CLEANUP CREW - Episode 2

Written by Iron-K in 2013

Dalziel walked out across the dark studio floor, staring at the back of Uma's swimming costume to distract himself as she walked eagerly in front of him among the scaffolding strewn about the backstage area. As they reached the back wall of the large set constructed in the middle of the studio, she half-turned with a grin and caught his arm, speeding up as she moved to catch up with the member of the studio staff who was leading them around to its side. He flattened his long ears against his head as he heard the murmur coming from the audience stands, reminding him that after three rounds of auditions and rehearsals, this was going to be the real thing.

He nearly bumped into Uma as the black mouse in front of them suddenly stopped, turning around and flicking the switch to turn off his flashlight. They were now standing at the side of the Cleanup Crew set in between two support braces, next to a shallow set of steps leading up to an entrance with a heavy plastic curtain across it.

"Okay, you two, this is it!" The tall mouse crouched down so that his face was level with the two of them as he gave them a friendly grin, his white teeth showing up starkly in the dim light. "How are you feeling - a little nervous?"

Dalziel began to stutter out an answer as his girlfriend shrugged, but jumped as he heard a swell from the audience stands behind him followed by the voice of Rish, the show's host, amplified through the speakers.

"I'll take that as a 'yes'," the mouse continued, his smile unwavering. "Remember - you'll forget all about the audience once you're in there. Have you decided who's going in first?"

"Yeah, me," Uma replied, stretching up on her toes and then dropping back.

"All right! So, we're going to run you straight into the first game - when the signal goes off, just bolt in there and it'll be the same as at the practice. With just one major difference," he grinned. Dalziel nodded along with Uma, feeling a tingle at the back of his neck as he looked towards the curtained entrance.

"We're just going to do a last camera check, then he'll give the audience a countdown," the mouse said, pointing out towards the front. "That's your cue to go in - Jez is going to keep an eye on you and make sure you're ready..."

He stuck his finger and thumb in his mouth and whistled, making a nearby stagehand look up. The mouse pointed down at the two contestants, and the other crew member nodded distractedly then returned to wheeling a large opaque liquid container over to the back of the set as the mouse dashed off towards the audience.

Dalziel watched him go and exhaled deeply, looking vaguely around as he searched for something to say. He turned back to where Uma had been standing and saw her sneaking a look through the curtain across the set entrance. She poked one arm through as well to wave to the audience, then withdrew again, a huge grin on her face as she jumped off the low step.

"The gunge vat looks even bigger than it does on TV!" she cackled as she clasped her hands together. "I can't wait to see Rachel when she lays her eyes on that..."

"Heh..." Dalziel fumbled as he tapped his hands on his thighs, looking towards the curtain again but deciding not to risk looking and being caught in the audience's gaze. "Remind me again how I ended up here...?"

The blonde jaguaress shrugged, and looked down at her bright green one-piece swimsuit, pinching the waist between her fingers and stretching it out as she looked down at the double-C logo across her tummy. "Don't know," she smiled. "They must have seen that photo I sent and thought you'd be great to tease!"

"Yeah, they got that right..." He breathed out, bouncing on his heels a little.

"And you know you wouldn't have got to see these for months if you hadn't come on with me!" Uma reached up to the top of her swimsuit, and Dalziel's eyes widened as she yanked it down the way.

"Uma...!" His fur bristled as she grinned, shaking her chest at him with most of her cleavage exposed, and he stepped sideways to make sure that he was between her and the audience. "People'll see you..." He glanced over his shoulder towards the tiered seating, with a few figures visible on the end of the row.

"Oh, they're not watching us just now - besides, they're going to see more of you...!"

Dalziel spread his arms and looked down at his shorts, the same green as Uma's swimming costume, which were the only thing covering any of his mottled black and white fur. He sucked his tummy in a little, adjusting the waistband of his swimwear uncomfortably. "Maybe I should have gone a size bigger..." he muttered.

"Hey, stop worrying - at least they're not going to fall off in front of the audience while you're running around!" Uma giggled as she turned him around, grabbing his tail and adjusting it through the back of his shorts. "Hah, wouldn't that be embarrassing..."

"Yes..." Dalziel agreed, trying to chase the thought out of his head immediately. He looked down at his feet, tapping them against the rubber matting that had been laid out on the floor as he tried to think of something else to say to distract himself, then looked up and caught sight of Rish, the squirrel that hosted the show, walking to the front of the set. The orange squirrel had been one of the hosts on a long-running pop-science show before starting to host Cleanup Crew as well, and Dalziel had to do his best to ignore how odd it still seemed seeing him in front of him in real life. "Do you think he'll say my name right?" he asked, nodding towards him.

"Bunny, nobody says your name right," the jaguaress smiled, stretching a hand forward to ruffle his scruffy headfur as he turned back towards her, twitching his nose agitatedly. "U - M - A," she spelled out as she wrote the letters in the air with her other hand. "Three letters, and I need every one of 'em! Yours... your parents just shoved any old stuff in there..."

"It's not like they just made it up!" he protested. "My dad's old school was called Dalziel, after..."

"Yeah," she interrupted him, "But anyone who wasn't alive three hundred years ago?"

Dalziel spluttered as she grinned, then she suddenly came forwards.

"Shh." She put her hands on his shoulders, her ears perking as she heard Rish's voice begin a countdown, and at the same moment he realized she'd been teasing to take his mind off the wait. As the audience joined in, beginning to punctuate each count with a clap, she linked arms with him and turned sharply towards the entrance, and he scrambled to stand beside her.

"You remember what we're doing?" she hissed excitedly.

"Just about..." Dalziel nodded as he tried to pull himself together, squeezing her hand and glancing to his side as the stagehand from before rushed around from the back of the set, nodding and standing off to the side as he saw they were ready.

Uma bounced on her heels and gave him a kiss on the forehead, getting a smile from him as the countdown finished. Suddenly the sound of an air horn filled the studio, and the same instant, Uma let go of his hand and bolted through the plastic curtain in front of them.

Dalziel held his breath and caught the curtain as it flapped back towards him, blinking in the sudden light as he stumbled his way on to the set. He was on the right-hand side of a large yellow inflatable arena, about thirty yards from side to side, with the front open to face the audience and a small solid platform running along the opposite end at the back. What made it different from the practice sessions they'd been to before were the five-foot-wide channels of mixed green and orange gunge, one dividing the set in two down the middle and the other running across it near the front to form a T shape. As he bounced unsteadily towards his spot, thankful for not being able to see the audience for the glow of the lights on the ceiling rack, he swallowed as he stared at the huge circular pool of the stuff at the point where the channels met. Its surface shifted slightly at every movement of the blowup surface nearby, leaving a film of opaque slime on the yellow banks surrounding it.

He looked up to the back of the set, where Uma was climbing up the last of a set of three large padded steps that led to a raised platform in the middle of the back wall, accompanied on the opposite side by Raph on the orange team, a young orange and white papillon canine with large ears that bounced as he hopped his way up his side with both hands. The two of them reached the top of the pile together, and Dalziel flinched as they both vanished behind a wide curtain of deep green slime that poured down from the ceiling on to the top of the ramp leading down into the channel of gunge beside them. A mixture of whoops and screams of appreciation came up from the watchers as it smacked on to the vinyl with a heavy splattering noise, thick drops of it splashing outwards to the sides as huge fingers of the stuff slithered down the ramp and dripped from its edge into the gunge moat.

Awestruck at the sight of the vast downpour of gunge from the ceiling, Dalziel's fur stood on end as the last of it dropped to reveal Uma jumping on to the ramp, her hands out to the sides for balance as she wriggled down the first foot before beginning to slip on the slimy surface. She leaned forwards as she neared the tip of the slime channel below and gave a laughing yelp as her legs slid into the stuff, pushing off the slide and barely staying on her feet as thick plumes of brightly colored slime billowed up around her flailing legs.

Raph slithered down into the slime behind her as she began to walk away from the slide, and he gave out a bark as he stood up and then fell backwards against the ramp. As he picked himself up again and wallowed forwards behind Uma, Dalziel took a couple of steps back to reach the channel running across the width of the set and grabbed the long barge pole leaning on the wall, trying to ignore the feeling of the audience's eyes on his back.

This was a game that they'd played at the practice, with the channel empty - Uma had to find a certain piece of junk among the others hidden in the channel, and to attach it to the hook on the end of the pole he was holding so that he could swing it over to their target dumpster standing over the other gunge river behind him. He glanced up at the screens on the back of the set to see that their current target was a hubcap, then returned to watching his girlfriend and Raph, who were both becoming a little braver and sticking their hands into the gloop to pull out and examine the props beneath the surface.

He looked across at the canine's partner on the orange team, who he remembered was called Gaby - a curvy white mouse girl with chin-length red hair and prominent freckles on her cheeks and the bridge of her muzzle. She was twisting her hands around her pole anxiously as she watched her boyfriend searching in the gunge, and Dalziel assumed she was thinking the same thing as he was - that soon it was going to be their turn in there.

He was jolted out of his thoughts by an excited yell, and he quickly looked towards Uma to see her with her hand up, the padded prop hubcap dripping with slime as she held it in the air. Fumbling with the pole, he lowered it towards her, trying his best to stop it shaking as the jaguaress reached towards the hook. He adjusted his grip as she tugged it downwards, her slime-coated fingers slipping against the dangling hook before she succeeded in hooking the prop on to it.

Carefully, Dalziel pivoted around on his heel, keeping his eyes on the round prop dangling from the hook as it left an arc of thick green drips across the set. As he swung it over the front slime channel he took a couple of steps forward, stretching to tap the end of the stick against the lip of the container and managing a smile at the swell in the noise of the audience as the hubcap thumped into the bottom of it.

A slimy hand clapped on to his shoulder, and he squeaked and turned around to see Uma grinning into his face. "Your turn!" she exclaimed as she slipped around him to take the pole, and dazedly he set off towards the back of the set, moving in a spacewalk-like bouncing run against the inflatable surface.

He reached the giant step set and threw himself against it, struggling up on to the first two-foot-high padded block. Already finding it difficult to climb up with the steps buckling underneath him, he looked over the top of the pile to see the mouse girl approaching and beginning to crawl up the other side. Clawing at the top block, he slid himself on to the summit and began to pick himself up, then his stomach gave a lurch as he looked down the slime-spattered ramp towards the surface of the gunge still slowly moving from side to side below.

He hesitated and stood at the top of the slippery chute for a moment before he felt a dip in the surface as the mouse struggled up behind him. Realizing she was catching up, he hurriedly crouched and unfolded his legs so that he was in a sitting position, then took a breath and then pushed himself off to slide down the ramp.

He gasped at the cold feeling of the gunge on the ramp soaking into the underside of his fur and swimwear, scrabbling against the smooth surface as he slipped faster downwards. Feeling himself beginning to turn uncontrollably, he threw his hand out to cling on to the ramp's blue border, then gasped as he plunged into the slime before he realized what was happening.

He opened his eyes, feeling his heart thumping in his ears as he looked down at himself - somehow he had stayed upright as he came off the ramp, and he was standing knee-deep in the gunge, with rings of the opaque liquid painted around his thighs just above the surface as it wobbled lazily around him. The stuff was cool but not unpleasantly cold under the stage lights, and clung closely around his fur, which would have been standing on end if it hadn't been so heavy with the slime soaking into it. In a daze, he began to wade forwards, the feeling of the thick slime giving him goosebumps as it oozed slowly around his legs.

There was a splash from behind him as the mouse girl fell in, and he yelped as a wave of gunge slapped against the back of his legs. He turned his head to see her picking herself up from a sitting position with a squeamish high-pitched squeak, the slime swirling around her arm as she plunged it into the channel to lever herself upright. He suddenly remembered what he was supposed to be doing, and glanced up at the screen on their side of the back wall, seeing a leather boot displayed there. Turning back to face the front, he began poking around underneath the surface with his toes, gasping as he dragged them through the ooze and revealed vague shapes of the props hidden underneath it as he kicked them up.

He saw Raph hurrying forwards with his pole outstretched in front of him, and saw that the mouse girl had been lucky enough to virtually land on her target junk piece - as she hooked it on to the rod, he leaned over and dipped his hands into the slime as well, eeping as the stuff seemed to suck at his fingers. Moving various pieces of junk aside, he spied something that looked like his target, and lunged for it, his fingers slipping off it a few times before he finally hauled the slippery gunge-soaked boot out of the channel.

