Written by PML — 2011 — from WamLibrary
f/f, food, m/f, slime, tv
“I’m sure they’ll arrive soon Kelly, just sit down.”
Kelly kept watching the main door, where Peter had disappeared half an hour ago.
“Yes Emma, just like that time the guys got the Manchester United team to come visit, you really just sat through that.”
“Oh whatever. To be fair, it’s not like Michael Cera could make it, or Brian O’Malley, or Edgar Wright. At least we managed to get some of the girls involved.”
Kelly sighed. “How many girls did we manage to get involved again?”
“Six. One of them couldn’t make it.”
“SIX?! We’ve only got 5 gunge tanks set up. I guess somebody will be escaping clean then.”
“Yeah, Eddie did say that would be the case. Either way, I suspect the voters went for certain choices, so I wouldn’t be surprised if only one person got it. You know how they…”
♪#Take Me Away From This Moment And Show Me Insanity…. ♪#
Emma flipped her phone open. “Hey babe. Right, See you in a minute then.” She flipped it shut. “Peter’s just parking up. They’ll be in soon. C’mon, let’s go greet them.”
The two ladies got up, and approached the front doors, opening them just in time to see Peter leading 6 girls into the house.
“The conference room has been set up Pete.” Peter nodded and the girls watched with fascination as the film stars were led into the room:
Alison Pill, who played Kim Pine
Anna Kendrick, who played Stacey Pilgrim
Brie Larson, who played Envy Adams
Ellen Wong, who played Knives Chau
Mae Whitman, who played Roxy Richter
Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who played Ramona Flowers
“Shame Aubery Plaza couldn’t make it. Ah well, shall we make sure Eddie’s got the tanks fully loaded?”
Emma and Kelly headed off to the room of gunge.
The afternoon came, and the six girls were led into the gunge room. They all gasped at the wide variety of gunge tanks that were set up, not noticing as Eddie approached them.
“Welcome ladies. I hope your journey was well. We’ve no time to waste, no time to dally, there’s plenty of slime for you, something right up your alley.”
There were two simultaneous groans from behind him, as two women, one with pink hair, the other with green hair, approached. “Eddie, Eddie, Eddie. Leave the jokes to Brian, just get them to checkpoint number one.”
Eddie smiled sheepishly at his wife. “Ah yes. Ladies, follow me.”
He wandered off through the alleyway of gunge tanks, with each of the girls following behind. They had all been put in the same clothes, a white T-shirt with the Scott Pilgrim vs. The World logo, black shorts and flip flops. They all seemed hesitant, but plodded along behind Eddie, who seemed to be going in all sorts of directions, before zeroing in on a particular gunge tank, which seemed smaller than some of the other gunge tanks around the room.
“Now girls, we come to our first checkpoint. The people have been voting, and I can reveal that at this very stage of the vote, the woman leading the poll was Natalie ‘Envy’ Adams, you Brie Larson.”
Brie eyes opened wide, before shifting quickly between Eddie, the two girls with coloured hair, and the gunge tank filled with red slime on top. She felt herself being led over to the gunge tank, and being helped to climb in, before she was sat down, and staring out at the women she once was in the same film in. She ran her hand through her blond hair, as the pink haired girl one approached the tank.
“Don’t worry, if you’re lucky, you’ll be knocked off the top, and someone else will win the other rounds. Still…” Emma pulled the chain.
The red gunge fell down quickly, splashing over Brie and spreading over her head. Brie had screamed, but soon stopped as the goo covered her head. The slime came and went, and very soon, the slime shower had switched off, and the red slime was contrasting beautifully against Brie’s blond hair, and once white T-shirt. There wasn’t much slime, but there was enough for a first gunging, enough to remind each of the other girls that they had agreed to take part in this.
“Wow. Well, that’s what we have for starters. Hope you all enjoy where we end up going.”
The girls looked uneasily at each other, as Eddie started to move off in some other direction.
The girls followed Eddie right around the gunge room, stopping occasionally as Eddie filled them in on various bits of trivia. They soon came over to a gunge tank at the side of the wall.
“Now ladies, this is our second checkpoint. Does anyone recognise this thing here?”
He looked at the girls. Three of them were shaking their heads, clearly having no idea. The other three showed some sign of recognition, as if they knew what it was, but couldn’t place what it was.
