In the fifth grade, to make myself fall asleep, I would close my eyes, and I thought up a story...

Mutant Creature JouBi

By Lord Nocato

A dog, resting in its little doghouse, lay outside. She was completely unaware of what was to happen on that very day...

A rustling came from the bushes which separated her master's home from the neighbors. She glanced sleepily over at them, not really all too interested at the brush. A family of pigeons lived there, and they always made it shake with their bird-brained fluttering. Now, if this dog had lived at the house next door, she would know that those birds would never again open their wings in the thorny shrubs, because on the other side lay their corpses, bloody, with the heads at an average of three inches away from the rest of the bodies. The bushes rustled again, and the dog glared, tired, at the annoyance keeping her awake. She stood up, having decided to teach those idiot fowl a lesson.

A few minutes later, a woman came out of the big house, with a bowl of kibbles for the Kelpie dog. "Sonya! Food time!" She called. The dog gave no reply. The woman walked up to the doghouse. Two feet away from it, she gasped and dropped the bowl. Sonya was torn apart, a mere bloody pile on a familiar chain collar.

Panda was walking down the sidewalk, towards the clubhouse where he and his ham-ham friends often met. He was humming a song that his owner, Mimi, had sung to him that morning. A little along the road, he saw police cars and a bunch of cops at a friendly-looking home. Curious of what happened, he went over to the mob of men. What he saw gave him a tingle down his spine. A mutilated Kelpie dog lay out of its doghouse, the chain leash still around what would be its neck. Panda swallowed a lump that suddenly appeared in his throat and ran quickly across the street, into the forest where he knew he would find a tree-entrance to the clubhouse.

Jingle strolled through the forest, seeking a little inspiration. "Writer's block is like a vacuum," he said, running his paw up and down the strap that kept his guitar on him. "It sucks." He closed his eyes, still walking. There was nothing ahead of him for a while, anyways. Suddenly, he bumped into something. Surprised, he opened his eyes to see a girl hamster, with blue-gray fur. She had a bow on her left ear, and her eyes were sparkly violet. Jingle blinked and stared questionably at the character before him. "Even the most clear of waters carries a speck of dust," he said, concluding his confusion.
The girl giggled. "I'm sorry for bumping you," she said, "I was not looking where I was going."

Jingle smiled politely. "Had my eyes been open, I would not have left you unnoticed. My apologies." he said. The girl giggled again.
"You're so silly," she said, "What is your name?" A question Jingle despised answering. But this girl was so amazingly beautiful that he decided to deal.
"They call me Jingle," he replied, a certain magical rhythm to his speech. The girl gazed at him, mystified."What is yours?" Jingle questioned. The girl looked startled.
"Oh... Uh..." she stuttered. "My name is Sonya," she said, an innocent smile spread on her hamster lips. Jingle considered his words for a moment. He then brought his guitar to his front, strummed it once, and said "We shall go see Ham-n-eggs, and his... uh... Bacon-Bacon friends."
Sonya giggled. "That's odd. Bacon?" She giggled some more. "Okay, let's go see them," she said, voice sweet as honey.

Suddenly, a black and white hamster emerged from a bunch of trees, running as fast as his four paws would take him. He zoomed past Jingle and Sonya, taking absolutely no heed of them. Jingle watched him as he disappeared into the forest's depths, then strummed his guitar and said "A magnetic force attracts the spirits of even the house-pet hamsters to the dark forest." That made no sense whatsoever.
Sonya shrugged and said "Let's go see Ham-n-eggs, then."

