Revenge of the Giant Robot Chickens by Alex McCall

chicken proof. There was a large sliding door that would be used to drag Catchers in and out. Beside it was a normal, human-sized door, with a handle high on the side, inaccessible to chickens’ claws. I would have to go in that way. And I’d have to do it soon. Dawn was coming.
    I waited until the pair I was following had gone just past the door then darted towards it, praying it wasn’t locked. I got lucky; it opened easily. I slipped inside before the next pair rounded the corner.
    The inside of the warehouse was creepy, weird shapes looming out of the darkness towards me. I shrank away from a half-dismantled Catcher that rose from the gloom like a dinosaur. I shook myself out of it and crept on.
    It was at this point that I realised I had no idea what I was searching for.
    Still it was interesting looking around. I got out my head torch, hoping that if they spotted me they’d just assume I was a member of the Brotherhood. Even the little light made things better. I could see they were busy making more lasers from dismantled Catcher heads.In a corner, tucked away to the side, was a small table with half-built shock-sticks laid out. Beside it stood an empty Commando suit.
    I stopped, and a paralysing sense of horror flooded down my spine. No, it couldn’t be empty. We’d never been able to get a Commando out of its shell and I’d have heard if someone had.
    That meant there were no spare suits lying around.
    There was a chicken in there.
    I looked around for some kind of weapon, cursing my decision to leave my shock-stick back at the hotel. I spotted a length of metal pipe and tried to pick it up carefully. As careful as I was, it scraped against the floor and the Commando’s head turned towards me, its eyes glowing a bright red.
    I moved as fast as I could, swinging towards it before I had a good grip on the pipe. The chicken scrambled away and I hit the floor, dropping my weapon. As I scrabbled to pick it up again the Commando scuttled away. I followed, pipe striking, trying to hit it. But it was dark, even with my torch, and the chicken was a small target.
    We skirted past one of the hollowed-out Catchers, the pipe making it chime like a bell as I once again missed. The Commando leapt into the air and fluttered across the workshop, landing on one of the half-made lasers still in a Catcher’s disembodied head. It began fiddling with the lasers and I sprinted across the floor towards it, racing to hit the Commando before it could turn them on.
    We drew. The eyes of the Catcher head lit up andglowed red, but I had already reached the Commando, pipe held high over my head, ready to bring it down like a hammer. The Commando had a claw poised over the button that would activate the laser. We stared at each other, eye to glowing eye, daring the other to make the first move.
    And that was when Hazel appeared.
    Her hair was a mess so she must have just woken up, probably from the racket we’d made. She was rubbing sleep out of her eyes and was wearing a chicken onesie.
    “What’s going on?” she asked wearily before she’d really seen us. When she did she froze for a moment. Then she got angry.
    “Get away from there,” she yelled, storming towards us. I thought she was yelling at the chicken but she grabbed the pipe and snatched it out of my hands. I was so surprised I let her have it. Then she turned to the chicken.
    “Turn it off,” she said in a voice that brooked no argument. It instantly flicked a small lever and the laser’s glow faded. “That’s better. Are you OK?”
    “Yes, thanks, but what—” I started.
    “I wasn’t talking to you.”
    I blinked. “You mean is it OK? You know this thing?”
    “Don’t call him a thing,” Hazel said angrily. “His name is Clucky.”
    “Hello,” the chicken said.
    I stared at it. The voice had definitely come from the ball of metal feathers in front of me. There was no way a ventriloquist had thrown their voice into that thing.
    “It can talk?”
    “ He.