The Hall of Condiments

by Jon Hartford

asked. He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, all of his hyperactive energy gone. "Actually we didn't really plan all the simulation... it's tailored to each visitor's subconscious mind, so it's different each time..."

  "But you must have some way to stop...OW!" Sadistic mustard bottle knight. Who knew you could make a pickle spear so sharp?

  "When we go public with the exhibit we'll have somebody at the controls, but we're not supposed to be ready until next week..."

  "Aww, Kenny-chan. I'm sooooory... It'll be okay. :'-)"

  The knights pushed us through the gate of the castle and over to a small squat building in the corner of the walls. The buildings inside the castle were made of rock candy and had shingles on the roofs made of fruit leather. A grimy jar of Vegamite unlocked the heavy graham cracker door. We were thrown down through a trap door grille made of forged licorice sticks, which slammed closed above us.

  I brushed off the powdered sugar from my clothes and stood up. The sinister face of a ketchup bottle glared in through the grille. "We're watching you, spies; don't think you can get away. Nobody is going to stop us from spreading condiments over the whole world. Nobody!" The door clanged as the bottles hopped away. I reached towards the grille in the ceiling. It was just barely out of my reach. Ted and Haruhi stood up behind me and we stared up through the grille, where a small shaft of light shined through.

  "This isn't a joke, is it, Ted? I thought they were holograms. How can they lock us up like this?" He shrugged his shoulders.

  "Noooooo Kenny-channnnn... Everything is made of synthesized matter like we were telling you before. :P So it is real--not a hologram. :)"

  "How can you be happy about this?"

  ":( Somebody will find us eventually, Kenny-chan; it's okay. :/"

  "Well at least we won't starve..."

  ":)"

  "...but what was all that about taking over the world? With hordes of condiment 'goodness' I suppose?"

  Ted scratched his chin. "The simulation includes artificial intelligence constructs for the virtual characters. Our main objective is to educate people about condiments and spread appreciation for them, so we programmed the artificial intelligence to include a genetic algorithm with those objectives in the fitness evaluation function..." I cocked an eye at him. "What I mean is, it's in their programming to try to actively increase the global influence of condiments."

  "So they're going to try to take over the world?"

  "Hmm..." Ted's face brightened. "YES! They will! It's the ultimate way to achieve our objectives! Why didn't I think of this before?"

  "Uh, great. Who else knows about this?"

  Ted grinned from ear to ear, all of his normal gleeful energy returned. "Nobody!" I stared at him. He rubbed my head vigorously and laughed.

  "Wait... you're HAPPY about this?"

  "Of course! I've always wanted to program a sentient AI and release it into reality. This program might not be sentient, but taking over the entire world? It's a dream come true! Better than I imagined. And at the same time propagating the full joy of condiments throughout the universe? Awesome!" He started jumping around the room. "Yay! Yay! Yay!" Ted grabbed hold of Haruhi's arm and started dancing. "We're the parents of the new dominant (non)lifeform of the planet! Woo-hoo!"

  ":D"

  "You're both insane." I said.

  "Come on Ken, what would be so wrong about the world being ruled by a materialized group of foodstuffs controlled by a malevolent artificial intelligence?"

  "Nothing, but..."

  "But what? There aren't any buts about it!"

  "...but I HATE MAYO."

  They stopped dancing and stared at me. "You're a horrible person, Ken."

  I shook my head. "I don't see how you can put up with having it in your refrigerator, let along eat the stuff. It's made out of raw eggs..."

  "They're pasteurized."

  "...it's slimy, smooth and almost pure fat..."

  "Lots of foods are."

  "...it's off-white yellow and the smell of it makes me gag..."

  "Oh, we can fix that."

  "...and it has almost no culinary applications with the possible exception of tuna fish sandwiches..."

  "It's great by itself."

  "...where it can be easily replaced with a creamy salad dressing like ranch or thousand island."

  ":("

  "Hater."

  "Prejudiced hater."

  "Mayophobe."

  I held up my hands. "Fine. Be that way. I'll just save the world without you then."

  "From mayo? Ken! You're not talking sense, Ken! Mayo is good. It's your friend. It's creamy, delicious, wonderful. Mayo is on your side, it's in your corner, it's working to make the world a better place for you, Ken, for you, and for all of us."

  "No."

  "You will eat it and like it."

  "NO."

  "Hitler hated mayo, Ken. Hitler."

  "NO!"

  The door above us rattled and creaked. "You prisoners down there, shut up. You're negatively impacting our progress by distracting us, and it's impolite. And we'll torture you if you keep it up."

