5.18: Juno Steel and the Terrible Waste (Part 1)

Out in the furthest reaches of the Milky Way float piles of things best left forgotten: trash, refuse, the runoff and leftovers of a society that wants too much and produces too much. What better place, then, to put an impossible dream: that dead bodies, what we leave behind when we eventually exit life, might start to walk and talk and love again?

The Dokana group has chosen one of these trashteroids as their place to dream this dream. But be careful: it doesn't take much for a dream to become a nightmare.

Welcome to the Penumbra, dear Traveler. We hope you enjoy your stay.

(Trigger warnings can be found at the bottom of this episode description and at the end of the transcript.)

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You can find all of our transcripts here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1OLddnnYamZuglgZc8pM2gqToPOwEBccM?usp=sharing

Transcripts will come out along with the public release of the episode.

On staff at the Penumbra:

Ginny D'Angelo -- Head of Merchandise and Outreach

Melissa DeJesus -- Script editing team

Harley Takagi Kaner -- Co-creator, Head of Episode Development, Director, Sound designer

Joelle Kross -- Transcriptionist

Noah Simes -- Production manager

Grahame Turner -- Script editing team

Kevin Vibert -- Co-creator, Head of Operations, Lead writer

Ryan Vibert -- Composer and performer of original music

Jeff Wright -- Graphic designer

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Attribution: Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.

“Error_04.wav” by distillerystudio https://freesound.org/people/distillerystudio/sounds/327735/

“Designed Sci-Fi Atmospheres - Harmonic - 018.wav” by GregorQuendel https://freesound.org/people/GregorQuendel/sounds/638440/

“Ambience_Sinister_Electric_Cello_Loop_05.wav” by LittleRobotSoundFactory https://freesound.org/people/LittleRobotSoundFactory/sounds/274167/

“Pulsing Static 03 (w/ intermittent noise)” by clwhite https://freesound.org/people/clwhite/sounds/574310/

“March over the desert” by Diegolar https://freesound.org/people/Diegolar/sounds/411772/

“Monolith.wav” by _NOMINAL_ https://freesound.org/people/_NOMINAL_/sounds/124626/

“Fading Clanking” by KodyTron https://freesound.org/people/KodyTron/sounds/641919/

“CN_tower_02.flac” by tim.kahn https://freesound.org/people/tim.kahn/sounds/35540/

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Trigger warnings:

- Sudden loud noises

- Deception and betrayal

- Violence and threats of violence

- Use of firearms

- Death

- Abuse of the dead

- Abuse of authority

For early and ad-free episodes, production scripts, commentary tracks, blooper reels, livestreams with the creators, and much more, you can find The Penumbra Podcast: SPECIAL EDITION at: https://thepenumbrapodcast.supercast.com(In old episodes, you will often hear us mention Patreon, which was our old platform and is no longer live. Please feel free to ignore!)

For tickets to our live reading of If Memory Serves: A Juno Steel Mystery on November 21, 2026, visit: https://therockwell.org/calendar/the-penumbra-podcast/ Join us at The Rockwell, home of our first two live shows, in Somerville, MA, for Joshua Ilon's one-night-only reading of an excerpt from our Juno prequel novel to be followed by a Q&A with Harley and Kevin. We can't wait to see you there to celebrate the release of the full audiobook!

We are also currently running a subscription sale on our Supercast and Patreon subscriber platforms to celebrate the conclusion of our first full season of Thirst. Visit https://thepenumbrapodcast.supercast.com/ or patreon.com/thepenumbrapodcast to get 28% off all tiers!

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