Harriet hated clowns. They were creepy if not downright scary. They were impossible to read with painted smiles hiding frowns and were unpredictable; you could never be sure whether they were going to kick you in the pants or give you a flower. But even more disturbing, three of them had surrounded her and were armed with custard pies.

"Can't we talk about this?" Harriet pleaded.

Suddenly the clowns began to upload their creamy ammunition upon her. Pies were splattered into her face repeatedly before they began to vary their target. Soon there was custard in her hair, on her blouse and even worse was to come as one of the clowns bent her over whilst another pulled up her skirt, the third one then slapped a pie against her panty clad behind.

"Don't let us catch you messing in our affairs again!" one of the clowns stated.

"I won't" Harriet swore.

* * *

It was a long walk back of the office, especially with custard in your knickers. But Harriet made it in time to clean herself up before her part time assistant arrived. Jackie was a short bundle of energy with bleached blonde hair tied back in a ponytail and large breast which were always threatening to burst out of her colourful tops.

"Bad luck with the clowns boss" Jackie said.

"How did yo..." Harriet began.

Jackie held up her phone which was showing a video of Harriet getting pied by the clowns. It seemed someone had been recorded the whole thing, including a close up of her getting spanked with a pie, and it had apparently gone viral. Even as she looked as the clip Harriet could see the web counter going up and up.

"Shit!" Harriet exclaimed.

Harriet sat down at her desk and wrote up her latest case, excluding the part where she was caught and humiliated by the clowns. She then filed it away and began to prepare for her next case, she'd agreed to meet a couple of television producers who wanted her to investigate some financial irregularities with one of their shows.

The two producers arrived on time and whilst Harriet got them seated, Jackie made all of them drinks. They then talked about the reason for their visit. The producers had developed a popular gameshow which had originally been a cash cow for the network. However, recently profits were down considerably, and the producers believed foul play was responsible.

"We suspect the host" one of the producers stated.

"And have an idea how you can get close to him" the other producer added.

* * *

So, a few days later Harriet found herself sitting among the studio audience alongside Jackie. Despite accepting the case she'd not researched the gameshow itself and so had no idea what to expect. But the producers had sent her a pair of tickets and suggested this as the perfect starting point for her investigation. Harriet wondered why.

The studio lights dimmed, and a spotlight highlighted the entry of the gameshow host and the Harriet's suspect. He was a smartly dressed man in his mid-thirties with slicked back hair and cheesy smile. He was accompanied by a pair of scantily dressed female assistants who struck up poses on either side of him as he did his opening monologue.

"I'm Larry and this duo are Jade and Tara. Now let's find tonight's contestants!" he announced.

Larry then sent his two assistants into the audience to select a pair of contestants for the show. Jade immediately made a beeline for an attractive young man sitting in the front row. Initially he seemed a little reluctant to go with her, but gave in and was soon being lead over towards the host. Harriet had lost sight of Tara until she popped up beside her.

Harriet was too shocked to react as Tara got her up out of her seat and escorted her over to join the other 'volunteer' onstage. He gave his as Phil when asked and was apparently some kind of engineer. The host then turned his attention to Harriet and she found herself automatically giving him her name. Then he asked her what she did for a living.

"I'm a bank teller" Harriet lied.

In no time at all the two contestant found themselves standing behind a pair of podiums and answering a series of general knowledge questions from Larry. Harriet was no slouch when it came to answering her questions but she couldn't beat Phil who seemed to know the answer to all of his. By the end of the first round Harriet found very much in second place.

"And what happens now?" Larry asked the audience.

They replied with a chant of "gunge her" and Harriet was suddenly deluged with think green slime. She hadn't realised it was that kind of gameshow and so wasn't expecting to get messy. The slime kept raining down over her until she was covered from head to toe in the green stuff whilst the audience cheered her humiliation.

Eventually the slime shower ended and Tara handed Harriet a small towel to clean some of the gunk from off her face. As she cleared her eyes Harriet noticed Phil and assistant whispering to one another. It would seem that the two of them were either starting to get very friendly or were renewing an existing acquaintance.

"On to the next round" Larry announced.

The second round was a repeat of the first with Harriet getting most of her questions correct but Phil getting them all correct again. He won the game outright and Harriet was subjected to another torrent of gunge but this time it was pink in colour. As the audience applauded Phil's victory, Harriet was lead off to what she hoped was a hot shower.

* * *

Unfortunately there was no shower although Harriet was able to clean herself up a little. What was worse however was that she was then shown back into the studio and made to sit on a chair. Standing on either side of her were Tara and Jade, and beside them were five buckets each filled with a different colour of gunge.

"So Phil, lets begin your prize builder" Larry declared.

