Cryptid Hunter: Scarecuckoo

Ah there you are. Step right this way, young lady. I've been expecting you.

No, I know you didn't call ahead. Don't worry about it. Just step through that door there.

[Hurried] I know you're quite disoriented right now, but do NOT speak or you'll get an electric shock -

BZZT

[Regular pace] Of course you had to test it. Now if you'll be quiet and listen to me. When you stepped through that doorway without any talisman to mark you as a member of the staff, you were transported three feet to the left, into an iron cage, leaving your clothes and belongings behind. This is a security measure. Let me quickly check your things here... no weapons, good. Nice thong, by the way. Interesting choice for a job interview. And your phone is off. That's my fault, I'm afraid. Don't worry, your phone will start working again once you leave this room.

You may be uncomfortable being naked, standing in a cage that will electrocute you if you speak. Don't worry, this is customary for our job interviews. In my long life, I've learned to be cautious. I will explain.

You've been having strange dreams lately. Or perhaps you remember catching glimpses or strange creatures out of the corner of your eye. Perhaps you had a more memorable run in with something not quite of this world. Since then, you've been drawn to learning more about the paranormal. You learned about my tabloid, the Daily Hunt, perhaps consuming our content through one of our social media channels. I am Mr. Wolf, CEO of the Daily Hunt. But this is no mere tabloid.

Those strange creatures you saw? Those were real. And no, they are not of this world.

BZZT

I forgot to mention, don't touch the bars. Those will also shock you. Just stand straight in the center of the cage. That's a good girl.

As I was saying, there are creatures not of this world, creatures not recognized by human science. Cryptids. These are all displaced creatures from another world. Alfheim. Occasionally beings from Earth or Alfheim will pass through a random portal into the other world. Tripping into a fairy circle, diving into a mystic pool, perhaps being in the wrong place at the wrong time as a shooting star passes overhead.

We publish ridiculous stories about cryptids - stupid, groundless tales too illogical to be taken seriously. That's just to distract people from the truth. Our real job is to keep the reality of cryptids secret. We must honor the treaty we have with the Fae Courts; if the monsters and magical portals become common knowledge, they will invade Earth and try to destroy humanity, rather than risk us contaminating their realm en masse.

You really don't need to keep covering yourself like that. Why be embarrassed? Human bodies are human bodies, from the beginning of time. Don't worry, you'll get your clothes back after this interview is concluded.

Anyway, when there's a sighting of some strange creature, we investigate. If it's an actual cryptid, we catch it or destroy it. We transport it to our wealthy patron, Mr. Nare. Yes, of Nare Industries. He's fascinated with the cryptids and likes to see them before they pass through the mists back to Alfheim. Then we make sure nobody on Earth can find out the truth.

Let me tell you a story as an example.

Libby, our photographer, decided to investigate a cryptid sighting on her own. People reported creepy feelings and a menacing figure in a corn maze - and it wasn't supposed to be a haunted corn maze.

She was absolutely not supposed to go on a mission alone, but Libby wanted to prove herself. She went at night, long after the maze had closed. A full moon illuminated her path, and she went stalking through the maze, looking for anything out of the ordinary. She had her taser and thought that would protect her. Foolish girl.

BZZT

I said, stay away from the bars! I imagine it hurts quite a bit, especially on your naked skin. Just hang in there for a couple minutes. You kids these days really have terrible attention spans. Back in my day I was used to staying motionless in the rain for hours as part of a hunt. But I digress.

Libby thought she was good at mazes, but was feeling frustrated that she wasn't getting through the maze quickly. With corn tall around her, every twist and turn looked the same as every other. She passed a few scarecrows and then started to look at them more closely. She realized she had passed the exact same scarecrow, more than once.

But how could she be going in circles? She thought she had varied her route too much to loop back on itself. She tried again. Going left, then right, then left.

She passed the same scarecrow AGAIN.

