Walking a little way back from the foamy yellow water's edge, toward the grove of brown fleshtrees, Montana- with Vira trotting next to her- came to a flat stretch of brown sand that seemed to have queer signs marked upon its surface, just as one would write upon sand with a stick.

  "What does it say?" she asked the brown-feathered cockadoodoo, who walked along beside them in a rather dignified fashion- if you can call pooping out white poop with black flecks every few feet dignified.

  "How should I know?" returned Cockadoody. "I cannot read."

  "Oh! Can't you?"

  "Certainly not; I've never been to school, you know."

  "You should learn to read, then you can watch movies with subtitles." said Montana; "These letters are big and far apart, and it's hard to spell out the words."

  But she looked at each letter carefully, and after a while finally discovered that this message was written in the sand:

  "BEWARE THE SYMPHOROS!"

  "That's rather strange," declared the cockadoodoo, when Montana had read aloud the words. "What do you suppose symphoros are?"

  "I don’t know." said Montana, walking towards the little rocky hills that stood near.

  "Where are you going now?"

  "Over to those trees, to see if I can find something to eat," answered Montana.

  With Vira at her heels she tramped across the sand and soon reached the edge of the forest.

  At first she was greatly disappointed, because the nearer trees bore no fruit or berries or meat or nuts at all. But, by and by, when she was almost in despair, the tween came upon a tree that promised to furnish her with plenty of food.

  It was quite full of collectible molybdenum lunch boxes, which grew in clusters on all the limbs, each one with a bas-relief logo or icon from a different feature film motion picture. There were lunch box blossoms on some of the branches, and on others tiny little lunch boxes that were as yet quite green, and evidently not fit to eat until they had grown bigger.

  The rotund tween stood on tip-toe and picked one of the nicest and biggest lunch boxes, emblazoned with a "Revenge of the Dork-Butts II: Dork-Butts in Paradise" image on the front, and then she sat down upon the ground and eagerly opened it. Inside she found a thermos full of hairy lemonade, a toasted curry-infused alien feces sandwich, a slick pickle, a slice of scroat cheese, some dried scab scrapple chunks, and a sliver of splonge-cake. Each thing had a separate stem, and so had to be picked off the side of the box; but Montana found them all to be delicious, and she and Vira ate every bit of luncheon in the box before long.

  "I think I'll pick a lunch box for later," said Montana, "and then we'll start out and explore the country, and see where we are."

  "Haven't you any idea what country this is?" inquired Cockadoody the Cocky Cockadoodoo.

  "None at all. But listen: I'm quite sure it's a thaumaturgic country, or such things as lunchboxes wouldn't be growing upon fleshtrees." She selected a very desirable lunch box with a cartoon of the Yellow Yeti smoking a huge hand rolled cigar. The metal lunch box seemed to have a stout handle, and she picked it from its branch. Then, accompanied by the brown cockadoodoo, she walked out of the shadow of the lunchbox tree toward the sea shore.

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  They were part way across the sands when they heard a loud honk like an old-timey automobile.

  “AAA-OOO-GAH!”

  Cockadoody suddenly squawked, in a voice of terror:

  "What's that?"

  Montana turned quickly around, and saw coming out of a path that led from between the fleshtrees a most peculiar creature.

  It walked, or rather rolled, as it had no legs. Its torso was balanced upon a sort of square wooden skateboard and it had bricks in its hands it used to propel itself forward. The creature- naked save a dingy diaper- was hairless and sinewy and had a scrawny long neck with a prominent adam’s apple. Its head was shaped kind of like a flamingo’s but not birdlike at all.

  "Run!" screamed Cockadoody, fluttering away in great fright. "Don't you remember the warning in the sand: 'Beware the symphoros'? Run, I tell you- run!"

  So Montana hurriedly picked up the yipping puppy-dog-shaped yokai Vira in her arms and ran, and the symphoro gave a sharp, wild honk and came after her in full chase.

  Looking over her shoulder as she ran, the girl now saw a great procession of symphoros emerging from the forest- dozens and dozens of them, all rolling swiftly toward her on their skateboards and ejaculating their wild, strange honks.

  "They're sure to catch us!" panted the portly tween, who was still carrying the lunch box she had picked. "I can't run much farther, Cockadoody!"

  "Climb up this hill,- quick!" said the cockadoodoo; and Montana found she was very near to the heap of loose and jagged rocks they had passed on their way to the lunch box trees. The brown cockadoodoo was even now fluttering among the rocks, and Montana followed as best she could while clutching Vira, half climbing and half tumbling up the rough and rugged steep.

  She was none too soon, for the foremost symphoro reached the hill a moment after her; but while the girl scrambled up the rocks the creature stopped short with high-pitched honks of rage and disappointment.

  Montana now heard the brown cockadoodoo cackle.

  "Don't hurry, my dear," cried Cockadoody. "They can't follow us among these rocks, so we're safe enough now."

  Montana stopped at once and sat down upon a broad fleshy boulder, for she was all out of breath. She dared not let go of the wriggling Vira for fear she would charge the nightmarish symphoros.

  The rest of said symphoros had now reached the foot of the hill, but it was evident that their skateboards would not roll upon the rough and jagged rocks, and therefore they were helpless to follow Montana, Vira and Cockadoody to where they had taken refuge. But they circled all around the little hill, so the tween, puppy-dog-shaped yokai, and bird-shaped yokai were fast prisoners and could not come down without being captured.

  Then the creatures shook their bricks at Montana in a threatening manner, and it seemed they were able to speak as well as to make their dreadful honks, for one of them shouted in a squeaky, shrill voice:

  "We'll get you in time, never fear! And when we do get you, we'll tear you into little bits and eat the bits and poop out the bits and then eat them again and poop them out again and we’ll keep doing that forever!"

  "What’s your deal, man?" asked Montana. "We didn’t do anything to you!"

  "Didn’t do anything to us?" screamed one particularly veiny and emaciated symphoro who seemed to be their leader. "Did you not pick our collectible lunch boxes? Have you not a stolen lunch box still in your hand?" His flat, droopy breasts swung back and forth as he screeched.

  "I only picked two," she answered. "Vira and I were hungry, and I didn't know the lunch box trees were yours."

  "That is no excuse," retorted the leader in a loud piercing voice. He clacked his bricks together three times. "It is the law here that whoever picks a lunch box without our permission must die immediately. Sorry not sorry."

  "Don't you believe him," said Cockadoody. "I'm sure the lunch box trees do not belong to these awful creatures. They are fit for any mischief, and it's my opinion they would try to kill us just the same if you hadn't picked a lunch box."

  "I think so, too," agreed Montana. "But what shall we do now?"

  "Stay where we are," advised the brown cockadoodoo. "We are safe from the symphoros until we starve to death, anyhow; and before that time comes a good many things can happen."

  Vira let out a tired sigh, then farted a tiny, squeaky fart that smelled like flukeberries.