Jingle and Sonya entered the Ham-Ham Clubhouse through a hole at the bottom of a tree. When they got inside, everybody was in the main room; all fourteen Ham-Hams that Jingle knew, and even a few he could not recognize. Everybody was whispering, as if frightened. Bijou was the first to notice Sonya and Jingle."Bonjour, Jingle. Who is that with you?" she asked. All the hams jumped, surprised at the sudden louder speech. They turned to look at the new arrivals.
Sonya blushed. "My name is Sonya. Nice to meet you all." Everybody simultaneously said hi (Hamha!) and smiled friendly-like at her. Jingle went through and pointed out all the hams he knew, saying their 'names'.
"Ham-n-eggs," he introduced.
Hamtaro sighed. "My name is HAMTARO, Jingle."
Jingle cocked his head. "Right. What'd I say?" he asked. "Boss-man," Jingle continued, pointing, "French-fry, Stripes-girl, Stripes-boy, Scarfy, Spot, Bookworm, Glasses, Texas, Blanket, Sleepy, Hat, and Raccoon." Sonya giggled. The hams said their actual names afterwards,
"Boss",
"Bijou",
"Sandy",
"Stan",
"Pashmina",
"Oxnard",
"Maxwell",
"Dexter",
"Howdy",
"Penelope",
"Snoozer",
"Cappy",
and "Panda".

There were three others that Jingle did not recognize. Three girls, who introduced themselves as "Sparkle", "Pepper", and "Hannah". But Sonya was not at all interested in these last three. She was eyeing the boy-hams. And although nobody noticed, her eyes were no longer her friendly violet, but a terrible, evil shade of red.

After a few weeks, Boss had built a room for Sonya, in the chamber where all fifteen of the usual hams had their own. Her door was next to Jingle's, Boss decided to do that since she came with him in the first place.

Sonya furnished it artistically. It looked wonderful. But the strangest thing lingered in that room. It was a devilish scent, a smell that hung around Sonya wherever she roamed, and a fragrance that made the boy-hams crazy.

Sonya studied the behavior patterns of the boy hamsters. She noticed how Bijou loved Hamtaro, but Hamtaro didn't even understand. She noticed that Boss loved Bijou, though Bijou didn't notice. She noticed Maxwell and Sandy's relationship, Dexter and Howdy's rivalry over who deserved Pashmina, Oxnard's relationship with Pepper, Hannah's love for Dexter and Howdy, and Stan's flirtation with any girl possible.

"These girls make my plan a tad difficult," Sonya said to herself, sitting alone in her room, "but at the same time, they make it so much easier."

"I'm going to go collect food for the winter. I wouldn't want Snoozer and Sonya to starve," Boss said randomly one day.
"Oh, how nice," said Sonya, voice an eerie sweet tone. "You're a kind man."
"Boss! You can't go alone! Let me come with you!" said Hamtaro. Boss agreed, and they were off. "Perfect," thought Sonya, "Here comes part one of my plans."

Bijou hurried down the corridor in the room room. (Hahaha.) She turned a corner and...
"Gasp! Oh, Sonya. Sorry, I did not see you there," Bijou apologized.
"It's alright," said Sonya, "I wanted to talk to you anyways." She smirked at Bijou, an almost kind look in her eyes. Bijou felt uncomfortable about this newcomer.
"Oh, I... I am in a hurry. I must be somewhere—now!" She rushed away. Sonya stared blankly after her.
"Am I that frightening? Oh, dear. Hee-hee." She started to walk off, following Bijou.

Sonya caught up with Bijou eventually, somewhere in the dance room. "Bijou, please. Might I have a word with you?" she asked, kindly. Bijou glanced, worried, at the blue-grey hamster.
"What are you, some kind of stalker?" Bijou questioned.
"Oh, dear! Of course not! I simply wanted to ask you something..."
"What? What do you want? You're scaring me. I do not agree to being followed, you know..."
"I don't know a soul that does." Sonya smiled at Bijou, and stepped closer. "Bijou… How would you like to be part of a new revolution?"
Bijou's eyes widened. She screamed.

