I was paid $1,000,000 to stand perfectly still in a cornfield for 7 nights. I wasn't scaring away birds.
It was in that scenario of desperation that I found the ad. It wasn’t on the dark web, nor in some shady back alley. It was in a printed newspaper—the kind nobody reads anymore—forgotten on a park bench. The kind of place I shouldn't have even stopped to look at.
It read:
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**NEEDED: STATIC FIELD SECURITY**
Location: Boa Safra Farm (Interior of Mato Grosso, Brazil).
Duration: 7 Nights (Harvest Period).
Requirements: Extreme physical resilience, total muscle control, military discipline.
Payment: US$ 1,000,000 (Tax-free, offshore deposit).
NOTE: Candidate must be capable of remaining motionless for 12-hour periods.
One million dollars. A scam, obviously. But when I called the number, the voice on the other end didn’t try to sell me anything. It just gave me GPS coordinates and a time.
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Would they steal my kidney and leave me waking up in a bathtub full of ice? To be honest, not even my kidneys are worth much these days, so I took the risk.
The interview was brief. The contractor, a man named Colonel Valdemar, met me in a warehouse on the side of a dirt road. He didn’t look like a farmer; he looked like a warden. Sun-cured face, scarred hands, and a look that evaluated me like a slab of meat at a butcher shop, not a professional.
"Can you stay still, kid?" he asked, smoking a straw cigarette that smelled like burnt manure.
"I sat in a hide site in Haiti for 14 hours without moving a muscle, sir," I replied.
"Haiti is a playground compared to my plantation," he laughed—a dry, humorless sound. "The job is simple. You put on the suit. You get up on the stand. You stay there from six in the evening until six in the morning. If you come down before the bell rings, you lose the contract. If you accidentally move when *they* are close... you lose your life."
I signed the contract. The paper was thick, yellowed. There were clauses about "biological risk," "irreversible psychological damage," and "accidental disappearance." I didn’t read it properly. I only saw the number with six zeros.
The farm was in the middle of absolute nowhere. Miles and miles of corn. But it wasn't common corn. The stalks were too tall, almost ten feet high. The leaves were a dark, oily green that shined under the scorching sun. And the ears... the ears of corn were red. A vivid, arterial red.
"It’s Transgenic," Valdemar explained, catching my stare. "Resistant to pests. But it attracts... another kind of pest."
We went to the center of the cornfield. There was a circular clearing, and in the middle of it, a solid wooden cross treated with pitch, featuring supports for feet and a backrest.
"Your post," he pointed.
Then he handed me the "uniform." I was expecting camouflage fatigues, or maybe a tactical vest. What he gave me looked like a medieval nightmare. A jumpsuit made of thick leather, reinforced with ceramic plates and Kevlar underneath. Over the leather, coarse burlap was stitched on, mimicking the clothes of a classic scarecrow. The smell of the outfit was ranker than the breath of the local crackheads.
"Why the smell?" I asked, holding back vomit as I pulled on the heavy pants.
"Olfactory camouflage," Valdemar said seriously. "They are blind, but their sense of smell is sharp. This disguises your human scent. If they smell live people, they attack."
The mask was the worst part. A burlap sack reinforced with an internal steel cage to protect the face. There were only two tiny holes for the eyes, covered by a dark mesh.
Before leaving me there for the first night, Valdemar went over the rules. He spoke with the gravity of a priest giving last rites.
* **Total Immobility:** "They sense vibration. If you tremble, they know where you are."
* **Silence:** "If you have to sneeze, bite your tongue until it bleeds, but do not make a sound."
* **The Bell:** "I ring the bell at the main house at 06:00 AM. Only come down when you hear the bell. Never before. Even if it looks like the sun has risen. They mimic the light."
* **Contact:** "They will climb on you. They will smell you. They will touch you. Do not react. The suit can withstand a few light bites. But if you decide to be stupid and react, they will gut you, and that suit will tear like paper."
He helped me up onto the support. He strapped my feet with leather buckles but left my arms free (though resting on the crossbar).
"Good luck, Miguel. The last guy lasted three nights. What was left of him, we buried with the fertilizer."
Valdemar left. I was used to insane orders; my previous commanders had put me in worse situations. His jeep disappeared into the dust. The sun went down.
