SAT-IZ - Scene 6

Written by Iron-K, 2012

"Hello again!" Alex's claws clicked against the stone-effect floor of the storage area as he approached the wall-mounted camera, turning to address it as he walked past. "Our season may have ended, but while we get all the machinery oiled and the pipes flowing again, we've still got some time left over to make sure nobody's safe!"

The red wolf stopped and leaned against the curved side of a six-foot-wide spherical contraption as the camera panned over to show the room at the end of the corridor fully. "This time, we're using one of our newer machines, and we've already got someone inside who's anxiously awaiting the game..."

The machine was made up of two hemispheres, with a blue bowl-shaped half on the bottom and a clear dome on the top with a wide vertical pipe poking slightly through a hole in the center of its ceiling. Underneath the pipe, a young catgirl with light blue fur stared shyly back at him, one hand grasping the fur on her knee with the other twirling nervously in her shoulder-length blonde hair.

"Sierra..." Alex knelt down next to the tank so that his face was level with hers. "You're just beautiful... welcome to the Industrial Zone!" The feline inside the tank smiled and looked to her feet embarrassedly, squeezing her hands between her thighs. "I really hope I don't end up having to gunge you..."

"Yeah, me too...!" she said quietly, a laugh creeping into her voice despite her shyness as Alex smiled back at her.

"Well, unfortunately it's not going to be my choice - this morning, your fate's going to be up to these two!"

The catgirl twisted around in her seat as he stepped to the back of the room and unbolted a metallic door, pushing it open and stepping aside. As he held his hand out, another kitten stepped through, the same color but slightly younger than Sierra. She grinned as she made eye contact with the girl in the sphere, then bounced forwards, tugging her partner forward eagerly - she was followed by a dark pink-furred platypus with brown hair tied into two tails that came down to her chest.

Alex came forward behind the two girls and put his arms around them, walking them forwards to face the gunge tank. "We've got Sierra's sister Dakota, and her friend Hannah! Good morning to both of you, too - how are you doing?" He looked back and forth between them as he got a whoop out of the younger catgirl, while the platypus nodded shyly in response.

"Now, you wanted to get Sierra on here for a reason - what was that?" the red wolf prompted.

The younger catgirl smirked. "'Cause she never lets us have the TV when Hannah's around," she replied, stretching up on her tiptoes to look through the plastic dome at Sierra.

"Hannah, is that right?" Alex turned to the platypus, who nodded, and then spun around to face Sierra. "Sierra, can you say anything to defend yourself?"

"Dakota's got a TV in her room...!" she protested, her hand out towards her younger sister.

"Yeah, but it doesn't have the cable!" Dakota called back. "So we always have to record IZ and wait until she's out..."

Alex nodded, glancing at Sierra with a smile as she giggled and put her face in her hands, knowing this last detail was bad news for her. He walked over to the tank and looked into it as the blue catgirl peeked through her hands up at him.

"So, Sierra, you're not a fan of Industrial Zone, then?"

"No, the... gunge always looks really icky..." Sierra pointed up at the nozzle looming over her head, collapsing into a giggle as she was reminded exactly what was going to happen to her.

"Will you be watching this when it goes out, at least? 'Cause I'm willing to bet all your friends will be..."

The elder catgirl winced, but kept her smile, stroking her fingers distractedly through her hair as Alex turned around to her younger sister and the platypus girl.

"So we know you both watch this show - how do you feel about getting gunged yourselves...?"

"Yeah, bring it on," Dakota answered casually, looking over to her platypus friend, who nodded much more slowly.

Alex laughed, shaking his head. "I think we can tell who convinced who to come on this morning! Let me just introduce you here..."

He turned around to a similar sphere on the opposite side of the corridor and hauled its top half upward, looking between the two girls as they stood on their tiptoes, their hands on the side of the bowl as they looked down at the smooth layer of white foam inside it.

"Come and have a taste..."

He took hold of the younger catgirl's hand and guided it gently to the foamy surface, then plunged it down and mixed it around, grinning as she squeaked. He stepped back as she withdrew it slowly, the white foam clinging to her arm with a thick mixture of yellow and green gunge covering her hand up to the wrist. The platypus took a step back as she giggled at the sight of the slop dripping off her friend's hand.

"How's that feel - want to get your sister covered in that?" Alex asked.

