CINDY ON GET YOUR OWN BACK
Written by Iron-K, 2021

"You ready?"

Cindy gave a nervous grin and nodded as she took the reptilian stagehand's outstretched arm. Her heartbeat thumped in her chest as he scampered up on to the cartoony horror-themed set in the corner of the studio, tugging her along behind him. She swallowed as she straightened up on the raised platform, staring as she got her first close look at the setup she had been glancing excitedly at all morning.

The center of the raised platform was dominated by a vat of slime, a swirled mixture of light and dark greens that glistened wetly under the hot studio lights. As they walked around to its far side, she stared down at the gungy surface, biting her lip as she saw how the stuff clung stickily to the edge of the pool.

They stopped next to the device positioned precariously at the back of the vat. A chair was fixed to the end of a horizontal metal frame that stretched a couple of feet out over the surface - a headrest, backrest and seat covered in black vinyl. So that it could be wiped clean easily, Cindy thought to herself with a flutter in her tummy as the stagehand let go of her arm.

"So, Cindy - my name’s Flit, I’ll be gunging you today..." The yellow reptile, about a decade younger than Cindy, grinned as he crouched down on his haunches behind the frame supporting the seat. As she watched, he undid a catch at the back, and she stepped back as he swung the chair around to face her.

"Come on and make yourself comfortable!" Flit encouraged with a smile as he looked up at her, wiggling the seat slightly to the sides.

"Heh, thanks..." Cindy smirked at the lizard boy’s enthusiasm and turned to sit down. She eased herself slowly into the seat with her eyes still on the gunge pool, the padding of the chair oddly comfortable given the circumstances. She wriggled as she budged herself up against the backrest, then gasped and gripped the sides of the seat as Flit slowly turned the arrangement back again.

Curling her toes as she was moved out over the gloopy surface, Cindy stared down at the stuff just a fraction of an inch underneath her dangling feet. She blinked behind her glasses, the chair suddenly feeling much narrower as it returned to its position fully over the gunge vat. A jolt made her yelp, and she put one hand to her chest, gripping the seat tighter with the other as Flit fiddled with the mechanism behind the chair. She felt her heart beating in her ears again as she thought about whatever small catch beneath her was keeping her from being tipped into the gunge.

"You okay there?" Flit’s voice came from behind her.

"Yeah, I suppose..." Cindy slowly half-turned her head to respond. "Do I need to, uh, lean forward or back on this thing so I fall right...?"

"Uh... no, I don’t think so," he answered. "You can just pick the falling technique up as you go..."

Cindy shook in a laugh but stopped quickly, trying not to move more than she absolutely had to. As she faced out towards the audience she saw Ignis and Luci being led up to the stage as well, and Flit walked out from behind her to help them up into the inflatable couch in the stony arched alcove to her right. She grinned over at them as they squeezed in together, then looked at the giant lever jutting out of the wall between them. As Flit shut a clear waist-high plastic panel in front of them they giggled and chattered excitedly to each other, and she dared to take her hand off the side of the chair to wave at them.

"Feeling good there, mom?" Ignis grinned, craning his neck to see past his sister and stare at the slime vat.

"Oh yeah - I'm totally gonna gunge you two..." Cindy replied. She became aware she was swinging her crossed feet a little back and forward, and stopped as she felt the chair tilting very slightly as she moved. She swallowed as she saw their host Kass approaching, but sagged as the black squirrel stopped to discuss something with one of the other members of the stage crew. Flexing her toes, she looked around again at her situation.

Beneath her, she watched a gooey bubble expand and then burst with a glorp as some unseen hose pushed air gradually through the gunge. Looking up, she stared into the cylindrical pods mounted on the ceiling rack among the lights - one above the center of the vat, the other directly over her head, its red balloon-like valve bulging just a couple of feet above her...

"Hey!" Cindy faced Kass as she stepped up on to the set, a broad smile on her face as she waved to the twins in the booth. "Sorry for the wait! Let's get our finale going - Cindy, are you settled up there?"

"Heh..." Cindy's eyes dropped to the slime below her feet again, then looked across to the audience area where the crew were letting the watchers down from the bleachers to the standing area in front of the vat setup. "I'm kind of nervous..." she admitted through a smile, waving vaguely at a few of the kids at the front who were stretching up on their toes and looking wide-eyed at the expanse of gunge.

"Good - you should be!" grinned Kass. "And you two - you're about to gunge your mom, are you looking forward to this?"

"Oh, definitely," Ignis smiled back at her, his sister giving an enthusiastic nod.

"Okay - you might get a bit slimy as well, but we'll try to make sure that doesn't happen..." the squirrel smirked, then turned back to the cameras across the studio as the last of the audience joined the standing crowd.

"Are we ready to roll?" she called out. One of the camera operators stretched his arm out and put his thumb up, and she returned the gesture. Cindy looked to the side, her heart thumping as Flit took his place tucked behind a control panel out of view of the cameras.

"Okay, everyone - give us some noise!" Kass called to the watchers below. "We're about to gunge this dragon mom, are you ready to see that?" Cindy faced the audience and blushed, twitching with excitement as she listened to the enthusiastic whooping and cheering in support of her being dropped into the slime.

