This is going to be a very long chapter, please enjoy!
Thade pressed his hairy paws against the viewing port of the strange human space contraption. Stars flew by, like diamonds. It was fascinating really, that humans could build machines that would go here, this dark infinity. Not that it changed his view to find out that humans had once been the masters. They had strength, yes, in their creations. Apes were born strong. They were stronger, matured faster, were wiser. These scrawny humans had had to resort to mere trickery to gain a meager victory over him. A "victory" that was only temporary.
Thade was surprised at how simple the device had been to control, it a process of trial and error to push the right buttons. He had devised the plan to break out and use one of them to escape after he had been betrayed by Attar, then by Ari. Again. She had been a last ditch effort, and Thade had crawled under the control desks to make the appearance of giving up. The fools bought it. He would never give up till the human scum was eliminated off the face of all worlds, Ashlar, and the one where his and the spaceman's ancestors had come from. He would start there. Find that world and start a new dynasty. The spaceman had cheated, bended time. Thade could do that too.
As the chimpanzee plotted his revenge, he noticed that the contraption was flying towards a pinkish purple mass, that was spiraling and expanding.
Suddenly another pod came up behind him, and it was going faster than his.
As the pod approached it, a portal opened, a tunnel into blackness. The pod was sucked inside the electro-magnetic storm.
Thade growled, and followed.
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Apes...Man. What really was the difference between them? The obvious answer would be that Apes were beasts and humans were civilized beings. Except that it was all coincidental. Apes were no more defined by their beastliness than humans were defined by their civilization.
That just happened to be the way things were.
For now.
Many things had changed since the three visitors from the future had landed on the California coast. The astronauts—or as some called them, the ape-o-nauts—had not been around for very long. Before it was discovered that the three chimpanzees were intelligent they were brought to the Zoo. One died there, killed by a unintelligent gorilla. The other two expressed their intelligence soon afterward, and became national celebrities. Cornelius and Zira were their names. They claimed to be from Earth's own future, a future where the human race was somewhat subservient to the apes. But on that point they were vague. Not until later would anyone find out exactly why. What made matters more suspicious is that they returned in a spaceship that belonged to a missing astronaut. Colonel George Taylor.
Taylor had been part of the first manned space mission ever sent up by ANSA to explore deep space. They had gone in the Liberty 1, a specialized ship capable of traveling near the speed of light. The mission had not returned, so it happened that another, even smaller manned mission was sent after him, the Liberty 2. Neither ever returned, at least until 1973, when the Liberty 1 crash landed near San Francisco. Also important to note, one more expedition was sent in 1978. It never returned.
A manned spacecraft, Probe Six, was lost in 1980 near Alpha Centauri after encountering radioactive turbulence. Probe Six contained three astronauts, Alan Virdon, Peter Burke, and Jones. It had been assumed by ANSA that Probe Six had met the same fate as the Liberty 1 and Liberty 2.
Initially the two chimpanzees and the good old USA were friends. That lasted for a few months. It had been revealed that the female ape, Zira, was pregnant. Of course that didn't sit well with the government. Two talking Apes from Earth's future were all well an good, but throw in a child and....it would not bode well for humanity. The main enemy of the two ape scientists was the famed professor Otto Hasslein, who pushed the government to make the decision to kill Zira's baby.
The attempt failed however, and the two apes escaped to a nearby circus. The owner, Armando, sheltered them from the police. Zira gave birth, then switched her baby with that of a dumb chimpanzee. Together her and Cornelius escaped and hid on a large mabandoned boat, and were promptly gunned down by the US Military and Otto Hasslein, who was now certain that the simian threat to humanity had been averted. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
The real baby of Zira and Cornelius was safe in the circus with Armando, and grew up there, performing in the country. In the cities however, things were changing. Cornelius had predicted these events back when he and Zira first landed. First it was the cats and dogs, all killed by a mysterious disease that some theorized to have come from outer space. Of course, humans couldn't go long without some sort of animal companion, so a new 'man's best friend' was chosen. Monkeys.
Yes, little monkeys, that's how it began. Then people moved to larger, and larger monkeys. Finally, great apes were all the rage. Chimpanzees, Gorillas, and Orangutans. It was about this time that the government built and sent out their last great space expedition, the Oberon. The Oberon was a gigantic space station that trained apes and monkeys for the stars. Not surprisingly, the Oberon, just like the Liberty 1, Liberty 2, and Probe 1, was never heard from again.
