BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES David Gerrold Screenplay by John William Corrington and Joyce Hooper Corrington For Harlan Ellison, who will appreciate the thought. BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES PROLOGUE Many years, many centuries, after the fact, an orangutan sat on a hillside and taught a class. He read to his students from a large handwritten book. And in this manner does history become legend and legend become myth. "In the beginning, God created Beast and Man, so that both might live in friendship and share dominion over a world at peace. "But in the fullness of time evil men betrayed God's trust and, in disobedience to His holy word, waged bloody wars not only against their own kind but also against the apes, whom they reduced to slavery. "Then God in his wrath sent the world a savior, miraculously born..." *** The time of the Savior was a time when the world needed a savior. The surface of the Earth had been ravaged by the vilest war in human history. The great cities of the world had been split asunder and were flattened. Out of one such city came a remnant of apes and men who had survived. History would report that they came in search of a place where Ape and Human might live together in friendship. But their thoughts were of survival, not of friendship. And after survival, retribution. One does not live peacefully with one's former oppressors. One punishes. One seeks vengeance. And that was their mistake. The apes had brought the ways of evil men with them. The apes were proud that they had thrown off the yoke, but they failed to realize that they had not thrown it away. They put men into it and made them live in shame. They adopted other ways of men, too. Like men, they quarreled among themselves. Like men, they argued over directions and goals. Like men, they forgot their original purposes. And like men, they paid homage to strength. When the apes planted their orchards and sowed their fields, they also planted fruits of bitterness and sowed seeds of discontent. That crop would soon be ready for harvest. One among them might be a savior - but like other saviors before him, he had to find a way to make his people listen ... ONE Aldo the gorilla knew how to save his people. Aldo the gorilla had a plan. It was a good plan. It was right. He knew it. He smacked his lips in anticipation as he thought of it. Yes. Apes should be strong. Apes should be masters. Apes should be proud. Apes should make the Earth shake when they walked. Apes should rule the Earth. He knew that someday they would. And he would be the gorilla who would lead them to victory. He sat on his horse, on a ridge, and stared out over the desert below. Somewhere out there was a city ... or what was left of it. Perhaps there were men there, too. Dangerous men. With guns. And bombs. Apes should be ready for them. Apes should kill them. The thought excited him. He leaned forward in the saddle eagerly, squinting and frowning. Was there something out there? The city was forbidden, but the thought was so alluring ... But now was not the time. Not yet, not yet. He snorted loudly and kicked his horse in the ribs to make it move. He pulled hard on the reins and wheeled the animal around. He trotted toward the gorilla outpost farther along the ridge. The gorillas came to attention, grumbling. They were slovenly and untidy, and that made Aldo glad - it was a sign of their strength. As he rode through their ranks, they saluted, and he grinned in response. He kept on going and headed down the side of the ridge, away from the desert, toward a valley that was startling in its sudden lushness so close to the blasted sand. The valley was deep and peaceful. Vineyards, fields of crops, clusters of trees - Aldo grunted, restless at the sight. There was so little challenge there. He kicked the horse again, urging it faster. He splashed through a shallow stream. Ahead lay Ape City, nestled in the midst of dense trees. It was an arboreal city, multilevel, with numerous tree houses blending in with the forest around. Vines and ladders hung from openings to permit easy entry, and there were limbs that could be climbed from one level to another. Food hung outside the windows, all vegetables and fruit. Flowers grew in suspended pots. The whole vista was one of tranquility. Aldo sneered in annoyance. Kicking his horse once more, he galloped at full speed down into the valley, along a narrow road, through a grove of trees leading into Ape City. The wind lashed against his face; the dust of the road made his eyes water, and he squinted in reflex. But he galloped along, anyway, for the sheer brutal joy of it. The feel of the horse's hooves pounding along the dirt was rhythmic and powerful. He came loudly around a curve in the road and reined in suddenly. A wagon had