Now Libby was getting very concerned. Either this corn maze was far more challenging than she expected, or something was wrong. Something was causing her to be lost in the maze. As she walked, I'm sure she tried to think of my lectures, of everything that could be relevant. Was there a minotaur in the center of the maze? Perhaps she would be lost in fae mists, unable to find her way out. Perhaps she would spend 40 years wandering the maze. Was something playing with her mind, causing her to go one way when she thought she was going the other?

Then something changed.

There was a scarecrow directly in the path in front of her. Denim overalls covering a bundle of straw, with a pumpkin on top. No, not just a pumpkin - a pumpkin with eyes and nose and jagged teeth cut in it, the sort of jack-o'-lantern kids always think of. A vertical pole kept the scarecrow up above the ground. A horizontal pole kept its straw arms spread to the sides.

Libby was startled. The scarecrows were supposed to be in the corn, not in the maze itself. That would just get in the way of people trying to walk the maze. Feeling uneasy, she turned to the right.

A scarecrow was there. It looked exactly the same. Straw, overalls, two poles, and a creepy-looking carved pumpkin for a head.

Libby spun back to where she had originally been facing, to see if both scarecrows were really identical. Then she gasped. The scarecrow wasn't there any longer. Instead, there was an unbroken wall of corn. She KNEW there had been a path and a scarecrow there a moment ago!

She turned back to the right. That scarecrow was gone too! Again, nothing but an unbroken tall wall of corn in front of her.

Panicking, she turned in the direction she had come from. The same creepy scarecrow was RIGHT THERE, inches in front of her! She let out an involuntary shriek, but had the presence of mind to raise her taser and fire!

The electrodes shot forward into the straw, releasing their electrical charge.

Nothing happened. I imagine Libby felt quite foolish for using a taser on a bundle of straw.

Then a straw arm pulled away from the horizontal pole. Rope broke with an audible snap. Instead of falling apart, the straw arm held together and landed on Libby's shoulder heavily.

It didn't speak. It just laughed. Laughed and laughed with the maniacal glee of someone who's waited a long time for something evil.

And then suddenly the two had swapped places. Now Libby was tied to the pole. Her clothes were gone, leaving her completely exposed to the cool autumn air. Her legs were bound to either side of the vertical pole. Her bare arms were bound to the horizontal pole. And she started screaming in terror.

The scarecrow was no longer attached to the pole. It stood where Libby had been a moment ago. Now there was a turnip in its straw hand, which it shoved roughly into Libby's mouth. Her screams immediately became muffled whimpers. But it didn't stop there. Libby's eyes grew wide when she saw the cucumber in the monster's other hand. A monstrously large cucumber. She thrashed helplessly in her bindings as it pressed the end of the cucumber against her naked sex... and then roughly inserted it into her.

That cucumber shouldn't have slid in as easily as it did. Not without any sort of lubrication, not with Libby's legs almost being closed. But it did. Libby shrieked into her turnip-stuffed mouth and trembled and her eyes rolled back in her head, but it went all the way inside. I would wager she'd never had anything half as large in her before.

Libby hung silent and exhausted from the ropes for a moment. Then things changed again. Suddenly she was wearing overalls just like the scarecrow's. But I have to say, the overalls looked MUCH better on her. Her breasts threatened to come free of the overalls any moment.

A pumpkin appeared around her head as well. A carved pumpkin, just like the one the scarecrow had. I could see Libby's pretty, terrified face through the holes in the pumpkin.

Only now did the monster speak. It growled at her, telling her that she only had until midnight to escape. That at midnight... the princess would turn into a pumpkin. Her fate would be irreversible. Oh, how she struggled and screamed then! She only had about an hour until midnight! But she was a partially trained cryptid hunter. I'm confident she was determined to use every trick she could think of to escape and do her duty to bring in the monster!

[Pause]

We didn't find her until the next afternoon. In fact... let me pull this sheet off...

