“If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds,” Meredith told a local paper. “It would face any army in the world. They could face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks.”

For two days now we have been staking out this pond. Four or five come by at a time, but never the numbers we need. Hundreds would have to show up for this machine gun we brought to be effective. Major Meredith keeps on a confident front, but we’re starting to suspect he’s just as doubtful as us after the first two confrontations. First in an open field, with maybe sixty of them. The feathered terrorists, the marauding enemy with voracious beaks and even worse appetites. The Emu. The farmers tried to flush the birds into range of our machine guns, flailing around shovels and hoes at the beasts. The enemy would not be so easily defeated. Rather than fleeing from the farmers, they trampled them. The major ordered us to open fire, and so we did, but it was already too late. The gun can’t hit anything far off, and the emus were already out of sight. Casualties from that battle were gruesome. One man with a hurt leg on our side, and three emus bludgeoned to death with farming equipment on the enemies side. Even losing three, the birds had won.
Our second encounter with the beasts was on a small family owned farm, a target for emus since the early 1920s, or so the locals say. The major had us post up around the perimeter fence, and to radio in if they came. That day, the first day of harvest, was supposedly the day they always strook. It was only three bobbing heads in the distance at first. I reported the sighting to the major, who called the order to ready the guns. Returning to the fence ready to fight, the three birds had turned into fifty. A charging stampede that I had not seen the likes of in any of my combat experience. The call to open fire was given, but it was already too late. The bullets bothered the birds just as much as the local insects bothered us. I only saw two hit the ground, the rest went right around and over us. Farmers once again swung with pitchforks, but any harvestable wheat was ripped away in a flurry of beaks and feathers. Not willing to risk hitting a civilian, the major called a retreat. Two battles lost against the fiends.
Now we wait once more to fight the birds. After our first two failures it is hard to criticize the lack of morale. We’re averaging around 20 bullets per dead bird, and that’s if we can hit them at all. It only takes three or four to put a man in the ground. My lament was interrupted by a rumbling. The kind that you would hear and expect to see a waterfall crashing into the river below. The pond however is still, save for the four emus currently milling about. They came slowly, almost nonchalantly if a bird could express it. A plethora of emus emerged from the bushes, more than I could ever count and ever want to see. The major held up an open hand, signalling for us not to move a muscle. The feathered mob encroached on the water, and dipped their heads in to drink. Glancing at the major again, I saw that under his command giving stoical face, there was uncertainty. He was sizing up the birds before us as he would a turkish regiment we were to ambush. The gun was already loaded and ready, all it needed was the major’s signal.
Not another tense moment passed before the major closed his fist and silently mouthed the command we all understood. This seemed almost brutal, the birds had no idea what was coming, yet it had to be done. I squeezed the trigger. The mechanism of the gun sounded to life, and let out a single click.
The gun had jammed.
Alert to the crewman trying to tug the ammo belt from the gun wanting to consume it, the emus raised their heads. They looked at us almost mockingly for a moment, before striding back into the bushes from whence they came, with not a trace of alarm in their pace. I have never been a religious man, but I would say that some higher power was behind those emus. Perhaps we just got outsmarted by birds. The major looks down for a moment and chuckles to himself at the absurdity of the situation, before telling us to pack up. If things continue like this, I doubt we’ll be here much longer.