"Oh, yeah," replied the catgirl, flicking her hand down at the bowl a couple of times and grinning over her shoulder at Sierra. The elder sister let out her breath as she sagged, her eyes turning up toward the nozzle above her. Hannah curiously extended a finger and then poked at the white foam, then shuddered and retreated as Alex spoke again.

"Good! Hopefully that's going to happen very soon, but we're going to get you to work for it first..."

He stepped to the side of the corridor, and slapped a fusebox-like protrusion on the wall to direct the girls' attention to it. "The lever to start up Sierra's gunge machine is behind this combination lock," he said, tugging at the box's small dangling padlock with a set of tumblers on the side. "All you have to do is find out the code to let you in - and here's how you're going to get it..."

Alex stepped forward, putting his hands on the cat and platypus girls' shoulders and turning them to face down to the end of the corridor as the fluorescent lights in the ceiling buzzed into life. Just ahead of them, the floor dipped down into a five foot wide channel of gunge, with a thin plastic mat laid precariously on its surface to form a bridge. On the opposite bank, ten plastic booths were set up in a row all the way across the corridor, with a set of circled numbers on the lower halves of their doors numbering them from zero to nine.

"These cubicles are going to show you the four numbers you need. I'm going to ask you both a set of questions, and if you get the answer right, then you can cross this... river of gunge," he said as he pointed down at it, "and step into one of the booths. If you choose a number that's in the code, you'll be let out clean - but if you get into one of the other six... you're going to get gunged."

He smiled as he felt a twitch from Hannah. "Not looking forward to that?" he grinned down at her as she giggled nervously. "You're the lucky ones - it's nothing like what Sierra's going to get if you turn that thing on in time..."

They all looked back at Sierra, who rolled her shoulders and then breathed out heavily, blowing a strand of hair off her face and tucking it back behind her ear as she glanced once again at the nozzle above her head.

"So..." Alex looked between the two girls. "Who's going first?" The younger catgirl's hand shot up, and she turned to face him, bouncing on her heels as Alex raised his pocket computer to eye level.

"Okay! Dakota - what does the abbreviation ASAP stand for?"

"As soon as possible," she said, pointing back at him excitedly.

"That's right - go!" He pointed over at the cubicles, and the cat girl made a jump towards them, hovering at the edge of the gunge channel. She tapped the mat with her foot, giggling as it wobbled underneath her, then propelled herself forwards, trying to jump as far as possible before touching it. She put her foot down near the opposite end and yipped as it dipped down, a thin layer of the green slime spilling over it, then quickly lifted it again as she touched the other side, the gunge dripping from her footpads.

"Come on - pick a cubicle!" Alex encouraged as the kitten looked at the row of gunge booths from end to end. After stepping forward and turning around as she second-guessed herself, she grabbed the handle on the front of cubicle six and stepped inside, looking up at the round opening in its ceiling and then turning around to face her partner as she clasped her hands over her mouth. The platypus held her breath with her as the door swung closed.

The kitten yelped and twitched down as there was a click from the tank, only for the door to swing open as the light on top of it turned green.

"You're safe, Dakota!" Alex called as she breathed out heavily, grinning at her sister with her hand clasped against her chest as she got out of the booth. "Hannah, your turn now - at what temperature does ice melt?"

The platypus removed her hand from her beak and paused as she ran the question through her head again, distracted by watching her friend. "Uh... zero degrees," she nodded.

"That's right - go and pick a booth, and hope you don't get gunged!" Hannah stepped aside as Dakota came back over the plastic bridge, shaking her gungy feet as she stepped back to safety. Hannah put her arms out for balance and stepped tentatively down on to the mat, running quickly across and squeaking as it dipped down, the gunge oozing over her bare feet. After stepping on to the opposite bank, she headed straight for the booth just to the left of the one her friend had been in, tugged it open and tiptoed inside. As she turned around to face the others, she clasped her hands behind her back and hunched her neck down, rocking on the balls of her feet as she waited for the sound.

The click sounded again and she opened her eyes, blinking disbelievingly as the gunge tank opened to let her out. She leaned out and looked up at the green light above it, before stepping fully out and on to the slippery bridge again.

