SAT-IZ - Scene 8
Written by Iron-K, 2016

"Okay, now it's my favorite time of the morning - we're about to go over to Alex in the Industrial Zone," the spiky-haired cat announced as he and the black squirrel seated themselves on opposite ends of the couch below the studio's big screen, pumping his fist in the air and enjoying the reaction from the studio audience.

"Last week, we asked you to guess how many points our celebrity team could collect on the Gunge Gear, with the closest answer winning one of our exclusive Sat-IZ T-shirts as modelled by Kass here..." He held his hand out towards the squirrel, who reached her hands to the bottom of her yellow T-shirt and stretched it out, revealing the logo to a chorus of whoops.

"And on top of that, we're also going to let them have the honor of nominating our next player!" the squirrel continued. "So if you know anyone who's made a call, be very afraid..." She laughed as she pointed around at the audience surrounding them. "I've made my guess, and Jayce is definitely getting slimed if my number comes up..."

"Hey..." the cat started, chuckling as he was drowned out by a cheer from the stands.

"So let's have the moment of truth," Kass called. "Alex, how are things down there?"

She turned, swinging her feet up on to the couch and facing the wall of monitors as the show's logo dissolved away to show Alex standing at the front of one of the game rooms, his hand on a large lever sticking out of the wall. Behind him, a giant horizontal gear prop was slowly rotating in the centre of the room, with four figures on inflatable pool seats on its teeth facing outwards at right-angles to each other.

"Oh, I'm going to have fun with this one," the muscular red wolf grinned. "We've got a very special team playing the game today, and hopefully getting extremely gungy in the process..." He glanced back over his shoulder at the figures seated in the revolving chairs, exchanging nervous glances and looking up at the three long clear vertical pipes looming from the ceiling as they passed underneath them. The three girls - a red-headed squirrel, cream-white bat and young peach echidna - were each wearing two-piece black IZ swimsuits, with the fourth member of the team, an orange fox boy, in a short pair of swimming trunks. "How are you doing this morning, all of you?"

He laughed at the chorus of half-responses, flashing a smile at the echidna girl as she was rotated past the front of the gear. She responded with an anxious giggle, squeezing her hands between her thighs as she looked behind and above her at the pipes. "Come on! We're going to have some fun..."

"Great, that makes one of us!" the ground squirrel replied, stretching up in her seat and stretching her arm over its back as she twisted to face the wolf. She ducked slightly as her seat came around from the back of the room, moving her underneath one of the pipes.

"Heh, I'm sure you'll get into it," Alex said, then cleared his throat and raised his voice to address them all. "We're going to run the gunge gear for two minutes! As it moves, you're going to take it in turns to come to the front and face a question from me - once you answer, stomp on that trigger in front of you." He pointed in front of him at the large dome-shaped button flashing on its podium in front of the gear, and Sally lifted her feet briefly as she passed over it. "If you've got it right, you'll earn some points depending on how quickly you answered and the gear will spin on - so if everyone answers correctly, you're all walking away clean!"

Alex paused as Rouge was brought to the front, sarcastically putting her thumb up at him, and he smiled as he pointed up at the spherical reservoirs of blue, yellow and green slime that capped the pipes - one above each of the compass points of the gear except at the front. "If, however, you get it wrong, the button's going to open the gunge pipes above your friends and splatter them with gallons of the stuff - so think carefully before you answer!"

He grinned as the voluptuous bat was carried away from the front position, shaking her head with a nervous smile. The echidna girl was rotated behind her past the blue pipe, staring up into it before cringing and giving a nervous giggle.

"Got all that? Okay! Let's see who we're starting with..."

He wrenched the lever down and skipped over to stand next to the podium as the giant gear began to creak to a halt. The fox boy's seat rotated past the button, and he squirmed to the side as if to encourage it around, but it clicked back a few inches to stop with him facing the front. He smiled timidly, wriggling himself upright in the oversized seat as Alex looked up at him.

"Tails! How are you up there - a little nervous?" he asked as the young fox tapped his fingers together.

"Yeah, kinda..." he answered with an anxious grin, biting his lip.