Uma bounced excitedly against the blowup surface as she hovered the hook above him, not helping his efforts to reach up and catch it. As he finally got hold of it in his fingers, he tipped the boot over and eeped at the heavy glooping noise of the gunge in it pouring back into the channel before hanging it on to the hook by its tied laces. Already out of breath, he waded to the channel's edge and flopped forwards as she lifted the pole away, wriggling on to the gunge-stained surface as he felt the gloop drip slowly from his toes behind him.

Raph on the orange team's side was already dashing over to the ramp again as Dalziel bounced towards Uma, taking the pole from her as she sprinted over in an attempt to catch up. As Raph clambered on to the middle step on his side, a burst of color erupted from the ceiling as another tank on the lighting rack opened, pouring out a column of yellow gunge that caught him squarely on the head.

Uma skidded to a halt as a roof canister erupted on their side of the set as well, turning her face away as the blue gunge from it broke into a gloopy rain as it splurged back and forth across the set of steps right in front of her. A shocked bark came up from behind the dome of bright gunge spraying crazily outwards over Raph before he lunged forwards, crawling on to the top step as globs of the stuff from the ceiling tank slapped down over his back.

The jaguaress smiled and dodged around the drizzle of gloop still pouring on to her side of the steps as she bounded up them, levering herself up on to the top step with her hands and throwing herself on to the ramp at the same time as Raph slithered on to it. With the slime on their fur making them slip faster, the two of them laughed and yelped as they batted at each other, sliding down the ramp to plunge into the slime channel tangled together.

Dalziel twitched as a wave of goo splashed up from where they'd fallen in, stretching up on his tiptoes to see as Uma stumbled forwards first, her hands out for balance as she dragged her feet through the slime. Raph was still on all fours behind her, slowly pulling himself up into a kneeling position and watching the gunge drip from his arms with a grin. He began to get up, then changed his mind and started crawling forwards through the slime, grinning through gritted teeth and closing one eye as the ooze slipped over his front, his arms sweeping from side to side as he searched.

Uma prodded around underneath the slime with her toes, smiling as she kicked forwards with one leg to reveal her foot, barely visible as more than a blob of gunge. She ducked as Gaby accidentally swung her pole right over her head as she saw Raph holding up another junk piece, then glanced over at him and took a breath before crouching and dipping both her arms into the gunge as well.

Dalziel looked on anxiously as his girlfriend waded through the gunge while the mouse on the opposite side deposited the orange team's third piece. As Raph slithered out of the channel, laughing as he got up and held his dripping arms out to the sides, Uma suddenly bounced upwards, and he hurriedly manuevered the pole over to her to receive the piece of pipe she was holding.

He swung the pole over to the container, trying to take his time even as he saw the mouse girl stumble towards the steps out of the corner of his eye. Jiggling it frantically to get their latest piece off the end, he let his breath out as it finally thumped into the container and nearly crashed into Uma as he turned around, running to catch up as the mouse slid down the ramp into the gunge in front of him.

He tried to stop as he reached the stairs but slipped against the gunge-slicked surface, bouncing against the crash-mat pile. Steadying himself hurriedly against the barrier at the back of the steps, he started to make his way up them, his eyes on the mouse girl as she walked forwards bent over in the slime channel, her heart-shaped bottom facing him as she felt around under its surface. As he crawled up over the gungy middle step, he turned his attention to the ceiling rack, squinting against the glare of the lights to see if there were any more canisters poised to open above him, and yelped out loud at a sudden blare of the air horn, hunching down and covering his head instinctively.

"Time's up!" Dalziel gradually unfurled himself as Rish's voice came over the speakers, letting out his breath as he looked around the set from the top of the block pile, seeing the mouse breathlessly holding up the orange team's fourth junk piece as a cheer came up from the stands.

"Sorry, orange team, you didn't quite get that one out in time - so both our teams got sixty points for the first game, let's get them down here and meet them!"

The canine with the pole scoffed and threw the pole down theatrically, grinning as he got a laugh from the audience, then stepped over to the gunge channel and took the mouse girl's hand to help her to her feet. On the other side of the set, Dalziel caught sight of Uma leaning on her upright pole, laughing at his jumpiness. He picked himself up fully, looking at the pattern of splatter marks that now stained the length of the banks around the central gunge channel, then hovered at the top of the ramp before changing his mind, bouncing heavily back down the steps as he concentrated on not slipping.

A couple of stagehands laid stiff plastic bridges over the gunge at the front of the set as the teams approached, providing a dry way for them to get down from the game area. Dalziel looked at his feet as he walked behind Uma, wriggling his toes and shuddering as the gunge oozed slowly off them on to the the clean bright yellow vinyl.

He stepped down on to the lower ramped surface at the front of the giant inflatable set, and picked his feet up high as he moved through the half-inflated material. Here at the front of the studio floor, three industrial-styled podiums stood in a row - one green, one orange, and a slightly higher and longer one in the middle where Rish was standing between two empty seats. As the teams made their way over to their positions, Dalziel looked up against the glow of the lights, giving a renewed shudder as he saw two large barrel-like tanks suspended horizontally from the ceiling, with nozzles attached to their undersides that were aimed down at plastic seats just in front of the team podiums. Beside each of the seats stood huge clear graduated cylinders that were used to represent the score - a second nozzle on each barrel pointed into a funnel on top of each of them, and each of them were already filled with about a foot in depth of slime in the team colors. Dalziel looked up from them and glanced out at the audience, cringing inwardly as he saw a group of friends from his school clapping and cheering near the front, and almost waving to them before catching himself and looking towards the squirrel.

"Thank you!" Rish called above the applause from of the audience, holding his hands up and then waving the noise down. "What a start from both our teams - as usual, our first game's set the tone of what's to come..."

The squirrel looked up at the slime-splattered set behind him, and Dalziel managed a smile along with the other contestants as he looked down and rubbed the slippery gunge between his fingers.

"The school year's over, but we're back down here in the toxic caves and things are a little different - after seeing the school teams playing the games, a few couples from colleges around the country wrote in telling us they wanted to have a go themselves, and we've got two of them with us here!" Dalziel swallowed as the orange squirrel looked towards him and Uma, suddenly very aware once again of the audience's stare.

"So, green team, tell us about yourselves - where are you from?"

Dalziel opened his mouth and stuttered as Rish thrust a microphone in their direction, but stopped as Uma got in first.

"I'm Uma, this is my boy Dalziel, and we're at Parkmoor College in Silverlake!" She raised her fist in the air and turned to the stands as there was a screaming whoop from a couple of her friends among the audience.

"All right! You're in your second year there - how did you two first meet?"

Dalziel smiled and nodded along as the host fired questions at them, glad of Uma to answer for both of them as his mouth felt too dry to speak.

"So," the squirrel said eventually, "We've met two of you, but every Cleanup Crew team also has a third member that's perhaps a little less keen to be here - Dalziel, who are you two nominating to send to the Gunge Plunge today?"

He stuttered at the sudden direct question. "Er, Rachel, Uma's sister," he croaked.

"Good - let's bring her out!" Rish called, stretching up as he looked towards the right hand side of the set, and Dalziel turned and shuddered as his eyes met with Rachel's in the gloom just outside the glow of the stage lights. She was wearing only a green bikini and was fastened to a large boulder prop, with shackles around her ankles and her wrists in cuffs that were chained together through a thick metal hook screwed into the stony surface just above her head. As a pair of stagehands wheeled her forward into the light, a mixture of hisses, whoops and wolf-whistles came up from the audience, which she acknowledged by splaying her hands and tossing her long blonde hair as she looked out at them.

Dalziel twitched as Rachel was stopped just behind them, and he wondered - not for the first time - about the private interests of whoever had thought up this part of the show as he looked the bikini-clad jaguaress up and down.

Rish moved over to stand beside the tied-down feline. "Rachel, welcome to Cleanup Crew! Uma, can you tell us why you wanted to see your sister like this?"

Uma's grin couldn't have been wider as she stared at her helpless sister, who sighed exasperatedly and then gave a nervous smile back at her. "Well, we shared a bedroom growing up..."

"I've heard enough!" Rish cut her off, prompting a laugh from the audience. "I can already imagine just how bad she could have made life for you! Rachel, sorry if our guest services treated you roughly at all - let's give you a seat here..."

"Yeah, that'd be good, thanks!" the elder jaguaress said back, tugging her chained hands back and forth as he stepped around and reached up to unhook the shackles holding her in place. She stepped down on to the floor, sitting down at one of the central seats behind the host's podium.

"So, Rachel, if these two have their way you're going to end up in the gunge vat - but I'm told you're no stranger to being covered in slime, are you?" the squirrel asked as he stepped around to face her again.

Rachel's shoulders shook as she giggled embarrassedly. "No, when I was in school I was on Industrial Zone," she replied, raising a hand and turning to the audience as there were a few whoops of recognition.

"So just to get this straight, Uma..." Rish laughed as he turned towards the green team, leaning on his central podium. "Rachel's the one who was on Industrial Zone, and you're saying she still needs to be gunged?"

"Yep." Uma nodded without missing a beat. "I think we both know she deserves it!"

"Rachel, do you agree?" Rish asked as he looked back at the elder jaguar, who was already shaking her head.

"No, I've had my turn - you should be gunging these two instead!" she replied, waving a finger towards them.

"Well, luckily for you, we're going to be playing a few games that might get your sister and her boyfriend very messy indeed, so we'll hope to even the balance up through those... orange team, you look like you've got a head start on that!" Rish turned towards the papillon behind him, whose hair and ears were still dripping with the yellow gunge that had caught him on the head.

"Yeah," he panted, dragging a hand over one of his flattened ears and glancing at the slime slipping from his fingers as his ear sprung back into place.

"So, Raph and Gaby are our orange team, and they're both in their first year, taking mathematics at Edenbridge City College - how's the college life treating you both so far?" he asked them.

"It's been good, yeah," the papillon nodded, still slightly out of breath. He turned to his mouse girlfriend as she smiled in agreement.

"There's something I always loved about college life, coming from school - how long did it take you before you realized you were free to skip lectures now?"

"Oh, the first day," Raph grinned as Gaby rolled her eyes beside him.

"And we've got some diverse athletic interests among these two," Rish continued as he looked down at his cards. "Raph's a climber, and Gaby's on the swimming team. Gaby, do you think swimming's going to help you out today?"

"I... kind of hope not," Gaby said with an awkward laugh as she glanced up at the gunge pool.

Rish smiled back at her. "Well, let's meet the girl you're hoping to send for a dip instead - you've also got a sister you're hoping to see gunged, don't you?"

"Yeah, my older sister Gina," the mouse nodded.

"Okay, let's give her a huge welcome!"

Another round of cheering and whistling went up as the stagehands wheeled a second boulder prop out on the other side of the stage - a white mouse girl a couple of years older than Gaby was shackled to this one. Unlike her sister, she was wearing thick glasses and had lighter ginger hair that was almost blonde, but she shared Gaby's freckled face and fur as well as her curvaceous build. Dalziel did his best to keep his face neutral as the mouse was carried around to the back of the podium, smiling nervously up at the audience as she blinked under the studio lights.

"Nice to have you with us, too, Gina - are you doing okay?" the squirrel asked as he looked up at the newcomer's face.

"Er, I've been better..." she replied, looking down at her ankles in the restraints.

"Sorry, let me get those for you..." The squirrel came forward and began unhooking the cuffs. "So tell us, Gaby, what on earth made you want to nominate this beautiful young lady for a messy plunge?"

Gaby whimpered a little embarrassedly, even with Raph's grinning encouragement beside her. "She always called me a tomboy when we were in school..." she started.

"For anything in particular?" the squirrel encouraged as he let Gina down from the boulder, walking her towards the seat next to Rachel as she nodded.

"Um... well, she always used to be on at me for playing video games," she said, her long thin tail flicking as she clasped her hands behind her back.

"What, you think girls shouldn't be into those?" Rish asked the elder sister as she sat down.

"I... no!" Gina squirmed, looking between him and Gaby. "She was just... always taking up the TV..."

Rish smiled at her struggling for a moment, then turned back to Gaby. "Are you still a fan of them?"

The mouse girl hesitated. "Kind of..." she started.

"Yeah - she's the best Starfight player on the team at the net parties!" Raph jumped in to answer for her as his girlfriend looked shyly at her feet with a smile.

"What about you, Raph, do you share this liking as well?"

"Oh, yeah," he nodded.

"Do you win when you play against her?"

"Sometimes," Raph said quickly, prompting a laugh from the audience.

The squirrel smiled. "Well, today you'll be working together - hopefully the competitive streak will pay off..."