"You're out clean as well! Sierra's looking disappointed here, she wants to see you getting slimed but if you keep this up, you're going to do it to her very soon!" Alex smiled as the elder catgirl wriggled on her seat, looking up at the nozzle protruding down above her. "Dakota, who was at the top of the charts this week with 'Someday'?"

The kitten gasped, and answered then took off towards the channel before waiting for a confirmation from Alex. This time, the gunge-soaked bridge sagged underneath her as she reached the middle, and she waved her arms as she sank up to her calves in the slime, then fell forward and yipped as her hands slithered on the slimy opposite bank. She pushed her feet off the soaked bridge to propel herself out, then stumbled to her feet and ran to the booths.

"Number four - it's a sequence that's worked for you so far, but there are still six wrong booths there...!" Alex called as the kitten pulled another door open, shaking the gunge off her feet behind her as she stepped inside. She breathed out as she turned her eyes up toward the nozzle above her, her lips pursed to blow at her hair, and stared over at Alex and Hannah with a squeamish grin as the door swung closed in front of her.

There was a click as the booth's door closed, and a harsh klaxon hooted as a flood of yellow gunge poured into the tank, enveloping the kitten girl in a dome as she squeaked behind it. As she shifted to the side, the gloopy curtain bulged and twitched, slapping against the sides of the cubicle and painting its walls in bright arc shapes.

Hannah watched wide-eyed with her hands over her mouth as the dome broke away, revealing Dakota with a shocked smile on her face, her hands at the sides of her face to shield it. She ducked forwards as the last of the slop poured on to the top of her head, the brightly colored slime slipping down her arms and dripping from her elbows.

"And Dakota gets the first gunge of the day!" Alex announced, smiling as the kitten girl shook her head, ran her hand squeamishly over her slimy hair, and pushed the door of the cubicle open. "Come back over here - I think Sierra enjoyed that..."

He looked over his shoulder at the laughing cat girl, who clapped her hands together as her dripping sister stepped out of the gunge tank, drizzles of yellow slime slithering down from her hair and shoulders. Hannah giggled from behind her clasped hands as Dakota nudged the soggy bridge aside and dipped the toes of one foot into the gunge, eeping as the thick surface rippled lazily around her. Sinking up to her knee, she yelped as she lost her balance and quickly brought her other foot forward to stand in the middle of the slime channel.

"Hannah, it's your turn - that could happen to you!" Alex quickly flipped to another question as the platypus distractedly glanced between him and the kitten wading her way back towards them. "In music, how many notes are there in a major scale?"

"Um..." Hannah hesitated, looking unsurely between him and the dripping kitten girl struggling back on to the bank.

"It's called an octave for a reason..."

"Oh, eight!" she called out before Alex had finished his prompt.

"Yes!" He clapped his hands together, and the platypus quickly sat down on the edge of the gunge channel and shuddered as she dipped both her feet into the gloop at once, smiling back at her friend as she quickly waded through it and crawled on to the other side. With a glance at the gunge-painted door of the tank that the catgirl had just been inside, she dashed over to the eighth cubicle, tugging it open a little and slipping through the opening. Shuffling her feet as she waited for the door to close in front of her, she squeezed her eyes closed with her hands balled near her mouth, hunching her shoulders up.

The gunge tank closed, and she cringed down, drumming her feet on the floor as she waited. After a couple of seconds, it clicked and opened again.

"Picking the cubicle that matched your answer paid off, Hannah - you're still clean!" Alex called over to her, and she opened her eyes, her mouth hanging open in a smile as she stepped out of the cubicle, pointing down at her gunge-coated feet.

"Well, yeah, apart from those," he continued as he watched her step down into the slime river. "But if Dakota gets this last booth, you're going to leave with just your feet wet..."

He turned to the kitten, who pushed her hand through her slimy hair and stuck her tongue out in mock disgust as she listened to the question. Answering unsurely, she sagged as Alex shook his head.

"No, I'm sorry... you might be going straight back across there, Hannah," he said as he turned to the pink platypus girl, who stood knee-deep in the gunge river as he read the next question out to her. She answered breathlessly but confidently, and spun around to face the booths, the gunge swirling around her legs as she turned.

"Booth three this time..." Alex announced as she clambered out of the slime and stumbled toward another of the cubicles, tugging it open a little and squeezing herself through the gap. "I know you've been lucky so far, but remember this time you've got a five in six chance that it's going to gunge you..."