“No one? This is a very famous gunge tank. Here in England, we know it from a TV show, Noel’s House Party. However fairly recently, the voiceover man,” Eddie paused, looking directly at a camera above, as if subtitles had just appeared next to him, “he set up a competition for a load of celebrities. There were a wide variety of celebrities, and I believe you three,” pointing at Mary, Anna and Brie, “might remember the Gunge Grand Prix.”
Eddie watched as those three girls’ eyes widened. “Of course, the competition is over now, and the voiceover man tells me that Karen Gillan was the winner. You know, Amy Pond in Doctor Who. Anyway, since we’re now at checkpoint two, it’s time to see who topped the poll at this moment.”
Eddie consulted his pad, quite surprised at what he was seeing. “Eddie, you know, I sometimes get the feeling that the voiceover man is controlling us, especially since he doesn’t exactly speak much.”
Eddie looked at Kelly. “Oh, that’s just the residual effects of the medium we are in. I hear the one time he did hold conversation with us where everyone could read, the story never made the final edition. Anyway ladies,” He turned to look at the six girls, all of whom were completely put out by whatever Eddie was talking about, “We’ve had quite a change up to the result for this round. Currently in first place as far as you are concerned, is Mae.”
Mae was speechless as she felt Emma guiding her to the chair at the start of the rails. She was sat down, and gripped the arms of the chair tightly as Emma moved away. She kept looking at the red car wash brushes, and the nozzle beyond it.
“Looks like Ramona’s evil Ex is about to get her comeuppance. This is your Roxy knee.” Kelly groaned at Eddie’s bad joke before pulling a lever on a control panel.
The chair carrying Mae jerked forward with a bunch of sparks (Eddie frowned when he saw this), and carried her forward into the spinning brushes. She squealed as water sprayed at her, and the brushes managed to muss up her hair from its previously neat state. The chair ground to a halt under the nozzle, and Mae made the classic mistake of looking directly up at the slime juts as it was released. The pink and orange gunge splashed right on Mae’s face, eliciting a scream from her as she pulled her head forward. The gunge splattered around her, mixing to form a peach colour, while simultaneously flowing down Mae and covering her completely. The gunge kept flowing, pooling on the floor around Mae’s chair, although giving her a utter covering of goo.
Eventually, with the gunge beginning to slow down to a trickle, the chair came back to life and moved forward and out of the gunge tank area. She moved into view where the other girls (with one exception) clapped for Mae.
“Well done Mae, and let us hope some of these other girls get to experience the wonder you just went through. Maybe one of them will have been top for the third checkpoint.” The clapping ceased immediately. “Onwards I say.”
Onwards around the gunge room the ensemble went, going around some of the tanks in the centre. They stopped at a particular tank, which had been raised up on a small platform. It seemed like this gunge tank had been built on a pedestal. Looking at it though, none of the girls thought this tank looked any different from some of the other gunge tanks that they had seen around the room.
“Now, this gunge tank was made by our favourite method. We read a story online, and copied the basic design of the gunge tank, altering it only to make it actually work, compared to some ideal designs which sound good, but don’t work in reality. Kelly and Emma have both told me that their favourite tank is one created from a story, rather than one based off a past TV show, or one we invented ourselves. Anyway, they had me try out this one, so I just want you to remember that Mary.”
Mary looked shocked as he said that. “Me?”
Eddie smiled. “Yes Mary, you took the lead by the time the third checkpoint was taken, and so you get to delight in the gunge tank right here. Would you like to climb in?”
Mary took a moment to survey Eddie, before sighing and going to the gunge tank and sitting on the seat. She found her feet didn’t touch the bottom of the tank, something that seemed unnerving to Mary. Still, she kind of expected she’d end up on top at some point. She was Ramona Flowers after all.
“You know Mary, apart from Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, the other film I remember you from is Live Free or Die Hard. This must feel something like when you shot that terrorist.”
Mary shook her head. “Nah, this feels more like Final Destination 3, like something is trying to catch up on me.”
Eddie frowned. “You know, I’ve never actually seen that movie. Either way, the gunge has caught up with you.”
Kelly pulled one of two levers beside the gunge tank, and unleashed the yellow gunge upon Mary. She screamed, ducking her head as the slime splattered all over her. The gunge split into various streams, spreading the coverage on poor Mary until it slowed to a dribble, leaving Mary fairly covered in the slime, although there didn’t seem to be as much goo as had fallen on Mae in the car wash. Mary just thought she must have got lucky.
“I suppose you can let me out now.”
Eddie’s smile got wider. “Actually Mary, this is where we dump you.”