"And you're not even under those things yet! It's your friends who should be worried right now..." Alex leaned to the side to watch as the girls glanced upward at the nozzles above them. "So, to save them for now - what is one hundred degrees Celsius in Fahrenheit?"

The fox's eyes darted around the room as his lips moved. "Two... hundred and twelve?" he answered uncertainly, with a glance toward the echidna girl under the green pipe to his left. She drummed her feet on the front of the inflatable seat, looking up the wide pipe.

"Okay, if that's your answer - push the button!"

Alex gestured forward at the large red dome-shaped trigger in front of him, and the fox boy pushed both his feet down on it tentatively, suddenly shutting his eyes as a buzzer rang. He jumped as the gear began moving again, rotating him slowly away from the front position.

"He was right! So everyone stays clean, but you're going under the gunge pipes now... we'll see how you look next time!" Alex bounced on his feet as the next seat was brought to the front, and he smiled up at the ground squirrel with striking red hair in front of him. "Sally, you're looking beautiful - and I'm hoping that you stay that way..."

The squirrel rolled her eyes but smiled at his remark, then broke into a nervous laugh. "Yeah, I'd like that as well..." she said, leaning back in the clear plastic seat and pushing her arms down beside her to budge herself up.

"Here's your question - if the gear you're on turned completely around four times, how many degrees would it have moved?" asked Alex, and the squirrel put her hands to her temples and looked to the ceiling as she concentrated. To her left, the fox boy looked up at the green pipe above him, hunching down in a cringe, while the bat below the blue pipe to her right turned around and watched her carefully.

"Fourteen hundred forty degrees," Sally answered suddenly, then seeing Alex's gesture, she pressed her feet on to the button.

The buzzer rang again, making the four of them all twitch, but Sally let out a hesitant cheer and put her arms in the air as the gear underneath them rotated around another quarter turn.

"Absolutely right - so you've got two correct answers so far, so that's..." Alex glanced over his shoulder at a screen mounted on the wall facing the contestants. "68 points and thirty seconds gone - let's speed it up!" He faced up to the gear as this time, the curvy cream-white bat was brought around to the seat above the button.

"Rouge... I can't believe you haven't been gunged yet!" Alex shook his head as she smiled, tilting her head a little to the side as she relaxed into the inflatable seat, kicking her heels against the front of the chair. "To keep your friends clean - the Grounder enemy appeared in which Sonic 2 zone?"

The bat girl's eyes flicked to the side, and she pushed her lips out as she thought for a few seconds, sagging back further. "I... don't know!" she said back with a shrug.

"No? Want to have a guess...?" Alex encouraged her.

Rouge shook her head from side to side slowly, then spoke up again. "Uh... Mystic Cave," she decided, then brought her feet together to push the button down.

This time, the buzzer erupted into a repeating alarm, and Rouge turned to her side as the valves on the three pipes snicked open, columns of brightly colored gunge erupting down on to the other three contestants. She leaned over and put both her hands on the left arm of her chair, a gaping smile on her face as she watched the squirrel girl squirm underneath the flood of green gunge splattering out over her head. Sally twitched her head sideways out of the downpour, shuddering with a shocked laugh as the slime smacked down on to her shoulder, doming out and painting her golden-brown fur as it splashed into her lap. Catching Rouge's eye, she gave another laughing squeak and wagged a finger at her as she tossed her slimy hair out of her face, streaks of green slime flicking off it.

The bat girl turned back to Alex, an unapologetic grin on her face as the gunge shut off again, leaving a trickle of green slime pouring on to the soaked squirrel girl's hand as she held it up to defend herself. Behind her, the fox boy straightened his bowed head, yellow gunge drizzling from his flattened ears as he flicked them and ran his hands over his head.

"Someone had to do it!" Alex chuckled as he looked around at the gunge-painted gear, the squirrel and the echidna opposite her blinking under their coating of slime and turning to face him. "Sorry, it was the Aquatic Ruin - as Tails knows well..." He leaned around the giggling bat girl and watched as the fox continued to wipe the gunge off his head fur, looking at his hands and watching the stuff drip from them. "Rouge, you gave the first wrong answer, and you're going back under the pipes - so you might get to experience what just happened to Sally...!"