Larry asked Phil a series of questions. For each one he got right his prize money was doubled and one of the show's assistants would empty a bucket of gunge over Harriet. As Phil answered all his questions correctly that meant she got covered in orange, blue, yellow, purple and finally black gunge. But thankfully for Harriet her public humiliation was finally over.

* * *

And also thankfully for Harriet, she finally got her shower. She quickly stripped out of her clothes and stepped under the fast flowing water until the gunge had been washed off her and she was once again spotless. Someone had left a clean set of clothes in the room consisting of a green t-shirt with the show's title written across it and a pair of short shorts.

The clothing certainly wouldn't have been Harriet's first choice, but it was better than putting her own gunge soiled set back on or remaining naked. She quickly donned the clean clothes and after tying her hair back in a ponytail, she opened the door and took the opportunity to start exploring the back stage areas of the show.

"I wonder where they put Phil?" Harriet mumbled to herself.

She made her way down corridor after corridor, trying to avoid encountering anyone else. For the most part it was easy to do so as there were very few backstage crew. Eventually she discovered the room reserved for her opponent but he was long gone. However, she did find a scrunched up ball of paper in the waste bin with all the questions and answers from the show.

"Looks like we've caught a sneak" a female voice said.

Unfortunately for Harriet the voice came from behind her and before she could turn round to see who it was someone had deposited an empty bucket down over her head. They then took hold of Harriet's arms and bundled her out of the room before frogmarching her down the corridor and into another part of the building.

* * *

As soon as whoever it was released hold of her arms, Harriet reached up and removed the bucket from her head before taking a good look around. She was in a large factory-like chamber that was dominated by a huge vat which was clearly used to manufacture the vast quantities of gunge used in the show. Standing in front of her was Jade, the assistant who'd conspired with Phil.

"So, get me guess, you and Larry are supplying answers to contestants in exchange for a share of the prize money?" Harriet stated.

"Who needs Larry" Tara responded, stepping from behind Harriet.

Harriet was surprised at the second assistant's appearance, but it made sense as it was the two women who actually chose the contestants for the show rather than the host. Harriet just needed to get away from the pair and report her findings to the producers. Sadly, it didn't look as if the assistants would go along with those plans.

"What do we do with her?" Jade asked her colleague.

Tara didn't respond verbally. Instead she indicted towards some of the buckets positioned by the vat. Harriet tried to think of an escape plan whilst the show's two assistants armed themselves each with the bucket filled to the brim with green gunge and made their way back over towards the hapless private investigator. They raised the buckets intending to hurl the contents over Harriet.

Suddenly from out of nowhere Jackie appeared wielding a fire extinguisher. She took aim at Jade and Tara and squeezed the handle sending a stream of foam into their faces. Jackie continued to spray the two glamorous assistants until they were both covered in the white bubbly liquid. Harriet couldn't help but smile at seeing the pair get their just desserts.

"Well done" Harriet congratulated her assistant.

Jackie turned to smile at her boss. Unfortunately, the extinguisher she was holding was still spraying out foam and Harriet got a face full of it. Jackie quickly dropped the apparatus and went to help temporarily blinded boss. This gave Jade and Tara time to gather themselves together and regain the initiative as they attacked the pair: Jade tackled Harriet whilst Tara went for Jackie.

It was clear from the offset that Harriet was stronger than her opponent and managed to drive her backwards until the pair were beside the gunge of vat. The gameshow assistant didn't seem to like the idea of getting too close to the gunge which gave Harriet an idea. Grabbing hold of Jade, Harriet lifted her up and threw her into the vat.

"No!" screamed her defeated opponent.

Whilst Jade floundered around in the gunge, Harriet went to help her own assistant who wasn't doing so well in her fight against Tara. Luckily the second gameshow assistant was so focused on defeating Jackie that she wasn't aware of Harriet until she found herself being manhandled over towards the vat. However, unlike her colleague she didn't succumb so easily.

Jackie picked herself up and looking around saw the two foam covered women standing beside the vat. Without taking time to determine who was who, she charged and threw herself at the pair of them. Both Tara and Harriet were taken by surprise by Jackie's act and whilst she rebounded off them, they found themselves tumbling into the gunge to join Jade.

"Where did Harriet get to?" Jackie asked aloud.

* * *

Jackie had found a couple of security guards and they had managed to extract the three women from the vat of gunge and escorted all of them to the producers' offices. The producers were astounded when Harriet revealed how the two assistants had been swindling the show but delighted to discover that their suspicions about the host were unfounded.

"Of course, we now need to find some new assistants" one of the producers stated.

"Oh, I don't think you need to do that" Harriet responded.

She suggested that in exchange for them returning their ill-gotten gains the two assistants be allowed to continue on the show and avoid prosecution. However, for the rest of the show's run when a contestant got a question wrong it would be an assistant who got messy rather than them. The producers love the idea and reluctantly Tara and Jade agreed.

The end.