Mary shrieked, but before she could say anything, Kelly had already pulled the second lever, and it had started its action. The seat under Mary dropped away, and with it, Mary fell down. Down below the floor level. Down below where the other girls could see Mary. They heard a big splash, clearly whatever Mary had plunged into even if they couldn’t see whatever it was. At least, not until Eddie flicked a TV screen on and showed Mary surfacing from some dark brown gunk. She was holding her nose, face coated in the gunge she had been dropped into.
“And then we close the trapdoor, saying goodbye to Mary down there.”
The TV showed Mary looking up with her eyes wide open, just as the trapdoor swung down on to where Mary had gone down through, shutting out the light. After the camera had taken a few moments to readjust to night vision, the TV showed the end of something falling upon Mary, who was panicking and thrashing about in the slime she was swimming in.
“Right. Normally, the idea is to leave the ‘Victim’ down there as part of their punishment, at least for a good few minutes, before getting them out, but since we’ve got to press on, we’ll get Mary out straight away.”
Emma was round the back of the tank, opening up a hatch. The TV went back to colour with the new source of light, and it showed Mary climbing a ladder into the light. She emerged beside Emma, absolutely plastered in the gunge. The yellow gunge had been washed away almost, with her body now covered in some sort of brown colour, which didn’t look nice. She had also been topped off with some grey slime, over her head and shoulders, but the one fact remained. Mary Elizabeth Winstead had been completely and utterly gunged, and there was still more to come. What came next?
The girls were moved onwards, further around the room, looking at the various gunge tanks. They came to two pools of gunge stood beside each other, one of which had a ramp upon which the chair sat.
“Now ladies, as you might have gathered by now, this is another of those gunge tanks where we copied someone else’s idea. This one comes from our childhood, here in Blighty. There was a show called Get Your Own Back. It allowed children to come on and get back at adults for some whatever crime, and would have a chance to dunk them in the gunk dunk. Today, we get our chance to get our own back on Anna.”
Anna looked shocked at that. “Me?”
Eddie frowned. “Sorry, I’m getting déjà vu. Anyway, yes, you topped the poll at the fourth checkpoint, although I’m told it was very close.” –SUBTITLE — IT’S ALWAYS VERY CLOSE – “Either way, yes you, our Twilight beauty, will be going to have a seat on this ramp here,” Eddie said, as he gestured to the gunk dunk with the ramp to the left.
Emma came over to Anna and led around the gunge dunk and up some stairs to the side. She helped Anna climb onto the chair, leaving her perched above the green gunge.
“Now Anna, I’m a nice guy,” – SUBTITLE — HE REALLY IS!!!- “I’m going to give you three chances to lessen the drop into the slop. Be warned, because just one wrong could result in the gods of gunge deciding to worsen your punishment. Just answer me these questions three.” Eddie pulled out a card. “What… is your name?”
Anna frowned. “Anna Kendrick.”
Eddie continued. “What… is your quest?”
“To avoid the gunge.”
Eddie smiled as if to say ‘good answer.’ “What… is the airspeed of the unladen swallow?”
Anna burst, “What? How the heck am I meant to know that?”
Eddie smiled. “Well you could have asked if it was African or European, but still, that was wrong, so to the top you go.”
The chair carried Anna up the ramp all the way to the very top of the room, a fair distance from the gunge she was about to be dropped into.
“Sister of Scott, you were the top at the fourth checkpoint, and now you must face the slop.”
Kelly pulled a lever, and sparks flew from the chair (Eddie frowned again, muttering “I’ve got to get that seen to”). Anna was carried forward by her momentum, gravity pulling her down the slope. She screamed as the chair started to pick up speed, and just as the chair neared the bottom, blue slime dropped from above, splattering all over Anna as the she whizzed underneath, flying through the air after the chair stopped suddenly. Anna compacted herself as she fell forward, plunging into the green gunge with some force. She slipped right under the surface consequently, although she quickly came up for air, the green goo sticking to her. Anna tried in vain to wipe away the slime, and although she got rid of some, she still resembled a slime monster from the 50s. Anna was just looking over at the other girls when a spray of turquoise slime splashed down, covering Anna even more in slime.
After a while, Eddie approached the side of the tank, holding a ladder. “This might help you out.” Anna gratefully used the ladder to climb out of the gunge pool, trailing the slime everywhere.
“And now ladies, the end is near. 4 of you have already sampled our gunge tanks, and there remains just one final gunging. The votes are in….”
