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20-round box magazine of the BAR. Also, it was much lighter and less cumbersome. It took a strong
man to stand up and handle the 18.5-pound BAR. The rifle was fitted with supports attached to the
barrel so that the operator could lie prone on the ground and shoot with most of the weight on the
support. Unfortunately, Hank s targets were mostly in the air. He had to tilt the weapon at considerable
and varying angles.
Nevertheless, he worked carnage and panic over the meadow. There were at least two hundred and fifty
Monkey carcasses on the bloody grass and many hawks and eagles.
Then he was out of ammunition.
He put the BAR on his shoulder, making sure that the hot barrel was not on the leather. He said to
Nabya, Follow me!
About ten Monkeys were brave enough to fly towards him. He had six rounds in his revolver. Even if he
got six of the enemy, he would not have time to reload before the survivors were on him.
His long legs left Nabya behind. He stopped when he heard a cry, and he whirled. The pseudo-simians
were bounding along on all fours, their wings folded, close behind the Winkie. Nabya, who was
burdened with a knapsack holding the empty magazines, had turned to face the attackers. He lifted a
sword and stood ready.
Hank dropped his rifle and raced toward Nabya while he took his revolver from his holster. He shouted,
Lie down! Lie down, Nabya!
The Winkie either did not hear him or was afraid that he would be too easy a prey if Hank missed. He
slashed at the first of the Monkeys and cut its paw off. Then he was hurled to the ground on his back by
a screeching Monkey.
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Hank held the .45 in both hands, and he loosed three bullets. The two behind the simian which had
attacked Nabya fell. The Winkie and the Monkey were rolling over and over on the ground. Unable to
shoot from a distance without endangering Nabya, Hank ran up to them. When he got the chance, he
fired, and the bullet went through the back of the creature s head and blew its face all over Nabya.
The surviving Monkey ran off but collapsed before it got sixty feet away.
Nabya did not move. His throat was torn open.
Hank cursed. He rolled the Monkey off from Nabya and turned Nabya over so he could remove his
knapsack. He picked that up and ran to the rifle. He decided that he should reload the revolver before
going on. He did that, and then, carrying the sack and the BAR, returned to the edge of the forest.
The Woodman and ten soldiers and medics were the only ones on their feet. Before and around them
were piles of dead and wounded attackers. Two dozen Monkeys, about fifty feet away, were jumping up
and down, howling obscenities at the defenders and encouragement to each other. They were trying to
work themselves into a frenzy for another charge.
Hank emptied the revolver into them, reloaded, and advanced, firing again. By then the Monkeys were
running away, heading past the barn into the wind and toward the farmhouse. They went very fast on all
fours, then stood up, their birdlike legs moving. Their bone-and-skin-wings were flapping hard, but they
just did not have a long enough runway. They could never get into the air and clear the farmhouse or the
trees behind it.
Realizing this, they stopped, howling, and reversed course. Five of them made it, finally rising slowly and
heavily.
Niklaz said, Erakna has paid a heavy price. But so have we.
I m glad she didn t use all the Monkeys at her disposal, Hank said. If she d sent the whole horde,
we d all be dead now.
Niklaz said, Yes. When we were with your mother, the West Witch sent the entire pack against us
when we approached her castle.
How many?
Oh, I d say a thousand.
Then she has plenty left.
He looked eastward. There were approximately fifty flying away. These had never landed but had turned
when they saw their fellows ahead of them tumbling from the air under the fire from the BAR.
I wonder, he said, when Erakna will summon them back to her.
Those? She won t. She d have to use a second wish to recall them. She s abandoned them. They ll
have to get back to their pack as best they can. It ll be a long way, too.
Hank sent two men to get his weapons and the belts. He then said, What re you going to do, Your
Shininess?
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You may call me Niklaz. What will I do? I could hole up in the castle. It s provisioned for a long siege.
But my people would be without a general to lead them. I m going to retreat into the forest and
reorganize my army. I ve already sent a messenger to tell the people in the castle to leave it.
Good fortune, Niklaz, Hank said. I m taking off right now. The Gillikins will be here soon.
What a vast stupidity, the Tin Woodman said. All these deaths and hurts and suffering. And for
what?
That s the way it is on Earth, too, Hank said. Only there, this goes on all the time. At least, you ve had
thirty-three years of peace and no wars or rumors of wars until now.
I don t even have time to bury the dead.
They won t care.
The wounded were being carried on improvised stretchers towards the woods. Jenny had been trundled
out of the barn, her path cleared of corpses and carcasses. Hank saluted Niklaz and said, No time for a
leisurely farewell.
Don t I know it, the king said. He pointed at the north. Hank turned and saw two camels standing on
top of a hill a mile away. Presently, one turned and disappeared behind it.
Hank put the knapsack and BAR in the back cockpit and got into the front seat. Ten minutes later, he
was airborne. The Winkies had been swallowed by the trees by then. The Gillikin cavalry was racing
down the nearest hill, camels in the front and camels bearing archers behind them. Beyond them, people
were pouring out of the castle, joining a throng from the north, the beaten and fleeing army of Niklaz the
First and Only.
Hank went back to the Emerald City. Jenny badly needed her wing repaired. She was lucky Hank,
too to get there without folding up. The city and the area around it were unusually crowded. Refugees
from the north had come to it with all the household goods they could pack into wagons. As yet,
however, the invaders were stalled in the forest. Forced to march in narrow columns, they could not
mass for a battle. The Oz army was ambushing them, cutting columns off, shooting from the cover of
trees, snipping off pieces here and there. The defenders were greatly helped because the wild animals
were their allies. The Cowardly Lion had enlisted the local beasts and birds and also brought with him
many lions, cougars, sabertooths. bears, mammoths, mastodons, and wolves from his realm in the forests
in the north of Quadlingland.
Even so, the Scarecrow said, the Gillikins will break out of the woods within a few days. We won t
be able to stop them in their march to the city. The country s too open. Tell Glinda that all I can do now
is to prepare for a siege. That ought to tie down most of their army.
She probably already knows that, Hank said.
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