Yes. That's Libby. Just as she looked in the cornfield. A beautiful young woman tied to a pole, her arms stretched out and bound horizontally. Naked except for the revealing overalls. A carved pumpkin on her head. The turnip is still in her mouth - and yes, the cucumber is still in her pussy. Every moment must be a torture for her. Jaw sore, vagina sore, feeling stuffed beyond capacity. Desperate to touch herself, unable to move a muscle.

This is what a magical curse can do. She doesn't eat, she doesn't drink, she doesn't sleep. The bonds can't be broken. The pole can't be sawed or burnt. The turnip can't be bitten through. The pumpkin can't be cut. Every inch of this is magically unbreakable.

When she spent the day in the corn maze like this, people saw her, but didn't think it was anything strange. That's part of the curse. They'd take notice of how oddly sexy and curvaceous this scarecrow was, but moments after they walked out of sight, they'd forget they ever saw anything unusual.

The monster was a scarecuckoo. It imitates a scarecrow. It needs to be able to force someone to take its place before it can be freed. It then goes off to wreak havoc. People who look at it will see a scarecrow walking around, but magic will compel them to think that's normal. They think the pumpkin-headed, ambulatory scarecrow belongs there. Then moments after the scarecuckoo leaves, they will forget they saw it. Most people aren't protected against magical influences like my staff and I are, so scarecuckoos can cause a great deal of harm since nobody even realizes a monster is among them.

Don't worry. We tracked down the scarecuckoo. It was too dangerous, so we destroyed the pumpkin-headed bastard. Utterly smashed it.

As for the victims of scarecuckoos... in Alfheim, the victim will gradually transform mentally and physically into a scarecuckoo. Then it will wait for an innocent to come close enough for it to trade places with, repeating the cycle. We've been able to protect Libby here against that. She won't change any further. She will still have her own personality. She just won't be able to move or talk. Fortunately, Mr. Nare will allow her to be placed in the private garden at his mansion. She'll be safe there, and she'll be prevented from trading places with any more victims.

We hope to find a cure for poor Libby one day. Until then, she will forever be on display. Her legs and arms bound tightly. Her beautiful breasts on the verge of falling out. Her vagina so desperately full that her pussy is perpetually leaking around it, soaking the crotch of her overalls. And she can never speak a word again. She is just a helpless object. Poor Libby. She couldn't even tell me herself what happened - I had to use scrying to see the event for myself.

You might wonder why I am telling you all of this.

You need to know the risks in this job. Libby made foolish mistakes. Her training wasn't complete, but she went out to hunt an unknown cryptid alone, without even telling anyone where she was. But even in the best of times, mistakes happen and people get hurt. What we do is dangerous. I've published a story in my tabloid about a hodag attack in the parking lot of the corn maze. Put some fake scratch marks on her car. Placed a mundane scarecrow in the corn maze so nobody notices the scarecrow is missing. Nobody will ever know the truth about Libby.

We do important work. We are the chosen few who know the mysteries of the world. You can join us. As you can see, I need a new photographer. I don't need to test your skills. You were led to me because you already had been learning too much about cryptids, and your skills were deemed suitable to join us.

In a moment, I'll turn off the shock cage and unlock it. You'll put your clothes on and leave this room. But before you do, you need to make an important choice.

If you join us, you'll face a life of paranormal adventure - and challenging deadlines. You'll get a good salary and excellent... "benefits."

If you choose not to work for the Daily Hunt, you will be free to go. But I'll have my succubus... adjust... your memories. You'll remember interviewing for a job at a tabloid and not getting the job. Nothing unusual at all. I should warn you that this kind of memory alteration occasionally has side effects. Dizzy spells, tasting colors, becoming extremely ticklish, or nightly wet dreams featuring mythical monsters. But you'll probably be fine, that doesn't always happen.

You can't sleep on this decision. You can take a few minutes to think about it, but you aren't leaving that cage until you make your choice. So which will it be? Will you join us?

[Pause]

Good choice! Glad to have you aboard. I'll turn off the cage and let you out. Oh, and since it's Monday, I brought baked goods for the staff.

Do you like pumpkin pie?