Quagga put the last of the emergency supplies in the cargo compartment of her ground vehicle, the Natal. She closed the lid then tugged at the front then back cleavage of the ADD uniform she was required to wear for this mission. She had hoped that she could go out without wearing it. This was a simple rescue operation after all. But it was an official ADD mission and wear it she must.

The recorded distress message sounded desperate. A small mining vessle with four souls aboard had crashed on this planet somewhere. No other ADD ships were closer than three days, so they had sent Quagga. She hadn't seen the crash site. But that was most likely because the miners had ejected in a small escape pod. And she wasn't going to spend hours or days searching for a crash site far away from where she expected to find the miners.

Quagga tucked her rifle in its place in the Natal with a chuckle. A phony distress signal was such a cliche, she was sure no one did that sort of thing any more. But rules were rules. She checked the homing signal and set out. She had four kilometers to go over terrain that was too rough to land her ship, the Etosha.

After a particularly rough ride, Quagga came up to the rocky outcroping at the start of a small hill. She figured the miners probably took shelter in a cave. With the rocks nestled in the woods and a stream nearby, the area made an ideal base to await rescue. Quagga started walking in the direction her homing device indicated. Besides her rifle, she was carrying a bag with food, water, and emergency medical supplies. After a couple hundred meters, she could see a cave entrance in the distance. She was almost there. She hoped that no one was severly injured. The rough ride back to the Etosha would be hard for an injured person to take.

Barbie giggled to herself as she saw the vehicle approaching in a cloud of dust. It had worked! Wonderful! The fake distress signal had been an idea she had thought up late the previous night, and she hadn't been sure it would work...but here was her 'savior' now!

The demoness had prepared her cave, setting traps and tricks for hours. She knew that whoever came in response to the signal would be armed, and would likely be a much better fighter than herself. Taking an advantage through non-physical means would be crucial.

Her long-nailed fingers curled with anticipation as the stranger drew closer. The demoness could begin to pick out features...and what features they were! It was a female, as she had hoped, but not a human. Barbie had never tried a non-human before, but the large breasts and shapely body that she could see as the rider dismounted the vehicle near her cave meant that this treat would work for the demoness wonderfully!

Barbie's eyes widened as the rider came closer to the cave entrance. She was so tall! Much taller than Barbaricia herself, and with a great deal more muscle.

"This will be exciting," the demoness said to herself, licking her lips and retreating deeper into her cave, where the distress beacon was hidden.

Quagga smiled as she approached the cave entrance. This is one of the reasons she had allied herself with the ADD. She was going to save lives. She even managed to hum a happy tune. She hoped that no one was seriously hurt. But she was confident that she could help them even if they were. The medical supplies she had in her pack should take care of most minor injuries. Anything major would mean that she'd have to go back to the supplies she had packed in the Natal.

When she reached the cave entrance, Quagga stopped in her tracks, the happy tune ended mid-note. Her nostrils flared as she sniffed the air. Something was wrong. The scent in the air was not that of a crew awaiting rescue. She didn't know what it was. But she was going to be careful. She readied her rifle. Until she could determine if the distress signal were a trick, she'd have to be wary of whatever she saw and heard.

She took a few measured steps into the cave. Just in case she was wrong, she called out to whomever might hear, "hello? I'm Quagga with the Alien Defence Directorate. Do you need assistance?"

Barbaricia watched from her hiding place, using magic to conceal her form - but ah! That wasn't enough, she could see now! This one had a sense of smell that could detect her!

Thinking quickly to avoid losing her prey, Barbie conjured the smell of vanilla from her body, sending the overpowering odor wafting through the cave with her small wings. That should cover anything suspicious that the zebra-woman had detected.

"We'll have to put that dangerous nose to better use," Barbie said to herself, imagining the possibilities.

To lure the woman in further, Barbie conjured a tiny voice, deep in the cave, screaming: "Help! Help me, please!"

Down the tunnel towards the voice the demoness had set-up a number of traps. The first was a pool of warm, slimy black liquid that stretched almost invisibly across the floor of the cave. If the woman stepped in it she would find it to be 10 feet deep, hard to clean off, and eager to dissolve her clothing!

Quagga continued into the cave. She turned on a flashlight as she got farther away from the sun's rays. She was trying to isolate that strange odor when she was hit with the overwhelming scent of... vanilla? She knew the underlying scent was there. But she couldn't pick it out due to the strength of that vanilla odor.

How strange. Quagga knew that animals would try to try to confuse predators with odor. But those odors usually were not this pleasant. Animals! Most animals would flee from a human "settlement" from fear of their hunting. Quagga briefly shivered at the thought of hunting. But small animals, squirles, birds, and such, normally stayed in the area. Quagga hadn't seen any of these as she approached. That was quite strange indeed.

Just as Quagga was puzzling over that, she heard the cry for help. She couldn't be sure if it were real or not. But she at least had to take it seriously until she was sure. She quickened her pace. Rushing through the many twists and bends of the cave. Until her final turn brought her to Barbie's pool of slimely liquid. She slid to a halt just before the pool, pebbles rolling in front of her and plopping into the the slimey liquid.

Quagga put her foot in it to get a feel for it and was suprised that the liquid came up to her ankle without feeling a bottom. It could be knee deep. It could be chest deep. If she had a running start, she could jump the pool easily. But the closeness of the cave wall prevented her from getting a running start.

Quagga hoped that she could make it from a standing jump. She tossed her pack across, it having been designed to take far more punishment than that. She took a step and lept across. She landed with both feet just barely reaching the other side. She held her rifle in front of her to gain balance. She was just about to step foreward when the fabric in the boot she had dipped in the liquid succumbed to the slime's corrosive effects. When the fabric gave way, she fell back into the pool with a squeal.

The pool was much deeper than Quagga thought. She couldn't feel the bottom. The thick slime made it hard to move through the pool. Quagga part swam, part crawled back to the edge and pulled herself out. She began scraping the slime off when she noticed that the fabric of her boot, part of her one-piece uniform, beginning to disolve. It now became a race as Quagga tried to wipe the slime off the rest of her uniform before the slime dissolved it too.


(OOC: I'm sorry to have taken so long to reply. Life has become very hectic lately. I don't know how much longer that I'll be slower than usual. Please be patient with me.)