Stan had been looking around for a while, searching for Bijou. He figured that this was his big chance. He would get her while Boss and Hamtaro were not around. "It's all good," he laughed to himself. He came upon Sonya, who was coming out of the dance room. "Hey," he said "Sonya. Have you seen Bijou?" Sonya looked at him. He could see she had two blue ribbons on her cheeks. She was sporting Bijou's idea, the ham-ham pigtails. He looked curiously at her. "Hey—aren't those Bijou's?" he asked.
"Bijou and I have become very close friends. She let me borrow them," she said, sugar sweet.
"Oh. Have you seen her recently?" Stan asked, not noticing the odd emphasis Sonya had put on the word "close".
She answered him. "No. I don't think she came today. She won't be around for a while, my guess. Maybe she's sick?" Stan looked at Sonya hard. Suddenly, his face twisted.
"Okay. Maybe. See ya later..." he said, and walked away. When he got into the room room, he started running. He ran straight to his room, sat on the bed, and shivered, in horror. The smell was terrible. Sonya smelt... almost... bad. But not like gross bad. Her usual candy-sweet scent had been there, but somewhat different. Now, it smelt nefarious, evil.

Stan eventually regained his senses, and walked over next-door, to Sandy's room. Sandy was practicing her ribbon twirling, as usual. Stan stopped her.
"Sandy," he said, "I need to warn you about Sonya. There's something totally messed up with that chick." Sandy shook her head at her twin brother.
"Stan, you're weird. Since when do you, like, not totally fall head-over-heels for such a pretty girl?"
"I'm telling you, sis! She's done something bad! I think she did something to BIJOU."
"You're crazy, man. What's going on? Ham-puberty?"
"No! No! NO! Bijou's gone missing. I know it was Sonya. I just KNOW it!"
Sandy's door opened.
"Talkin' about me, Stanny-boy?" asked Sonya.
Sandy gasped. "Hello, Sonya... do you know... your eyes look bad. Are you having, like, allergies? They're totally red." Stan backed up until he was up against the wall.
"Go away. We were having a private conversation," he said.
"It's not nice to talk about people behind their backs, Stan. Don't you agree, Sandy?" Sonya looked towards Sandy. "Or were you in on it, too? I thought we were friends, Sandy. What kind of friend talks about her friends like that? And your brother, too. Did you guys never learn your manners?" Sonya was asking too many questions, and now staking the blame on Sandy. Sandy was overwhelmed.
"I didn't do anything!" she said, near tears, "he just came in here and..."
"Shut up." Sonya sounded mad.
"Sonya-" Sandy tried to say something, but it didn't come out all the way. She didn't get to say anything else. And she wouldn't for a while.

When Hamtaro and Boss got back, they had sacks full of acorns, berries, and all kinds of seeds from the forest. Sonya greeted them, heartily. Boss looked around. The clubhouse was empty, except for Snoozer, who was sleeping quietly on the tabletop, and Sonya, who was standing before him. "I know only a few ham-hams came today," Boss said, "but there were SOME. Where did Bijou, Sandy, and Stan go?" Sonya looked up at him, innocently.
"They left a while ago," she said. Boss could smell her sweet scent. He did not notice anything strange about it.
"Oh, well," he said.
"Zuzuzu..." Snoozer mumbled from the table. "I didn't see anybody... leave..." he said, dozing off again. Sonya glared at him, frowning.
"That's because you're always asleep," she scolded him. Hamtaro looked over at Boss. Boss shrugged. Sonya turned away, and walked to her room. That's when Boss and Hamtaro noticed why she seemed to look different. She had two blue ribbons on her cheeks, and a red one tied around her tail.

The next day, Pashmina, Penelope, Panda, Dexter, Hannah, Oxnard, and Pepper arrived at the clubhouse. Nobody could tell where Sandy, Stan, and Bijou had gone. Sonya said she wore copies of Sandy's ribbon and Bijou's ribbons because she had a sick feeling something happened to them on their way home. "Cats!" said Sonya, "you all know that a cat could have taken them, and..." Nobody liked to think how she would end that sentence.Pashmina was scared.
"I don't think we should be going back and forth from safe places if there's a psycho cat out there," she said, in a panic. "I would never dream of putting Penelope in that kind of danger!"
"Nor would I," lied Sonya, still as creepily innocent sounding as a newborn child, "That's why I think that all hams should stay indoors. But that means you guys would have to stay here..." she frowned.
"How will we get the message to the other ham-hams at their homes?" Boss asked. Sonya paused, and acted out "thinking about it".
"If they happen to make it here, I guess we'll just have to keep them. We cannot risk delivering a message," she said. "If they come, they come."

