Hint. Desperado professional crooks do not break into chicken houses and steal single hens (market value <$10), stopping to ineptly re-latch the cage door.
My money is on your chickie showing up in the junior high gym teacher's office, in the chemistry teacher's desk drawer, or running around the opposing team's locker room.
But by all means, shoot to kill, because you definitely want to live with yourself after murdering your neighbor's pranking teenage kid in the dark. I bet the kid's family and the authorities will totally agree that it was so worth it. You just have to make an example, ya know? All the people who are recommending the reflexive use of deadly force as revenge for chicken theft have, of course, thoroughly considered all the potential outcomes and repercussions, and only have your best interests, and those of your neighbors and fellow-citizens, at heart.