He hated walking. It went against everything he believed in. Physical exertion of any kind wasn’t really his thing at all. He was completely against manual labor. It’s why he became a farmer in the first place.
No lifting. No sweating. It was the farmer’s life for him. All you had to do was sit back and watch the drones work.
On a bad day you might have to take the controls and pilot the drone yourself. That was about as bad as it got. He’d heard stories of some farmers having to go into the field to check on malfunctioning equipment, but until now, he’d never really believed it. He figured they were stories farmers passed around to scare off the masses from such a cushy job.
That’s why, when the alarm first came up, he assumed it was the day shift pulling a prank on him. Those guys had a hard time telling the difference between being funny and being dicks. Even at that, this wasn’t their best work.
A few keystrokes sent the drones to investigate and he kicked back to plot his revenge. The day shift foolishly left their food unguarded in the communal fridge overnight, and spiking their drink with some Nanolax would be a good start to the retaliation. He figured they could laugh at him all they wanted as long as a million microbots kept them glued to a toilet.
A chirp indicated that the drone had arrived at the site of the alarm and found nothing. Nothing at all. The equipment that was sending the alarm wasn’t even there. He set a search path and the drones began running the preset pattern.
He kicked back in his chair, much to the dismay of its springs, and put his feet up on the console.
Watching the cornstalks zoom past the fish-eyed lens had made him queasy. Every row was the same. Every stalk was identical. Every leaf and ear was pitched at the same angle. They had been designed that way to ensure maximum exposure to the sun, but the whole effect worked to lull him into a trance.
He spent an hour searching the cornfield for the missing machinery to no avail and was on the verge of passing out when a series of damaged stalks broke the monotony and provided the first clue as to what was happening. Seizing the controls, he piloted the drone back down the row then turned to follow the broken plants.
Something had crashed through the crop. Someone was making off with the equipment.
He sat forward in his chair and willed the drone to follow the trail. He smiled. This was no longer work, it was crime fighting. Capturing the thief on the camera was all it would take for the authorities to identify the culprits. But he would be the hero, and for the second time in his life he might even trend. He smiled at the thought of this story supplanting the old one in the feeds. Finally.
“‘Never live it down’ my ass,” he muttered to himself as he pushed harder on the control pad.
Sweeping through the crops, he followed the busted stalks and fallen ears of corn. He wasn’t a farmer anymore. He was a fighter jockey piloting the latest generation WarBird through enemy canyons. The whir of the rotors played through his monitor’s speakers, but they weren’t quite fitting to the mood so he made his own scramjet engine sounds until he reached the center of the cornfield and stopped the drone.
There it was. A shadow moving quickly between the plants. Each time the figure darted, another plant fell to the ground with the dry crack of firewood.
He chased after the shadow for two rows and turned right to follow. But there was nothing there. The trail of destruction had ended. He flipped the drone 180 degrees in a deft move he would have to recount to the reporters later.
For a brief instant, the figure filled the monitor. Then everything went dead.
The drone dropped from the air and landed with its camera pointed toward the night sky.
Corn swayed in and out of view through a cracked lens, but the machine no longer responded to his touch. He could hear nothing but the breeze.
“No!” he screamed as the headlines faded from his daydreams. He shot up with such speed that his chair sailed back across the room, spinning as it went. He didn’t wait for it to stop. He pulled a denim coat from a hook by the door with one hand and a shotgun with the other as he dashed out the door into the night. He had to bring these evildoers to justice. He had to have another fifteen minutes—a better fifteen minutes—of fame. They could take whatever busted piece of farm equipment they wanted from the company, but they couldn’t take that opportunity away from him.
The utility vehicle whirred into action. Knobby off-road tires skipped on the concrete before biting into the dirt with an unbreakable hold and catapulting him into the cornfield. A thousand acres separated him from his prey, but he wasn’t going to let it get away. He kept the pedal to the floor.
The cart’s suspension ate the uneven soil without complaint and kicked the looser earth into the air behind it as it went.
Much like the view through the drone, the rows of corn blended into a mesh of green silk as he zipped past. This time he accepted it. He kept his eyes forward and let his peripheral look for the trail. The broken stalks would be a sore thumb sticking out in the genetically engineered pattern.
They were. He stood on the brakes when he spotted them and turned the cart into the path. The ride grew rougher as he crossed the furrows and the cart threw him back and forth, left and right, but he pressed on and let the cart jostle him about until he found the downed drone.
The cart idled in complete silence as he stepped into the field. He was alone.
Breathing heavily from the excitement, he was startled by how loud his breath was in the middle of the night. He swallowed hard once to try to hold it back and exhaled slowly before approaching the fallen drone.
The device was peppered with holes. The rotors were shattered. Shot clean off. He bent to examine the wreckage more closely.
There was a snap and a nearby corn stalk fell.
He hurried back to the cart and grabbed the shotgun. He racked a shell into the chamber and turned back to the crop.
“Show yourself.”
There was no response.
He took a cautious step away from the vehicle. “You’re not supposed to be out here.”
Again, there was no response. There was no sound at all.
He racked the shotgun. The unspent shell fell to the ground and he closed his eyes at his mistake. “You’re trespassing. Do you know what that means?”
He bent down and grabbed the shell off the ground. “That means I can shoot you. Legally. That’s what that means.”
He plugged the shell back into the bottom of the gun.
“I don’t want to shoot you.” He so wanted to shoot them. He was terrified. But being the hero behind the trigger instead of the hero behind the camera was going to ensure him at least a half-day in the top fifty stories. Number one in the farm feeds for sure.
Another stalk cracked a few rows over and he dove into the corn. The leaves whipped at his face as he fought through the tight plantings and burst through into the furrowed earth.
He turned and saw the figure a few yards away.
The shotgun bucked in his hands as he fired from the hip. He felt the blast in his ears, then heard it, then watched sparks dance as the shot bounced harmlessly off the metal scarecrow rooted in the field.
The robot stood on spindly, telescopic legs that enabled it to set its head above the crop. Its straw hat flopped around, leaving only the lower half of its face visible.
“Good thing the news didn’t see that.” He chuckled to himself and fired at the lanky sentry again. “Damn thing scared me.”
The scarecrow took the blast in silence.
Its eyes began to glow red.
“What are you… You’re supposed to be offline at night.”
The machine looked right at him. Hydraulics in the legs lowered the body into the cornfield. Then it took a step toward him.
He ran.
Against everything he stood for, he ran. He broke through the stalks and sent them falling to the ground as he scrambled back toward the cart.
He had only made it two rows when he heard the scarecrow’s Gatling gun begin to whir.