He stepped away from the canine and mouse, returning to his position behind the central podium between Rachel and Gina.

"Okay! So at the end of the show, one of our elder sisters is going to find themselves poised above the gunge vat - our players are going to compete to be the ones making either Rachel or Gina take the plunge. We've got two more physical games and two question rounds to play, and neither team's ahead just now, so let's change that - come over here and let's get started..."

He beckoned by swinging his arm over his head, dashing a little toward the side of the set and away from the podiums, before motioning for the four of them to gather around.

"Teams, in each of these games, one of you will be doing most of the legwork and the other's going to have to face the consequences if you lose! And while you're not going to be tipped into a five foot deep vat like your sisters, those consequences are still going to be... pretty messy," he said with a grin as he looked around at the four contestants' reactions. "So we need a couple of volunteers for the first one - who wants to risk it first?"

Dalziel leaned close to Uma as Rish turned towards the orange team. "Can you go first?" he said in her ear.

"Sure," she said, flashing a small grin at him.

"We've got a vote for the girls from the orange team - mostly from Raph, I think...!" Dalziel looked up as the squirrel turned towards him, glancing at the mouse girl shyly flicking her tail, her hands clasped behind her back as she looked at the floor. Her boyfriend patted her on the back, running his other hand through his messy hair. "How about you, Uma?"

"Yep," the jaguaress replied quickly, bouncing on her heels.

"Okay, come over here, you two..." He beckoned to the girls, and Dalziel watched as his girlfriend stepped forwards, leaning towards Rish as he put his arms around her and the mouse. "Feel like taking a seat for the next game after running about up there?" he asked, looking between the two of them.

"Kinda..." Uma answered suspiciously as the mouse girl nodded, biting her lip as she waited to hear what that meant for them.

"Well, that's what you're getting, 'cause you're going in our gunge tanks - come on!"

Dalziel jumped as he said it, watching his girlfriend give a small gasp and then grin over at Gaby, who clasped her hands over her mouth to disguise her shocked smile. As he followed Rish and the girls off the side of the set, he glanced over his shoulder at Rachel, who was enthusiastically joining in the cheering from the audience, pointing at Uma with a wide grin.

A murmur rose from the studio audience again as the teams were led out of their view, and Dalziel could hear activity from up on the game area as Rish showed them over to a small cleanup station, a basin with a pair of glass screens attached to it and a tarpaulin spread on the floor. The squirrel unhooked a hose with a showerhead attachment from a nearby water tank, and sprayed it into the box, flicking his fingers in front of it to test its temperature.

"Well done, everyone - you're doing great! I know that ladies are meant to go first and everything, but we need to get the lads prepared - Raph, you got the messiest there, how'd you like it?"

"That was brilliant!" the papillon enthused, accepting the sprayer from Rish and stepping into the box as he hosed himself down with it, shaking himself as he ran it over his head and raising a hand to catch the watered-down slime as it drizzled off through his fingers. "What is this stuff, anyway?"

"Oh, we just scrape it out of factory drains," Rish replied, then grinned at Gaby's disgusted look. "It's custard and food coloring," he added as Raph swapped places with Dalziel, who quickly ran the showerhead over his feet, feeling the thick goo quickly break up and slide off his fur with the water. "Hopefully your girlfriends won't end up with too much of it on their heads..."

He smiled as Gaby wriggled, hugging herself as she looked down at the green slime coating her legs. Dalziel looked away, took a breath and hung up the showerhead on the back of the screens before turning around to step out, suddenly finding himself face to face with Uma.

"You doing okay, bunny?" she asked, then leaned in to give him a prolonged kiss on the lips, hovering her gungy arms over his back in a half-hug.

Dalziel squeaked in surprise but then relaxed, closing his eyes and feeling how fast his heart was beating as she pulled away. With a reassuring grin, she stepped around him and took hold of the sprayer.

"I bet she's hoping that brings you luck...!" Rish said as he began walking to the front of the set again, and Dalziel jogged a couple of steps to catch up with him. Raph waved at Gaby as she waited for her turn in the sprayer box, then he turned to follow them.

"Keep me clean!" she called after him.

"Hey, trust me," he grinned back over his shoulder.

Dalziel walked to the front of the set with the canine and squirrel, turning up to look at the game area as he saw Rachel and Gina watching. A set of twisting lengths of pipe about an inch in diameter were being lowered on cables from the ceiling, and the stagehands were hauling inflatable ramps and steps around to form an obstacle course beneath them. As they disassembled the pile that had been at the back of the set for the first game, they revealed one of the show's iconic contraptions standing behind it - a six-foot-high clear plastic box divided into two so that it looked like a pair of phone booths placed side by side, with a large covered reservoir on top and a tapered funnel protruding down from it into each booth. The show's logo was painted on the metal backs of the booths - an orange one on the left and green on the right - and two large levers protruded from the outside walls of the device, their handles in the up position.

His attention was suddenly turned to Rish again as a stagehand rushed past, handing the squirrel a pair of round objects.

"Now, we've got a bit of headgear for you both here - you'll need these for the game..."

"Oh, what?" Raph looked down as Rish passed him one of the things he was holding, and he turned it over to hold it upright - it was a mushroom-shaped bicycle helmet painted orange, with a metal wire sprouting out of the top that looked a little like an old-fashioned television aerial, curving in to form a loop about a foot in diameter with a small gap at the top. He looked behind him at the older sisters as they laughed.

"Come on, you happily sent your girlfriends to the gunge tanks - this is the least you can do in return!" Dalziel closed his eyes and squeaked as Rish turned and dropped the other helmet straight on to his head, and he lifted it off to shake the straps loose before beginning to clasp them together under his chin.

As the two of them strapped the helmets on, Rish pointed up to the stage and went over the course that they were going to follow for the next game. Dalziel watched and nodded along, feeling his fur stand on end as he mentioned they would be wading through the gunge again. After the explanation, Rish took off for the top end of the set as the girls were brought out of one of the back entrances, with Gaby collapsing into a nervous giggle with her hands over her mouth as she caught sight of the gunge cubicles. Uma put a hand on her back to encourage her forward.

"Oh, I've been so looking forward to this!" Raph enthused as he watched his girlfriend sidle uncertainly around the door of the left-hand booth. "Don't tell her," he added as an afterthought, turning his head towards the elder mouse sister.

"What? I thought you were out to gunge me!" she replied.

"Well, yeah. Er, no offence," he grinned back at her. "But, you know what it's like... Deel, how long have you two been dating? You must've wanted to see Uma in one of those things at least once..."

"Heh... yeah..." Dalziel ignored the mispronunciation and avoided making eye contact, pinching the back of his neck and staring up at the booths as the girls backed on to their seats inside.

"Think of all those times you've had to sit around in the department store talking about shoes..." The canine looked up at his girlfriend, and tailed off as the squirrel clicked the waist-high clear doors closed in front of her and Uma.

"So I think our girls are just about ready for the game..." Rish's amplified voice came over the speakers as he turned his microphone back on. He moved to stand in front of the booths, but turned and stopped next to the left hand one. "Gaby, are you all right in there?"

The mouse girl, whose shoulders were convulsing in a helpless giggle, closed her eyes and shook her head with a grin.

"Don't worry - it probably won't go off, and if it does, it's Raph's fault and not mine..."

Gaby crossed her legs and rolled her eyes, her silent laugh continuing as she caught sight of the curved nozzle protruding down towards her.

"Okay, we're ready!" Rish signalled to the audience, encouraging a cheer out of them, and Dalziel raised his hand embarrassedly to acknowledge his friends in the first row. He looked back up at the squirrel as he stepped in front of the girls.

"Now, for our second game we've brought out the dreaded gunge tanks - and there's absolutely gallons of the stuff poised above each of our young ladies here." He slapped the large covered area on the top of the booths, and Gaby visibly ducked, putting a hand to her chest.

"But as for how messy you're about to get... that's up to your boyfriends! Let's just go down and meet them..." Dalziel watched as he hopped down from the platform at the back of the set and bounded across the inflatable surface, stepping over the plastic bridge across the side of the gunge channel and stepping awkwardly off the ramp down to the floor.

"Hi, you two - I know it's not a great look for you, but it does the job for this game..." He reached up and flicked the metal loop standing upright on Raph's helmet, and the canine looked up as it sprung back and forth a little. "You're wearing these for a reason - you two are going to be racing each other around our obstacle course here."

He pointed up to the main game area, with the inflatable ramps and stairs forming a course underneath the thin horizontal pipes suspended from the ceiling. "Just hook yourselves on to the overhead pipes and follow those to the end. Remember, though, that if the loop on your helmet touches the pipe, we hear the buzzer and ten points go to the other team - and also..." he announced, a laugh creeping into his voice as he looked at the feline and mouse up at the back of the stage. "More importantly for them, it means your girlfriend's gunge tank is going to go off."

Dalziel nodded, leaning to the side to look at the two cubicles and making eye contact with Uma, who stuck her tongue playfully out at him as a camera operator came in to aim upwards at the nozzle looming over her. The mouse girl in the tank next to her clasped her hands to her head, biting her lip as she glanced upwards.

"To encourage you, when you've gone along all... one, two..." Rish pointed up as he counted the twisting pipes. "If you're the first to get past all six of your wires," he started again, "you can run up and pull the lever next to the other team's girl, which will empty the rest of the tank on to them, giving you a fifty point bonus and leaving them mightily gunged. All clear?"

Dalziel nodded, feeling the weight of the loop on his helmet, and reaching up to get a feel for how far it went up as the puppy opposite him faced up to the game area.

"Good..." Rish cupped his mouth and called up to the cubicles. "How are you feeling, girls - ready to get gunged?"

Dalziel leaned around the ramp in front of him to look as the mouse girl giggled helplessly, with Uma beside her looking up into the nozzle.

"Well, it's in your boyfriends' hands now - or on their heads! Go!" Rish clapped his hands together and jumped away to the front of the set, turning around to watch as Raph and Dalziel scrambled up to the inflatable surface in front of them.

Holding his breath, Dalziel stepped down into the gunge channel in front of him, almost slipping as he plunged in up to his thigh, and grimaced as the cool thick liquid splashed upwards over him. Stumbling forwards, he saw the canine on his left wriggle upwards and crawl towards the first ramp before clawing his way out on to the blowup surface himself.

Carefully, Dalziel crouched down and tilted his eyes up the way in a vain attempt to see what he was doing as he leaned forward to take hold of the rope on the ramp, hoping the loop on his helmet had hooked over the wire. Trying his best to keep his head level and at a constant height, he wriggled his way up the rope on the inflated plastic surface, grimacing as he felt a tug from above his head but not hearing a buzzer. Tilting his head slowly to make his way forwards, he listened to the noise of the audience cheering them both on behind them, then jumped as an electronic buzz sounded.

He lunged forwards and poked his head above the top of the ramp just in time to see the girls' nervous expressions, before a column of gunge poured out of the nozzle above Gaby, slapping in waves on to the back of her head and shoulders as she squeaked and leaned forwards underneath it, her face a picture of shock as the ooze slithered down her back. The jaguaress beside her leaned away a little as a lick of orange slop splattered out from the mouse's shoulder on to the plastic wall between them.

Distracted by the mouse girl being gunged in front of him, Dalziel grabbed the top of the ramp and swung his legs around, bringing his head up. He felt a bump as he straightened and quickly ducked down again, but cringed as the buzzer rang out.

Uma was still giggling as she watched the slime dripping on to the mouse in the other tank, and yelped as a glutinous dark green column flooded down on to her head, splattering out in a circle above her shocked mouth. She quickly bowed her head down and let it splurge in a dome over her face, her arms going up to catch the slime as it slapped heavily down on to her palms and trickled through her fingers.

Dalziel swallowed and stumbled down the steps from the top of the ramp, staring at Uma's gunge booth again as the green stuff eased off, drizzling in two slimy strings from the edges of the nozzle above his girlfriend. She shook her hands and then dragged them outwards across her green-painted forehead, brushing her heavy fringe aside and yelling excited encouragement as she made eye contact with him.

He turned to his left and looked to the next wire, which twisted from side to side on a level, leading towards the central channel of gunge. He watched as the young canine opposite him quickly moved towards him along the one on his own side, taking short steps on the unstable surface as he held his hands out to his sides for balance. Moving forwards and going underneath the wire, Dalziel glanced back to the tanks for a second, and watched his girlfriend bounce with excitement, his gaze dropping to the gooey fingers of green slime trickling down her swimsuit top. He squeezed his eyes closed as another buzzer went off, and whipped his head around to face the front again, doing his best to concentrate on the wire in front of him as he listened to the thick slapping noise of more gunge spewing on to the jaguar girl beside him.

