The mob of sand-thugs charged into the lobby of the building, crowding around the elevator as a large man frantically pressed the down button, repeatedly calling the elevator. The mob watched the numbers above the elevator door indicating the location of the elevator descend at a glacial pace, one floor after another until at last it reached the first floor, and the door slid open. They moved to enter the elevator but halted as they discovered that a young woman was standing in it, smiling up at them. 

“Well hey there,” she said. She began to play a romantic song on an odd instrument they had never seen before. It was the kind of song that might have been sung in the 1950’s as people longed to dance with their secret crushes. The kind of song you drank cocktails and smoked cigars to. And as she began to sing, the world around them altered. The lobby shifted as if it was being painted over with an entirely different reality, one pulled right out of a childhood cartoon. And within moments, they were no longer in the lobby of a broken-down apartment building, but instead on the deck of a pirate ship. Rain pummeled down from above. Lightning tore through the sky, and wind blasted through the sails as the ship moved up and down over rolling waves. 

One of the thugs in the front of the mob caught on that this was not in fact a good thing and charged at Juno. An enormous purple tentacle exploded out of the wooden floor. It loomed over the shocked thug for just a moment before crashing down on him, splattering him all over the deck. This, obviously, caused a fair amount of shock amongst the rest of the henchman. They now realized that this sweet girl and her adorable tune were actually a vicious death trap. 

Chaos erupted. Some of the men and women made a run for the sides of the deck, while others tried to charge at Juno. Continuing to play and sing as if she were simply playing an incredibly fun performance, she strummed the strings and played on the keys as tentacle after tentacle burst up from the deck and over the sides of the ship, grabbing some of the thugs and tossing them or simply dragging them under the water. 

The henchman stopped to get their bearings and noticed that Juno was no longer on the ship. The ship itself was barely accounted for at this point. Most of it had been torn away by the monster beneath the sea’s surface. Across the waves, they saw a smaller ship approaching and riding atop it was Juno, her ukeytar, and a large black cannon. They waved at her, yelling and moaning like a pack of scared zombies that she might hear their pleas over the sound of the storm.

But Juno just went on singing and playing. A spark of fire shot out of her instrument and hit the wick on the back of the cannon. It burned down as the henchmen yelled in protest. But nothing could stop it as it fed into the cannon and the weapon exploded, firing a giant cannonball at the ship’s remains. A fiery explosion ripped through the scene Transforming the world once more. 

This time, they were all in a dark mine. Juno rode in a wooden mine cart as it sped along a trail of train tracks suspended in midair. The henchman were behind her, stuffed into a single mine cart like sausages, and gaining. Though they were on a different track. If they could just get close enough they might be able to grab her and stop the assault on their lives. The mine cart approached Juno’s, but just as they reached out to grab her, the track they were on went up as hers went down and then down as hers went up. And then it all happened again and it was terribly inconvenient as they swung their arms wildly trying to grab her. 

Their pursuit of Juno came to an end when their track disappeared altogether, and their cart fell into the black abyss.

The world exploded with light. Juno skated along a surface of shimmering light beneath a bright winter sun. The world was white as snow all around her. From behind, she could hear several men and woman trying desperately to find their balance in the ice skates that were now tied tightly onto their large feet. A few of them caught on quickly and began speeding towards her.

“I’ve got you now you little witch,” hissed a woman who clearly had experience skating prior to this moment. 

A wicked grin spread across the woman’s face. But it quickly dissipated as she heard a terrible crashing noise behind her. She glanced back to see the mountain literally chasing them as a swirling white avalanche crushed the henchmen who hadn’t been able to figure out the ice skates in time. Worse yet, it was now racing towards her and the others who had actually managed to race forward. 

“Oh balls,” the women said, taking off on her skates alongside two other men. But they simply weren’t fast enough. The avalanche crashed down upon them. 

Juno skipped across a sunny green hillside as the few henchmen and women who survived cried out in agony all around her. Flowers sang along to her tune, all the while growing thorny vines and ensnaring a man with a baseball bat. The birds flew around her, whistling happily, before dive bombing another man and tearing through his ace, erupting it into black sand. A unicorn nuzzled her cheek, then promptly gouged a tattooed man through his stomach, exploding this body into black sand. A rainbow colored T-Rex stomped by, flashed Juno a wink and stopped to eat a man who brought a pistol to a ‘dino’ fight. The T-Rex swallowed the man whole along with the pistol and then burped black smoke followed by a rainbow, which erupted out of its mouth and flew out over the scene below. The rainbow arced across the sky and then, to everyone’s great surprise, it opened a pair of eyes and a toothy smile. Juno waved at the rainbow and it reciprocated by shooting lasers from its eyes, finishing off the last of the sand thugs. 

The song ended, the world returned to normal and Juno sighed, observing the mess of black sand which now permeated every surface of the lobby. “What a mess,” she said, disappointedly. 

CONTINUE TO CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX