AN:

Hi lovelies, you're here so I'm assuming you've watched the POTA remakes...if you're here and you haven't - JAYSUS get off this website and go do so immediately. This fic takes place ten months after Dawn of the POTA and won't feature any of the new characters from War (not indefinitely, but highly unlikely).

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the plots or characters from the Planet of the Apes franchise, only my OCs. I'm posting this fanfic for fun and gaining nothing from it besides enjoyment!

"A vague disclaimer is nobody's friend" - Willow Rosenberg.

Enjoy!

Over the past ten years it had become increasingly difficult to pinpoint just what it was that made a human being. The philosophers will tell you that it is their curious nature defining humanity, the politicians will have you know that it's their strong opinions on morality. But if another species begins to demonstrate these traits, that which allegedly sets humanity apart, what judgement do we make of them? It would be easy to explain in scientific terms what it is to be human, but what of the mind and soul? If, of course, you don't believe consciousness to be an evolutionary accident…

Caesar once believed he had the answer to these questions. He believed that the defining feature that set both human and ape apart was loyalty. Humans constantly destroyed each other but apes were family, and then his comrade and brother in sentiment tried on his life. Next, he had considered the trait to be mercy, and then he himself had shown none not ten months ago. The first kill to test the boundaries of his morality had been Koba. The second had been the band of humans who murdered his wife, they'd begged for their lives and he snapped their necks. Caesar knew now that there were not only bad humans, but bad apes too, and he was one of them.

So, the next time humans would attack their way into his kingdom, he'd drive his spear through their backs.

"Jesus Christ are you trying to get us all killed?!"

Somewhere among the trees and, unbeknownst to them, not two miles from Caesar's colony, a soldier held his comrade at gunpoint. A small female stood between them, her hands pressed bravely against the perpetrator's shoulder.

"Blake put the gun down, please" whispered the female "we've already made too much noise. Please."

"That's right, let Ari pussy whip you some more instead of standing up for-"

BANG.

Aria's POV

It had been 72 hours since they'd left the wall and already one of their group was dead. The gun shot pounded her ear drums and Aria squeezed her eyes shut, not in shock, but exasperation. She wondered at which point a human murdering another human stopped coming as a surprise to her. Three days ago, they'd been called to the main building to be dispatched on what would be their first mission. The team had consisted of Aria, Blake, Elliott and Pleoh. All highly trained, all under the age of 21. Aria's parents hadn't had the resources to send her into politics and government. The human race might be in tatters, but they were still at the mercy of money and dictatorship. If you were a surviving family with even less money, your child would be trained as a soldier and deemed expendable. Most of the young adults of the surviving colony were soldiers. Aria and Elliott were part of the medical research core which, until three days ago, meant that they'd never ventured into the Redwood. Which is why Blake and Pleoh, the oldest members of the group and both highly trained soldiers, were sent with them.

Blake had volunteered to go with her, much to Aria's surprise. He'd been cold towards her and well, everybody, for months. He was an entirely different person when they'd started dating, kind, never acting without contrition. But war changed everybody. She wondered whether he'd contracted one of the few diseases now plaguing humanity, she sort of hoped really. She wanted an excuse for his violence and hostility. Pleoh might have been hot headed and arrogant, but he probably didn't deserve to be shot in the face.

"What the hell man?!" Elliott yelled from his position on the ground, shock forming a cold sweat on his face. Clearly, he hadn't spent a lot of time with Blake recently. "he's fucking dead!"

"And you too might be so lucky. "Blake spat, crouching down to loot Pleoh's corpse of spare bullets "better this way than the disease all that sniffing around in bushes is gon' get you"

"Shut up both of you! We're God knows how many miles into the Redwood because of your poor mapping and now we've just alerted every living creature here to our whereabouts."

Aria would spend time being sickened by Blake's viciousness later, right now they needed to get as far away from their current location as possible. She picked up her research equipment, quickly snipping and bagging one of the wild flowers and dragged Elliott up and out of his alarm state. A colony of birds flew past them and she knew instantly that something was coming.

"We need to go!"

The remaining three began running through the dense forest, Aria at the lead. Whilst she stood just over five foot and small framed, she may not have been the strongest but most certainly the fastest. That was until, her foot caught on a fallen branch. She went down with hard thud, unprepared and gasping for breath.

Fuck.

