Kenzie was lying on Chicken Little’s desk, legs bent at the knees so they hung over the front and side of the desk, her head not that far from Chicken Little, while she held a projected panel up. Chicken Little sat in his chair, chicken in his lap, and Darlene sat on the desk next to him, one foot resting on the edge of his chair. All three twisted their heads around to look at Tattletale.

“We want to rent Chicken,” Tattletale said. “With the supporting team in a supporting, stay-at-home role.”

“You’re taking him?” Darlene asked.

“It’s good, it’s a job,” Kenzie said, without lifting her head up off the table.

“Okay,” Chicken Little said. “Let me get ready.”

“Don’t say yes yet,” Kenzie said. “Parameters? Guidelines? What’s the job, how long? How intensive? How dangerous? What tools should we expect to employ, and what does it cost us to employ them? Then what do we get paid, based on all of that?”

Good questions, I thought. The sort I’d told her to be ready to answer.

Tattletale rolled her eyes, clearly annoyed. The end of the roll saw her eyes looking at me, for some reason.

“Okay, what she said,” Chicken Little told Tattletale.

“The job is to accompany us. Might use your birds. Strict fact-finding mission,” Tattletale told him. “Talk to your team to get answers once or twice. Low intensity. Darlene can take a fifteen minute bathroom break to fuss over herself if she wants, it’s that mild a job.”

“That’s—don’t go and say that,” Darlene said.

“One of us on desk duty to go and get the other if we need it, if we’re not using microphones?” Kenzie asked. Her legs kicked where they dangled over the edge of the desk.

“Yes. Low danger,” Tattletale said. “I hope it’s low danger. Tools? Bring two raptors.”

“And the Haast Eagle?” Chicken Little asked.

“That you called Chicken Large, told all the other kids about, and expected I wouldn’t hear about? Too big, too dramatic for what we’re doing.”

“I’ll have him fly with, give him a chance to stretch his wings, if that’s okay,” Chicken Little said, getting a short nod in response. “Okay. That’s good.”

“For pay, let’s say… seven hundred.”

“Too low,” Darlene said. “For a day’s work—”

“Day’s half over.”

“Tying up all three of us—”

“To a small degree. We don’t really need you two, so you can decorate, play that singing game you’re too embarrassed to play when anyone else is around—”

Darlene huffed, annoyed.

“—or sit in his chair and spin in circles until he’s back if you want. You’re not that tied up.”

“Don’t sit in my chair,” Chicken Little told Darlene. “We can get you a good spinning chair if you want.”