Birth of the Planet of the Apes

Red - Part 1

It took a few minutes for Riley to regain control of the horse and gallop it back to Alex and Blue Eyes. Blue Eyes hoped to receive a cheerful return, yet he was handed a glare that could boil water.

"What the hell was that for?!" she yelled as she slid the horse to a stop in front of them.

Blue Eyes cocked his head and looked over at Alex, who gave him an 'I told you so' shrug of his shoulders. Why was she so angry? Did humans not like horses? True he never saw horses in the human colony, but their horses had come from the humans, so why was she mad? He tried to think of something he had done wrong. Perhaps he was too reckless in his idea for cheering her up. Perhaps he came off as angry. Blue Eyes shifted the dirt through his long toes as his heart sank. She had been so distraught, and now he seemed to have only made it worse with his ignorance. Why did humans have to be so confusing?

Blue Eyes didn't want to meet her angry brown eyes and instead looked over a rock he moved around with his feet, "Thought it would...make you happy."

She rolled off the horse, ungraceful due to the large pack still on her back, and stomped over to them. Alex shied backwards at her advance, but Blue Eyes' pride was stronger than the human boy's so he managed to keep his ground, however uncomfortable it might be. Just as he prepared himself for another shouting lecture, Riley surprised him. She grabbed his hand, set his horse's reigns in it, and then gave a grateful, yet still annoyed smirk, "Thanks."

Blue Eyes looked at the reigns, then up at her, then over at Alex, cocking his head again with a muddled abundance of confused grunts. Was she angry or happy? If he hadn't been frozen out of complete confusion he probably would've banged his head on a tree. Humans were so confusing!

Riley turned away from him and over to Alex, who failed at trying to hide under his hood. "Alex," he glanced up and she gave him a small smile as well, "I'm sorry," she caught Blue Eyes' eyes again, "To both of you. I...didn't plan on going off on y'all like that. I was just tired, and frustrated, and I didn't..."

"It's okay," Alex said quietly, "We...we didn't help this morning either."

Blue Eyes huffed in embarrassment, "My fault. I should...act better."

Riley raised her eyebrows and shrugged, "Yeah, you should." Blue Eyes felt himself sink even more until he met her smiling eyes. These random signals he was getting from her were starting to test his patience. His rise in annoyance apparently came across his face because Riley gave him a shake of her head and playful roll of her eyes, "Sarcasm, Blue, sarcasm. If you're gonna hang with humans you gotta learn the nuances."

All Blue Eyes could do was give her another annoyed snort.

Travel was lighter now, not entirely friendly, but the mood didn't have the cold ambiance it had before. Blue Eyes remained off his horse and walked beside Alex, while Riley walked on Alex's opposite side.

The bipedal walking was okay for a few hours, but Blue Eyes' short legs weren't used to the constant use and he soon ended up going down to his knuckles. Unable to lead his horse properly and hoping that he could ease tensions more, he offered to carry Riley's pack in exchange for her leading his horse. The way the pack strapped and hooked around his shoulders and chest was awkward, but it weighed less than his brother, Cornelius, so it was an easy adjustment.

"Ya know, Blue," Riley shouted up to him after half an hour, "We should just give you Alex's pack to and both of us can get on this horse. With the speed you're going we could get to Fort Ross by this afternoon!"

Her plan wasn't bad, so he gladly trotted over to Alex and offered him a hand with his pack. Alex just shook his head and waved him off, "She was just kidding. I'm fine," the boy turned to Riley and gave her a frown while Blue Eyes, realizing Riley was being sarcastic again, gave her a short snort.

She raised her hands in surrender, "Alright, alright, my bad. But you have to admit it wasn't a bad idea. We are a good day behind and 'Hulk' over here could've easily handled both packs."

Hulk? Who was this Hulk?

"Okay, you've gotta stop doing that!" Riley pointed at him and raised her eyebrows harshly.

He gave a confused grunt and she jumped up again.

"That! That right there!" she waved her finger around more, "That little...puppy dog eyed, cock of the head thing."

He straightened up quickly. What was he doing exactly? Luckily Alex broke his confusion when he started to laugh. Blue Eyes turned his eyes to the boy in disbelief. Now what?

Alex tried to stop his giggles by biting his lip, "She thinks it's cu..."

"Aaaand we're walking again," she pulled the horse between them with an annoyed snort and started walking again.

Alex laughed again and glanced back down at him, "Don't worry about it. At least she's not mad at us anymore."

Blue Eyes could've begged to differ, but, again, Alex knew more about humans than he did, so he didn't even bother trying to understand what the human girl was talking about. Instead, he dropped the thought completely and offered to take Alex's pack again. When Alex refused as expected, he ignored his protests and took it anyway then stopped and started to tie the top of the packs together with the rope Riley had hanging from her pack. Riley noticed what he was doing and soon was next to him.

"Uh, what'cha doing there, Blue? You realize I was just kidding about you carrying everything right?" she asked as he worked.

"Help," he mumbled as he continued tying the rope.

"Do you know what he's doing, Alex?" Blue Eyes didn't see Alex respond but he assumed he either shook his head or shrugged his shoulders like he usually did.

He finished quickly then stood, turned to his horse, jumped on its hindquarters, and laid the packs across its back. After everything was in place, he turned to the humans below him and gave a proud snort, "Help."

Riley raised her eyebrows, "Well...that works."

With everyone unburdened, their pace quickened and they managed to get another three miles behind them before they paused for the daily check-in with Fremont and Malcolm.

It was an odd conversation. Malcolm didn't join the colonel and what words Fremont did say seemed guarded and blunt. Blue Eyes was grateful to be left out of the conversation again, however it was clear both she and Alex were concerned with how Fremont had acted. Riley pressed the human leader for information for minutes, but wasn't able to get anything relevant from him. In the end they decided to wait it out and hope that the next day's check-in would be better.

They kept up their pace from the morning and managed to reach a small barn five miles north of Jenner about an hour before sundown. It wasn't Riley's highly optimistic goal of Fort Ross, but it was still farther than her and Alex had been managing every day.

The livestock pens were too weathered down, so Blue Eyes released his horse in the largest one and returned to where Alex and Riley were setting up camp for the night. Alex was tending the fire with the end of one of Riley's spears and Riley was laying out the tent. Both had more-than-welcome smiles on their faces as they held a quiet conversation.

Riley waved him over when he hooted his return, "Hey, Blue. You want to learn how to put up a tent?" she asked. Blue Eyes nodded with an inquisitive smile and crouched down beside her as she laid out the poles and tent for him.

Alex came to their side of the fire and put a few more logs on it. "What are we having tonight?" he asked Riley.

"We've still got some dried fruit left," she pointed to the pole in Blue Eyes' left hand, "This is the front cross pole. It's gonna go through here," she looked back over her shoulder, "I found some blue chanterelle mushrooms and miner's lettuce earlier. We can just cook the mushrooms up and mix it with the lettuce...Oh, don't give me that face, mushrooms are good for you."

Blue Eyes caught Alex's disgusted grimace and huffed a small laugh as he turned back to the tent. He was just figuring out how to click the poles together when there was loud pop from the fire. The sparks sent Alex falling backwards onto him, and then...everything went red.