She could hear rumbling now, panic engulfed her and she looked up desperately at the soldier who'd ran past her crumpled body, Blake, her boyfriend. She wasn't surprised when it was Elliott who ran to her side, Blake hadn't been a boyfriend in months. Her comrade yanked her to her feet but it was too late. They were already surrounded, even Blake at the far end of the clearing. She didn't have to squint through the rain to know who had found them, the black shapes consumed what little sunlight cracked through the trees, bringing nightfall to the forest. She knew exactly who they were.

"Shit, oh shit." Elliott gasped in her ear, still clutching her sides. An appropriate reaction, considering they were now surrounded by eighty furious looking apes. Aria's able brain worked at a million miles per hour, trying different combinations of escape until one of them stuck. She knew all about 'Caesar's Army', knew they hated humans, she had been there with her parents when they'd attacked on mass and lead her family through the streets in chains. She didn't know what happened after that point or why so many of them had fled to the town hall. The soldiers from the North arrived quickly and shot down the apes that still held the civilians' prisoner. No one had seen anything of the creatures since, some believed Caesar himself had been taken down and that was why no more attacks had come. How do you reason with a creature that wants your entire species dead?

Suddenly a silver chimpanzee landed on the leaves in front of them, causing Aria and Elliott to stumble backwards. It stood up on two feet until it was almost eye level with Elliott and growled.

"Human…NOT…bring…GUN…into WOODS"

Now, Aria had been told of the apes evolving to be able to speak but she'd never heard it. Knowing they could hadn't prepared her for the chill that would rock her spine when they did.

"O-okay" she gasped palms out in front of her now, in her nineteen years, she'd never been so terrified.

"We don't mean any harm, we came here for medicine."

"HUMAN…LEAVE…NOW."

"Okay Okay" Elliott gasped nodding furiously, gripping Aria's forearm and pulling her back in slow steps with him.

"HAND OVER GUNS FIRST."

They want to take our weapons before we turn our backs and leave, will they even let us leave once we've handed them over? We don't have a lot of options. FUCK. She remembered that she had the skinning blade strapped in her knee-high boots but that was it. She hadn't even been properly trained in knife fighting. She knew Elliott had a handgun hidden on him too. It'll have to do

The two teenagers laid their visible weaponry on the grass slowly, never breaking eye contact with who they'd assumed to be the leader of the group. Aria nodded slowly. Okay? She turned to Blake who was lowering his machine gun, he glanced back at her. She froze when their eyes met, his cold eyes much darker than usual. She knew that look only too well. Oh no.

"BLAKE NO!" she screamed. But it was too late. The gunshots split the clearing and she watched wide eyed as the apes in front of Blake fell to the ground. He took off running through the space he'd created. Howls of ferocity erupted from behind her. They would be slaughtered within seconds if they didn't follow him. Elliott had already started running and she followed, swiftly overtaking him through the dense woods.

A scream ripped through her ears and she knew Elliott had been taken down. She gritted her teeth, every nerve in her body yelled at her to keep moving despite wanting to help her friend. There was just one scream though – he was already dead. Tears began blurring her vision and she smacked straight into Blake. She took him down with a thud but as quickly as they fell, he was up again, so much stronger than her. Though this time, he clutched at her hand and dragged her up with him.

"Come on!" were the last words Aria heard before hot blood splattered across her face. She stared wide-eyed at her boyfriend as she processed. A thick spear head jutted out from his chest, mere inches from her nose and his body trembled aggressively. She was almost sick. She knew she had to run again but she couldn't, that was it, that was too far. She remained frozen as the apes surrounded her once again.

"Are you OK Ari?" Blake chuckled tearing off a piece of fabric from his Steel Panther t-shirt and wrapping it tightly around his forearm. The warmth and cheekiness of his smile would have, as always, been enough to calm the storm inside of her, if she could only lift her worried gaze from his arm.

"Come on baby, it's just a little blood..."

Blake's eyes faded quickly and he was gone. Aria heard a crunch behind her and she turned around to see an ape holding her at knife-point. Not like this. The seconds passed as hours and she squeezed her eyes shut, praying her body would be returned to her parents.

Then suddenly the apparent leader of the group grabbed the ape's shoulder in an all too human fashion and signed something to him. Aria had learned quite a bit of sign language in school, everybody had in order to communicate with those afflicted by the Simian Flu.

Caesar will want to question alive one. Find out about other humans.

The ape before her lowered his weapon in agreement and quickly seized her upper arms.

Well, I guess that means their ruler is alive after all. God help the human race.

Thanks for reading, I'd really appreciate it if you left a review letting me know what you thought!