The platypus nodded, closing her eyes and hunching her shoulders, shaking in a giggle as the door clicked closed. She cringed as the siren rang, and let out a shriek as a flood of dark green gunge dropped from the hole in the ceiling to splatter out over her.

Hannah wriggled and squirmed underneath the slimy downpour as streams of the heavy liquid slumped over her face and dripped down either side of her bill, dripping off her chin and spattering the front of her swimsuit top. Leaning forward and wiping her eyes, she put her hand out on to the door of the tank and shook her head, blinking her eyes open and sharing a grin with her friend as the ooze glooped and slithered down her back.

As the downpour of slime broke into a blobby rain behind her, the gunge tank unlocked again and Hannah pushed the door open, shaking her slimy hands as she looked down at the fingers of green gunge creeping down her pink fur. As Dakota answered another question from Alex, Hannah stepped down into the gunge channel again, and squeaked as she was splashed by Dakota jumping in from the other side on her way back to the booths.

The platypus dipped a hand into the gunge and splashed it back towards the catgirl as she crawled up on to the other bank, then felt behind her to grasp the inflatable border of the channel, sitting down on it breathlessly as Dakota stood in front of the booths. The lights on the three on the left were still off, along with the ones on numbers seven and nine on the other end of the row. After shifting her weight from foot to foot for a couple of seconds, she leapt for the cluster on the left and tugged open the door of booth number one.

"Okay, Dakota - you've still not got the best chance but you might be lucky...!" Alex called as the booth's door closed on the catgirl, but his last word was drowned out as the alarm hooted again. The kitten girl flinched down with a grin just before a column of green slime poured down from the ceiling, bulging out into a dome as it splurged off her head.

Sierra watched with a grin from the round gunge machine as her sister squirmed underneath the sloppy dome, putting her hands out on to the sides of the slime booth for balance as the gloopy downpour thinned out. Straightening her bowed head as the brightly colored column slowed to a drizzle, she shook herself, sending thick dollops of gunge splattering out from her messy hair. She looked down at the green gunge mingling with the bright yellow stuff on her fur as her shoulders shook in a squeamish laugh, before pushing the door open and stepping out of the booth.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Dakota... maybe Hannah can finish this! A one in four chance, now..." Alex leaned down to the platypus girl, who was still sitting with her feet dangling in the gunge. "Which corner of a phone keypad has the number three?"

The platypus girl fiddled with one of the slimy tails of her hair as she thought. "Top right," she answered, already getting to her feet. She smiled as Alex nodded and dragged her foot forward under the channel of thigh-deep gunge, but squeaked as it slipped out from under her. Waving her arms wildly, she slithered across the channel for a few inches before collapsing sideways with a shriek, a thick splatter of gunge billowing up around her as she splashed into it on all fours.

The kitten quickly slithered down into the green stuff beside her and put a hand on her friend's shoulder, helping the gunge-coated platypus up into a kneeling position and standing back as she slowly got to her feet again. Thick strings of the stuff slipped from her pink fur as she straightened, pouring in curtains back into the channel and leaving the front of her swimsuit painted completely in deep green. She stretched her arms out to the sides and flicked them, sending a wave of slime down into the channel and making Dakota step a little back from her, then wiped her chin with a grimace as she looked back at Alex.

The red wolf grinned and pointed over at the spherical gunge tank, where Sierra was clapping her hands together delightedly, and her long hair spilled over her face as she doubled over, her shoulders shaking in laughter. After a moment, she peeked up above the rim of the lower half of the sphere again, covering her mouth in an attempt to disguise her huge grin as she looked out at the messy girls.

"I'm going to give you a free pass, too, Dakota..." Alex called as Hannah brushed down the front of her top, turning around and wading through the slime towards the cubicles. "Go on, find that last number and get Sierra back for laughing at you!"

Hannah put her hands down on the opposite bank, the green gunge dripping slowly off her fur as she slipped forward and scrambled up the other side, the inflatable surface buckling down under her knees. As she hauled herself out, Dakota scrambled up next to her, helping her up to stand on the opposite bank together. After a moment of whispering to each other, Hannah pointed at the pair of gunge tanks on the right, and the two of them dashed towards them, opening their doors at the same time and stepping inside.

