Conquest of the Planet of the Apes - Jakes John - Страница 17

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EIGHT

On the morning following Caesar’s admittance to the training cells in the chimpanzee wing, a day handler arrived with four sets of leg shackles. The chains were long enough to permit relatively free movement, but short enough to prevent the long striding of which a desperate, runaway ape might be capable.

Caesar gave a protesting grunt as the handler fastened on the two iron cuffs with links between. The grunts were strictly for effect. He intended to be very careful about how he distinguished himself as special. Given the speed with which he’d passed through conditioning, a certain amount of extra intelligence might be expected—and could be shown. But not too much. He would dissemble, pretend.

His strategy was based on the assumption that, since wild apes were received at this facility, and conditioned apes were employed in the city, he would be shipped out again eventually—if he survived. He could do that by showing he was clever, quick to learn. But as to exhibiting power to dominate the other apes—as he’d rashly done the preceding evening—no. That would merely arouse suspicion.

As the handler started to shackle the second chimp in the cage, the ape scuttled away, whimpering. The handler had to resort to a couple of strident exclamations of “No!” In response, Caesar cringed with appropriate realism. The handler noticed.

Finally, with all four chimps individually shackled, the handler ran another chain between their legs, fastening it to each ankle chain with special catches. Caesar displayed no interest in heading the line, opting instead for the anonymity of second to last. He noticed the handler studying him as the file waited for the elevator. With the pleasure of playing an elaborate game, Caesar chittered and scratched his belly, his expression momentarily vacant. He meant to be simply another animal slave.

He saw no more of the kindly Morris. There were new handlers, less gentle. Evidently Morris was assigned only to reception and initial conditioning, and Caesar and his trio of associates had graduated to a program of more specialized training.

The first class concentrated on instructing the animals in the proper way to put on and take off the servant garments they would wear later. In a way, the class amused Caesar. There was always one slow learner—a male who donned his coat backwards, or his trousers.

Females were instructed in the same large, unfurnished classroom as the chained males. The antics of the female apes seemed particularly funny to the trainers forced to go through the same routine over and over. Typically, the females tried to push their heads through the sleeve hole of a uniform—and got their heads stuck. One such mishap led to a female going into complete panic. She ran screaming along the wall, hunting a way of escape, and even the instructors, barking the “No!” which always preceded correction of an error, couldn’t calm her. Handlers were summoned with prods and hypodermics to beat and tranquilize the hysterical female into unconsciousness.

That incident removed all trace of the comical from garment training, as far as Caesar was concerned. When he made his own, deliberately “forgetful” mistake—climbed into his trousers backwards, then cringed at the firm, “No!”—he was still full of anger at the treatment of the deranged female.

A special washroom-like facility served as the hygiene classroom. Each ape was put in front of a stainless steel basin whose faucets were foot-pedal operated. Above each basin was a paper towel container; below it, a waste basket. An instructor hovered behind each group of three or four apes, constantly correcting—“No!” “No!”—as the animals tried to imitate earlier demonstrations of the proper way to wash and dry their faces and hands.

To maintain his protective cover, on his first attempt Caesar deliberately ripped off a paper towel first, crumpled it between his hands, threw it away, then pedaled the cold water to wash.

“No!”

On the second try, he washed and dried his face and hands in proper sequence, impressing his instructor. The effect was precisely the one Caesar wanted.

In the table-waiting class, the chimpanzee ahead of Caesar was making his fourth unsuccessful attempt to pour ice water from a huge pitcher into a glass. The chimp, one of Caesar’s group, just kept pouring until the water cascaded over the glass rim and flooded the table top.

“No, damn it!” yelled the instructor, an older man who seemed unusually irritable. He snatched up the glass, flung its contents toward a wet floor drain, and whacked the glass down on the table—looking as if he’d prefer to whack the miserable chimp instead.

“Again,” the instructor demanded.

The chimp started to pour. Caesar could tell the poor creature was confused, and might earn a beating for overflowing the glass this time.

Debating only a moment, Caesar intervened. He reached forward, grasping the startled chimp’s wrist while he watched the glass fill. At the precise moment, he exerted pressure that brought the pitcher lip back up. The chimp turned huge, almost pathetically grateful eyes toward Caesar—while the instructor stood open-mouthed.

Peeling back his lips in a witless smile, Caesar decided that one such deliberate demonstration of his ability per day was about all he could risk. It should be enough to get him out of this terrible place quickly, but not too much to engender extreme suspicion. At least that was the game he played—with apparent success—as the week wore on.

During the second week, Caesar had an opportunity to survey the exterior grounds of the Ape Management complex.

He and his three fellow trainees were taken outside, at night, through a main-floor ramp. A handler with a metal prod kept a watchful eye on them as they proceeded along a walkway past a sign pointing to Night Watch Training.

Letting his eyes rove, Caesar managed a few glimpses of the Ape Management tower, some twelve to fourteen floodlit stories, with smaller auxiliary buildings of square, ultramodern design at its base. Tonight Caesar and his cage-mates wore only their individual leg shackles. Presumably, their next course of instruction required mobility.

When the path veered left between high plantings, one of the chimps wandered straight ahead. The handler’s “No!” brought the animal scuttling back into line. Caesar had grown accustomed to the command. He was able to simulate a ripple of cringing fear almost unconsciously.

The four chimpanzees and their handler reached a small, paved quadrangle in front of an auxiliary building whose lower story was windowless. An instructor in a smock awaited the group under the floodlights bathing the quadrangle.

First the instructor and an assistant performed a demonstration, which Caesar and his companions watched with varying degrees of attention. The demonstration was repeated twice more. Then the instructor said to the handler, “Okay, which one first?”

The handler singled out Caesar. “He’s the brightest—let’s see whether he picked it up.”

The handler took a silver whistle on a chain from the instructor’s hand. He looped the chain over Caesar’s neck: To the instructor, he said, “You’re the visitor, I’m the burglar, right?”

The instructor nodded, maneuvering Caesar close to the windowless lower story of the concrete structure. Then the instructor retreated. After a moment, he returned toward the front of the building at a brisk walk.

He went directly to the first-floor entrance and pressed a bell at one side. The door slid back. The instructor entered.

Caesar remained passive through the entire procedure. But a moment later he bounded into action.

The handler had crept toward the building’s far corner, was now scrambling up the first story by means of a series of rungs projecting from the concrete. Now Caesar ran after him full speed.

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