And the cornfield woke up.
The first night was a test of pain, not fear. Staying still in a crucifix position is anatomically torturous. Within two hours, my shoulders burned. In four, my legs were numb. Sweat ran down inside the leather suit, boiling my skin, but I couldn't scratch. The smell of the clothes impregnated my nostrils, making me dizzy, but let's say... it was all expected so far.
The cornfield was noisy. The wind hit the hard leaves making a sound like crumpled paper. I kept imagining things. Footsteps. Whispers. But I knew it was my mind projecting fear. I saw nothing. Just the dark green sea under the moonlight. When the bell rang at 06:00, I almost fell off the cross support. Valdemar had to help me walk to the headquarters. My muscles were locked up.
"Good start," he said. "But they haven't found you yet. It takes them a while to sense something new."
On the third night, the wind stopped. Silence fell over the farm like a lead shroud. I was up there, fighting the insane urge to crack my neck, when I heard it.
It wasn't the sound of corn breaking. It was the sound of earth being turned... like a gravedigger preparing the ground for a coffin. Except, unlike that, it was coming from below. From the roots.
I looked down, moving only my pupils, without turning my head. The earth between the rows of corn began to swell. As if giant moles were digging to the surface. And then, a hand came out of the dirt.
It wasn't a human hand. It was long, pale, with six thin fingers that looked like white roots. The nails were black, curved claws. The creature emerged. It was humanoid, but disproportionate. About seven feet tall, thin to the point of being skeletal. The skin was white, milky, covered in pulsating blue veins. It had no eyes. In their place, there was just smooth skin. I could say it looked a lot like that internet legend, Slenderman.
The Creature wasn't alone, though. Another came out of the earth to the left. Another to the right. There were dozens of them. "The Reapers," as my mind christened them.
They walked strangely, with spasmodic movements, joints cracking. They sniffed the air, their eyeless heads swaying from side to side. The smell that wafted up to me was horrible. The smell of an open grave.
One of them approached my post. It hugged the wood. It began to climb. My heart raced. *"They hear vibration,"* Valdemar had said. I tried to calm my heart using military breathing techniques, but panic is biological.
The creature climbed until it was level with my boots. It licked the leather of my boot. The tongue was black, long, and rough. It was looking for meat. But the chemical smell of the suit worked. The creature recoiled, seeming confused. It hissed something to the others—a clicking sound, like dolphins—and climbed down.
They began to eat the corn. Not the cobs. They tore the stalks and drank the red sap that oozed from inside. I stayed there, static, watching that grotesque banquet until dawn.
On the fifth night, it rained. A summer storm, violent, with lightning that illuminated the field like flashes from God's camera. The rain was a problem. Water washed away some of the smell of my suit. That olfactory protection dripping down my legs.
The creatures came out of the earth earlier, frantic with the rain. They knew something was wrong. One of the Reapers, larger than the others, with deep scars on its pale chest, came straight to where I was. It didn't hesitate. It climbed fast, with the agility of a spider.
In seconds, it was face to face with me. I could see the pores in its skin. It had no eyes, aiming its empty face in my direction. The nostrils, like slits in the center of its face, flared.
It raised a clawed hand and touched my chest. The claw scratched the burlap, hitting the ceramic plate underneath. It tilted its head, as if curious.
It brought its face close to my mask. Licked the steel mesh where my mouth was. I felt its viscous saliva fall onto my lip. I wanted to scream, to kick, to draw the knife I didn't have. But I froze. I turned my body into stone. If I moved a millimeter, it would tear out my throat.
It stayed there for an hour. A whole hour. Hanging on the cross, breathing in my face, touching me, smelling me. The Reaper ran its long claws along my neck, looking for an entry into the suit. Of course, I cried in silence, just as I had done countless times as a marine. Tears ran down my face inside the mask, salty and hot.
I guess in the end, that was my luck—being used to acting correctly under pressure.
Suddenly, a lightning bolt struck nearby. The boom was deafening. The creature was startled. It let out a high-pitched scream and jumped, disappearing into the corn. I spent the rest of the night trembling, praying for the bell to ring.