"Welcome to the final game, and the moment that Get Your Own Back is all about!" she called through the noise. "Ignis and Luci have earned their mom a seat above the gunk dunk... and if their luck holds she's soon gonna be sunk!"

Cindy wriggled as more noise went up from the watching crowd. At the back of the throng, she caught sight of the long purple hair of her partner Marble, a white dragon like her - as he caught her eye, he grinned widely and put his fingers to his mouth to let out a loud whistle. Giggling helplessly at his own eagerness, she turned back to the black squirrel as she addressed her.

"Cindy, you're in a risky spot there - did you ever watch other parents being dropped in the gunge on the old show?"

"Oh, yes..." Cindy nodded.

"Good, then you know what you're in for! Your nominators Ignis and Luci are poised to throw the switch on you... but just like before, we've got a vat of slime poised above their heads as well. If you can light up the skulls by answering six questions correctly in under a minute, we'll open it up and get them to share the gunge..."

Cindy glanced to the stack of six prop skulls next to her then looked past it at the alcove again. The twins looked up into some unseen mechanism and shared a nervous grin as Ignis felt for Luci's hand.

"Now, this time around we're doing things a little differently," Kass said, bringing Cindy's attention back to her as she recited slowly, "As you answer the questions, remember that you can't use any letter at the start of an answer more than once! So if you've answered a question with "squirrel", you can't then answer another question with "slime" or "snake" or anything else that starts with S. Have you got that?"

"Uh, I think so..." Cindy clasped her hands on her knees and pointed her toes, then yelped as the movement made the tips of her claws dip into the lukewarm slime pit beneath her.

"Okay - your time starts... now!" Kass glanced down at the tablet computer in her hands as Cindy gasped at the sound of a large clock ticking. "What's the opposite of upwards?"

"...Downwards," Cindy replied.

"You've got it!" Kass pointed over at the skulls and Cindy glanced behind her to see the first one light up with the letter D on its forehead. "What kind of person do you go to when you're sick?"

"Uh..." Cindy rubbed her dangling feet together and squeezed her eyes closed, trying to push the obvious answer out of her head. "S... specialist?" she hazarded.

"Okay, I'll have that!" The black squirrel nodded as the second skull flicked on, and quickly read out the next question. "Three examples of precious metals are gold, platinum and what?"

"Agh..." Cindy cringed, but laughed to herself as she felt her tension rising. Years ago she'd played along as other parents struggled with this game, but having to do it perched above the gunge made things different. "Uh, pass..."

"No way, you've got to get this one first!" Cindy sagged at Kass's response and heard the giggling of the twins beside her. With an embarrassed smile, she put her hand over her eyes and desperately thought back to her high school chemistry lessons, pushing away the thought of the rapidly diminishing timer...

"...Mercury?" she asked.

"Hmm... kind of. Okay, then," Kass replied, tilting her head from side to side then launching into another question. "What's a word for a female parent?"

Cindy gave an involuntary high pitched whimper, then laughed as she realized the sound she was making. A couple of seconds later, her racing mind was interrupted by a deep gong sound, and she drew her breath in as she realized what that meant.

"Cindy, you're out of time - get your hands off that seat!" Cindy jerked her hands up away from where she had unconsciously been gripping the chair, and balled them into fists on her lap instead, letting out another whimper of mixed nerves and excitement. She stared down at the gloop beneath her feet, her heart pounding as Kass continued. "Ignis and Luci, you've won - now pull that switch and drop your mom in the gunge!"

Cindy squeaked and flicked her eyes to the side as her twins reached up to the big lever on the wall together, tugging it down with their hands clasped over each other. She twitched at a bursting noise from above her then yipped as a downpour of bright green slime caught her on the snout and then splurged into her lap.

She gasped and turned her head to the side, only just registering the feeling of the heavy wet goo splattering against her face, shoulders and tummy before the seat vanished from under her. Instinctively her hands shot up as she fell the few inches down, her head going under the downpour as she smacked into the gunge backside-first. She just had time to close her eyes before the surface of the goo came inwards and closed over her head.

Cindy flailed instinctively as the gunge swirled all around her, thick and heavy as she sank through it. As she felt the bottom of the pool, she levered herself off it with one arm and hauled herself upwards, vaguely feeling her head break through the thick surface again. She planted her feet on the bottom of the vat, unsteadily straightening up as she felt the slime sloughing away from her face in thick waves. She breathed out heavily through her nostrils, the cheers of the audience reaching her ears as the slime oozed slowly out of them.

She pulled her hands out of the chest-deep gunge and shook them in front of her, about to reach for her face when another payload of slime crashed down on to her, scoring a direct hit on her head and nearly pushing her under again. She hunched up, staying still with an involuntary shriek at the guttural splurging sound of the ooze falling into the gunge vat, then slowly raised her head as the umbrella of slime folded in over her. She wallowed unsteadily to the side to escape the drizzle from above and bared her teeth, not even sure herself if she was grinning or grimacing at the sensation of the thick slime crawling down every inch of her skin.