The gungy squirrel girl turned towards the bat, nodding as she flicked a handful of slime out towards the front, and Rouge ducked back into her seat, her sly smile fixed on her face as the gear turned another position around.

"Tikal... that's a great color on you!" Alex called up at the echidna as the gear clicked into position with her at the front. She looked up through the deep blue splatter across her head, holding her front spines up a little with a hand on her forehead as gunge dripped down from them into her soaked lap.

"Trust me, coming out of a full spin of that thing looking like that isn't that bad..." the red wolf said as he looked down at his computer, prompting a nervous giggle from the echidna girl. "Which band wrote the theme for the 2006 Sonic revival?"

Tikal hesitantly let her slippery spines drop back to the sides of her head, and wiped her hands back and forth across her legs as she thought. "Oh, er... Crush 40," she answered, then kicked down at the button.

"Oh, I'm sorry...!" Alex called to Tikal above the siren, just before the three figures behind her disappeared under new floods of gunge, a yellow wave splurging out over Sally's head and into the centre of the gear. On the right, Rouge held her hands out in front of her as the green gunge spewed out off the top of her head, a shocked expression just visible on her face underneath the flying slime. She shivered as a lick of it splashed down on to her knees and slithered down her legs, the waves of slime painting her cream fur green as it went. Her toes curled as the gunge flowed over her feet and dripped off her claws. As the slime eased off, the domes over the three of them folded inwards, and Tails rolled his shoulders as the last drizzles of blue goo from the pipe above his head sputtered down on to the back of his neck.

"Sorry, Tikal," Alex repeated. "That one was by Zebrahead, but it's okay not knowing about that instalment - it's not like anyone enjoyed it." Tikal sagged and he gave a small laugh, which he disguised by clearing his throat. "At least you don't get any gungier yourself for that - but you might in a minute! We've come all the way around, so let's have you back up here, Tails..."

As he spoke, the fox boy was carried to the front position again, a squeamish grin on his face as he kept himself hunched over. His orange fur was plastered with yellow gunge, the new blue splatter on his head and shoulders slithering in thick fingers down his chest and back and mingling into a green color at its edge as it crept down his fur.

"Two right and two wrong so far! You're looking a little messy - let's try to turn this around..." The young fox cringed under the coating of gunge, distractedly running his slippery hands down his arms and tentatively brushing at his head fur as Alex read his question out.

"Another mathematics one for you - what's the name for the longest side of a right-angled triangle?"

"Oh - hypotenuse." This time the fox answered more confidently, and stretched one foot down to poke the button, leaving a yellow toeprint behind. The buzzer sounded and the gear moved again, with Tails still cleaning himself off as he was carried towards the green gunge pipe again.

"Sally..." Alex's voice cracked into a laugh as the squirrel girl was moved around to face him. She was slumped back in the oversized seat coated from head to toe in a sickly mixture of green and yellow slime, oozing slowly down all over her fur and drizzling from the tips of her toes on to the button below. As he said her name, she shook her head and opened one eye, looking through her gungy hair with a breathless smile.

"I know, I'm sorry - you're not quite as clean as you were, but I suppose it could be worse..." Alex cleared his throat and smiled as she struggled to pick herself up and lean forwards, hesitantly putting her gungy hands on her knees as she listened.

"In the first Sonic game, how many Chaos Emeralds were there?"

"Uh... seven," she answered, flicking a slimy strand of hair out of her face, and stretched down to hit the red dome again, her feet slithering over its slimy surface before she managed to press it down.

Sally squeezed her eyes closed in a cringe as she heard the siren, and put her hand to her forehead as she heard the squeamish shrieks and giggles from behind her. In the seat behind the squirrel, Tikal squeaked and squirmed as she held her hands over her head, the bright slime splashing down her arms and on to her shoulders, pushing through the blue gunge and giving her a new coating of yellow. Eventually the downpour began to ease off, revealing the flow of smooth ooze crawling down her head and back as the stuff continued to drizzle down around her. As she wiped her hands down her spines and flicked them to the sides, the gear started moving again, and the gungy fox next to her blinked his eyes clear of green slime and looked up at the drizzling yellow pipe as he was carried towards it.

