Attack of the Giant Robot Chickens (13 page)

Then droning filled the sky and giant chicken after giant chicken fell from the sky, landing on the ground and surrounding us. The cheering died away and we all huddled together.

“Looks like they’re re-cooping their losses,” I muttered to myself and heard someone snigger behind me. I turned slightly and saw it was Percy. He was covered in sweat and seemed to have been in the thick of the fighting, but
there was a huge grin plastered across his face and it looked like he was having the time of his life.

“Good one,” he said. “Got any more of those grenades?”

“Not on me,” I told him. He shrugged.

“We’ll find some way to do this. Got a plan?”

“Yup. Just watch.”

The chickens began advancing towards us again then there was a cry from behind them. “Let’s stuff ’em!”

Then grenades began raining down. I looked past the chickens and saw that they were being thrown with considerable enthusiasm by the Brotherhood of the Egg, who had been hiding in the seats. Explosions started going off and everyone started cheering again. Then the fighting began.

For a while we held our own. But eventually the explosions stopped. Either we’d run out of grenades, or the Commandos had rushed the stands and the Brotherhood kids were now all unconscious. More Catchers had landed in the middle of the fighting. There were about fifteen striding about. And gradually we were whittled down to a last desperate group, our backs against each other, surrounded by a sea of metal.

“Well,” Cody muttered beside me. “I guess the Ambassador’s plan really wouldn’t have worked after all.” His voice was shaking. I think it was the first time I’d heard him afraid.

“Yeah, it would have been nice to know there were this many chickens around,” Noah answered, clearly terrified. I didn’t think they knew they were talking to each other. Either that or they were too tired to care that they hated each other. I knew how they felt. My arms could barely hold my weapon and I was tempted to just drop it and sink to my knees. But I couldn’t. I would not let the chickens win.

One last chicken fell from the sky and took a step towards us. I thought it looked like a leader. It had a huge comb that towered over the rest of them and in the flickering light of a few fires that we had started its body looked more gold than the others.

“Looks like they think they rule the roost,” I muttered, too tired to think up something better. I closed my eyes. I could hear the chickens coming at us and there were so many of them. I just couldn’t bear to see them coming.

But at that second, I heard a distant boom echo over the silent city. My head snapped up and I looked about, almost convinced that it was thunder. But the clouds weren’t thick enough for thunder.

“Sorry guys,” I said to the approaching birds. “But I think your signal just got scrambled.” Then with a yell I lifted my crowbar one last time and charged forward.

I aimed right at the golden one, waving my crowbar about and screaming at the top of my lungs. At first it stared at me in astonishment. But then I could almost see the intelligence go out of its eyes. It didn’t matter that it was more than twice my size and weighed even more. It was suddenly just a chicken.

It turned and ran, flapping its wings and hopping in an ungainly manner, and the rest of its flock went with it. They reached the stands and crashed up them, sending chairs flying. Finally, they disappeared over the stadium’s rim. I ran a few more steps then flopped over and lay on the ground, unable to get up. I heard some people talking and cheering nearby but I ignored them. I just lay there, staring at the sky and laughing. I was vaguely aware of Lizzie dropping down next to me. I reached out and squeezed her hand.

We had done it. The chickens were gone.

It was a week later and we’d finally got round to having that party.

There wasn’t a functioning chicken left in Aberdeen. After the battle we’d dragged or carried everyone who had been hit by the Commandos back inside so they could be warm. We watched over them until they’d come to.

Most people had got through the battle in surprisingly good condition. There were a couple who were pretty groggy from being tranquilised, and everyone had bruises, but that was it. I was worried about the guys pecked up by Catchers, who had then run off with the kids still inside them – but they turned up over the next few days. They said that they’d woken up to find that the Catchers were just lying there, hatches built into their heads open and empty. The chickens that had been inside them were nowhere to be seen.

After that Aberdeen was ours.

It was weird at first, being able to walk around the city in broad daylight without being afraid of capture. Everyone had kept to their groups for the most part, but some were beginning to spread out, go back to their homes if they could. Rayna had found a few other groups that had managed to hide from everyone and was slowly getting them used to the idea that the chickens had been defeated. They took some convincing.

But the amazing thing about it was that it brought some families back together. Rayna had found her sister Hazel while blowing up the mast; she was one of the few Brotherhood members left at Beechwood. Some other kids had siblings who had been one of Egbert’s people, or who had been in other groups in different parts of Aberdeen.

So to celebrate our freedom and bring everyone together we’d thrown a huge party.

The Bon Accord shopping centre was the perfect place for it, on the upper floor where there had once been an eating area. Before, it had been too close to the Brotherhood of the Egg to be safe, but now we could come and go without a care. The sunlight streamed in through the glass roof, illuminating all the tables where kids were mingling, laughing and tucking into food. The grub wasn’t much better than we’d had before, but for once we weren’t rationing it. There was also a lot of corn. The Brotherhood had showed us where the chickens had kept their supplies and we’d happily looted it.

I walked around, passing between different tables and catching snatches of conversation. I smiled as I passed the Library Gang, who were sitting in a corner, gazing wide-eyed at all the food. In another corner, Billy sat next to Paul, telling anyone who would listen that he’d once taken down a Catcher single-handed. Cody and Noah sat at either ends of the hall, keeping their distance from each other. They seemed to have called a truce after the battle. They still didn’t like each other, but I think they had a kind of grudging respect for one other.

Glen was messing about with a projector, screen and TV at one edge of the hall, a group of five-year-olds
running and screaming all around him. He’d turned up with them and glared at Rayna, as if daring her to say anything. I guess all that food hadn’t just been for him after all. Lizzie was with them, shrieking as loudly as any of them. It was good to see her having fun.