Raph wobbled as he reached the end of his wire, brushing against it and glancing over with an apologetic grin as Gaby was slimed again, leaning forwards with her hands over her cheeks as the orange slop fanned out around her neck after splashing down on to the back of her head. Dalziel looked up again and bit his lip as he slowed down, putting his hands out and in front of him as the papillon had.

"It's a close match so far, both for distance and in how much gunge our girls are getting..." Rish's voice came up over the speakers. "But it looks like the boys are about to collide, so this could get messy in many ways!"

Dalziel's eyes dropped to the gunge channel he was heading towards as the canine sat on the edge, dangling his legs in before pushing himself off, slipping into the gunge up to his knees with a yip and then paddling forwards in the heavy slop to hook his helmet around one of the pair of wires suspended a couple of feet above the surface. Ducking a little and trailing his hands through the slime, he threw himself forwards, touching the wire at its lowest section, and Dalziel looked aside to see the mouse giggling under another sputtering rain of orange slime, streaks of it splashing over her head and making arc-shaped splash marks against the tank's door. Beside her, his girlfriend smiled at Gaby's squirming, her hair stuck together with dark green slime and blobs still running down the sides of her head.

Stepping aside as Raph flailed his hands on the bank next to his feet, Dalziel let the canine get up out of the gunge channel, his feet dripping with a mixture of slime as he grinned back at him and stood up, nearly slipping as he stumbled forwards. Nervously, Dalziel stepped around the gungy streak he'd left and lowered his feet into the river of gunge, eeping to himself as he slowly pushed himself off and let himself sink on to his knees, the cold gunk seeming to suck at his waist as it lazily wobbled and rippled from where it had been disturbed.

Shuffling on his knees, he carefully made his way forwards, the end of his long lop ear twitching as it dipped into the slime. Concentrating on the wire above him, he yelped again as the buzzer rang, keeping his head straight as yet another flood of orange splashed down into the left hand tank visible in the corner of his eye. Holding his breath, he tilted his head forwards as he wriggled forwards to the lowest section of the wire, and whimpered as he lowered himself down a little more, the cold gunge lapping against his tummy. As soon as he dared, he craned his neck up and shook his head a little, squeaking under his breath as he felt the ooze trickling from the tips of his ears.

He wallowed his way over to the inflatable surface on the opposite side of the set, flopping against the other side and scrabbling against the surface to get out as he felt the slop ooze and trickle through his fur. He looked to the side at Uma, who was watching him intently as he struggled to get up. He shared a smile with her and then glanced to the opposite booth as the mouse girl raised both her hands up, grimacing squeamishly as she watched the thick orange goo slither and drip from her fingers.

Treading very carefully in the ribs of the inflatable floor to stop himself slipping, he weaved his head from side to side to follow the next wire, holding his hands out to the sides again and resisting the temptation to look round as there was another harsh buzz, then a squeak and a thick splattering noise as Gaby was covered in a fifth payload of gunge. Feeling a shiver at the back of his neck as he pictured being inside there, he reached the end of the flat wire without touching it, and quickly scrambled his way to the top of the downward ramp as he watched Raph scoot down the one he had climbed on the other side.

Trying to move more quickly, he swung his legs around as he reached the top of the ramp, ducking a little to try and centre the overhead wire in the loop of his helmet. As he slipped to the bottom of the ramp, trying to slow himself down with his feet but with his gungy fur slipping rapidly against the inflatable surface, he felt the loop scrape against the wire from halfway down. The buzzer went off as he collapsed sideways at the bottom of the slide, and he flopped a little forwards to see around the ramp. He caught sight of Uma again as he flailed to get up, her mouth open in a shrieking laugh as the gunge tank poured more dark green gloop down on to her back and her shaking shoulders. Beside her, the mouse girl squeamishly reached her fingers up to wipe slime away from her eyes, then squeaked as another orange downpour flooded down and splurged off her head, slapping on to her right shoulder as she leaned out of it. As he stumbled to his feet, his eyes widened as he saw the puppy boy approach the tanks, having gone along his last wire and finished the course.

"No, wrong lever, Raph! Wrong lever!" the host called through his laughter as Raph grasped the handle at the side of Gaby's booth, making her shriek incoherently and put her hand to her chest gasping in shocked laughter as he backed off. In the next cubicle, Uma wiped at her eyes, dragging drips of the green slime away from them, before looking up at the canine with a defiant smile as he moved around to her side. She kept her gaze on him, sticking her tongue out as he looked back at her through the wall of the gunge tank, then a grin spread across his face as he reached up and tugged on the giant lever on its side.

Dalziel swallowed, his heart thumping as he caught his breath, and then cringed as the gunge tank siren blared. Uma squeezed her eyes shut, a grin frozen on her face as she balled her hands into fists next to her mouth, and both the mouse and canine next to her leaned back a little as she was engulfed by a flood of mixed slime from the nozzle.

He listened uncomfortably to the clapping and whistling from the stands behind him as the huge downpour domed off Uma's head, painting the perspex walls in a sickly mixture of orange and green as it twitched and splattered around the cubicle. As he watched, she brought her hands forward to poke them through the sloppy bowl shape, the slime slipping through her outstretched fingers and dripping on to her lap. Beside her, Gaby gaped into the neighboring gunge tank, leaning slightly away with one arm up as if to defend herself from the slime splattering on to the perspex wall next to her, and wiped at the orange gunge dripping across her own face.

His eyes dropped to the bottom of the gunge cubicle as the siren rang again, and a fountain of bubbling foam began spraying into the tank from somewhere underneath the set, making Uma squeak and lift her knees as two of the jets tickled the soles of her feet. Wriggling them out of the way, she ducked forwards out of the pouring gunge, her head bowed with a mass of thick slime pouring off her fringe as she watched the foam bubble up to her knees. Behind her, the slop spewed outwards from the back of her neck in a slow wave, the colors mingling together as they slipped around her shoulders.

The gunge from above finally began to run out, the wave coming inwards with thick fingers of slime pouring around Uma's neck as she rolled her shoulders. The foam began to bubble up faster, and she squeaked and wriggled up away from it, putting her head back under the sputtering downpour of green and orange, the colors slumping down over her face and dripping around her giggling muzzle. As the foam reached the height of the tank's door, the gunge broke into a slow drizzle from the edges of the nozzle and finally revealed the mucky jaguaress again, completely coated in a layer of dripping ooze with her hair plastered to the sides of her head. Slowly, she raised her hands out of the foam bath and gave a shocked laugh, thick drizzles of the slop dripping down across her mouth.

"Uma...!" Rish stepped forward unsteadily on the blowup surface, back towards the pair of gunge tanks. Dalziel watched, shuddering a little as his slime-covered girlfriend reached both hands over her head, slicking her messy hair back and revealing her eyes as the viscous gunge dripped from her open muzzle and chin. "You all right?" the host continued.

"I'm okay..." The young jaguar giggled, then blinked and twitched as another rain of blobs sputtered on to her from the nozzle, splatting on to her head and shoulders and drizzling down around her neck to gloop below the surface of the foam she was sitting in. She wriggled back in the seat, looking down at her completely gunge-plastered fur as thick blobs of the stuff slithered around her neck and down towards her chest. Hesitantly, she stretched two fingers forward to slip the straps of her swimwear a little further back on to her shoulders.

"Dalziel was trying his best to keep you clean but I'm afraid he didn't quite rescue you in the end... so Rachel's going to be pleased - look at her, she's loving this!" He pointed towards the front of the set, and Dalziel turned to see Rachel's huge grin. As the centre of attention was turned to her, she clapped her hands above her head appreciatively, making her gunged sister playfully put one fist up and shake it as she pinched her muzzle with her other hand to clean off her face.

"Gaby, how are you in there?" The squirrel stepped to the left hand tank, where the orange slop-covered mousette was dragging her feet through the brightly colored gunge that had collected at the bottom of the tank. "I know it might be hard to believe from looking at you, but you won the game - are you pleased with Raph's performance?"

She looked up to reveal the smile on her muzzle, shaking her head a little to move her messy hair aside and twitching as a drip of orange gunge slithered down off her nose. "Kind of..." she laughed as she looked up at her boyfriend leaning on the booth, and she dragged both hands over her head, sending a wave of the slime slapping to the tank's floor.

"Well, I'll tell you how he did - I know you didn't survive it clean, but for getting covered in all that... you get thirty points from the greens' mistakes on top of the fifty-point bonus, giving you eighty for the game!"

As Rish waved encouragement to the audience, Gaby smiled and raised one arm in the air, smiling breathlessly and reaching down to brush away another spatter of orange gloop as it dripped on to her forehead. With his arm out for balance, the squirrel moved back to the green team's gunge booth, watching Uma gripping each arm in her opposite hand in turn and dragging the slop off her fur.

"And as for you, Uma, your boyfriend was a little more careful with you, but... yeah, it didn't work out," he grinned as he motioned down at the opaque foam she was sitting in. Dalziel tentatively walked up to stand beside the gunge tank, shuddering as he kept his eyes fixed on the dripping feline inside it. "But you're getting sixty points as well for the six times Raph slipped and gunged Gaby - happy with that?"

"Yeah, I'll take it," she nodded. She brushed another wave of slime off her brow and turned to look up at Dalziel, and he quickly rearranged his expression to flash a weak smile back at her.

"Okay..." The squirrel turned around, hooking his hands on to both the booth doors and pulling them open as he stepped away. "Girls, we're finished with the gunge tanks - shall we get the boys now?"

"Yeah!" Dalziel twitched at the girls' simultaneous call of agreement, watching the mouse girl slither forwards off the seat, brushing another drip of orange goo away from her fringe and rubbing it between her fingers before flicking it to the floor.

"All right, let's get back down there!"

Rish took off, bouncing down to the front of the set. Raph leaned down to take the orange-stained mouse girl's hand and she flailed her other arm for balance as she stood upright, stepping down on to the inflatable surface. With her gungy feet slithering against the vinyl, she hugged the canine and dragged her hands over his head, making him grin and wriggle himself away.

Dalziel turned and looked at Uma as she hauled herself up from the seat, kicking through the mounds of foam as she came forward. As she turned to face him with one hand on her hip, he looked up from her slippery feet to her face, watching the orange and green gunge drizzling from her chin and hair.

"...Sorry," he started, but completely failed to stop himself grinning as he said it, glancing down once again at her soaked top clinging tightly to her front.

"I can't wait to see what they do to you in the next game..." The jaguar girl shook her head as she reached forward, and he yelped at the cool slippery feeling as she dragged her hand down his arm. As she took his hand, he walked with her back down to the front of the set, glancing back at the bright arcs of slime on the booth walls and watching the colorful liquid still dripping slowly from both nozzles.

"Come on, let's have you down here..." Rish filled in as the teams slipped down on to the skirt of the inflatable area, and Dalziel carefully stretched his gungy foot on to the floor before stepping off fully. As he and Uma took their positions behind the green podium, he watched Gina trying to stifle her laughter as the gungy younger mouse girl stood up beside her, then they all looked over to the squirrel in the centre as he addressed the audience.

"Okay, so we've got the second round of gunge out the way and the greens came a little worse out of it - Rachel, I think you enjoyed watching that, didn't you?"

"Oh, yeah," the elder feline replied, sharing a grin with her sister as she looked at her gunge-soaked and darkened fur. "I'm gonna leave happy even if I get gunged now..."

"Good, well... you're not in quite so much danger of that just now, because the orange team got to the end first, putting them twenty points ahead. But don't worry too much yet, Gina, because that could change very quickly - it's time for a quick quiz, so Raph and Dalziel, please go around and take your seats under the gunge barrels..."

Dalziel looked up at the horizontally-mounted green cylinder hanging just in front of their podium, twitching as he felt Uma give his tail a playful squeeze. He walked around the score cylinder and took hold of the arms of the blowup seat, easing himself backwards and looking at the mechanism on the nozzle of the barrel as he positioned himself beneath it. With a shudder, he twisted round to watch as Raph flopped down into the chair on the opposite side, and the girls took their places on the buzzers behind them.

"Okay, girls, here's how it works! We've got one minute - hit your button if you know the answer to my questions. A right answer will pour ten points' worth of gunge into your score - but if you answer wrongly, the other team gets the points, and the gunge is going to be dropped out of the nozzle above your boyfriend's head instead..."