Well, as you can guess, all the Ham-hams ended up at the clubhouse after a while. Sonya's scent was evil again. Her eyes were glazed over. Her entire mind was racing with extreme thoughts. "Soon," she muttered to the mirror in her room "soon, I will have it done."

Pashmina and Hannah walked through the hall in the room room, chit-chatting about girl stuff. Penelope had just been put to a nap, and they had spare time to talk like mature hamsters. Pashmina was worried. "I really hope cats don't know how to dig," she said.
Hannah laughed. "I doubt it, cats are really stupid."
Pashmina's ear twitched. "Did you hear that?" she asked Hannah.
Hannah nodded. "It sounded like it came from that Penelope's room. Maybe she talks in her sleep."
Pashmina rolled her eyes. "She can't even talk when she's awake. I'm gonna go check on her." She ran back to Penelope's room, Hannah right on her tail.

When they reached Penelope's room, it was dark. Her lamp was out.
"Hmmm..." Pashmina looked around, eyes failing to adjust to the dark. She wandered blindly, until she hit the lamp, and flicked it on. A hamster with a yellow blanket over her was standing on the bed. Hannah stared at the hamster.
"Since when is Penelope so tall?" she asked.
"She isn't," replied Pashmina. "She doesn't have blue legs, either," she said, pointing at the bottom of the blanket, where Sonya's legs were exposed.
"Well, well," said Sonya. "Brilliant observations, detectives." Her sickeningly sweet aroma hung around in the room. She hopped down from the bed. "Too bad about your friend," she said. "Looks like you guys, too. All of you. Wandered outside a little. Acorn hunting? Sure. You were acorn-hunting, you three. Then a cat..."
"What are you talking about?" asked Pashmina. "Where's Penelope?" Sonya looked at her, and frowned.
"Those cats. Man. They got ya, Pash. And Penelope, too. And Hannah. Them cats got ya all. That's too bad. I thought we'd get to know each other. Oh, well." She smirked. Hannah was petrified. Pashmina was about to run, but never got a chance.

"I told them not to go. But they said 'We're bored. We wanna go.' So they went acorn-hunting. Then they never came back." Sonya's eyes were teary. She sobbed. "I TOLD THEM NOT TO GO!" Boss, Hamtaro, and all the others tried to relax her.
Panda said, "It's alright. It's not your fault, Sonya." Sonya smiled up at Panda.
"I think I'll wear a pink scarf, a yellow blanket, and..." she wondered a while. "And, I guess, a yellow ribbon on my tail. In memory." The ham-hams nodded, and she went to go get those three things. She came back, wearing them. She was starting to look ridiculous, but only Pepper and Sparkle noticed.

Oxnard and Pepper were in Oxnard's room, snuggling and sharing sunflower seeds. They soon fell asleep, full of yummy seeds, and full of love for one another. The door was tightly shut.

When Oxnard woke up, he looked beside him, where Pepper had fallen asleep. She was no longer there. Oxnard looked at the door. It was slightly open. "She must have gone somewhere else," he thought. He went out to the main room. Sonya was sitting on a cushion, shivering. Hamtaro, Boss, Panda, Cappy, Maxwell, Dexter, Howdy, Sparkle, and Jingle were standing around her, whispering. Snoozer was on a couch, sleeping, like always. Sonya spoke.

"I warned her. She wanted to go home, though. 'I have a whole bunch of sunflower seeds at home. I'll be extra careful. No cats'll get me! I'll be RIGHT BACK!' she said. But I saw it. I saw it with my own eyes. I followed her, I wanted her to stay. That creature! It's crazy. The monster's crazy. I can't even call it a CAT! It was horrible. I saw her get... I saw it... I..." she was bawling. Boss noticed Oxnard, and his face turned blue.
Oxnard looked carefully at them. "Who is she talking about?..." he asked. Boss sighed. All ham-hams sat simultaneously, with a plop. And, yet still simultaneously, all but Snoozer and Sonya said "Pepper." Oxnard wobbled. He shook his head.
"No... no... NO!" he fell to the ground, fainted.

