Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: The Official Movie Novelization by Alex Irvine Page A

was chaos—worse than anything I’d seen in all my years on the force, and I want you to know, there’s not a day that goes by when I don’t think about that. It wasn’t until we came here—and started working together—that we finally started to live again, like human beings. And I would never do anything to jeopardize that, I promise you.”
    Malcolm could only admire the skill Dreyfus was demonstrating. He’d taken a sliver of a chance to turn back the tide of panic, and now he was already rallying everyone together by recalling their common experience. A master of his craft, the man looked from face to face in the crowd, making eye contact with the people who moments before had been ready to lynch him.
    His tone changed a little, now that he’d brought them back from the brink.
    “But you all know what we’re up against. We’re almost out of fuel. Which means no more power—which means we could slip back to the way things were. That dam up there was the answer. We just had no idea… they were up there, too.”
    “So what do we do now?” someone cried. It was the same woman who had asked what they would do if the apes returned. Dreyfus had turned her attention toward the future, toward action rather than reaction.
    Malcolm had always taken Dreyfus’s leadership for granted. The survivors of the flu had fallen into place around him because he had been the police chief, and then the mayor as the entire world sneezed blood and died. But now Malcolm saw that there was a reason for that. Whatever intangible characteristic it was that defined a leader, Dreyfus had it.
    Maybe Malcolm had a little of it, too. He wondered about that. At least the ape chief seemed to think so.
    “We will find another way,” Dreyfus said. “You all know Malcolm,” he added, pointing him out. Heads turned to look. “He’s not just a brilliant architect, he cares about the future of this community as much as I do. And I’ve already spoken to him about finding an alternative power source.”
    Just like that, Malcolm’s opinion changed. He kept looking at Dreyfus, not trusting himself to stay impassive—much less hopeful—if he had to interact with the crowd at that moment.
    Because there was no alternative power source. Dreyfus had suddenly gone all politician on the crowd, and on Malcolm in particular, waving a sign of hope that only Malcolm knew to be false. If they didn’t get the dam running, there would be no power, except what they could keep squeezing out of the generators. That would only last as long as they could keep finding drips and trickles of fuel, which were growing scarcer and scarcer.
    That son of a bitch , Malcolm thought. What Dreyfus had done, more or less, was take the bull’s-eye off his own back and put it on Malcolm’s. It was one thing to lie in a political speech, but it was another entirely to tell a bald-faced lie in a life-or-death situation.
    Especially when it was Malcolm’s death they were talking about. If they couldn’t get the dam operational and there was no other power option, the Colony would blame him. It wasn’t just possible, but probable that someone in the Colony would be so desperate and angry about the failure of the power project, that he would put a bullet or a knife in the person he blamed for it.
    The crowd now focused on him. First Dreyfus had shifted their attention away from the apes. Then he’d shifted it away from himself. Dreyfus had made Malcolm the fulcrum of their hopes. And now he swung into full-on rallying mode.
    “Because power isn’t just about keeping the lights on. It’s about giving us the tools to reconnect to the rest of the world. To find out who else is out there, so we can start to rebuild—and reclaim—the world we lost.” He paused for a professional beat, bringing the crowd back to him. “We will get there. You have my solemn promise.”
    By which, Malcolm thought, he meant they had Malcolm’s promise.
    Dreyfus wrapped up his speech by