As the noise from the audience continued she dragged her hands down her face, wiping down her muzzle a few times then putting her palms to her eyes to pull the gunge away from them. Hesitantly blinking her eyes half-open, she looked out through the glutinous curtains of gunge hanging across her vision and then pushed her soaked hair away from her face.

She laughed hesitantly as the slime lapped at her waist, wobbling in slow heavy ripples around her, and slowly dipped her hands back under the gloopy surface as she drifted toward the front of the vat. She sagged with a defeated smile as she looked over at the lever chamber, where Ignis and Luci were bouncing and cheering along with the audience. Turning to look for Kass, she gaped as she caught sight of herself in a monitor - barely recognizable as a lump absolutely painted in bright green gunge with the slimy mixture hanging in globs that slowly splatted downwards from all over her.

"You did it, Ignis and Luci!" Kass announced, stepping forward from where she'd retreated during the gunging. "You've won the day - you're going home with our Get Your Own Back T-shirts and backpacks... but most of all, you got to gunge your mom - how are you feeling?"

"Awesome," Ignis replied, grinning from ear to ear as he stared down at Cindy. Beside him, Luci nodded rapidly in agreement.

"Good!" The black squirrel turned around, and Cindy blinked and swatted the slime away from her eyes again as Kass paced over to the edge of the pool.

"Thanks for re-opening the vat for us, Cindy..." she grinned down at her. "Have we persuaded you to change your soda restrictions for these kids?"

"Hah, no way," she laughed. She shuddered a little as she bobbed in the tank of slime, and raised her hands up again, watching the stuff drip away in gooey strings as Kass turned to face the audience.

"Parents, you've seen Cindy take the plunge - the gunk dunk is open again! Join us again next time... when it could be you in here!"

She threw her hands up to encourage another cheer from the audience, and Cindy raised one hand in a vague wave as she grinned out at them. Turning slowly in the heavy slime, she shared a smile with her twins, who were cheering the loudest of all.

After a few seconds, Kass walked back towards them, breaking into a laugh as she looked between the slime-spattered booth and the gunge pit.

"And that's it! Thanks for being a great set of contestants," she smiled. "Cindy, Flit and the guys will get you out of there..."

Cindy glanced over as she pointed, seeing Flit scamper up from backstage. He knelt down at the side of the pool, stretching over to hand a towel to her, and she bobbed her way over to accept it.

"And you kids - just before we let you out, do you want to be gunged too?"

"Pf - yeah!" Cindy called as she turned again, spitting slime away from her mouth and wiping at her eyes.

"She doesn't get a vote," grinned Kass, waving her hand behind her and not turning around. "What do you say - want to be saved or slimed?"

"Uh..." Ignis hesitated, glancing up before looking at his sister.

"Yeah, gunge us!" Luci grinned, flicking at her purple hair and bouncing her heels against the seat. Ignis smiled, and nodded back at Kass.

"Okay, you heard them - let them have it!"

Cindy saw the two of them flinch as an alarm blared, and gasped as a wide curtain of green slime poured down into the booth. Luci raised her arms in the air then gasped as the wave broke over her head, her shocked face visible for just a moment before the slime flopped over her. Beside her, Ignis wriggled with an embarrassed smile as he stretched his head out of the bright green downpour, with the gunge slithering around his neck and forming a clean white V shape on his chest as it painted his front.

As the gunge spluttered slowly to a halt, she watched the mixture of exhiliration and cringing on the gunged twins' faces. Giggling to themselves as they opened their eyes, they caught each others' gazes and grinned as they high-fived each other. She smiled as she remembered when she'd been plucked out of a studio audience years ago to have her own first gunge experience.

Her thoughts were interrupted by Flit throwing the end of a rope ladder down into the pool next to her, and she looked up at him as the rungs slowly glooped beneath the surface.

"That was unbelievable!" he hooted. "You should have heard yourself going in - I've never heard a noise like that in my life!"

"Heh, I can't wait to see it..." she answered. She wiped the towel over her eyes, which were still feeling a little gluey after her dunking, then fumbled for the ladder and began to climb up.

"Try to haul yourself up and sit on this for now..." Flit continued. He knelt down again to spread out a rubber anti-slip mat at the side of the vat. As she struggled upwards, Cindy smirked to herself as she noticed the reptile hovering a little, staring down at her clinging clothing.

She hoisted herself weightily on to the mat, feeling much heavier than she had when she'd gone in. Putting her hands on the floor for balance, she sat with her legs in the gunge, shuddering as the green slime crept down her exposed skin.

"That's right..." Flit encouraged. "Now don't move, whatever you do - I'll get the cart to take you down to clean up..."

"Okay! Just as long as you can get me out of these too..." She picked at her drenched outfit, darkened and heavy from the gunge, and smiled as the young reptile blushed at her phrasing. She raised her head up, looking at the dunking chair next to her which now had its seat swinging loosely underneath.

"Actually..." she started as he turned to leave. "Once the kids are out of here, how would you like to do one more take just for my friends...?"