seen. She had been born, grown up, died, like a flame lighting up in the darkness and winking out again. Had she found love? Had she found purpose?
My son and now he had to put the cup down and press the heels of his hands against his eyes to rub the wetness away. I wanted to come back to you, Chris, so much... I didn't know, I couldn't know, how could I've known...
He felt a warm hand on the nape of his neck, and then Zana put her arm around his shoulders and gave him a gentle squeeze. "We'll get there in time, Alan, don't you worry. We'll find Peet and get him out of there. He's strong, and he knows we won't abandon him. He'll be alright, you'll see."
No, he won't be alright, but there was no use telling her that.
Virdon awkwardly cleared his throat and put one hand over Zana's. He had to get a grip on himself. He needed... he needed something to distract him. His eyes fell on Galen, who was studiously staring down at the pages of his book, trying to give him privacy.
That book. Virdon had sometimes wondered just what about that book was so damning that Galen had to flee for his life just for keeping it.
He sniffed and rubbed a hand over his face. "What are you reading there, Galen? I've been meaning to ask you for some time..."
Galen slowly lifted his head and gave him a long, unreadable look, and Virdon felt irritation starting to simmer in his gut at the chimp's hesitation. Zana's fiancé had never made a secret of his fascination with "Zana's humans," as he insisted on calling them, but the glances thrown their way when he thought they wouldn't notice were cautious at best, and wary most of the time. Pete and he were defying the ape's assumptions of human potential in ways Virdon couldn't even know.
That didn't keep Galen from pelting them with questions about their world every day, and Virdon had answered them all as truthfully as he felt was reasonable. And now Galen was weighing his trustworthiness?
But then Galen did answer. "It's a history book," he said slowly. "About a, a part of history that Zaius absolutely wants to keep secret from ape society." His fingers brushed lightly over the page, as if he meant to touch the events described in the patchy script. Pete had called it "paw prints"-
Virdon forced his thoughts back to the present.
"What part would that be? - Come on, Galen, you're hammering me with questions about my world all day, every day. You can't blame me for being curious about your world in return." As far as Galen and Zana knew, he and Pete had come from another world among the stars, a strange upside-down version of reality where humans had built a civilization. He didn't intend to change that assumption - not after he had suffered Urko's reaction to the truth of apekind's status at that long gone time.
Galen sighed and scratched his chin, clearly struggling with whatever misgivings he had about them, and Virdon reached for his tea to give his hands something else to do than clenching into fists.
"It deals with a war between apekind and... and humans," Galen said finally.
"Oh," Virdon deadpanned, "who won?"
Galen shot him a withering look. "You should leave the joking to Peet, he's more funny while doing it."
Virdon inhaled deeply and took another sip from his tea. His irritation was wavering around the edges of his control, a slight, steady tremor in his chest. It was because he was so frustrated with their situation, he told himself, it wasn't fair to unload his bad mood on Galen. He sent him a rueful smile. "I'm sorry, Galen. I didn't mean... what were they fighting over?"
Galen shrugged. "Dominance. Resources. The question of which of them were persons, and which... weren't." His gaze dropped to the pages again. "The book claims that apes... that apes hadn't been persons before."
Virdon's breath stilled in his throat. "Before what?" he whispered.
Zana shook out her bedroll with a huff. "What does it matter?" she snapped. "That was hundreds of years ago! Peet is in danger now, and all you two can think of is chatting over an old book?" She threw the blankets into the grass and turned to them, arms akimbo. "I've read all the reports from the Strays' Rebellion, you know? Urko was just a lieutenant then, but... do you know what they called him back then? What the apes called him? 'Belly-buster'... because he'd force the humans to drink lots of water, and then he'd jump-"
Pressure shot into his head with such force that Virdon thought his skull would explode, clogging his sinuses, pulsating in his throat. Zana ducked and stared at him wide-eyed, and he realized that he'd hurled the cup against the decayed wall behind her, and he was on his feet and he couldn't even remember moving a muscle.
For a moment they just stared at each other; Virdon was sucking in air with too deep, too rapid breaths, and it was making him dizzy and it made the pressure in his head worse. His throat was tight and hurting, and his voice was hoarse.
"I don't need to hear that, Zana! I don't need to hear every single damn thing Urko did to humans to know what Pete's in for! I was down in that hole with Urko, remember? I've looked into his eyes and I know... I know..." His breath was running out, and he had to take several of those sucking breaths, like a drowning man gasped for air before he was drawn under again.
"You need to face it, Zana, you need to face it" I need to face it "no matter how fast we ride, there's a possibility... a, a strong possibility..." and he had to take another breath, "no matter what we'll do, we might be too late, or that he, that Pete, that he'll be in such a bad shape that it'll be the merciful thing to do to... the merciful thing..."
And now he couldn't breathe anymore, no air was going in, none at all, and his heart sent jolts of stabbing pain through his chest, the kind of pain that signaled a heart attack and wouldn't that be an ironic way to die? Not by the hands of an ape, on this world?
Zana made a step towards him and he turned away with a sudden, jerking motion. "Got to check on the horses." He needed... distance, and darkness, and fresh air, and silence-
He desperately needed a plan, but he lacked everything - information, resources, allies. Virdon buried his face in the horse's mane and inhaled its scent, musk and honey and hay. The animal turned its head and breathed softly against his thigh.
He stood there for a long time, not thinking of anything.
When he returned to the fire, Zana had already buried herself under her blankets. For a moment he thought of apologizing to her, but he was too wrung out to really care. Galen had put away the damn book and was tending to the fire, his face thoughtful.
"I'll take first watch," Virdon murmured, hypnotized by the flames.
"I'm absolutely sure that you'll lead us to safety, Alan," Galen said gently. "And I'm equally sure that we'll be able to save Peet, no matter what state he's in. I have a cousin-"
"Urko will know all your connections by now," Virdon said flatly. "Don't even think of visiting your parents - his men will have them under surveillance around the clock." Not for the first time the thought occurred to him that their pursuit had run so smoothly until now because Urko had called off his men - why chase after your prey if you could just let it come to you? And Urko had the ultimate bait now.
"That is a good thought," Galen agreed. "Well, I do have some more... obscure contacts, too. In fact, I can think of at least one of them who'll be happy to be part of the adventure."
Virdon stared at him. "The adventure?"
Galen's eyes crinkled at the corners. "That is exactly how he will see it - as a magnificent prank we're playing on Urko. And I have no intention to disabuse him from that notion. It will keep him motivated."
Virdon just shook his head and put another log on the fire.
"Alan."
When he looked up, there was no distrust in Galen's eyes. Only compassion.
"We will find your - our friend. And we'll find him in time."
With that, he retired for the day. Virdon leaned against the mossy stones of what might have been an altar once, and began to count the hours until dusk.
