Conquest of the Planet of the Apes - Jakes John - Страница 1

THE TIME: 1990

THE PLACE: A gray, tightly computerized city-state, somewhere in North America

THE INHABITANTS: Apes who serve as terrified slaves. Men who function as brutalized masters

Until the Apes revolt . . . in a battle as savage and monstrous as the bondage they’d been forced to endure for decades!

20th Century-Fox Presents

An Arthur P. Jacobs Production

CONQUEST OF THE PLANET

OF THE APES

Starring

RODDY McDOWALL and DON MURRAY

and

RICARDO MONTALBAN

as Armando

Produced by

APJAC PRODUCTIONS

Directed by

J. LEE THOMPSON

Written by

PAUL DEHN

Based on Characters from

PLANET OF THE APES

Music by

TOM SCOTT

CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

FIRST AWARD PRINTING February 1974

Copyright © 1972, 1974 by

Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation.

All rights reserved

AWARD BOOKS are published by

Universal-Award House, Inc., a subsidiary of

Universal Publishing and Distributing Corporation,

235 East Forty-fifth Street, New York, N.Y. 10017

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CONTENTS

Title

Copyright

CONQUEST OF THE PLANET

OF THE APES

Prologue

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

PROLOGUE

Under a red-tinged moon, the dark towers of the central city thrust against the sky. Black glass facades caught the moon’s reflection, sectioned it like so many endlessly repeated blank faces.

Aerial walkways arched gracefully between the cubistic towers, empty at this hour. From the buildings, and from intersections along the walkways, ramps led down to the perimeter of a vast mall, a checkerboard of small green pocket parks and paving blocks that reflected the moon from their mica flecks. There was no sound except the tack-tacking of the boots of a helmeted state security policeman walking along a parapet above the plaza. His rifle barrel glittered, slung over his shoulder, muzzle upward.

The policeman drew in a breath of the cool, fresh air. Two years ago, in 1989, the last of the huge air-scrubbing plants, constructed at a cost of billions along the mountain chain a hundred miles eastward, had, in combination with stringent laws, made it pleasant to breathe again—at least in this American city. The policeman couldn’t speak for others, never having traveled much.

But he’d heard it was the same in all the great metro sprawls. An ordered society. Law breakers—including polluters—were promptly, severely punished. And the masses of people had been relieved of menial chores by the careful conditioning of thousands of . . .

Abruptly, the policeman stiffened, cocked his head. His helmet flashed moon reflections. Somewhere deep in the glass and steel canyons surrounding the mall, he heard soft, urgent footfalls.

Then another sound made him glance quickly up and down the mall. The second noise was—a jungle sound.

He had seen pictures of the world’s few remaining jungle places on solido shows. The policeman reached up, slowly unslung his rifle. He was sure now. What he’d heard was the whimpering cry of a frightened animal—a running animal.

His face tense, the policeman headed for the nearest ramp. His boots clacked as he ran down to the mall proper. He searched one direction, then another. Nothing but shadows, glass, silence. The footfalls had stopped.

But in thicker shadow beneath another ramp angling down to the pavement far on his right, he swore he heard the light, raspy sound of something breathing.

He whipped around as a shadowy figure broke from under the ramp. The figure began to zigzag between the pocket parks in an unmistakable shambling stride.

Almost before he realized it, the policeman was running himself. He understood the nature of the humped silhouette; understood why it scurried so rapidly across the plaza, dashing past building entrances, temporarily vanishing behind ramp pillars, then plunging frantically on again.

High on another parapet to his left, he heard a word barked by a human voice, then realized it was his own name, called out by a colleague who patrolled blocks Q four through seven. Moving fast, trying to keep the fleeing figure in sight, the first policeman shouted up to the other: “Runaway!”

The cause of the flight, or the identity of the fugitive, he did not know. But he knew that what was happening violated their conditioning, and therefore could not go unchecked. He breathed hard, gripping the rifle in a sweaty palm as he ran. Finally the fleeing figure broke into plain sight, forced to cross a wide paved area in order to reach the sanctuary of the streets opening from the mall’s far side.

The state security policeman halted, braced his booted feet, brought the rifle halfway to his shoulder. He yelled the command that carried more power—with them—than lethal weapons:

“No!”

The echo bounced off the high buildings. And, for a moment, the fleeing figure did react, break stride—almost hesitate. But ultimately, the traditional command failed to work. The figure went shambling on, the emptiness flinging back the whimpering, terrified sound it made.

“Jesus Christ,” said the policeman with a violent swallow. “A real renegade.”

His training had the rifle at his shoulder by then. With only an instant’s pause, he squeezed the trigger. The first thunderous report was followed by a second.

The distant figure spun, toppled to the paving stones, flat on its back, arms flung wide. It let out a piercing bellow of animal agony. The policeman had never shot one of them before. There was a shock reaction as he dashed forward, sourness rising in his throat. Coming down the ramp from above, the boots of his colleague slammed like ghostly echoes of the shots.

The policeman knew what he would find—an ape. He discovered it was a large, mature, male chimpanzee. It wore only green trousers now, the rest of its servant’s garb cast off somewhere as part of its desperate flight to freedom. What the policeman and his companion had not expected to see was the condition of the chimpanzee’s face and hairy upper body.