Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: The Official Movie Novelization by Alex Irvine Read Free Book Online

the direction of Lafayette Park. They had the run of the city now. There were mountain lions and bears in the Presidio. Only in the Colony did humans still hold sway… and Malcolm could almost read Dreyfus’s mind.
    If there are that many apes out there, how long will it be until they decide to finish what the plague started?
    “Sorry, I don’t know if you heard what he said,” Carver said. “They spoke.”
    Dreyfus nodded. “Everyone, just, please… I’m trying to process this. Give me a second to process this.” After a beat, as if thinking aloud, he said, “I thought they were all dead? There were air patrols, fire bombings…”
    There had been. Large swaths of the forest at the edges of Muir Woods National Park had gone up in smoke. Malcolm didn’t know the details, but patrols of armed mercenaries had gone after the apes, too—at least until the Simian Flu took priority. Dreyfus had been in charge. If he was confused, the apes’ survival must have been incredibly unlikely.
    The image of the apes strung along the ridgeline over the river came back to Malcolm. However unlikely it might seem, they were there.
    “Fire bombings, huh?” Carver said. “Mission not accomplished.”
    In the truck behind them, Foster honked. Malcolm looked out the window and saw Foster waving him on. He was in a big hurry to get out of the abandoned city to the safety of the Colony. Malcolm put the truck in gear again. They couldn’t just drive around the city forever.
    “What are we going to do?” Ellie asked.
    “I don’t know,” Dreyfus said. “We need that dam running. Without power… oh, crap.”
    They drove for a while in silence. Carver sulked and muttered back and forth with Kemp. Malcolm couldn’t hear the conversation, but he knew the man well enough to figure that they were griping about the failure to exterminate the apes, ten years ago. In the rear-view mirror, Malcolm saw Alexander scoot away from Carver. The boy didn’t like aggression, and it came off Carver in waves. Whatever happened, Malcolm thought, they would have to keep him away from the apes, or somebody would get killed.
    “All right,” Dreyfus said. “Let’s not tell anybody about this. Not until we figure out what to do.” Malcolm started to argue, but Dreyfus went on. “I don’t want to create a panic. We’re barely holding things together as it is.”
    He didn’t like it, but Malcolm nodded. A few minutes later they arrived at the Colony.

16
    The Colony was built into the lower levels of a skyscraper that had been in progress when the plague struck, and still stood unfinished, its upper floors a steel skeleton with cranes still braced against the clusters of girders that framed elevator shafts.
    The lower twenty floors or so had flooring, and had been turned into housing for the few thousand people who, for all they knew, were the last surviving humans on earth. The bottom six floors occupied the entire block, and enclosed what had been envisioned as an upscale mall and luxury office complex.
    Dreyfus had chosen the location carefully. The triple arch of the building’s main gateway was easily defended, and other entrances had been blocked for years. At first they had built defenses against gangs and loose militias that had ravaged the city during the plague’s first years. As time went on and more and more people died, however, many of those marauders “came in from the cold,” as it were, joining what came to be called the Colony.
    Now they all had to stick together.
    Part of the mall was open to the air. Its roof had fallen in during the earthquake and they had never had the resources to spare for repairs.
    An open area on the other side of the building had once offered parking and delivery space. The Colony’s mechanics and engineers had taken it over, and their meager supplies of fuel were stored there. Long lines for fuel were a fact of life. There was very little of it, and as the years passed, they were able to find less