"Sorry - in the very first game there were only six! Okay, Rouge, welcome back..." Alex grinned up at the blue and green-painted bat girl as she was rotated around to the front position, still wearing a sly smile as she leaned back with one elbow on the arm of her seat and drummed the fingers of her other hand against the blowup surface. She flopped against the side of the seat as the gear stopped, then folded her arms under her large slippery chest, glancing down at the mixture of gunge sliding down her fur and flicking her ears a little to shake some of the gloop off them. "I know it's hard to concentrate when you're covered in that stuff, but here's one you might like - what's the name of the precious stone known for its deep red col..."

"Rubies," she interrupted with a smile, dragging one finger across her brow to wipe the slime away. She felt in front of her with her foot, and pressed the button as she blinked her eyes open again.

"Yes! That was amazingly fast - that's about 250 points now..." Alex encouraged as the gear moved again, the bat girl putting her hands in the air and flopping backward again with her shoulders twitching a little as she watched the green pipe approaching. "Tikal... how are you doing under there?"

He leaned down to look up at Tikal's face as the gungy echidna girl reached under the dripping spines slumped across her face and pushed them to the back of her head, revealing her sickly grin. She wiped her hand across herself as a smear of yellow slime dripped down from her forehead, and shook her head rapidly, bright dollops of gunge flying outwards before the tips of her spines splatted heavily back on to her shoulders.

"Oh, look at her...! Don't worry, it's nearly over..." Alex grinned back at her, glancing over his shoulder at the timer. "Another one about precious stones - which gem has industrial uses for cutting tools due to its supreme hardness?"

From the right side of the room, the bat girl leaned forwards out of the drizzle from the green pipe as if to whisper to the echidna, but Tikal gave a small gasp as she lifted a hand and pointed it forward. "Diamond?" she asked back, eeping as the yellow gunge dripped in a wide curtain from her arm.

"Could be! Push that button..." The red wolf lifted his foot and mimed pressing down with it as he said it, and the young echidna grasped the sides of her head, closing her eyes as she pushed both her feet down. She drew air in through her teeth as the buzzer sounded, but as she felt the gear start to move again, she squeaked and put her hands in the air, grinning over at the green-coated fox boy taking her place as she was moved around.

"Okay, Tails, we can fit one more in!" Alex glanced back at the timer ticking off the last ten seconds. The fox stretched forward to listen intently, flicking one ear as blobs of green gunge trickled slowly around it, mingling with the bright streaky mess coating his fur. "What's the middle name of the beautiful but slightly slimy squirrel sitting next to you? Is it Alicia, Elizabeth or Megan?"

"Ummm..." The fox boy shuffled uncomfortably, looking up at the ceiling and tapping his fingers together, mouthing the three possibilities to himself. He took a glance behind him and to his right at Sally, who just grinned back at him, brushing a hand through her gungy hair.

"Quick, take a guess! You've got nothing to lose..." Tails jumped and faced the front again as Alex got his attention back.

"Uh... Megan?" he shook his head, not seeing Sally clap a hand to her forehead as he did so, and he grimaced as he stomped down on the button. His ears flattened as he heard the whooping siren, closely followed by a chorus of giggles and screams as the gunge splattered down on to the three girls behind him.

"That's the end - just empty them!" Alex called up to the ceiling above the alarm noise, grinning as the levels of slime in the spherical tanks slowly oozed downward, leaving colored film on the insides. He gestured down with his hand as the gunge continued to pour, watching the three girls wriggling underneath the bright slimy downpours. At the back, the yellow slime rebounded crazily out from Rouge's head, the shape of her ears barely visible through the glistening upturned bowl shape. The dome twitched as she leaned forward, wriggling as the ooze coated her back.

On the left, Sally stayed upright as the blue gunge splurged down on to her, splitting into ribbons as the downpour dropped from the pipe, a little grin on her face only just visible as the heavy slime splattered in streaks and blobs from her head. She picked her hands off the seat, thick drops of blue crawling around her arms as she slowly raised them, pushing her hands under her slimy hair and pushing it behind her head only for even more of the slime to pour over her hair and face. Opposite her, Tikal had her hands cupped to her face, slowly shaking her head as the green stuff poured smoothly over her, the thick liquid piling up in shiny rings on top of her head before slumping down to slither down her spines and pour into her lap. She tried to wriggle forward only to squeak as the gunge poured down her back, pooling in the seat around her.