Dalziel shrank back as he felt the eyes of the audience on him, and looked to the side at the level of slime inside the tall cylinder next to him. He pictured Uma in the gunge tank again, his heart thumping as he tried to imagine the feeling of the slime pouring over him.

"And one more thing before we start - you've each got a lever on the side of the podium." Dalziel looked to the mouse girl to his right as she looked down, taking hold of the lever's handle as she turned to Rish. "You can use that once in this round - if it looks like your opponent's clueless, pull that and she'll be forced to answer. If she gets it wrong, you get a bonus of twenty points and we gunge her boyfriend... but if she gets it right, she gets the points and your own boyfriend gets the gunge!"

He smiled and looked from the mouse to the jaguar and back. "All clear?" he asked, before straightening his question cards on his desk and looking down at them as the lights dimmed. Dalziel swallowed, tensing his fingers and feeling the plastic squeak on the arms of the seat, as Rish read out the first question.

"How many number segments in total are there on an LED clock?"

Dalziel felt his heart beating in his ears as there were a few moments of silence, then he jumped as there was a sudden buzz from behind him.

"Twenty-eight," the jaguaress said, and he glanced up at the nozzle above him despite her confidence.

"Absolutely right - ten points!" Out of the corner of his eye, Dalziel saw the mechanism on the nozzle above the cylinder shift, and he wriggled nervously as a stream of green gunge poured down beside him, filling the cylinder to another mark.

"In the southern hemisphere, which way do low-pressure weather systems turn - clockwise or counter-clockwise?"

Dalziel heard the same buzzer again, and tensed up, holding his breath as there was a pause.

"...Clockwise?" Uma's voice came eventually.

"Yes!" Dalziel finally let his breath out as the host announced the correct answer, sagging down as he looked over his shoulder at Rish. "You had absolutely no idea, did you?"

"Nope," the young jaguar girl grinned back at him.

"Well, your risk paid off there, especially for Dalziel..." The squirrel shook his head. "There are three categories of radiation - alpha, beta, gamma - but which is the one that can travel the furthest?"

This time, a ringing noise interrupted the last word of the question.

"Gaby, this time!" Rish said as he turned towards the mouse, holding his hand out as she paused.

"Alpha," she answered, but already cringing through an nervous grin as she said it.

"She's wrong!" Dalziel looked over at the canine opposite as he folded his ears and squeezed his eyes closed with a grin. "And Raph knows what's coming...!"

Rish raised his voice over the alarm as the nozzle burst into life, and Dalziel twitched as the canine was engulfed in a downpour of bright orange slime. As it domed out over his head, he raised both arms up through it, pumping them in the air as the ooze splattered on to his lower arms. After a second it began to fold inward, and he shook his gunge-covered head, spraying drops of slime outward as he returned his hands to the slippery seat.

As the flood of gunge became an orange drizzle, Dalziel raised his eyes to look at Gaby, who had her hands over her mouth to disguise an embarrassed grin.

"Oh...!" Rish smiled over at her. "That was a confident guess, but a wrong one - don't do that too much for Raph's sake! Try this one - give me the famous quotation by Azetheus on completing the first known science textbook, his Theory of All Things..."

There was a moment of silence, then a sudden thump from Gaby's side of the podium as she scrambled for the nomination lever. Uma dived for hers as well, but the mouse reached it first, producing a mechanical click and a spotlight on Dalziel and Uma as Rish turned to them.

"Okay, Uma, Gaby's forcing you to answer! What did Azetheus famously say after spending twenty years writing his textbook?"

Uma hesitated, then shrugged and looked back at him with a grin. "Was it 'Shit, my hand hurts!'?"

Dalziel laughed but it turned into a yelp as he realized what was going to happen, and hunched down as the alarm went off. Suddenly his head was pushed down by a wave of heavy slime pouring out of the nozzle above him, and he hissed through his teeth as he felt the cold gloopy torrent splashing down on to his shoulders an instant later.

He rolled his shoulders, his skin crawling at the weird ticklish feeling of the heavy slime pouring down his back. For a moment he looked up to the green curtain of gunge rebounding out in front of him, then closed his eyes as the dome pouring in front of his face began to come inwards. He screwed up his face, twitching his nose as the green stuff slithered over it, and shook his head, gasping in a laugh as he felt the slop slide off his chin on to his lap. He brought his hands up to wipe outwards across his eyes, flicking the slippery stuff to the floor beside him, then hesitantly blinked them open again, still shuddering and wiping his forehead with the back of his hand as he felt the ooze slither down from his head.

The host was still laughing as Dalziel looked down at his front, two stripes of deep green slime still slithering slowly down his black and white spotted chest and dripping in long strings from his outsretched hands. He looked back up at the squirrel with an embarrassed smile, laughing a little awkwardly as Raph raised his hands in appreciation.

"I almost want to give you the points just for that answer, Uma...!" Rish cleared his throat and looked back down at the card. "No, he said 'All our knowledge is here forever' - though unfortunately, as we now know, he got most of it wrong."

He looked down at his cards, still chuckling at Uma's response, and suddenly a burst of electronic beeps played over the stage speakers.

"That's a minute gone already! But I'll give you a ten-point bonus if either of you know this one anyway..." he said as he held up a finger. "What is the scientific term for the study... of clouds?"

There was a gasp from the orange team's side and Dalziel looked around to see Gaby lunge for her button.

"Nephology," she called delightedly over the ringing noise.

"Wow - that's right!" The gungy canine in the opposite chair tilted his head up over the back of the seat to grin upside down at his mouse team-mate, who jumped with a squeak as her right answer was announced. "So that's another ten points to you - and halfway through the show, you've gone up to 170 and the greens are still trailing by twenty points at 150... Gina, you still look like you're headed for the plunge!"

The elder mouse sister shuddered as she grinned anxiously back at him, glancing over to the pool of slime in the middle of the game area. "Hey, they've got time to pull it back," she said.

"Well, nice that you're still confident," the squirrel smiled. "How about you two - do you think you can turn it around to drop Rachel in there?"

"Yeah!" Uma called back immediately, and Dalziel nodded in agreement, putting a hand to his brow to wipe away the green slime slipping from his head.

"We'll find out - we're playing Capture the Castle next, and if our boys think they're messy just now, just wait until you see this!"

He pointed towards the side of the set and dashed off camera, followed by Uma and Gaby. Dalziel struggled out of the slippery chair, nudging himself forwards and grimacing as he felt himself sliding through the gunge. Getting to his feet, he watched the girls talking as they headed for the shower box and began to hurry forward to join them, but then twitched as Raph suddenly clapped his arm around his shoulder, walking with him over to the sprayer.

"Messier than this, eh?" he said happily. "Looks like they're really going to get us..."

He pointed up to the ceiling rack at the opposite end of the studio, and Dalziel gulped as he turned to see two large square hoppers being hoisted over the back of the set on crane arms - one green and one orange, tapering down to end in long spouts pointing down towards the game area.

"How much gunge do you think those things can hold?" the canine grinned as he stared up at the approaching tanks.

"More than you splatted me with, I hope!" The two of them looked to the mouse girl as she spoke up, checking the temperature of the water from the sprayer on her hand before aiming it at her head and turning it on, closing her eyes as the thinning orange slime ran over her face.

"Hey, I won, didn't I?" Raph grinned, massaging the back of his neck as he watched the slime on Gaby's fur quickly break up under the water, leaving her white once again. "At least I'm not this guy - you know he's not getting any tonight!"

Dalziel forced an awkward laugh as Uma smiled and nodded, his cheeks heating up as he looked at her face framed by dripping gunge-plastered hair. She accepted the sprayer from Gaby and carefully stepped into the box in her place, her legs and feet still covered in slippery foam.

"Yeah, if he doesn't end up like this he's going on the couch!" Uma stuck his tongue out at him as she ran the showerhead over herself. She turned the nozzle around and sprayed him in the face for a second, giggling as he stumbled backward.

"Don't worry, Gaby and I'll make sure he does!" Raph put his arm around the white mouse girl next to him, who grimaced and squeaked as the gunge on his arm smeared over her back.

Dalziel tried to think of a comeback but ended up just giving a smile as Uma thrust the showerhead towards him. He stepped up into the box, turned the water on and looked down at the swirling slime as it poured off him and ran towards the drain.

"You all right, man? You're quiet!" He looked up as Raph leaned on the plastic shield behind the shower box, seeing Gaby and Uma being led away towards the front of the set by a stagehand.

"Oh - yeah, fine," he nodded, his heart still thumping as he imagined the game being set up on the opposite side of the set wall. "Just kind of nervous..."

"Hey, what's the worst that could happen?" In response, Dalziel looked up to the hopper poking over the wall, and Raph turned as he followed his gaze towards the large orange contraption. He laughed to himself. "Best not to ask, eh..."

He spun around to face him again, bouncing excitedly on his heels. "Come on, you're clean enough - let me get some of this off before we have to go under those!"

Dalziel looked down at his own slightly green-tinged fur, and reluctantly turned off the warm water, handing the showerhead to Raph as they swapped positions. He quickly felt himself beginning to dry under the studio lights as the canine quickly sprayed his head and shoulders.

"So, how'd Uma convince you to come on?" the canine asked, closing his eyes and grinning as the thinning slime slithered over his head.

"Uh..." Dalziel thought back to the morning Uma had shaken him awake yelling about getting a message back from the television studio. "I don't know, it... just kind of happened," he shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant.

"Heh, I'd do anything a hot girl like her asked, too..." Raph replied, slicking his hair back and combing his hand over his ears to dry them. "That's why I'm here!"

"Oh?" Dalziel answered. "I... thought she would have been the one that you had to convince..."

"I think she used to love stuff like this, really," he said. "You know, when they used to gunge the kids on Sat-AM, Massive, all of that. She's just shy, she needed Gina and me to come on with her as an excuse... and, hey, I always wanted to get to play on one of these shows as well!"

He shook himself, smoothing down his fur with his hands as he stepped out of the box, then bounced forward. "Ready to get messed up again?"

Dalziel smiled through his nerves and walked with him around to the front of the set once more. Rachel and Gina were exchanging grins as the stage crew swarmed around setting up two large stepped pyramids of padded material on opposite sides of the central gunge channel, their layers alternating in the garish green and orange theme colors of the set and stretching up to about eight feet above ground level at their peak next to the walls. Looking up, Dalziel shuddered as the hoppers were manuevered into position above the tops of the pyramids, their long brightly colored chutes pointing down to the peaks.

"Okay, Raph and Dalziel - the girls already know what they're doing, and you're going to be the ones in the hot spots this time!" Dalziel twitched as Rish came up behind the two of them and put his hands on their backs, encouraging them forwards. "If you'd all like to take your places just under those massive tanks..."

Dalziel swallowed as he clambered up on to the inflatable area and walked across the plastic bridge over the front gunge channel, glancing back to see Uma being sent up behind him. His eyes were fixed on the orange-painted nozzle of the gunge hopper as he half-crawled up the steep incline of soft steps, and hauled himself over the peak to find himself in a slightly sunken square area where the soft padding formed a seat facing the other pyramid. In front of him was a watergun-like device mounted on a pivot, with a handle and trigger at his end, and a couple of steps below the peak, a set of three green foam balls were nestled side by side in a dimpled piece of matting.

"Okay, it looks like we're all just about ready!" Rish looked back and forth between the pyramids as the girls squeezed into the seats next to Raph and Dalziel. He smiled as Gaby put her arm on her boyfriend's shoulder, biting her lip as she looked at the device suspended above them. "Don't worry, Gaby - you'll be getting out from underneath that thing in a moment, but the boys are staying right there...!"

Dalziel whimpered through a laugh, his eyes tilting upward again, and gasped as Uma leaned in to kiss him on the cheek. He shuddered as Rish began to explain the game to the audience.

"We call this one Capture the Castle - and each of our teams' castles has a set of three orbs they have to defend." The squirrel pointed up to the soft balls in the team colors nestled a couple of steps below the peaks. "It's going to be the girls' task to venture out, down the pyramid, over the moat of gunge and up the other side, to grab one of the opposing team's balls at a time..." He broke off as there was a murmur of laughter from somewhere in the audience, and shook his head as it quietened down.

"Can you imagine how hard it was to explain this game to the kids? You're even worse!" he grinned. "The girls have to grab the orbs and bring them back to their own base. But the boys are on defense - they're each armed with a foam cannon that they can use to make progress a little more slippy and slimy for the opposing team's girl..."

Rish pointed up to the hoppers looming above the peaks. "And, girls, try to go as quickly as you can..." he grinned, "because every time you bring a ball back, it's going to set the gunge off above the opponent's base. So make the most of the distraction while you have the chance!"