"Seven and nine - you've got a fifty-fifty chance of one of these being right, but at least one of you is getting gunged..." The girls turned around and nodded as the booth doors closed in front of them, Dakota looking up into the nozzle above her and wiping green gunge off her forehead. In the other cubicle, Hannah grinned nervously, hunching her shoulders up and looking to the floor as she clasped her hands behind her back, swinging herself a little from side to side.

The gunge alarm blared as the booth doors clicked shut, and Sierra whooped and raised her arms in the air as both girls were enveloped by domes of slime. Dakota yelped and ducked her head out of the sudden downpour of orange slop, shaking her head as the gunge bulged out around her and reaching up to wipe drips of the stuff off her face. With a squeamish grin, she turned her head to her partner, who was standing underneath a flood of yellow slime, her hands clasped on top of her head with her shoulders hunched, giggling helplessly as the ooze slithered down her arms and dripped in long strings from the tips of her elbows. She gasped, rolling her shoulders as two streaks of slippery goo spilled around them, forming thick yellow stripes across her green-stained swimsuit.

"Just pick again!" Alex called across the channel with a wave of his hand as the girls opened their booth doors and stepped out, grinning at the sight of each other dripping with fresh gunge. "There's just one right and one wrong one still there..."

Hannah was the first to dash along the row of booths and stepped up to open the door of cubicle two, but Dakota caught her arm as she dashed past. Letting the handle go as Dakota pointed at the booth at the far left side, she stumbled as she moved to keep up with the kitten girl as she headed towards booth zero. Dakota reached forward and her hand slithered off the door's handle, but she opened it on the second attempt, and propped the door open with her elbow as she turned around and pulled Hannah inside with both hands.

"Or you could do that!" Alex laughed. "You'll know the last number either way..."

Dakota glanced up at the nozzle above them as she grasped her friend's shoulders, positioning the two of them right under it before she wrapped her arms around the platpus in a hug. Hannah tentatively returned the embrace, burying her face in the kitten girl's shoulder as Dakota stared up into the gunge chute with a breathless smile.

The booth clicked closed and Dakota hunched down as well, just before the light above the tank came on with a soft bell noise. After a second, both the girls looked up again as the door unlocked and drifted back open.

"That's it - you've got all four of them!" called Alex. "Now get back over here and get this thing started..."

He turned and smiled at the elder catgirl in the sphere next to him as she looked up at him with a nervous grin, combing her hands up through her long hair with a shudder as she watched her sister and Hannah jump down into the gunge channel. After they waded across hand in hand, Dakota scrambled out on to the surface next to her sister and dipped down to help the platypus crawl up after her. Sierra looked on, occasionally glancing to the pipe above her head as Alex beckoned the two of them over to the box on the wall.

"So it's all yours... dial in that code and open it up..." Alex stepped back as the gungy kitten girl stretched up to the combination lock, her slippery fingers turning the tumblers as she looked over her shoulder at the booths. Still brushing slime out of her hair, Hannah grinned and came forward to look as the lock clicked open, and the catgirl dropped it to the floor and swung the box open to reveal a large lever with caution tape wrapped around its handle.

"Go on, pull the switch - Sierra, you've had a great seat so far but now it's your turn!" The elder catgirl cringed and nodded, closing her eyes and squeezing her hands between her thighs as Dakota stretched up to grasp the lever. Hannah clasped her hand over Dakota's as the kitten tugged the lever down, then yelped as a jet of special effect smoke burst from the box as the handle clicked into place.

Sierra bit her lip, letting out a small squeak as the noise of a siren rose up around her. She opened one eye and quickly closed it again as red lights began to pulse on and off around the edges of the gunge machine, drumming her feet on the floor as she tensed up and rolled her shoulders. Suddenly a repeating alarm blared above the siren, there was a click from the nozzle above her, and she was enveloped by a dome of yellow gunge from the overhead pipe.

The blue catgirl's face burst out of the downpour as she leaned forward, a look of shock on her face as the cold gloop continued to pour on to the back of her head and neck, rebounding out in a cape behind her. Carefully, she brought her hand up to wipe a streak of slime off her muzzle with its back, her face framed by two streams of brightly colored gunge pouring off her head and down into her lap. Stripes of the slime began to creep over her shoulders as she shook them in a giggle, her shocked expression gradually turning into an open-mouthed smile as the smooth heavy liquid coated her.