Kelly shouted, “Eddie! Wait a few seconds, let them catch their breath.”
“Am I allowed to tell them yet?” Eddie asked.
“Shouldn’t we tell them all that happened today?” Kelly asked back.
“Of course not, are they not able to read these the previous instalments?”
“Surely a quick recap would do?”
“But what about spoilers?”
Emma screamed, silencing Eddie and Kelly. “Sorry guys, please stop playing questions only. This isn’t ‘Whose Line is it anyway?’ I’m sure the readers can work out where to get the other parts of the story. Eddie, just tell them.”
Eddie shook his head at the ‘readers’, but then turned to the girls. “Yes, well. It’s time to reveal who won the poll. But first, there were some interesting things. Alison, you pretty much stayed in last place, and were never in any real danger of going in the gunge.” Alison smiled.
“Ellen, you also managed to stay clean, although it was close at one point. Either way, you’re safe.” Ellen also smiled.
“And now to those who were slimed. Brie, you took the first gunging, but after that, the others went way ahead of you, so it ain’t you in the final gunging.” A red slimy Brie smiled, albeit not as widely as Alison or Ellen.
“And that leave you three. One of you came top, and will be going on the final gunging. This way please.” Eddie led the three girls up to the top of the stairs, to where a waltzer car sat on some tracks. The other three girls were led away by Kelly and Emma.
All three girls with Eddie were covered in the various gunges and slime. All of them were looking at the waltzer car with great mistrust, knowing what it meant. All of them were anxiously waiting on Eddie.
“So ladies, I can tell you that the winner of the poll was… {DRAMATIC PAUSE}… Mary Elizabeth Winstead.”
Mary sighed, almost as if she had expected it. “Ramona Flowers, winner of the gunge. Fine, let’s get the sliming over with.” She moved over to the car and climbed in, sitting down in the seat, taking the time to wipe her face from some of the gunge she was already covered in.
“Erm, yes. Mary, you were the winner of the ramp, and now, you get to enjoy the final gunging.” And with that, Eddie pulled the handle, sparks flying from the waltzer. Mary never noticed Eddie freak out as the waltzer car turned her to face her journey. Ahead, Mary could see a big sign pop out from the side: “The colours of Ramona Flowers”. As the car moved underneath the sign, pink gunge fell on Mary, who squealed, but let it fall over her. The pink gunge petered out soon, but was quickly replaced by some blue slime. Following the blue came the green, leaving Mary in the goo.
The waltzer car moved onwards into the corner, and Mary started looking around, not sure where she was going next. It was good thing for her, because she managed to catch a nozzle to her left starting to spurt foam. Unfortunately for Mary, her face just happened to be facing that direction when it fired. The foam splattered against her face, causing Mary to splutter at the forthcoming foam. The whole car then started to rise, heading up a level. Just as the car reached the very top, red slime sprayed out from above, splashing over Mary, who was still screaming at every bit of gunge, despite the fact she was clearly used to it.
The car turned to move along the wall, and there, on a platform along the side of the track, stood the other five girls. As the waltzer car moved past, each girl threw their bucket at Mary, each with varying messes. So Mary went through beans over her body, porridge in her lap, ketchup on her breasts, chocolate sauce across her legs, and milkshake in her hair by the time she came to the massive vat in the other corner. She looked up at it just as it tipped down, and unleashed a wave of thin green slime, which proceeded to wash Mary down. She shook her head like a dog once the slime had passed, allowing her a chance to breathe and let some of the mess wash away.
The car then moved downwards, head straight on down into the corner. It didn’t stop at the ground, but continued right under into some dark tunnels. The waltzer car then started moving through the tunnels, occasionally forcing its way through giant cobwebs, which stuck to Mary, although she was preoccupied with the thought of what size spider spun those. At one point, the car stopped, right in the middle of the track and unleashed lots of flour upon Mary, who was left coughing as she was utterly coated in a paste the flour formed with her slimy body. She hadn’t a clue where she was in the tunnels, with the exception of a tank which looked like it was where she had been earlier in the day. So it was some relief when the car finally started to rise, lifting Mary up into what looked like an alcove, although the nozzle on the ceiling gave that game away. From the opening, Mary could see Eddie, flanked by Emma and Kelly.
“Did you enjoy our own subspace highway? Anyway, Amazon has sent back their order, and it’s been delivered to you.”
With that, multiple streams of gunge poured over Mary, completely covering her and giving her the gunging of her life.