He paused and looked between the two teams. "You're going to get ten points for every ball you get into your own base, and a fifty-point bonus for the first to get all three balls back. Everyone ready?" he asked, getting nods from all four of the team members.

"Then let's begin the capture! Go!"

A klaxon blared as the studio lights swung inwards, music pumping over the speakers. Instantly, Uma put a hand on the ridge at the front of the sunken area and launched herself over it, and Dalziel craned his neck forward to see as she sprinted down the steps and into the river of gunge with a splash, collapsing against the orange team's first step as her feet slithered underneath the slime. With some difficulty, she hauled herself out of the gunge, bracing her knees against the inflatable surface with strings of slime dripping slowly from her feet as she struggled on to the first step of the opposite pyramid.

Gaby passed her more slowly as she came down the steps, the movement of the soft material making Uma nearly overbalance as she got herself upright again. Hesitating as she looked down, the mouse girl took a breath and stepped down into the moat of gunge, squeaking and falling backwards with a splash then launching herself out of it again. Dalziel watched her looking down at the slime slipping from her hands with a squeamish grin, then looked up to where Uma was climbing the orange team's pyramid, giggling and feinting to the sides as she avoided the bursts of bright foam that Raph was raining down on her.

He looked down at his own cannon, aimed it down and pressed the trigger, gasping as a burst of green shaving foam-like stuff sputtered out of the end with a hiss. Looking down at the mouse struggling up the pyramid in front of him, he aimed it down and slathered the middle step in front of her, finding that he could fire it in about second-long bursts. As the mouse stepped up, smiling squeamishly as the foam squished between her toes, she let herself fall forwards on to her hands and knees and scrambled upwards, her knees slithering a little on the slick surface.

As she concentrated on moving upwards, Dalziel swung the foam cannon around and aimed the nozzle at her face, but hesitated as she slipped and struggled to get purchase on the slimy plastic surface again. Cringing, he tilted the cannon up a little and pressed the trigger, spewing green foam over the mouse girl's back as she wriggled forward and snatched the first ball from its place.

With his heart beating fast, he watched Gaby flip herself over and shuffle down the increasingly messy pyramid on her bottom as an orange foam-stained Uma leapt across the channel, clutching the orange team's ball to her chest. Her toes touched the first step of his pyramid before she wobbled and fell backwards, hopping off and splashing feet-first into the gunge river again.

Dalziel looked between his girlfriend and the mouse as they both made their way towards their targets, picking their way around the foam dripping from the steps. He caught the jaguar girl's eye as she stepped sideways up towards him, clutching the ball to her chest, and stretched forward to put her hand on the lip of the seat area as she triumphantly threw the ball overhand down into it.

"That's our first ball captured!" Rish's voice came over the stage speakers, and Dalziel looked across to Raph as he gasped and looked upwards. The mechanism on the side of the hopper above him twitched, and he ducked as a stream of green gunge poured out of the corner of the nozzle, closing his eyes and letting out a bark as the stuff bulged outwards over one side of his face. As he shook his head, the downpour got wider, breaking into thick ribbons of slime as it poured out of the nozzle and enveloped him a twitching dome shape.

Gaby yipped and dodged to the side as Raph laughingly put one hand up to defend himself, splashing the heavy gunge outwards and over the top of the first few steps of the pyramid, staining them in thick dripping green. Uma's eyes were fixed on the gungy canine as she lowered herself into the slime again, watching the downpour over him gradually subside and break into a stream of thick dollops. He dragged both his hands up over his face and head, then grinned and put his hands back on the cannon, shooting an arc of foam down at Uma as Gaby leaned forward to throw the green ball in next to him.

Dalziel yelped as he looked upwards, seeing the valve on the hopper above him snick aside before cringing down and screwing up his face. A cold trickle on the back of his neck made his fur bristle, and he yelped just before the stream turned into a downpour of gunge flooding over him. He slipped his hands off the cannon and put them to his forehead as the slippery goo formed a heavy wet blanket over him, twitching as he felt the ooze dripping through his fur.

He laughed helplessly as the gooey splattering noise surrounded him, imagining the slime billowing out from him like he'd just seen happen to the canine opposite. After a few moments, he straightened up as he felt the torrent gradually subside, and took his hands away from his face, grimacing as he felt strings of slime stretch from them, blobs of gunge still crawling down all over him.

He wrung his hands together to try to get the worst of the gunge off, then dragged his fingers across his eyes, blinking them open. His shoulders shook again as he saw he was sitting in the middle of a huge orange splatter mark, the entire sunken area and half the device in front of him painted with the bright slime. As more of the goo dripped across his vision, he tossed his head back, wiping at his forehead once more as he put his hands back on the handles.

Leaning forward to peer over the lip of the sunken area, he saw Uma and Gaby side by side knee-deep in the gunge and both heading towards him, the surface of the gloop shifting and buckling with the girls' struggles to get up out of it. Grasping the second orange ball tightly, the jaguar girl levered herself on to the bottom step of his pyramid with her elbows, then straightened up and made to climb up the way. Midway through her step, she changed her mind, ducked and offered a hand to the mouse, pulling her on to the bottommost step on her knees before turning around and taking off up the pyramid.

Dalziel watched the mouse girl let out her breath and haul herself upright, getting to her slippery feet uncertainly as she held her arms out to the sides for balance. With an apologetic smile, he pulled the trigger on his foam cannon and sprayed the steps in front of her with the bright green stuff. As the foam dripped off the steps of the pyramid, Gaby slithered to the side, moving hand over hand on the step just above her to keep her balance, before beginning to climb the pyramid towards him.

Distracted by watching the slippery mouse, he gasped as Uma stretched over the lip of the peak to give him a peck on the cheek, sticking out her tongue as she wiped the orange slime away from her mouth. As she dropped the second green ball into the gungy pool around him, he looked over at Raph, who had flattened his ears and hunched over, a grin on his face as he waited for the slime. Uma turned and bounced down the pyramid again, raising her hands in the air as the green hopper clicked and the canine was engulfed by another huge downpour of gunge, splattering off him spectacularly and staining the pyramid around him in a new coating of dripping green.

There was a thump from a couple of steps below Dalziel, and he leaned forwards to see the mouse girl on her side, having slipped on the gunge dripping from the peak. Giggling helplessly, she struggled on to her knees, then stretched forward, touching the middle green ball with her fingertips and rolling it out of the recess towards her. Dalziel swung the device in front of him around to face her and she flinched, holding her other hand up to cover her face, but he held off until her back was turned before squirting a jet of foam at her with a grin. She yipped as the green stuff sprayed out from her lower back, hurrying down the pyramid as Uma clambered up the one on the opposite side of the set.

Dalziel tried to cheer his own encouragement to Uma over the noise of the audience as he saw her beginning to tire, crawling up the slippery steps as the gunge-covered canine sprayed her in the face with foam. As she turned her face away, the mouse girl dipped her toes into the gunge before wriggling off the step and falling forward to collapse against the bottom step of the same pyramid. She stayed there for a moment to catch her breath, then squeaked as a column of yellow gunge poured down from the ceiling, hitting the surface of the slime next to her with a thick glooping noise. Keeping her arm on the step for balance, she took a couple of heavy steps through the gunge to get away from it, then threw the ball she was carrying up on to the second step so that she could use both hands to haul herself out of the slime channel.

He grinned to himself as Uma clutched the last green ball to her chest as she bounced down the orange pyramid for the last time, watching Gaby's progress as she climbed past her on the way up. Glancing once again to the massive square chute above his head, he counted the steps as the mouse girl struggled up them, then held his breath as she pushed the ball she was carrying up on to the peak, watching it teeter on the lip before splashing into the gunge.

He heard the click of the valve above him and closed his eyes, aware of the downpour of orange slime blocking out the stage lights just before it crashed on to him with a smacking noise, ballooning outwards for a second before folding in and enveloping him in a slippery flood. He squeaked and wriggled his shoulders as he felt the gloop slithering around them, cool fingers of it slipping down his back and trickling around his neck. As the deluge sputtered, he leaned forward and hunched up, feeling the thick layer of ooze matting his headfur as the flood of gunge broke into a set of stringy drizzles from the corners of the hopper above him.

Bringing both hands up to wipe over his face, he blinked and grinned as he saw Uma clambering up the last few steps. He watched as she turned to the audience and raised the ball up, pumping her other fist in the air. Breathlessly, she slithered herself over the lip of the peak area and dropped the ball into the ankle-deep gunge, collapsing on to the seat beside him and putting her arm around his soaked shoulders.

Gaby sat down heavily on the bottom step of the orange pyramid as she saw Uma reach the top, turning up to watch her boyfriend as a repeating klaxon rang, and Raph let go of his foam cannon and looked up at the hopper, dragging his hands over his head and then spreading his arms out with his eyes closed. At the same moment, the valve above him opened, and a shadow fell across him just before the huge downpour of gunge splattered down into his face.

Uma giggled and hugged Dalziel tighter as the huge dome of green gunge billowed out from the canine's head. The flow twitched as he bowed his head down and raised his arms into the downpour, flailing them to splash the stuff outwards as much as he could. Dalziel swallowed as the alarm continued to ring, glancing down at the bright orange slime covering his own markings and dragging his feet through the viscous, slippery fluid, shuddering as he felt it crawling slowly down through his fur.

"Okay, it's over!" Rish announced from the ground, a laugh creeping into his voice as the slime continued to flow down on to the green-coated canine. As the hopper began to run out, the stuff poured in one tapering stream from the back edge of the spout, and the canine beneath it turned his palms up to catch the goo splattering off him as he leaned back in the seat. He shook his head, spraying a fountain of slime outwards before slipping forwards and turning to look down at the squirrel with his arms folded on the lip of the sunken area, running a hand over his completely green-coated face as the remains of the gunge drizzled down behind him.

"You know..." Rish said as the applause died down, looking around at the gloop dripping slowly down the inflatable pyramids. "Sometimes we use so much gunge in these games that we lose sight of the bigger picture - namely, who's going in the vat at the end! So let's have a look at what that did to the scores..."

As the teams clambered down towards the ground again, Rish stretched both arms out to point at the cylinders, and Dalziel flinched at the sound of more gunge pouring into them. "The orange team have 190, but with the bonus for winning the last game, the greens have gone all the way up to 230 - Rachel, you're in line for the Gunge Plunge now!"

The elder jaguar grinned at the whoop from the audience, gasping a little and shrinking back as Uma dragged a handful of gunge off her fur as she approached. She tipped her hand over in front of Rachel's face, letting the slime drip in long strings from her fingers.

"So, this time the boys are going to get to find out what it's like trying to concentrate when covered in all of that stuff - we've got another questions round coming, so girls, get under those gunge barrels!"

Dalziel watched as Uma stepped around the podium, kicking her feet a little to shake some of the gunge off her lower legs. His fur bristled as he looked across at Raph and then down at himself - the slime didn't feel cold under the heat of the studio lights, but he could feel it oozing and dripping slowly off everywhere, hardly any of his fur markings visible under the orange mess. He shuddered and shuffled towards the dome-shaped button as Uma tossed herself backwards into the inflatable seat in front of him, her slime-covered legs raised in front of her for a moment before she flopped them down against the front.

"Okay - you know the score by now, buzz in if you know the answer - ten points if you're right, ten to the other team and a gungy girlfriend if you're wrong. And remember those levers if you want to force your opponent to answer..." Rish cleared his throat and Dalziel did his best to concentrate as he read out the first question.

"What's the name of the force that keeps still things still and moving things moving?"

Dalziel hesitated, glancing at the back of his girlfriend's head in front of him, before a ringing sound came from the other podium.

"Inertia," Raph said as the squirrel turned to him.

"That's right!" The squirrel dropped the question card to the floor, and the mouse girl under the gunge barrel leaned away slightly as the nozzle above the cylinder next to her opened and a trickle of orange slime poured down into it. "The images on computer and TV screens are made up of which three colors of light?"

Dalziel forced himself to press down on the button, but still jumped as the buzzing noise sounded. Finding himself suddenly unsure of his answer, he swallowed as Rish swung around to face him.

"Um... red... green and blue," he managed, clearing his throat.

"Yes, those are the there I was looking for..." He breathed out as Rish announced his right answer, and watched their team's cylinder filling up next to Uma. Gaining a little bit of confidence, he smiled as he got the next question right as well, and hunched over the button again as the orange squirrel read out the fourth.

"What kind of charge is carried by..."

