Three years old.
That's when things really started to change.
I wasn't just mimicking sounds or stacking blocks anymore. I was reading.
Not in the way a human toddler learns — slow, choppy, letter by letter.
No.
I read everything. Every label. Every formula in Will's notes. Every article left open on his computer.
The ALZ compound fascinated me. Even without my future memories, I would've been drawn to it.
But I had more than curiosity.
I had blueprints in my head.
I knew what this gas did. How it evolved apes. How it destroyed humans.
And how it turned me into the legend I'd become.
The irony?
Will thought I was becoming smarter because of ALZ-112 exposure in the womb.
He didn't know the truth.
He hadn't given birth to Caesar.
He'd adopted a ghost.
⸻
During the day, I played the role.
Cute, smart, obedient.
I let Will teach me sign language, even though I already knew more than he did. I pretended to struggle with puzzles, then celebrated when I solved them — like a well-trained pet eager to impress.
At night, though?
That's when I trained.
Will's house had a basement he barely used. It was half storage, half workshop. Old tools, cracked dumbbells, dusty shelves of forgotten files.
That basement became my temple.
I'd sneak down after Will went to sleep, slipping past the squeaky third stair. I moved like a shadow, careful, deliberate.
In the mirror mounted on the wall, I watched my posture. My grip. My growth.
I did push-ups until my shoulders screamed.
Chin-ups on the exposed support beam.
Squats with paint cans.
Isometric holds with bricks tied to my ankles.
The pain was real. The soreness lingered for days sometimes.
But I was evolving.
Faster than even the original Caesar did.
Because I wasn't just training my body.
I was sculpting a king.
⸻
One night, I overheard Will on the phone. He was pacing in the kitchen, whispering heated words.
"No, I can't bring him in… he's not ready."
A pause.
"He understands too much, Franklin. I don't know how else to say it. Sometimes I think he knows what I'm about to say before I say it."
My ears twitched.
"He's not just mimicking. He's processing. Learning."
Good.
Let him suspect.
But not too much.
I still had time before the flu.
⸻
That same week, I found my first real weapon.
Not a gun. Not a spear.
A mirror.
I'd been watching myself, comparing posture from different angles. But one night, I noticed something strange.
Something… human.
My eyes.
They didn't look like any ape's eyes I'd seen in the lab — or in the mirror of the original Caesar in the films.
They were deeper. Calculating. Layered.
And it clicked.
That was my edge.
My awareness.
I wasn't just a beast with smarts.
I was a reincarnated strategist in a body that was becoming a perfect weapon.
If I could keep my mind sharp, my body conditioned, and play dumb just long enough…
I could start reshaping the world before the first shot was even fired.
⸻
At age four, Will took me to the Redwood Sanctuary.
I remember that moment clearly — even in my last life.
The moment Caesar touched the trees for the first time. The wonder in his eyes.
This time?
I was still amazed. But not because it was new.
Because it was mine.
The redwoods stretched into the sky like ancient gods. Silent. Watchful. I could almost hear them whisper.
This is where it begins.
Will smiled as I climbed, faster and stronger than most kids my age.
"You love it up here, huh?"
I looked down at him, signed, "Home."
He blinked.
"Yeah. It could be."
He didn't understand the double meaning.
He thought I just liked the forest.
He didn't know I was already mapping it.
Identifying choke points, high ground, water sources, natural barriers.
Because someday — not far off — I'd lead hundreds here.
And we'd make it a fortress.
⸻
By five, I'd doubled my strength.
I could hang from one arm for over a minute. I could carry buckets of stones up stairs without strain. My back was broader. My legs were spring-loaded.
But more than that — my mind was war-ready.
I'd read through Will's ALZ-113 files. Memorized lab protocols. Understood the behavior of every scientist he worked with.
I even started drawing — carefully. Simple symbols. Language systems that apes could learn.
Not English.
Not human.
Something in between.
The foundation of a culture.
One night, I scratched the first symbol into the basement wall:
𐍃
It meant "remember."
Not for me.
For them — the apes I'd lead. The ones I hadn't even met yet.
The ones I would train, uplift, and protect.
From man.
From war.
From each other.
⸻
But fate, as always, wasn't going to wait on me.
That summer, Will's father — Charles — began to decline faster.
The Alzheimer's was winning.
I knew this beat.
I knew what Will would do.
He'd risk everything.
He'd take the new strain of the ALZ virus and test it on his father behind closed doors.
It would work.
For a while.
And then?
The Flu.
The world would begin to fall.
But not yet.
I had time.
A few years, if I played it right.
Enough time to prepare.
To turn this body into something even the original Caesar could never imagine.
To be not just a leader…
But a symbol.
A bridge between two species.
Or a sword, if it came to that.
⸻
I was six when I saw my first fight.
Will and a neighbor — angry yelling, accusations about Caesar being dangerous. That same man would later call animal control when I jumped to protect Charles during a seizure.
I remembered it well.
In the original timeline, it's what got Caesar sent to the primate shelter.
The prison.
I knew it was coming.
I couldn't stop it.
But I could prepare.
Because this time?
I wouldn't be thrown in there like a victim.
I'd walk in with a mission.
The shelter wouldn't break me.
I'd break it.
⸻
But for now, I returned to the basement.
To the cracked mirror.
To the concrete floor where I trained every night until my hands bled.
Where I carved new symbols into the walls.
Where I sharpened the edges of the future.
Where I became more than what the world expected.
Not Malik.
Not Caesar.
Something in between.
Something greater.