She yelped as a wave of orange slop spewed at her from nozzles around the edges of the tank, mixing into the yellow stuff as it splattered to the floor and beginning to fill the sphere up. Sierra put her hands out in front of her instinctively, a huge orange splash rebounding out from them as she ducked back into the gungy downpour from above. The slippery goo poured over her, her ears just visible twitching on the edge of the yellow cascade as she raised her legs out of the foot-deep gunge bath, wriggling her toes as the slime squished between them.

Dakota bounced on her feet as she watched her sister squirming in the gunge machine, her outline gradually becoming visible again as the yellow and orange slime began to ease off. As it slowed to a thin column, the dome over Sierra gradually folded inwards and she ducked forward again, her hair hanging in front of her face and painted in a smooth helmet of bright gunge. Blobs of the stuff slithered down from the top of her head and dripped off the end of her hair, glooping on to the surface of the gunge that had reached up to her lap.

Sierra raised two fingers squeamishly to her hair as the gunge continued to rain down in drizzles from the edges of the pipe above her, then hooked them under and parted it like curtains, tucking it behind her ears with a ticklish grimace. Looking down at her slime-covered hands, she rubbed the gunge between her fingers, her shoulders twitching up and down in a squeamish laugh as the yellow ooze slithered over her. Suddenly a second burst spewed from the nozzle, this time pouring ribbons of green slime out around her from sprayers on the sides of pipe, and Sierra squeaked and clasped her hands to her head as they splashed into the gunge bath around her, forming wells in the surface with the color swirling out from them.

Dakota and Hannah stepped back a little, the platypus covering her smile nervously, as the level of gunge in the spherical tank reached Sierra's tummy. After a few seconds, the diagonal streams of slime slowly folded inwards, and Sierra gasped as they headed towards her. As she hunched down they converged over her, turning into a gloopy cascade over the squirming catgirl, splashing off her head and shoulders and bursting into wide curtains as they rebounded off her soaked, slimy fur.

The alarm gave a last blare and the mechanical whine in the background began to wind down, leaving a thick glooping noise as the gunge poured over the cringing catgirl and slid down her to join the slowly rippling green and yellow surface of the slime surrounding her. She slipped her hands under her fringe to lift her hair out of her face, and looked out at the group watching her with an embarrassed grin, squirming her shoulders up as the ooze slowed to a drizzle and broke into a rain of slimy green strings from the edges of the pipe.

"That was incredible!" Alex called above the cheering of the two girls beside him, leaning around a splatter of gunge on the plastic to look at Sierra. "Are you okay in there?"

The catgirl exhaled breathlessly as she looked back at him with a shocked smile, wringing out her gungy hair behind her head and grinning through the slop dripping down her face as rivulets of the slime trickled from her elbows. She gave a laughing squeak as she ran her hand through her hair and the collected gunge slithered down her back. Her blue fur was almost completely covered in a sickly mixture of yellow and green, with her face splattered with the orange gunge that had got her from the front. She wiped her chin with the back of her hand as long strings of slime dripped from it on to her lap and the front of her soaked swimsuit top.

"Dakota and Hannah..." Alex turned and crouched to speak to the younger girls again, who had their eyes fixed on Sierra as she squeezed the gloop from her hair and fur. "You're looking kind of colorful yourselves, but... was it worth it to gunge your sister?"

"Definitely," the still-breathless catgirl grinned, wiping across the mixed colors of slime clinging to her forehead. The platypus nodded beside her, looking down at her dripping fur with a squeamish smile.

"And as for you, Sierra..." The red wolf straightened up again, looking through the clear plastic of the sphere into the gunge-filled tank, and smiling at the slimy catgirl in the middle of it. She grinned back at him squeamishly, leaning forward out of the strings of dripping gunge with her shoulders hunched. "Even though you ended up like this, did you enjoy seeing these two getting covered?"

"Oh, yeah," she nodded. She reached up and grabbed her flattened ears, wringing slime out of the short fur on them before straightening them again, then giggling helplessly as she looked down at her gungy hands.

"Perfect," he grinned, turning away as the gunge machine poured another streak of yellow slime on to Sierra's head, making her twitch as she hunched her shoulder, picking her slimy hair off her face. "We're going back up to the studio - but if you want to see someone else end up like this, just give us a call..."