A ringing noise interrupted the question, and Dalziel leaned around him as Raph grimaced, looking down at his flashing button and acting pushing it back up again.

"A bit trigger-happy there, aren't you?" Rish asked him, shaking his head with a smile as there was a murmur of laughter from the audience. "No, you've buzzed in now - come on, what kind of charge is it?"

"Er..." Raph sucked air in through his teeth as he tapped his hands on the podium in turn, grinning down at Gaby as she twisted around to look back at him. "Negative...?" he hazarded.

Rish rolled his eyes as the mouse girl whimpered, putting her hands to her ears in readiness. "He didn't even let me finish the question... and he still got it right - yes, electrons carry a negative charge. You're playing dangerous games here...!"

He looked down at Gaby, who exhaled, her hands clasped to her chest as she laughed relievedly.

"A chemistry question now, I think we've been avoiding those - what is the valency of... silicon?"

There was a moment of silence from both teams. Dalziel breathed out and shook his head, suddenly remembering about the lever on his left hand side just as there was a clicking noise from the opposite podium. He squirmed, curling his toes, as Rish turned to him.

"Green team, Raph's forcing you to answer! What's the valency of silicon?"

Dalziel stuttered, desperately searching his mind for what the word even meant, then looked down as Uma twisted around in her seat to look at Rish.

"Can you give him a clue?" she asked brightly.

"Yes - it's a number," the squirrel replied, and Dalziel winced as Uma flopped back into the seat, glancing expectantly up at the slime nozzle above her.

"Don't know. Twelve," he finally said with a shake of his head.

He squirmed as the squirrel smiled back at him, pausing to drag the moment out. "I'm sorry - gunge Uma!"

Dalziel cringed then jumped back as a column of green gunge splashed down in front of him, bursting over Uma's head with a gloop and fanning out in a dome as the alarm hooted above her. Embarrassedly, he looked on as Rachel clapped next to him, watching the thick heavy glop splatter out over the floor and the front edge of the podium, the shape of one of Uma's flattened ears becoming visible for a moment under the downpour as an air pocket bubbled out of the left hand side. As the nozzle clicked closed and the flow shut off, she brought her hands up from the arms of the chair to hold her messy hair out of her face, then slicked it backwards, turning to stick her tongue out at him and Rachel before leaning back under the drizzles of gunge from the edges of the pipe.

"Well, Raph, you used your lever at the right time..." Rish said as he looked from the gungy jaguaress to the canine. "Did you have any ideas yourself?"

"Nope," he shook his head.

"It's four - it can bond to up to four other atoms... except in the cases when it doesn't, and... never mind." Rish threw the question card over his shoulder, and Dalziel leaned a little to the side, poised with his hand next to the lever. The squirrel looked down at the next card and took a breath, only to be interrupted by the time-out noise.

"No, we're out of time! So that's twenty points for the greens, forty for the oranges and absolutely no gunge at all for Gaby - she's looking relieved!" Rish laughed as the mouse girl quickly squirmed forwards out of the seat, still looking up at the nozzle as she got out of its range. "Teams, you can go and get cleaned up now - you might be getting a little messy again, but this next game's going to be all about... these two."

The studio lights swung inwards to form a pool of light just around the center podium as Dalziel crept off to the side, watching the squirrel put a hand on each of Rachel and Gina's shoulders. The mouse girl's slightly embarrassed, unsure expression opposite Rachel's vivacious grin reminded him of Gaby and Uma just before the first game.

"Okay, older sisters... have you enjoyed watching the show so far?" he asked, turning back and forth between them and watching them nod, Gina much more hesitantly than her feline opponent. "Good - now it's your turn to take part. Let's get you up there, and play to decide who's going for the Gunge Plunge!"

---

After showering off for the third time, Dalziel held Uma's hand as they were guided over to the back entrances to the stage, and the jaguaress swung their clasped hands between them as they headed for the steps by which they'd entered the set an hour before.

"She's going to get plunged...!" Uma sang to herself, unable to contain her excitement.

"Hey, remember she still needs to lose this game..." Dalziel interrupted her, leaning around her to look inside as a stagehand pulled back the curtain and waved them inside.

"If she wins, I'll thrown her in myself!" she grinned, and batted the rest of the plastic curtaining aside as they stepped up back on to the inflatable set. She gasped and Dalziel blinked in the harsh overhead lighting again, bringing his other hand up to his forehead to shield his eyes as he looked around at the new setup.

The set was now dominated by a large yellow inflatable ramp, twice the size and height of the slide in the first game, positioned with its lip over the large round pool of gunge at the front of the inflatable area. At the top of the slide was a flat padded platform with an inflatable seat perched on the top, and a large round canister was mounted conspicuously on the lighting rack directly above it. At the sides of the arrangement, Rachel and Gina were poised behind a podium each, mounted on platforms at ground level that were connected to long cables reaching up to the ceiling.

Dalziel turned his head to see the stagehand behind them coming up the steps. He pointed to the side, and Dalziel noticed for the first time that next to them was a minecart-like contraption painted in faded green, mounted on a set of rails that led all the way to the gunge channel at the front of the stage. As he accepted the crew member's hand and clambered into the cart with Uma, he looked up again to see three wide right-angled pipes jutting out of the wall to loom above them further down the track.

"We... didn't do this at the rehearsal, did we?" he asked as his gaze dropped from the large pipes to the far end of the rails, which ended in a ramp down to the gunge. He glanced at Uma, who had propped herself up on her knees to lean on the side of the cart, looking fascinatedly at the platform her sister was standing on and then up along the wires towards the ceiling.

"Yeah, this is new...!" The jaguar grinned, and pointed at the gunge container mounted on the lighting rack above the seat at the top of the huge ramp. She grinned over at her sister and gave her a thumb-up sign as Raph and Gaby were shown into an identical contraption on the other side of the stage, and she laughed as Rachel giggled silently and flexed her toes, glancing up at the peak of the ramp as well.

Dalziel watched as Rish clambered up from the front towards the orange team's side of the stage, sidling carefully up to the edge of the large vat of gunge that dominated the floor. He threw his hands up dramatically to get a cheer from them before starting his introduction.

"It's almost time for one of our older sisters to take the plunge, but we like to be creative here and give them a last chance to escape before it happens..." He turned around to face the mouse and jaguar. "Rachel and Gina, this time you'll be answering the questions - buzz in if you know the answer. If you get a question right, you'll send your sister and her boyfriend a little down the track, going under the gunge pipes along the way... and you'll also winch your opponent up closer to the platform at the top of the ramp. If you get one wrong, you're going to get hoisted up instead... and you don't want to be the first one to the top, because that means you're taking the slippery, slimy route back to the bottom." He smiled as he traced a pointing finger from the platform's seat down the ramp towards the vat of slowly rippling gunge, and smiled at the girls' nervous expressions.

"Now, Rachel - Uma and Dalziel were twenty points ahead at the end of the last game, so unfortunately you're getting a head start - and so are Raph and Gaby..."

Rachel squeaked and looked down as her platform slowly began to rise, accompanied by a rhythmic mechanical clanking noise. Dalziel craned his neck up to see the orange cart on the other side of the set rolling forwards as the canine and mouse held their arms around each other, stopping just short of the first pipe jutting from the wall.

"Okay, Gina and Rachel - the points for each question depend on how long you take to answer. The faster you are, the further you'll send your nominators down the track - so be quick if you want to stay out of the gunge! If you're both ready... here they come."

Dalziel looked up as the lights swung around, dimming and leaving a faint glow along the tracks with spotlights picking out the elder sisters and Rish. The mouse girl clasped her hands over her buzzer, drumming her heels on the floor as she leaned forwards, while Rachel glanced again at the seat a few feet above.

"What is the name... of the process of separating liquids by boiling them?"

Dalziel held his breath as there was a tense silence for a few seconds, before jumping at the buzzing noise as Gina leaned on her button. The spotlight above her flashed orange and she blinked under the light.

"Yes, Gina?" Rish prompted her.

"Er, distillation?" she said unsurely.

"That's right! Rachel, you're heading up rapidly..."

The jaguar girl whimpered through her grin as the clanking noise started again, the platform winching her another foot up. She gasped and turned her head as there was a thick splashing noise from the other side of the stage, and Dalziel looked around just in time to see a burst of dark green slime splatter over Raph and Gaby as their minecart carried them under the first pipe. The canine barked through his smile as the gunge splashed over them, holding on to Gaby's arm as she turned her face away with an unsure grin.

Gaby looked up at Rish, a trickle of slime running from her forehead to her nose as he read out the second question, before cringing as her sister got it right again and they began moving towards the second pipe, stopping about halfway towards it.

"Rachel, you've really got some catching up to do here," Rish grinned up at the feline as Gina leaned forward to look at how high up her opponent was. "At least get Gina off the ground... name three states of matter."

There was an unsure silence from both the older sisters for a second before Rachel thumped on her buzzer.

"Oh, um... solid, liquid, gas," she counted off on her fingers.

"She's right, and that means Ums and Dalziel are off the start - and Gina's heading up...!"

Dalziel glanced over at the older mouse girl shuddering nervously and adjusting her thick glasses as the platform winched her up a couple of feet, before turning to the front as the cart he and Uma were sitting in rattled a few feet down the track. He held his breath and fumbled to take Uma's hand as they approached the first pipe, but relaxed as they stopped just short of it.

"They're on their way now..." Rish said as the mouse girl leaned over and looked down at the ground. "Which came first - the telegraph, the telephone, or the telescope?"

Gina looked like she was about to press her button, but hesitated and looked up at Rachel before buzzing in.

"The... telegraph," she called.

"No...!" The mouse girl squeaked in surprise as Rish announced her wrong answer. "I'm sorry, Gina, but the telescope's older by a couple of hundred years - so you're heading up again!"

Dalziel's stomach lurched as their cart started to move again, and he looked up at the wide pipe looming into position above it. There was a deep liquidy splurging noise, and he hunched his shoulders, closing his eyes just as he saw the gunge spewing out of the pipe. A second later, he ducked under the weight of the burst of heavy, cool slime, his fur standing on end as it slithered down his neck and back.

He brought his hands up to his face and wiped his eyes, opening them again and glancing to the side at Uma's blue gunge-stained fur as he looked up at the mouse girl, now just a couple of feet below Rachel. His girlfriend gripped the side of the cart next to him, bouncing agitatedly as she waited for the next question to be read out.

The host turned away from them with a laugh. "It's about time Uma and Dalziel felt some gunge... Rachel could be on a comeback here! You two - malacology is the study of what?"

A buzzer immediately sounded from the green side, and Rish turned towards Rachel as the lights around her flashed.

The jaguar stood silently for a moment, suddenly unsure of her answer. "Er... these?" she hazarded, poking herself in the bust with one finger.

Rish burst out laughing. "I know we're doing a student special here, but...!" He tailed off, shaking his head as the jaguar clasped her hands behind her back with an embarrassed grin. "No - it says 'mollusks' here. You've just sent Gaby and Raph fifty more points along the track...!"

The canine put his arm around his mouse girlfriend as their cart started up again, cuddling her with a smile as they moved under the second of the huge pipes. With a heavy splurging noise, a burst of yellow slime spewed out of it, showering them both as they passed underneath it, and they both squeaked as it rained down across them.

"What a great job that would be, though, wouldn't it?" Rish grinned as he turned to a new question card. "Much better than staring at snails... anyway, Rachel, you're looking quite high up now - one good answer from Gina could decide it!"

The elder mouse girl rolled her shoulders and then leaned over her buzzer, concentrating as Rachel looked down at the gunge vat. Rish read out the question in front of him slowly and carefully.

"What is the name of the precious stone made from a lattice of carbon, known for its hardn..."

A buzzer interrupted him, and he looked up to see the mouse girl practically jumping behind her podium. He nodded towards her and she stuttered before being able to speak.

"...Diamond?" she asked back.

Uma gasped and held her breath, wrapping her arm around Dalziel tightly as the host paused before responding.

"She's right - and I think that you've just put Raph and Gaby over the edge...!"

Dalziel ducked as Uma threw both hands up, watching the canine and mouse opposite them huddle together as their cart squeaked into motion again, this time accompanied by a wailing siren and a pair of rotating red warning lights on the floor next to the gunge channel. Gaby hunched down as they were carried under the third pipe, but opened one eye then the other as the cart stopped underneath it at the end of the track, giggling nervously and hugging her boyfriend close as he stroked one hand up and down her back.

