And he had let it happen.
An assistant slammed down a phone. “Mr. Governor? The main forces are forming up to repel them three blocks from here.”
The Governor leaned forward to twist up a volume control. “Forming up! We should be hearing gunfire right now!”
In the dimness, MacDonald turned away. Breck was beginning to sound like a man whose control was slipping.
SEVENTEEN
The ape army surged forward along the boulevard like some hallucinatory reverse image of a human fighting force. They carried human weapons, but there the resemblance ended. This army shambled and snapped, growled and slavered.
Caesar operated from the protective cover of the third or fourth rank, repeatedly pulling out small groups while the larger mass rolled ahead. He sent these smaller strike forces hurrying down side streets to seek entrances to the service tunnels; their orders were to come up from the tunnels as close to the Civic Center as possible. He knew that many of the apes would get lost in the mazes below the city, but if even a few got through, the tactic would strengthen his attack, and this surprise force striking from the rear might very well be needed to overcome the next, highly formidable barrier just two blocks distant.
Again the apes confronted cordons of men stretched across the boulevard. But now the humans carried more weaponry—ranging from riot sticks and shields to rifles. The vehicles ranked behind the double row of men were not the vans and fire pumpers of the first barricade, but heavily armored police equipment. Slots replaced windows. Top turrets bristled with the muzzles of mini-cannon.
Calling a last word of encouragement, Caesar ran to the right side of the street. He dodged behind the concrete rail of a walkway and scuttled up the incline to the second level, Where he could watch the engagement like a general from a hilltop vantage point.
The turrets of the armored vehicles revolved until all the muzzles pointed at the advancing apes. The rifles and pistols of men in the front ranks poked out between riot shields. Abruptly, the apes in the van recognized the threat, slowed their pace.
With perhaps fifty yards separating the apes and the humans, a helmeted officer brought a megaphone up to his mouth.
“No! NO!”
Like thunder, the command pealed away down the boulevard. For perhaps five seconds, the command conditioned reflex brought the apes in the front ranks to a dead halt.
Others crowded up behind them, progress blocked. Caesar knew an instant of hopelessness. Then his nerve returned. He gripped the edge of the parapet, started to stand up in full view to exhort the confused, hesitant apes . . .
A sound stopped him. The beginning of a wild, collective gibbering among the animals that grew louder, more mocking by the second. Joyfully, Caesar realized that the conditioning had ultimately failed. Ape intelligence had triumphed over gut fear.
Louder and louder the apes gibbered, as the front ranks began a shuffling advance.
The officer with the megaphone tried one last time: “Home! Go home, all—”
A rock whizzed toward him. He ducked behind the barricade of shields, his shouted orders all but drowned out by the massed howling of the apes.
Chunks of debris flew. A gorilla fired a pistol. The report triggered a screaming animal charge. They know we can win! Caesar thought, exulting. The first rank of foot police advanced to join the battle. A moment later, apes and police melted together into a furious melee.
Then Caesar realized the humans were still committing a tactical error. In their false belief in their own superiority, they were convinced that they could subdue this uprising without massive firepower. The police used their sticks mostly, with only occasional shots fired when an officer found himself seriously threatened.
But riot sticks were virtually useless against giant gorillas, who towered over the humans, their heads well up out of harm’s reach. Caesar watched gorillas pick up policemen bodily, wrench away their shields and sticks, then hug, strangle, fling, or trample the men into unconsciousness—or death.
One of the armored turrets began to chatter. Someone screamed a countermanding order when as many policemen as apes dropped under the withering fire.
Where the great stature of the gorillas helped overcome the riot policemen, the smaller size of the agile chimpanzees also carried an advantage. They could duck in beneath the stick-blows and shields to slash with their knives. Policemen fell with bellies ripped open. Caesar even saw one of the chimps leap onto the shoulders of hapless men, poised piggy-back a moment while knife hands plunged over and down to slash necks open from behind.
As the gorillas crushed and the chimps wielded their wicked blades, the orangutans darted in and out among the casualties, picking up whatever weapons the humans dropped. They unbuckled the gunbelts of the police, some orangutans draping themselves proudly with the captured equipment, others distributing the holsters and guns to members of the gorilla force—whose biggest members had already completely penetrated the police lines and were advancing toward the armored vehicles.
Still the armored turrets held their fire. Caesar could only thank some commander’s misguided humanity. At any moment the commander might give the order that would slay the apes and sacrifice his own men. But while the advantage lasted, the apes seized it—gorillas in the forefront, some already clambering up on the armored cars.
Just when it looked to Caesar that this inner defense line might be stormed, a new weapon was introduced from the boulevard’s opposite side. A panel sprang open in the side of an armored vehicle parked in semidarkness. From the compartment in the vehicle’s side, men began to unreel thick hoses.
A brutally powerful jet of water spouted from the first hose, the second, the third. The water stunned and panicked the attacking apes, knocking them off the turrets, spilling them among the bodies of the blood-slimed pavement. Ape yells of terror racketed between the buildings. The apes who shrieked loudest were those carrying police shields that the streams of water pounded thunderously.
Directly below Caesar, a second vehicle brought its hoses into play. Six powerful streams, angled in from both sides of the street, began to wreak havoc in the ape ranks, battering the animals back, sending them retreating a few steps, then more . . .
In seconds, the strategic balance shifted. Perhaps the human commander knew what he was doing after all. Why slaughter his own when the huge hoses, each requiring half a dozen men to hold it, seemed to be doing an effective job?
Something must be done to nullify the power of the hoses. That responsibility was Caesar’s.
The walkway he’d mounted continued down, reaching the street at a point some yards to the rear of the parked vehicles. Caesar raced down the incline, broke into the open, and ran full speed away from the conflict. He’d taken no more than four long strides when one of the vehicle turrets began to chatter. Slugs chewed the pavement behind him.
Cursing his bad luck in being spotted, he ducked low, angled toward the wall of a building. The relentless bullet-pattern followed him. Zigging and zagging wildly, he dove head first into the opening of a street as high-powered bullets ripped chunks from the corner of the building.
Behind him, the gun chattered away to silence. Panting, he crept back to the corner, risked a glance out and to the right.
Beyond the armored vehicles, great plumes of water caught the light. The roar of the hoses blended with the shrieks of the terrified apes. They were retreating . . .
He couldn’t possibly take out the two hose vehicles alone. The situation looked hopeless—until he heard a soft gibber from across the boulevard.