  I screamed and threw a loose chunk of rock candy up at the ceiling. It bumped the grille up a little and hit me in the head when it came back down. "If I'm distracting you, good. I want you distracted. I want you stopped. You stupid sauces, you dumb nuts, death to scummy mayo."

  "Alright, you asked for it!" Bottle hops faded and the door slammed. I could hear indistinct yelling outside as the dungeon keeper ordered bottles around.

  "Oops." I said. The two of them glared at me.

  "U fathead dumbbrains! >:("

  "Who knows what they're going to do now, Ken."

  "It can't be too bad..." I said.

  "Probably they'll throw a full-grown gummy bear in here, or, worse, drench us in citric acid and let it burn through us."

  "What if they...ooh, nooo...gummy snakes. :'("

  "They couldn't be that cruel."

  "I haaaate snaaakes. D:"

  The dungeon keeper came back in, leading a group of sweet and sour sauce packets who were carrying a steaming pot. They tipped it slowly until an evil-looking black liquid started spilling through the wrought licorice grille.

  "Chocolate! :)"

  "Yes," Ted said, matter-of-factly. "We'll drown."

  ":("

  The hot, melted chocolate oozed over the floor of the dungeon, reaching to our ankles, then our knees and waists. I started laughing.

  "What's wrooooong with you, Kennyyyyyy, you idiot, we're going to die!"

  "Bahahahahaha..."

  Haruhi slapped me and we started treading...er...chocolate. We floated up towards the ceiling and the air pocket above us narrowed. Haruhi's head bumped into the grille. She pushed it up out of the way and pulled herself out. Ted and I followed.

  "Hey. You can't do that..." the dungeon keeper protested. Haruhi grabbed the vegamite jar and threw it down into the pit. It shattered from the temperature change when it hit the hot chocolate, and the salty mixture dispersed as the glass shards sank. The sauce packets fled out the door, leaving the chocolate cauldron behind.

  "Yay! :D We're free!" Haruhi shouted and charged out of the door.

  "Wait, somebody'll see you..." I stuck my head out of the door and looked around. There was nobdody in sight. "Get back in here, now." She shook her head and ran off towards a small rock candy water well. It wasn't any use--we'd be seen soon enough anyway.

  Inside, Ted was jogging back and forth, muttering to himself.

  "Come on, Ted," I said and left the room. As I walked up to the well, Haruhi had the bucket drawn up and was washing the chocolate syrup off of her face and hands.

  "How do we get out of this? Can we make it back to the broccoli and cauliflower forest on the other side of the bridge and leave by that door, Haruhi? If we get going now, we might be able to make it before the Mayo king's army shows up..."

  She shook her head, splattering chocolate everywhere. "Hmm.... Yes! :D We can go back to th
e broccoli forest and go back through the entrance door. *nodnod*" I heard a shout behind me.

  Ted was hitting at a lone cashew that had accosted him. He picked up a rock candy and hit it in the head, cracking it in half. We waved him over. "I guess we're all 'murderers' now." I said. "Ted, we're going back to the forest and getting out of here. The sauce packets have probably regrouped and are going to tell the Mayo King we escaped... if they haven't already."

  Ted nodded. "We can use the entrance door to get back out again. At least, if they didn't re-synthesize the simulation and rotate it around us while we were in the dungeon... which they probably did..."

  "Do you have any other suggestions?" I asked.

  "Hey, wait! I'm not helping you out. You'll try and stop the takeover."

  "So you're going to help these freaks? You monster, traitor to humanity!"

  "No, no. I won't help them. If you can defeat the AI without my help, then I guess they don't deserve to be in charge..."

  "Alright, then, let's get out of here." I ran towards the castle gate. Haruhi and Ted followed.

  "Kenny-chan, what about the..."

  "Ssh!" Ted said.

  "...gate guards?"

  I screeched to a halt just short of the opening and peered around the edge. There were two sleepy mustard bottle knights standing on the edge of the drawbridge, looking out towards the plains. Neither of them were paying much attention, but I would have run into them and been caught if Haruhi hadn't warned me in time.

  "What'll we do?" I whispered to Haruhi.

  "Hmm... *:-( IDK?"

  Ted spoke up. "You know, you could tie some of these rocks up to the gate chains there, like with a handkerchief or something, hide behind the wall here, then scream to get the guards attention and when they come running..."

  "I thought you weren't helping?" I asked Ted.

  "Er... Sorry. Right."

  "Heya, I know!