The Penumbra Podcast

Sir Marc and Sir Talfryn of Second Citadel aren’t technically knights. They do all the knightly things, sure – killing monsters, saving the innocent, bickering about breakfast meats – the only problem is that the other knights don’t agree that they’re… y’know, knights. So what are a pair of free lancers to do? Get some respect, of course! Take down a monster so big that the Knights of the Crown have to let them join! The Janus Beast is gruesome, but Marc and Talfryn have dealt with monsters before. It’s the threats they aren’t prepared for that might tear these brothers apart for good. Welcome to the Penumbra, dear Traveler. We hope you enjoy your stay. If you miss us between episodes, remember to follow us on Facebook (The Penumbra Podcast), Twitter (@thepenumbrapod), and our website (thepenumbrapodcast.com) for updates, information about the cast and crew, and irresistible witticisms. We’d like to thank our first two Patreon supporters, Anna Meehan and Debra Simes! With Patreon, you can support us by scheduling a small donation for each episode we release. If you’d like to show the artists behind the Penumbra that you appreciate their work, you can do so here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=3386677

It’s been a day of unpleasant surprises for Detective Juno Steel. He didn't expect to spend his day off down in the sewers, that’s for sure. He didn’t expect to go back to the town he’d grown up in and run away from, either. He didn’t expect to hear from his old friends Mick Mercury and Sasha Wire… and one friend who shouldn’t be able to call him at all from where she’s gone. Surprises come with the territory when you're a PI on Mars, though. It’s all another thrilling adventure in the life of Juno Steel, Private Eye… until the biggest surprise of all threatens to turn this unhappy memory into an early memorial.

They thought they’d gotten away with it. They were just kids when it happened. Juno Steel, Sasha Wire, and Mick Mercury – they were just kids when they did it. It was supposed to be a game, the kind kids play when there are no adults around to talk to… when there’s nobody around to tell them just how deadly their little game could be. Detective Juno Steel has had that game on his mind a lot lately. Today is the twenty-fifth anniversary of that terrible day, and he hopes to spend it forgetting. Get a few drinks with Mick, get a few more drinks with Mick, and then pass out on the couch. Easy enough. But this day wasn’t easy the first time, and it won’t be easy the second. The pieces slide into place, slowly: wasn’t this bar where that day all started? What’s Sasha Wire doing back in town? Within hours the game is set again – and deadlier than ever before.

They warned her about the bandits, but Mary Anne didn’t listen. She was engaged, she said; her fiancée was moving to Crossroads, and even if Crossroads was crawling with bandits, she didn’t have much of a choice. Sheriff Beau Richmond asked her to marry him; Mary Anne said yes; and that, as far as Mary Anne knew, was the end of it. It might have been the end to Mary Anne’s entire story, too – decades married to a man whom she liked well enough, she guessed, stop asking, please – if the bandit hadn’t stopped the train. Chance Sequoyah is a very special bandit. Sure, she’ll take the usual things: money, necklaces, watches. But she plans on taking something else, too: Mary Anne Watkins.

The Prince of Mars, the mascot of Saffron Pharmaceuticals, is the worst witness a detective could hope for. The Prince has an imagination like a runaway train: when he tells the story, drizzles come out hurricanes and a fender-bender comes out three weeks in traction. Only problem: the Prince is the only witness to a vicious crime, everyone thinks he did it, and he’s the one lead Juno has. His story’s nonsense, of course. Flashing lights, rushing wind, a corpse appearing out of thin air, and a pill tens of thousands of years old… none of it can be true. Can it?

After an explosive murder case gone wrong, Detective Juno Steel is in the market for some slower work. His next client promises something quiet: a routine find-the-cheating-husband job. Well… it should be routine. But if your missing man heads one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies on Mars, his biggest secret always runs much deeper than an affair. Before he knows it Juno Steel is in a race against the clock and a mysterious stranger to find that secret first – or this runaway husband might not return home in one piece. Welcome to the Penumbra, dear Traveler. We hope you enjoy your stay.

WARNING: Shaken is a horror story with a focus on dark, unsettling situations and some descriptions and sound design that listeners may find disturbing. (Trigger warnings: self-harm, body horror.) If you find this type of content difficult to bear, you may want to check out one of the Juno Steel stories or another one of our one-shots instead. Louise Serling is a talented young painter with a bright future and promising artistic career in front of her. But Louise's family history holds a dreadful secret; can she conceal it from the world, or will the truth shake her life to its very foundations? Welcome to the Penumbra, dear Traveler. We hope you enjoy your stay.

Detective Juno Steel is looking for a killer, and he’s in the right place. Locked in the basement of a Triad restaurant, Juno and Special Agent Rex Glass have dozens of killers to choose from – thugs and waiters and middle-managers, all taking turns pummeling them. It should be pretty easy to pick out their culprit… if they can make it out alive.

Juno Steel has had a lot of clients in his time, high-profile and low. But when he’s called in to investigate the murder of Croesus Kanagawa, head of the Kanagawa crime-family-slash-entertainment-network, it’s not the client that interests him. It’s what Croesus was wearing when he died – and an ancient curse that hangs over that very strange mask.

Welcome to the Penumbra. Doors open on March 18th, 2016.