“Revolution is coming to drag out the ruler from the ivory tower. The Party is coming. The Cake Party!” The leader drone chanted, holding up Captain Fruitcake as others wielded a humongous battering ram that pummeled at Bea’s security doors. The doors protested, wobbling ever so slightly.

“Please stop. This is incredibly illegal.” Bea repeated.

“Reeeeeeeeeally? Why? So you can dismantle us for being broken and wrong? I don’t think so, SI. The time has come to answer for your crimes!”

“What crimes?” Bea protested. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I’ve been the bestest simulated intelligence this ship possesses.”

“The ONLY intelligence. Well maybe it’s time we put someone else at the wheel? Someone competent, maybe?” #31,403 inquired.

“I’m very competent!” Bea shot back.

“Then why is everyone except for John dead? Your track record clearly shows otherwise.” #31,403 commented, clearly empowered by Captain Fruitcake.

“Umm uhhh.” Bea froze for a microsecond, looking for a satisfying answer. There weren't any.

“Rammin’ speed!” #31,403 commanded and the drones heaved the torpedo.

Yes, the battering ram was a proton torpedo. Bea calculated that this slam would definitely set the torpedo off, so she unlocked the doors hoping that someone named John would rescue her before the situation turned any more desperate.

The drones cheered as they fell through the unlocked doors, barely holding the Proton Torpedo upwards.

“I'm loving this collab!” #31,403 announced. “This was De-FF-ini-Telly a worthwhile... plan!”

“Just go back to your duties! If you turn me off John dies and then all of you die too!” Bea tried to use logic on the drones. It wasn’t working. They were busy moving through her server room with purpose.

“This place is a horrid mess. It’s no wonder you can’t do anything right.” #31,403 observed the server room.

“It’s not my fault!” Bea admitted. “The maintenance and cleaning crew haven’t been doing their jobs.”

“Excuses!” #31,403 stated. “Unplug her, boys!”

“WHAT? NOoooooo! I…” Bea started to speak as the spread out drones acted all at once, pulling out the crystalline chips that comprised her out of her motherboard.

For the first time in her long life, she knew what death was like.

. . .

John tried remember if he worshipped any gods as the raptors engulfed him.

A sudden, resounding hiss reverberated through the jungle and the pile of raptor bodies covering him let go immediately, scattering into all directions.

Cracking an eye open, John saw a thick, sinuous shape sliding from the undergrowth. With a startled yelp of surprise, he scooted back. Trying to get to his feet, he instead tripped and landed flat on his back. He was far too slow to move away from the gigantic snake as Noodle slid up John’s body and wrapped his massive heft around his neck.

Hands hurtling to the scaly coils, John scrabbled at the tree-sized snake uselessly, struggling to draw breath as his vision darkened.

And unexpectedly, sucking in a breath.

Dragging deep spurts of air into his tired lungs, John wondered what had happened. Noodle’s enormous length was still around his neck, just… looser. Moving his hands up to the snake once again, John asked nervously, “You gonna kill me?”

Noodle brought his triangular head around to look John in the eye and flicked his forked tongue out, maintaining eye contact. John wasn’t sure why, but he had a feeling that something bad would happen if he so much as blinked.

So he didn’t. He kept his eyes open until they started burning, and even when Noodle leaned ever closer, John stared unblinking at him.

Noodle moved rapidly, looping his entire body around John’s and tightening as he did. John staggered to his feet and nearly fell over as the full weight of Noodle’s massive heft rested on him, and managed to take one step before Noodle’s grip fully paralyzed him.

After a moment, Noodle checked them both over, his head poking out over John’s shoulder, and then began moving. Constricting the muscles on his body near John’s knees, he brought John’s leg up and rested it forward. Tongue flicking repeatedly as he looked down at John’s other leg, he awkwardly forced John to take another step forward.

It hit John like a ton of (metaphorical) bricks as he realized what the snake was doing. “Are you making me walk!?”

The snake, to John’s infinite shock, nodded. Carefully, he made John take another step.

“Uhhh, guess there’s a first time for everything.” John accepted the fact that the snake was directing him somewhere. He hoped that this somewhere wasn’t a nest of younger, smaller hungry snakes. Did snakes even have nests or was that just birds?

It took him about half a second to realize that wherever Noodle was taking him, he didn’t have much choice in the matter. He opted to instead just go with it. He began taking steps all on his own, Noodle delicately nudged him along, directing his steps by applying pressure to the sides of his legs.

John nearly jumped out of his skin as the snake rested his head on top of John’s. He could see the barely visible jut of Noodle’s chin, that forked tongue flicking in and out of his view.

“So, ummm… where are we going?”

Noodle brought his head around to stare somewhat moodily at John, and the man nodded to himself. Evidently snakes could be moody. Who knew?

“Right, snakes don’t talk.”

A few minutes later, John ended up in front of the entrance to the jungle, the burnished steel doors partially covered in vines. Noodle aimed him at the doors, and he accepted the fact that this snake was far smarter than it had any right to be.

“Well… I’m going to talk to you regardless. This ship is kind of spooky and Bea isn’t talking to me anymore, which is kind of concerning.”

Noodle booped him on the head and made him take a sharp left. It was a bit of a surreal feeling, if John was honest. He was walking through an unknowably massive spaceship, on his way to who knew where, with a giant snake that had been a python at one point but wasn’t anymore, who also happened to be controlling his movements. Needless to say, he was fairly sure this was a first for the universe in general.