Suddenly, the front of the cart opened, swinging down on a hinge at the bottom and splashing into the gunge. Raph and Gaby both yelped as the floor underneath them began to tilt forwards, the container they were in being lifted up on hydraulics on the back wheel. As it slowly became a slide, the gunge pipe above them finally spewed a burst of bright green down on to the pair, enveloping them in a crazily splashing dome. The slime ran down the already slippery surface of the inside of the cart, and as it continued to tilt further, the two vague shapes under the flow slithered forwards towards the river of slime, their arms around each other in a tight hug.

Gaby stretched her feet out and attempted to land upright, but shrieked as she lost her footing and fell backwards into the slime channel with just her head above the surface, tugging on Raph as she went down and toppling him over as well. As he plunged fully in, she flailed her arms to keep her head up, laughing helplessly as her struggles splashed the goo out in wide arcs around her.

"Gina!" Rish called as the siren and the noise from the stands settled down, and he bounced over to the elder mouse sister's podium, where she was staring down towards the river of gunge, trying her best to stop herself laughing. "You've done it - that means you get to finish the show clean and dry, unlike those two..."

He gestured towards the two figures bobbing in the gunge as Raph pulled himself out and stumbled to his feet, curtains of orange and green gloop sliding off his soaked fur as he stood up heavily. He shook his head, sending strings of slime flying away from his ears, then reached his hand down to Gaby. The curvy mouse reached up to her head and ran both hands over her ears to clear the gunge away, letting them spring back up before rearranging herself into a kneeling position, the glop swirling around her as she moved. Dalziel swallowed as she hauled herself upwards, watching her large dripping chest as it pulled free of the gunge, and joined in the applause from the audience as Raph raised their clasped hands up together, smiling as Gaby's feet nearly slipped out from underneath her.

"So you're going home with the prestigious Cleanup Crew trophy, as well as your swim costume and our usual goody-bag for all three of you - have you enjoyed the show?"

"Yes, I have," the mouse responded, noticeably relaxing more now that the tension of the game was behind her. She looked down as the platform she was standing on slowly lowered again, returning her to ground level.

"Glad you don't have to go in the gunge?"

"Yeah," she said quickly with a rapid nod of her head.

"Brilliant - you can retreat now and enjoy the finale!"

The mouse smiled and tiptoed off the platform, leaning around to look up at the jaguar as she backed away to the side. Gaby leaned forward and hauled herself out of the gunge channel to join her, while Raph stayed in the knee-deep gunge, holding his hands out slightly to the sides as the stuff dripped from all over his fur.

"Now, getting back to you, Rachel..." Dalziel whipped his head around as Rish walked around to their side of the set, watching Rachel sigh and shake her head a little, her long hair spilling over her shoulders as she bowed her head forward. Uma whooped as the squirrel hunched forwards to look up at her face.

"You know exactly what happens now, don't you?" he asked. She nodded, combing her hand over her hair and looking over at the chair at the top of the ramp with a nervous grin.

"Go on - take your seat on the Gunge Plunge!"

Uma wrapped her arms around Dalziel in a tight hug, grinning as she watched her sister get up and step over to the seat in the center of the platform, her shoulders sagging with a squeamish grin as she looked along the ramp leading down to the gunge below.

"Mind your head," Rish pointed, and Rachel looked up at a wide barrel-like container mounted just above head height as she straightened up on the top platform. Biting her lip through her grin, she carefully slipped around the inflatable seat beneath it and eased herself back into it, clasping her hands over her knees and drumming them nervously as she flicked her tail behind her and stared up at the looming nozzle.

"Uma - you and Dalziel got spectacularly messy throughout the show, now it's time to do the same thing to your sister! Come over here!"

As Uma scrambled out of the slimy mine cart, Rish clapped his hands together above his head, encouraging a cheer from the audience as a camera operator took a shot starting with a view of the vat of gunge, panning slowly upward to face the jaguar girl poised above it. Dalziel struggled over the lip of the cart as Uma bounced towards the side of the ramp, where a large lever had been set up.

"Oh, Rachel..." Rish led in as the noise died down. "I can tell what she's thinking - how can the same slime happen to the same girl twice?" He leaned on the side of the ramp and looked up at the spotlit feline above him. "A fair warning - it's pretty deep down there, so I hope you can swim..."

"I've never tried in gunge before!" she said back brightly. Dalziel shuddered as she flexed and pointed her toes, looking down towards the slime vat a few feet below.

"Oh, then you're in for a treat... and so are our audience!" Rish smiled at the murmur of laughter from the stands as Rachel shook her head, running her hands up over her hair and tucking it behind her ears. "Uma, I think it's time to send your sister down, so take hold of that lever..."

Uma clasped her hand around the lever's handle, and Dalziel gently placed his on top of hers, sharing a smile with her before they both turned their eyes up to the elder jaguar.

"Rachel, do you have any regrets?" the squirrel called, already taking a few steps back from the pool.

"No!" she shook her head, cringing through her grin as she looked down at the surface of the gunge.

"Good, I'm sure she won't either - prepare for the plunge!"

As Rish threw his arm towards the lever, Dalziel yelped as Uma tugged it firmly towards her, triggering the sound of a huge mechanical clunk. He quickly brought a hand up to flick a stray drip of slime off his brow, blinking as the studio lights went down, some of them swinging inwards to illuminate Rachel and the gunge vat. Uma leaned over and grabbed his arm tightly as her sister tried to keep a straight face, giving a small whimper as she drummed her feet against the ramp. She hunched her shoulders down and grinned nervously as she ran one hand through her hair and looked up at the cylindrical container hanging off the lighting rack above her head, then gasped as a burst of bright green spewed out of it, bowing her head down just before the gunge burst over her head and enveloped her in a sloppy dome.

Uma whooped over the sound of the gunge alarm, watching her sister's toes curl as the gloop splattered over her. She bowed her head forward under the weight of the green slime, revealing a screaming smile as her face poked out of the upturned bowl shape and looking out at the cheering onlookers as she wriggled and bounced in the blowup seat, the deep green gunge splashing out from her head and the back of her neck to pour into the seat behind her.

Another payload of gunge burst from a greater height on the ceiling, breaking into a wide curtain of blobs as it spattered down on to the inflatable ramp and stained the yellow surface in green. Rachel looked down the ramp as it continued to fall, holding her green-stained hair away from her face, then squeaked and threw her hands up as the front of the chair suddenly buckled forwards, tipping her out of it and sending her sliding down the slippery surface.

Dalziel craned his neck to see as the elder jaguar slithered through the curtain of gunge, the downpour bulging a little before she burst through the other side. She slipped her gungy feet against the inflatable surface ineffectively as she slid rapidly down the ramp, falling on to her back as she came to the end. With a yelp, she slid off and finally hit the gunge vat backside-first with an audible smack, a huge splash of brightly colored slime billowing up from the pool and staining the surrounding surface in a wide splatter mark as she disappeared beneath the gloop. Uma gaped and took a few rapid steps towards the pool, watching the patches of orange and green gunge swirl into each other as the surface of the vat buckled and rippled crazily, waves of the thick liquid continuing to break against the sides.

After a couple of seconds, a bulge appeared in the centre of the vat, and Dalziel grinned as a vague blob emerged from the swirling gloop, a layer of slime slowly crawling and dripping away from it to reveal the outline of Rachel's gunge-covered face. She threw her head back to flick her hair behind her head as she bobbed upwards, sending an arc of gunge out towards the cheering audience as she stumbled to stand up. As she pulled her arms out of the slime vat and held them to the sides for balance, huge curtains of the brightly colored mixture dripped from her drenched fur, her pattern and color completely obscured by the layer of gunge.

As Rachel got her footing, a shadow fell across the vat, and another shriek came up as a third payload of dark green gunge crashed down from the ceiling, forming a twitching dome as it caught the gungy jaguar on the shoulder. Dalziel shuddered as he watched Rachel duck and wriggle under the downpour, one hand up to block the falling slime as strings of gunge dripped slowly across her shocked open mouth. Her shoulders shook in a laugh as the gloop poured off her and formed wells in the surface of the gunge vat.

The gunge from above slowly eased off, becoming a drizzle and then breaking into a blobby rain as Rachel hauled herself upright again and stumbled blindly forwards away from it, her head bowed and her hair coated with a smooth helmet of dark green. She stood frozen for a moment, then sagged with her shoulders shaking in a helpless giggle, bringing a hand up to her face and slowly dragging it down to wipe some of the gunge off. Hesitantly, she rubbed her eyes with the back of one hand before blinking them open and shuddering as she looked down at herself, her upper half painted in a mess of orange and green slime with the surface of the gunge lapping lazily against her chest.

"Rachel!" The gunge-covered feline turned as Rish called to her above the noise from the audience, and with an exhilirated smile, she paddled herself around to face him, the swirls of color in the glutinous liquid trailing around her as she moved. She leaned forwards and slowly dragged herself through the viscous gloop, picking her soaked and heavy hair off her face and combing it back behind her ear, then folded her arms on the edge of the vat and looked back up at him with a still-confident grin. Beads of the dark green gunge from above slowly slithered down through the coating of smooth slime on her fur. "Rachel, that has to be one of our best plunges ever - how do you feel after that?"

"Super-mucky," she replied, holding her hands up at head height and rubbing her fingers together as the opaque gunge slithered off them in long dripping strings.

"Is it as good as the stuff on Industrial Zone?"

"Yeah, do you want to try some...?" She reached up towards him, and the squirrel dodged backwards.

"No, I've been down here long enough to have learned to avoid it!" he smiled back as he waved a finger. "Uma and Dalziel, how does it feel to see her like this?"

"Fantastic," Uma grinned, brushing a drip of slime off her own hair as she shared a look with her gungy sister. Rachel looked down and dragged her hand up through the slime again, watching it as it poured glutinously off her palm. Rish patted Uma on the back and stepped away to address the camera.

"That's it from us this time, but we're starting a new series next year - so if you at home want to see a parent, teacher, older sibling or just anyone on the show, write in to us... and we'll do our best to have them end up like Rachel. See you then!"

Dalziel smiled exhaustedly at the cheers of the audience, and sat down heavily on the inflatable surface as he watched the gunge slithering off Rachel's hair and muzzle. She wiped the gunge off the back of her hand on a patch of clean vinyl and then wiped away some of the slime around her eyes, blinking as she raised her hands in the air and faced the stands.

Rish joined in their applause as he approached again with Raph, Gaby and Gina. The elder mouse girl hung back a couple of paces from the edge of the slime vat, shuddering as she watched the ooze dripping off Rachel's fur.

"Rachel, you're looking amazing in there... thanks for being a good sport!"

"Oh, sure..." the jaguaress giggled, twitching to the side as more slime slithered off her muzzle. "It's not so bad when you're in..."

The orange squirrel smiled down at her. "Well, we'll get you pulled out very soon, but there's just one thing I always ask before we hit the showers - does anyone else want to go in the gunge?"

"Yeah, us!" Dalziel jumped at Uma's sudden shout, and got up as she took hold of his arm, tugging him to his feet.

"Wait, do we...?" he said under his breath as he looked down at the vat of gloop. Rachel smiled back at him and pushed her arms through the slop to move herself backward, leaning against the bottom of the ramp and yipping as the buckling surface lapped heavily against her chest.

"Gina, how about you?" Rish looked at her.

"Oh...!" The mouse swished her tail behind her at the mention of her name, staring at the gunge-coated jaguar in the pool. "You said I'd stay out of there..."

"I'll go in, too, Gina," her sister encouraged as she and her boyfriend walked the elder mouse forward.

"Come on - you're not really going to come all this way and go home without touching the stuff, are you?" Rish grinned as the strawberry-blonde mouse took off her glasses and handed them to him with a resigned smile, her eyes still on the jaguaress as she raised a slimy finger above the surface and beckoned her forwards with an open-mouthed smile.

"That was the plan...!" she squeaked as she looked at the lazily rippling surface of the heavy slime, giggling as Rish arranged them all into a line. Dalziel took the elder mouse's hand as Uma linked arms with him, watching Gina poke her toe into the gunge and then quickly withdraw it with a yelp as Raph and Gaby joined hands with her on the other side.

"Everyone ready?" the squirrel grinned, already retreating back a few steps from the imminent splash. "Let's count it down..."

Dalziel drummed his feet as he looked at the group around him, the jaguar and canine leading the countdown from ten as the two mouse girls glanced at each other with nervous smiles. As he caught their eye, a grin slowly formed on his face, and as Uma yelled out the last seconds of the countdown next to him, he finally let out a whoop as they all jumped forwards together.