I gave Glen the plate that I’d been carrying and sat beside him as he stopped fiddling with wires and leads. “What are you doing?” I asked.

He swept a big load of corn into his mouth with his fork and chewed for a few moments before swallowing and answering. “The President of the USA is supposed to be making a speech about the chickens soon. I thought it would be worth seeing.”

One of the kids with him tripped on something and went sprawling. Glen immediately put down his food and went over to help the boy up and inspect his knee. I watched, feeling slightly uneasy. I couldn’t believe that I’d been so wrong about him. He was actually really kind.

“So where did the kids come from?” I asked, once the tears had stopped flowing and Glen was about to eat again. He shrugged.

“Most of them were in a daycare centre right next to my dad’s office. A couple of others were just lost. You know what it was like on the day. Chaos. I just rounded up as many as I could and took them with me. I dunno. I’ve got a nephew down south – those crying kids made me think of him.”

“That was pretty good of you.”

“It was the right thing to do.”

He finished the plate and went back to the TV. I picked it up and wandered back to my table.

On my way I passed the Brotherhood of the Egg,
sitting by themselves. A lot of them had split off once the chickens betrayed them, joining other groups or forming new ones of their own. But a solid core of them still remained. They might have been drawn to the chickens, but they’d been sticking together and looking out for one another for the last few months. I guess that sort of bond doesn’t go away overnight.

Rayna was with them, weirdly. She wanted to sit next to her sister Hazel. I’d heard some of what had happened the night of the battle. The chickens had been snapping up the Brotherhood up in Beechgrove as well, thinking that they didn’t need them any more. Hazel had been on sentry duty at the time and Rayna had managed to convince her to help, but after blowing up the mast they’d been mobbed by Commandos. When they came round, the chickens had gone.

I knew Hazel by sight but I hadn’t spoken to her much. I ambled over. One of the Brotherhood saw me coming and smiled.

“Stranger,” he said in greeting, and the rest of the table copied him. I guess some habits are hard to kick.

“Hey guys,” I said, waving vaguely. I turned to Rayna. “How are things going?”

“Fine,” she said through gritted teeth. She didn’t look fine. Although they were sitting together she and her sister weren’t talking much.

“I’m Jesse,” I said, turning to Hazel. She smiled at me, bright and lively, and held out her hand.

“I know who you are. It’s nice to meet you.”

We shook.

“Nice to meet you too. So what are you planning on doing now?”

Rayna’s scowl deepened. I think I just hit a touchy subject.

“I’m staying with my friends here in the Brotherhood,” Hazel replied, with a sideways glance at her sister. “We’ve got a lot to make up for and I’d like to be a part of that.”

“Well, that’s very…” I began but Rayna stood up and grabbed my arm.

“Come on, Jesse. I promised Noah I’d eat with your gang.”

“All right. See you around, Hazel.” I waved goodbye as Rayna towed me off, then shook her off and turned to her. “What’s up with you?”

She shrugged. “I don’t see why she’s got to stay with those freaks. She can hang around with me.”

“Those ‘freaks’ are her friends,” I pointed out. “I’m guessing this is an argument you’ve been having all week.”

She nodded. “She’ll come to her senses sooner or later. Come on, I want more food. Where are you sitting?”

My seat was with the Train Station Gang, crammed in a corner by a sushi restaurant, with Sam on one side. We squeezed Rayna in on the other. Sam was pretty hyper. He’d been reunited with a sister who had been hiding in Hazlehead and seemed to think that I’d been responsible for that happening. He was sitting there now, with one arm around her, eating corn on the cob like there was no tomorrow.

“I misjudged you, Jesse,” he said, for the fifth time. “I used to think that you were a little coward who only looked out for yourself. But look at all you’ve done. The chickens are beaten and it’s all because of you. Let me tell you this; you’ve got guts.”

He held out his hand and I shook it gratefully. He was getting better. At least he’d stopped trying to hug
me.

“You know this isn’t the end, right Sam?” Rayna said from my other side. She was still upset about her sister. “The chickens will be back.”

Sam wasn’t in any mood to listen. “And we’ll beat them again. They don’t have the signal any more. They can’t get into the city. Without that what can they do?”

I stopped listening to the argument and my mind drifted. There had been no sign of my brother in any of the groups. I felt hopeful, somehow, that he was OK. I had faith in him. I told myself to stop thinking about it, and concentrated on filling my belly with as much food as I could. A movement caught my eye and I looked up to see the crying girl from the sleeper train and her sister, sitting together and holding hands very tightly. I smiled to myself.

The projector flickered into life and a hush spread across the hall. I craned my neck and could see the President of the USA on the screen. He was standing at a podium, surrounded by grave looking men in uniform, a picture of an eagle behind.

“… because now we know more about them. We know their weakness. We know where they came from. They are not the alien invaders that we were led to believe. They are just chickens.”

He looked straight at the camera. “We have learned that they are merely a failed experiment. The UK government were developing them to deploy in place of soldiers in our platforms of war. We’ve all seen their fearsome leader, the chicken in the funny hat. Our enemy is deserving of no more than our contempt – and maybe some barbecue sauce.”

He paused while the journalists laughed. “They maintain their intelligence through signal masts. We
will take them all down. They get all their orders from their leader. He will fall. We and our allies will fall upon these metal monstrosities and drive them back to where they came from. We have suffered their advances for far too long. It’s about time we clipped their wings. And together, we will prevail. Thank you.”

He stepped back from the podium and a bunch of reporters started shouting questions. In the hall, kids were turning to each other, cheering and laughing.

I couldn’t help it. I smiled. It hadn’t been easy. The last few months had left us all a little hard-boiled. But now everything was looking sunny side up.

We were finally safe.