They started out as pets, but it didn't take humans long to figure out that these apes were intelligent, thinking animals. And so they ceased to be loved pets, and became slaves. As the ape's numbers grew, so did the government's suspicion that they killed the wrong baby chimpanzee. One in particular, Governor Breck, was determined to find the Chimp and have him killed. Finally, by the year 1991, the USA had transformed from the land of the free and the home of the brave into a police state oligarchy that bordered on dictatorship, led by Governor Breck. The entire economy was based on ape slave labor, and no respectable citizen didn't have a ape servant. The apes were trained for labor in ape management, then were auctioned off and sold to their human masters. They were dressed in color coded jumpsuits, Gorillas wore red, Chimpanzees wore green, and Orangutans wore yellow. This was the world that Caesar came into when he and Armando went into the future New York City.
Armando had had to remind Ceasar to act like a dumb, un-evolved ape. As they walked though the futuristic city, Ceasar examined his curious surroundings. They came across a statue of two animals that Ceasar had never seen before. One of them resembled the lion Armando had used to have in his circus. Armando said it was a monument to all the dogs and cats that had died. And Ceasar looked on in anger as he saw his fellow apes being mistreated. Then it happened.
A female chimpanzee was being beaten, harassed by the brutish police force. Ceasar forgot his vow never to speak and shouted, "Lousy human bastards!"
Armando immediately tried to claim it was he who said it, but too many people felt that somehow it was the chimpanzee who had spoken, and by now everyone knew what a talking ape meant. It meant that Zira's and Cornelius's child had not been killed after all.
In the midst of the panic, Ceasar ran away, down into a secluded area. After meeting with Armando one last time however, Ceasar decided to infiltrate the ape slave business. He quickly snuck into a cage of orangutans, fresh from Borneo. And that was the beginning.
Of Ceasar's revolution, of Ceasar's domain that lasted for the rest of his years.
However, history often takes many different paths. And perhaps it was destined that another path should form. And so it did, in the riotous year of 1991. For no pod crashed down in the outskirts of New York City on one path. But on the other...
Ceasar dashed down the cement tunnel, determined to hide with the other apes. Then he heard a voice.
"Stop. Who are you?"
Ceasar immediately halted, trying to look like a dumb ape. A figure emerged from the darkness. With a gun.
"Answer me!"
It was a another ape! Dressed in strange clothes, even armor. And it carried a gun. The strange chimpanzee stared him down. Ceasar was struck with fear.
"I am Ceasar".
The other chimp gave a menacing grin.
"Your sacrifice will be remembered, Ceasar."
The last thing Ceasar remembered was the roar of the gun and pain as the bullet ripped through his body. Thade examined the dead chimp, then walked down the passage. He had seen the way humans treated apes on this planet. Those miserable beasts, that had the gall to treat an apes like slaves. He would put a end to it.
But not yet. Thade knew he had no army, no followers. Yet. He was from another world, but he would be the savior, ruler of these long lost simian cousins of his. Thade crept into a crate carrying Orangutans.
Thade snarled. "Who are you all?". The big fools gibbered and looked at Thade strangely. They were dumb, like that small chimp that had ruined his war. Thade knew he could change them though. His own ancestry was of this planet.
In the following few days Thade raised a loyal army of apes, and then proceeded to kill almost all the troublesome humans, including Governor Brek. Some humans escaped, lived in the wilderness. Others led by a man named Mendez went underground, along with recently made nuclear weapons which the government had failed to obtain. The apes kept the rest as servants or for shooting.
The Planet of the Apes was born.
"Wait a minute" Leo said, "how do you know all this?"
Limbo walked over to the other end of his cell. "When you spend five years in a dungeon Leo, you'll realize how much we take reading for granted." The Orangutan held out a dusty old book. "Someone must've croaked down here while they were writing about the end of their world."
"Tell me what happened next." Leo Davidson said impatiently. "You were in the other pod, weren't you? The one that passed Thade's."
"Yes, I was."
So that's it for this chapter. As you can see, this story is not only a sequel to the Tim Burton film, but also ties directly back into the Original films. I really hope you all enjoyed reading it, and Limbo's Story Part 2 will be up sometime soon. Thank you for reading, and all comments are appreciated. Also please vote on this if you like it!
-LopEar