Revenge of the Giant Robot Chickens by Alex McCall Page B

obvious?”
    “We’re a testing ground.”
    “He’s right,” Hazel said. “We are. I mean, up until now I think we were just a training ground for Catchers before they were sent out to fight national armies. But it looks as if they’re taking us more seriously.”
    Cody pulled out a notebook and started scribbling away. “A testing ground? So everything they throw at us will eventually be used against other countries? The Chickenator,” he sighed, “could be used to kidnap the President of the USA or something?”
    “Maybe,” Noah said. “I mean that would make sense.”
    “I’m going to have to think about this.” Cody closed his notebook and  stood up. “Is that all?”
    Noah looked at him aghast. “We’ve just lost another two council members. We haven’t even replaced Sally yet. We need to talk about that.”
    “Then hold votes or something. If anyone wants to make a target of themselves then good for them.” He started walking towards the door.
    “Cody, stop.” Noah got up and grabbed his arm as he passed. Percy took a step forward but Cody waved him back.
    “We’ve lost three people. We don’t just need to fill their positions. We need to take a moment and think about them. About them being gone. Don’t you care about that?”
    “It’s not my job to care.” Cody shook himself loose and began stalking away again. “It’s my job to find us a way out of this. That’s all.”
    He was almost out of the room when Noah shouted one last thing after him, “I know you care for some people, Cody. I know it.”
    Cody paused slightly. Then the door closed and he was gone.
    ***
    After Cody left, the rest of us sat around and talked about the ones who weren’t there. Even Percy stayed for a while, though he mostly just sat and listened. I guess he was doing it to report back to Cody later but it felt nice having him there. Noah offered to take over as Head of Communications but we couldn’t come to any other solid plans. Eventually we decided to get some sleep and look for volunteers in the morning.
    I lay in my bed and thought about the day. What a complete disaster. I hadn’t found the spy. Jeremy and Glen had been taken. The only good thing was that we’d got the communications equipment, though I had no idea what we’d actually do with it.
    And to top it all off, I’d had to tell the council there was a spy among them. So whoever it was, they knew I was on to them. Not only that but it put up walls between council members, stopped them from trusting each other. I’d even seen some of them give me funny looks as they were leaving.
    I felt a sudden stab of sympathy for Hazel and rolled over, staring at the wall. She hadn’t spoken to me as she’d left, taking the Chickenator blueprints with her. She hadn’t even looked at me. I’d have to apologise to her in the morning.
    Although… where had she found those blueprints? Had the chickens really been working on the Chickenatorfor so long that they’d left them behind in the warehouse when we drove them out? Or did the Brotherhood still have some connection with the chickens? More than ever I wanted to know where she was getting her information.
    I frowned. There was something bothering me. Something that wasn’t about the disastrous day or Hazel’s weirdly accurate knowledge. Something that was missing.
    Jesse hadn’t contacted me.
    He’d promised he would call at exactly nine tonight. He wanted to know if my plan had worked. But it was almost ten and I hadn’t heard anything from him. The walkie-talkie rested on my bedside table where I always left it, plugged into the wall, the red light staring at me through the darkness. Hazel had even hooked up a recorder to it so Jesse could leave messages but when I checked there was nothing.
    I fidgeted for a moment then picked up the walkie-talkie. Jesse had talked about heading back soon. He wouldn’t be sneaking about tonight.
    I pressed the button. “Jesse?” I said into the speaker.