collapsed, blocking his way. His horse reared up at the sudden stop; Aldo jerked the bridle viciously, holding the animal in fierce control. It pulled nervously to one side and whinnied in protest, but Aldo ignored it. One of the wheels had come off the wagon. Overloaded with fruit and vegetables, it rested on the blunt end of its axle. Four human males in identical brown homespun tunics were trying to raise it; they were all unshaven and longhaired. Off to one side stood a black man Aldo knew as MacDonald; he held a clipboard and a sheaf of papers in his hands. He was looking concerned - more about the broken wagon than about the delay he was causing Aldo. Aldo snorted. He dismounted and strode over to the wagon. He grabbed hold of it with one hand and lifted; he gestured to the men to replace the wheel, holding the wagon up easily until they were done. One of them, a broad-shouldered, golden-haired young man named Jake, grinned, "Thanks, Aldo. You've got the strength of a gorill ... oh, sorry." He stopped himself as he caught the darkening expression on Aldo's face. Was it an insult? Aldo snarled. Though Jake was tall and muscular, Aldo towered over him; he slapped Jake's face hard with a huge, hairy hand. "Man is weak!" He slapped him again, the sound of it cracked in the air. "Man is weak! And you will address me by my rank of general!" Jake glared at him in a long, tense silence. It was broken finally by MacDonald "Yes, General." He said it in a deadpan monotone. Aldo contemptuously pushed Jake aside and remounted his horse. He rode off quickly. Jake spat after him, "That gorilla makes me sick." MacDonald nodded. "I'll speak to Caesar." "What good will that do? Nobody can control Aldo." The black man shrugged. "We can try." But he realized the truth of Jake's words. He stared off down the road at the rapidly retreating Aldo; Aldo was dangerous, he knew it; he had seen the signs in too many men not to recognize them in the gorilla. Aldo rode recklessly into Ape City. Apes and humans dodged out of his way as he clattered through the avenues. In the nine years since its founding, Ape City had established a culture of its own. Apes were the dominant class, humans the servants, though not physically ill treated. Humans could be seen carrying lumber and parcels, sweeping, doing laundry, tending ape children, and building shacks below the tree houses of their masters. Apes wore uniforms, green and black and tan. Humans wore faded tunics, the same tunics that had been worn by their ape slaves half a generation before. Aldo pulled his horse up to a hitching post and dismounted. It was good that apes were the masters - but they weren't firm enough with their slaves. Ape and human children were playing in the streets; apes were riding humans, tossing them things to fetch, and treating them affectionately, like puppies. That was wrong - it might teach ape children to be too lenient with humans. It might even teach apes to like humans. He growled deep in his throat at the thought. Aldo strode through the street toward a building set on the ground. It was the ape school. Aldo hated it. Inside, the room was large enough to permit the simultaneous teaching of two classes without either interfering with the other - unless voices were unduly raised; as sometimes happened. In one class, an earnest but amiable bespectacled human was teaching reading and writing, speaking to a class self-segregated into two groups: in front sat child chimpanzees and child orangutans; in the rear sat the more backward gorillas - both children and adults. They looked sullen and truculent in their black leather uniforms. The other class was less a class than what a university might have called a tutorial. Three adolescent apes - two chimpanzees and one orangutan - sat raptly at the feet of a young orangutan named Virgil. Virgil was an intellectual prodigy whose witty and fluent speech could only just keep pace with the ideas that fizzed in his remarkable brain. Both Teacher - for that was the name the apes had given him - and Virgil were equipped with chalk stone to write on two chipped old chalkboards salvaged from the dead city. Their pupils wrote with charcoal sticks on skin parchment or papyrus. If pens, pencils, and paper still existed, they were reserved for the elite. Aldo surveyed the scene with ill-concealed annoyance. Particularly the human- taught class. Humans teaching apes, indeed! Teacher had just finished chalking up the words "APE SHALL NEVER KILL APE" on the board. The chimp and orangutan children watched attentively. But behind them the gorillas were restless and mumbled to each other. Teacher turned to the class. "Gorillas! Read me what I have written." There was glazed incomprehension and silence from the back row. Teacher sighed. Then, more hopefully: "Orangutans? Chimpanzees?"