World of the Apes.
Lavender heard something in the distance, something that made her stop and pause to listen. She huffed for a moment in thought, before she began panicking in fear, hooting slowly when she dimly recognised what she was hearing. Turning to her mate, she signed, There it is again.
Oak paused and he listened. The two Chimpanzees could hear in the distance the low sound of buzzing; the colony and the outposts had been growing increasingly aware of human hunting parties ever since the war began after Koba's vendetta took it too far before Caesar regained control over his people. But by that point, of course, it was too late, and now the apes were now at war with the humans, and the humans were using whatever was left of their technology.
All of the apes were envious and hateful of human technology, as the humans' technology could be used for anything; while the humans had lost contact with the rest of the outside world, much of their technology was now geared to help them fight in this war.
It's the humans alright; no bug sounds that loud. It must be one of those giant flies they use. We need to return to the camp, Oak signed at last.
Why are they even bothering? They've lost everything, and now they stand to lose so much more!
They're terrified, that's why. The humans have lost virtually everything and now they're desperate to make sure they don't lose what little they have left. We would do the same if we were in their place. Koba and Caesar were both right, in a way.
Lavender stared at him in silence as she went over what he had just signed. What do you mean, Koba and Caesar were both right in a way?
Koba was tortured by the humans growing up. Caesar was raised in a loving home; they had seen opposite sides of the humans, but if they had worked together instead of Koba seizing control the way he did, then we would have made peace with them, but be aware and prepared in case things went wrong.
Lavender could see her mate's point of view, but she also saw a flaw in his reasoning. Yes, but what if the extremists on both sides made a mistake? Remember, many of the humans were just as terrified of us as we were of them; the war was inevitable. I can see that now. I had hoped not to fight, but I believed Koba had a point, the humans could not be trusted.
No, they couldn't. Now we are at war. Perhaps it is a good thing Caesar did not try to stop it.
He realised it was pointless, Oak. By the time he regained his claim he had on the throne, too many had died on both sides, too many had killed one another. Now, we must return to camp. Warn them.
Yes, Oak signed in agreement, but he paused to listen closely. The sound of that flying thing is some distance away, we still have the time to get back.
-8-
The small squad of human soldiers was moving as silently as they could through the seemingly endless forest. In the distance, they could all hear the sound of the drones they'd appropriated as a convenient spy to help them track down the apes, but the problem was while the drones worked perfectly for their jobs, they were sometimes too noisy.
"The monkeys aren't far from here," a soldier reported, pointing, "There's a group of them in that direction."
"Good, then let's go after them," another said eagerly.
But the others showed more restraint. The eager soldier was new, and he hadn't seen what the more seasoned soldiers had seen.
"They will have heard the drone," one pointed out. "We don't want another ambush; we lost seventeen, any more deaths and we'll need to withdraw and regroup to get more troops."
The leader interrupted before there was any stupid argument or stupid debate. They didn't have the time.
"Can we drop a bomb with one of those drones?" She demanded.
"Easily."
"Good. Rig it up, and make sure the bomb has a radio-controlled detonator. I want to cause as much damage as we can, without losing any more people."
"I can do that, no problem. We have the bombs. We also have incendiaries, I can fit two of them into the drone."
"Will that cause problems for the drone?"
"It might make the drone lose power, but if the apes aren't far, we can beat them."
"Good. And remember, the Colonel expects maximum results; with each ape death, we ensure our survival and the chances of us rebuilding Earth."