"Okay, it's over! It's all over..." Alex called above the fading noise of the siren, laughing as he watched the green gunge flowing over Tikal slowly ease off, breaking into drizzles from the edges of the pipe. She took her hands off her face and leaned forwards out of the thinning smooth slimy downpour, letting it pour down on to the back of her coated head, and a hesitant grin formed on her face as it slipped in two streams around her neck. Squirming herself upright in the slippery chair, she breathed out heavily, shaking her head and swinging her spines back and forth, strings of gunge flying out from their tips. As she looked to her left, a pair of gungy yellow arms rose from the chair at the back of the gear, then dropped again as Rouge slithered around in the seat, propping herself up on her knees and grinning as she looked at the other slimed players. She blinked as another shower of yellow blobs sputtered out of the pipe, wriggling to the side to let them slither down her back.

"Sorry, aunt Sally..." the fox mumbled as he looked over his right shoulder, but broke into a sheepish smile as he saw the squirrel's silent open-mouthed laugh, the massive downpour of gunge having painted her all over in a slowly dripping coat of deep blue. As her shoulders continued to shake, she raised her hands and pushed her hair out of her eyes, then did her best to wipe the slime away from her face, shaking her head and pursing her lips to blow away the drips of gunge around her mouth.

"That's 'Sally Alicia Acorn', in case you're wondering, Tails..." Alex called, breaking into a laugh as he looked around at them all. The fox groaned and raised a hand to his face as he remembered, nodding.

"So, that's the game over, and what a result..." Alex whistled at the slime-flooded scene in front of him, with all four players, the seats and the whole surface of the gear painted in swirling mixtures of blue, green and yellow, the slime forming spots on the floor below as it dripped off the gear's edges and the contestants' feet. Taking a couple of steps backwards, he felt for the lever on the wall and flicked it upwards, setting the gear slowly spinning around again.

"Thanks for playing, everyone - let's take a look at your score..." He turned around to the screen at the back of the room to read from it, and the four slimy, colorful players twisted in their moving seats to see. "In your two minutes, you answered... just nine questions, and your final score is 331!"

He smiled as the bat whooped, and turned to face her as she clapped her hands once in the air, spraying the slime on them everywhere. Tikal grinned and squirmed away as some flecks of yellow splatted on to her side.

"Heh, I can't lie to you all - that wasn't very good, I hoped you would be faster..."

"Hey, if you wanted fast, you should've put Sonic on this thing..." the completely gunged squirrel spoke up as she came past the front position again, her hands on the arms of the seat as she hauled herself upright against the slithery ooze around her. Thick drips of the blue gunge fell slowly from the smooth coating on her hair, trickling on to her chest and tummy.

"Maybe I will!" Alex called back. "You're the right color now, though..."

Sally laughed defeatedly as she picked her arms up off the seat, turning her blue-coated hands over in front of her. As she was carried around past the front again, her ears flicking as she went under the still drizzling green gunge pipe, the bright yellow bat replaced her at the front of the gear. Rouge dragged her hands up over her head to clear her face, leaving furrows behind with her fingers, and gave a smiling grimace as she felt the slime slither down her back as she pushed it away. Taking her hands off her head, she grinned again and flicked her hands out toward Alex, who dodged back even as the drops of yellow gunge splashed on to the floor far short of him.

"Okay, Jayce and Kass - 331 points was our final result!" Alex repeated as he turned away from the gear. "And I'm going to have to let our team get to the showers before they get me..."

The cat and squirrel turned away from the screen, leading the cheers from the young studio audience as the camera panned up to show the messy aftermath again.

"So, you heard him - they ended up on 331, and that means..." The black squirrel leaned forward to read the autocue. "Our winner with the closest guess wrote in under the name 'What A Mess', with 337!"

"Seriously?" Jayce laughed, budging around on the sofa as he leaned over to check the teleprompter. "Well, you predicted the result twice, with a name like that..." He twisted around to look again at the barely recognizable slime-covered foursome on the screen.

"So get in touch with us and we'll see what we can do - the number to call is coming up, and we'll be right back after this..."