There were only two girl-hams left. Sonya and Sparkle. Sparkle was urged to stay inside NO MATTER WHAT. She rolled her eyes at anyone who told her to stay. "Duh. Like I would even risk my life like that. I'm way too pretty."

Sonya sat in her room, her eyes burning, stinging. "Such terrible things..." she cried to herself, quietly, "I've been a bad girl. I don't want to hurt the ham-hams. Leave me alone. Please. I want to stop. NOW. LEAVE ME ALONE!" suddenly she stopped crying. "Leave? Never. Don't be stupid. We have almost our full hosting. The power is almost ours. Almost. I can't leave. You're so dumb. Silly girl." For a while, when she was crying, her eyes were violet again. Not anymore.

The ham-hams didn't notice, but Sonya now wore a vest, Pepper's vest, under Penelope's blanket.

The ham-hams devised a plan, to keep Sparkle indoors. She was to have a boy-ham bodyguard with her at all times. They all knew Sonya to have been traumatized by being in the middle of all the 'deaths', so they figured she wouldn't dare leave, anyways. Today was Howdy's day to guide Sparkle. He stayed close to her the entire day, never letting her out of his sight. Sparkle decided to go to the dance room. Howdy followed.

Sparkle was prancing about the stage in the middle of the dance room, practicing her ballerina routine. Suddenly, she stopped. Howdy grew alarmed.
"What's wrong, Sparkle?" he asked her.
Sparkle sniffed the air. "Hiff-hiff. Howdy, I smell... Bijou?" Howdy was confused. Sparkle sniffed more, this time the ground of the stage. She crawled around the stage, sniffing. "Hiff-hiff. Hiff-hiff. I smell Bijou. And Sandy... Pepper, too. And... Penelope! And... Hiff-hiff, Hannah... Pashmina... all the missing girls. It smells as if they're HERE." She looked around at the floor of the stage, curiously. H
owdy shrugged. "Maybe they was dancin' 'fore they all got-" he stopped. "Sparkle. The stage..." he walked towards the stage, eager. "I think the top here lifts up!" Sparkle hopped off and looked at the edge.
"Hey- it does look like it could, huh?" She put her paws on it and tried lifting. Howdy assisted her. The heavy lid lifted off the hollow stage, slightly. They pushed it to a side, and peeked inside. The smell of the missing ham-hams was stronger than ever, but they couldn't see anything, it was pitch black, almost. They went to the other side and pulled off the lid completely. They jumped up on the rim of the hollow, and saw the horror that was inside.

Bijou, Pepper, Hannah, Pashmina, Penelope, and Sandy lay in there; pale, unmoving, mouths sewn shut, hands tied behind their backs with rope, toes sewn together, with blank eyes wide open, staring up as if terrified. Sparkle screamed. Howdy yanked her off the rim of the stage, and they started to run for the exit door. A muffled sound came from behind them, though. They paused.
"Urmph! Hur-el! Oddy!" the sound came again. Sparkle turned and looked towards the closet that held costumes for ham-ham plays. Howdy looked worried.
"Don't worry 'bout that now," he said, "Let's just get outta here..."
Again. "Oddy! Ulp! Hur-el! Eesh!"
Howdy swallowed hard. "Come on, Sparkle," he said. Sparkle looked at him.
"Open it. I want to know what's making those noises." Howdy shivered.
"O-okay, Sparkle. Okay..." he felt sick. Yet, he obeyed Sparkle, and walked over to the wooden closet.

He opened it, braced himself. Stan was inside, a gag in his mouth, tied by his wrists to the metal bar at the top, which is used to put hangers on, in order to hang clothes. The costumes were pushed to either side, leaving room for the dangling flirt.
"Oddy! Hur-el! Ank 'od!" he cried, the gag making speech difficult.

