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ONCE upon a time lived a man in the Valley of the Far-Away Mountain. One day, walking through the woods near his home, he found a fruit tree. Being very thirsty, he took the fruit, squeezed its juice into a flask, and drank it. He began to feel strange. Then a pair of wings burst from his back. "The fruit of this tree gives you wings!" he said. He flew up through the trees, up over the valley, and all the way to the other side of the Far-Away Mountain.
THERE he saw three types of people: striped people, checkerboard people, and polka-dot people. But they were all fighting each other for the land on the Far Side of the Far-Away Mountain. "Stop!" yelled the flying man. "You don't have to fight each other for the land if you eat the fruit of the Wing Tree! Then you can fly in the air together instead!" He flew back to his valley, gathered more fruit, and took it to the Far Side of the Far-Away Mountain. The people stopped, took the fruit... and flew into the air to dance together.
BUT three people were not happy about this. The Commander of the striped people, the Commander of the checkerboard people, and the Commander of the polka-dot people thought it was great fun to get their people to fight each other, and they didn't want the Winged People ruining the game. So they came up with a plan. They went back to the valley, and chopped down the Wing Tree. Then they went back to the Far Side of the Far-Away Mountain, where all three kinds of people were putting down their sticks and flying together. They snuck up behind them and threw a bomb into the crowd. It blew up, killing some of the Winged People.
THE other winged people knew that if they stayed, they would be killed too. So they flew far away. Then there was no one left to stop the Commanders, who made their people fight each other again. For a long time the people fought...
UNTIL a young polka-dot person got very angry about this and walked away. He walked up the Far-Away Mountain, and walked down to the valley on the other side. There, he saw that a new tree had grown where the Wing Tree had been cut down by the Commanders. He took one of its fruits and ate it. Nothing happened.
"THESE fruits are no good," he said. "The Winged People had good fruit that gave them wings... But they left!" Then, an old woman walked out of the forest and approached him. She was a striped person, and she had wings on her back. "Not all of us left," she said, "I stayed here and helped this tree grow after the Commanders chopped the old one down. Now my wings are too tired to fly, but try frying one of those fruits before you eat it."
AND SO the young polka-dot person started a camp-fire, and fried the fruit of the New Tree. When he ate the fried fruit, sharp claws grew from his hands. He fried the rest of the fruit, put it into his backpack, thanked the old woman, and flew back to the Far Side of the Far-Away Mountain where the striped people, the checkerboard people, and the polka-dot people were fighting each other.
"STOP!" he yelled. "If you eat these fried fruit, you will grow sharp claws. If the Commanders see that we have sharp claws, they will be too scared of us to tell us what to do!" So the people ate the fried fruit. When the Commanders saw the people growing sharp claws, they thought, "Oh, good. Another weapon for our people to fight each other with." But instead, the people used their sharp claws to scare the Commanders away. And then there was no one left to make them fight each other.
THE END.
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