When Valdemar picked me up in the morning, I couldn't speak. He saw the scratches on the suit. "They're getting bold," he murmured. "Just two more nights, kid. Hang in there."
The last night. I was exhausted. My mind was worse than before. I was seeing things even with the sun high in the sky. Valdemar gave me a double dose of stimulants before I went up. "Tonight is the Royal Harvest," he said. "They'll be hungry."
I climbed onto the support and positioned myself on the cross. The sun set. The cornfield went silent.
At 8:00 PM, they appeared. Not dozens. Hundreds. The entire field moved. A sea of white bodies emerging from the red earth. They didn't eat the corn this time. They just... surrounded me. They formed a perfect circle, looking up at me. They began to sing. A low, vibrating hum that made my teeth ache.
I understood then... I wasn't a security guard. I wasn't just some scarecrow to ward off pests. I was the totem. The focus. The suit... the smell... it wasn't to hide me. It was to excite them.
Valdemar was growing that red corn with the blood of the earth, and those things were the gardeners. And to keep them docile, to keep them working, he needed to give them an idol. A toy. A lure that smelled like prey but couldn't be eaten... at least, not YET.
Three of them started climbing the cross at the same time. The weight made the wood creak. They reached me. One on each leg, one on my chest. They began to tear at the burlap. Sharp claws found the leather. They ripped it.
They bit the ceramic plates. They broke their teeth on the plates, but they didn't stop. Their black blood ran down my suit. I was being devoured alive from inside my armor. I felt a claw pierce a seam of the suit on my thigh... In my years as a marine, I'd never felt pain like this. It was worse than a shattered bone. The tip of the claw entered my flesh. I bit my tongue. I tasted blood. I didn't scream.
**Rule 1: Do not move.** If I moved, they would realize the armor had soft meat underneath everywhere. As long as I stayed still, they thought I was hard, a tough nut to crack.
They pulled at my arms. They dislocated my left shoulder. The bone popped out with a snap. The pain blinded me. I was going to pass out. If I passed out, my body would go limp. They would know.
I concentrated everything on my mental clock. *Almost there. Almost there.* They were ripping chunks off the helmet. The steel mesh was bending. The milky eye of one of them (wait, no, they had no eyes—the smooth skin where an eye should be) was pressed against my eye, separated by millimeters of metal.
That was when I heard the sound of a miracle.
A gunshot? No. The bell. The bell from the main house rang.
But it wasn't 06:00. It was 05:30. The sky was still dark.
The creatures stopped. The sound of the bell seemed to hurt them. It was a specific frequency. They wailed in pain all at once and scrambled down from the cross, diving back into the earth like cockroaches fleeing the light.
I was left alone, hanging, bleeding, shoulder dislocated, suit in tatters.
Valdemar's jeep arrived, tires screeching. He jumped out with a rifle and a powerful flashlight.
"Get down! Now!" he screamed.
Valdemar ran to me and cut the straps on my feet. I fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes. He dragged me to the jeep and floored it.
I looked back. The cornfield was on fire. Valdemar had torched the plantation.
"The harvest is over," he said, driving like a madman. "I had to ring the bell early."
I woke up two days later in a private hospital in São Paulo. Operated shoulder. Stitches in my thigh. There was a lawyer in the room. He handed me a tablet.
"The transfer has been made. One million dollars. Sign here confirming receipt and the non-disclosure agreement."
I signed. I didn't want to argue. I wanted distance.
I bought my freedom. I paid off the Agency. I bought a penthouse in the city, far from any plantations, far from any ground where I could see a single inch of dirt.
But, of course, money doesn't buy oblivion. Sometimes, when I'm standing in line at the bank or waiting for the elevator, I go still. Absolutely still. And I feel it. I smell the suit I wore. I feel the phantom weight of something climbing up my legs. I feel the hot, rotting breath on my face.
And I'm afraid to look down. Because I know they don't eat corn. The red corn was just a side dish. What they wanted, what they tasted when that claw pierced my leg... was me.
And now they know my flavor. They are blind, but Valdemar said they never forget a scent. I live on the tenth floor. It's high up. But they come from the earth. And buildings have deep foundations.
Last night, I heard a sound coming from the flower pot on my balcony. Earth being turned over.
I think I’m going to need a new suit. And this time, I’m not standing still.
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