Sparkle and Howdy had taken Stan off the rack, quickly as possible. He now rested on a chair in the dance room, massaging his bruised wrists, letting blood flow into his paws again. "Thanks for saving me, guys," he sighed, and lay down. It felt good, after so many days of hanging. Howdy remembered what he had seen in the stage.
"Stan. What happened to the girls?" he asked. Stan looked at Howdy, his face screwed up, as if it made him ill to think about.
"Sonya," he said.Sparkle and Howdy gaped at him.
"What?"
"Sonya did it. She took their souls. She drank all their blood. The tied them up, and sewed them up like dolls. She told me everything. She was using me to talk to. Because I was forced to listen. I had nothing better to do, being tied in a closet. But it's like... not her that's doing this. Sonya has like, a second personality. A dark side, like, y'know? Or she's possessed or something. Sometimes she tried to untie me, but then stopped, and retied me up again. I'm freaked out, man. She's a psycho. She's gonna kill you all! She said she'd spare me because I listened to her, without even trying to say anything. But you guys aren't safe! She's after Sparkle. She's probably looking for her right now. She's the last one needed to complete her." Sparkle looked scared. Stan continued, "You know, she told me. Sonya's not her name. She killed some dog named Sonya, and started to use its name. She said her REAL name's JouBi, a split-mixed way of saying Bijou. Because Bijou was the first one to..." he paused. He appeared to be looking at Howdy, but Howdy could tell that Stan was looking past him. He turned. Sonya was standing behind him.

"Stan... they've let you down. How sad. Did you tell them? They know, huh." Stan looked timidly at Sonya.
"Oh, well," she said. "They won't be leaving anyways..."
In a way, she was wrong. Howdy and Sparkle dashed out the door.

They ran down a hall, opened the door to the main room, and froze. The other ham-hams were there, all stuck in mid-movement, in transparent pink cubes. Sparkle gasped. "What are THOSE?" she asked.
"How would I know?" said Howdy.
Sonya appeared on the table in the center of the main room. "Ah-ha!" she said, and kicked the air in front of her. The cubes melted, and the room filled to the top with pink liquid, which soon enough started sloshing through the halls, carrying the ham-hams in its current.

The liquid absorbed into the gravel floors. Stan, Panda, Jingle, Sparkle, and Howdy all ended up in Boss's room, coughing the pink water-like substance out of their systems. Sonya walked through the door. "Hello, dearies," she said, "have a nice swim?" She smirked at the five ham-hams. "Sparkle. Dear friend, come here. Please?" Her voice was strawberry sweet. Sparkle glared at her.
"No way! I'm not gonna end up looking like the others! I'm WAY too beautiful for THAT makeover!" Sonya frowned.
"Fine. Then I will come to you." She walked up to Sparkle. Sparkle backed up into a wall, the evil blue-grey hamster still coming. Sonya smiled at Sparkle, so innocent looking that it was scary. She grabbed Sparkle by the neck, brought her close, and did what might have looked like a kiss. Sparkle's eyes became blank, and she stood there, motionless, as Sonya bit her neck, and drank her blood, every drop. Panda, Jingle, Howdy, and Stan all watched, freaked out. Sonya dropped Sparkle. She licked her lips. Everything she did just seemed scarier than ever, now. She took a needle and thread from a pocket in Penelope's blanket, and the boys watched as she sewed Sparkle's lips together, then her toes. She put the needle back in the pocket, and pulled out rope. She tied Sparkle's hands behind her back, and when she was done, her eyes were glowing red. She looked over at the horrified ham-hams and smiled sweetly.

Sonya then removed the blanket, vest, scarf, and all four ribbons. Her blue-grey fur shone with malicious power. She put her paws together, as if praying, and quickly transformed into a human-like creature. It looked like a girl, with bluish hair, except much smaller, only a tad taller than the ham-hams. Her eyes were blood-red, and she wore a scary black dress that covered the majority of her body, other than her face. She had transparent, glittering, dragonfly-like wings coming from her back and her ears were pointed like an elf's. "Well," she said, in the voice the hams knew as Sonya's, "part one of my great and terrible plan is complete. Boys, be kind, and do welcome the greatest evil, JouBi, into the world."