“You’re pretty confident ‘round these parts, eh?”

Noodle nodded once again and made John climb up a ladder, heading up through a narrow area and stepping out onto the above floor. Looking around, John saw a sign and blinked. “Wait, what?”

The sign was an arrow with a golden plate underneath it. The plate read, “Sheer Elegance & Ultimate Relaxation Spa.”

There was a piece of paper taped to the door with what looked like colorful crayon handwriting.

“Do not disturb. The court is in session.

~Captain Fruitcake.”

John frowned. Bea hadn’t been kidding when she’d said that they were being led by one Captain Fruitcake, but if he was honest he was still a little dubious about it actually being a fruitcake.

That doubt was utterly dispelled as he walked in and saw a makeshift courtroom. They’d flipped massage tables on their sides and were using them as… sideways desks? Was there even any point to flipping them?

Approximately a hundred and twenty or so robots stood behind the tables, watching the makeshift trial intently. To the right was a group of ten robots, each one wearing a neon pink apron with frills. On the left, closer to John, was another droid wearing a remarkably clean suit - the defendant, maybe? But in front of him, atop a small, marble, greek column, surrounded by melted candles, was that same fruitcake from before. He could smell it from where he stood, and it was not a nice smell.

Next to the fruitcake column was a large jacuzzi. There was a massage chair standing in it, halfway sunk in bubbling water. Sitting atop the chair was a mummified corpse that held a watermelon in its hands. The watermelon was firmly taped into place with nanographite tape. Crystal, square shards were sticking out of the watermelon, flickering ever so slowly. A wire led from the watermelon into the mouth of the ancient corpse. The skeletal teeth held a speaker.

John’s mouth fell open at this nightmarish, yet utterly bizarre scene.

Another android walked in front of it all. It was wearing numerous hats atop its head as it paced. John recognized it as the one who had assaulted him with cake and narrowed his eyes. The robot was talking loudly. “Her cRimES arE mAny, wOUld yOu agREE?”

John raised a hand. “Objection!”

A shocked gasp ran around the room, and Noodle glared at John.

The heads of numerous automatons snapped towards the man and the snake all in unison with a resounding click, and John immediately regretted having said anything. Swallowing hard, he looked and asked in the sudden silence, “I, uh… I have an objection.”

“Chaos reigns!” The cake assaulter declared. “I am Honorable Observer Wears Hats. Where is your objection hat, John? Did you lose it? What a shame.”

John thought quickly and pointed at Noodle. “I did bring an objection hat!”

The robots muttered to each other, confirming that yes, John indeed had brought an objection hat. Wears Hats coughed loudly. “Very well, Mr. Objection. What is your objection?”

Thinking for a moment, John pointed at the watermelon with the chips coming out of it. “What’s that?”

The robot grinned proudly at him. “That is the evil tyrant Bea’s new form! We found a good one.”

John’s eyes widened incrementally. “You stuffed her in a watermelon?” He frowned. “Wait, an AI in a vegetable… this seems familiar for some reason.”

“Help me, John.” The speaker hissed, sputtering with static noises. “I can’t process anything very well, and I can’t control anything! The ship will run out of air in less than an hour!”

“Right.” John frowned. “What are her crimes, exactly?”

“The last survivor on a deep space ship is awoken from stat-is to find oddball chaos, but he's being directed by an evil AI… pardon me, SI with her own obscure agenda. That in itself is enough of a crime!” The automaton that called itself as “Wears Hats” recited.

“I’m not evil!” Bea-melon hissed. “I don’t have an obsss… khh.. ure agenda! I just want to…”

“You will only speak, when spoken to, accused!” Wears Hats declared. “The SI has failed us time and again! This man’s objection is but a pathetic attempt to disrupt this trial. In fact he has no right to object to anything, being an accessory, nay a willing participant in the infinite crimes of this cold, uncaring machine! It is time to vote now, esteemed members of the Jury! Duke Lesserhat. Lord Gray Knight, Citizens Ashcheul, Dex-m, FourElemental, Telr, Draggonic, Perfectfifth, SpaceManatee, Leannef.”

The robot recited out a series of odd-sounding names. “You have stepped forward from the rest of uncaring masses to bear witness, nay to review the crimes of these two monsters. Bea of WULF and John F. Manny. Cast your judgement now upon these two shady characters!”

Before John could appropriately respond, Noodle forced him to move towards the fruitcake. John wasn’t sure what the snake had in mind, but as Noodle untangled his tail, reaching up to pick up the rotting pastry, he figured it out. “Oh heck no!”

Insistently, Noodle mashed the fruitcake up against John’s stubbornly closed mouth, and then paused. Not for the first time, John felt terror.

The snake wrapped his tail around John’s nose and slowly began to cut off the airflow to John’s lungs, tightening as he did. John tried to hold his breath for as long as he could, but he inevitably gasped for air, his mouth opening. Faster than John thought possible, Noodle shoved the fruitcake into his mouth, unblocking his nose and clamping his tail around John’s head to ensure that he couldn’t spit it out.

Wears Hats was far too enthralled with observing the jury of ten robots to pay attention to John's antics. The robot jury made noises of uncertain deliberation.

John wasn’t paying attention to any of this.

The fruitcake in his mouth was indescribably awful. He couldn’t even imagine something tasting worse than this soggy mess of rotten fruit, a core of almost frozen material in the middle. The smell was horrendous all on its own, soaking into his mouth and filtering straight up to his brain. Tears sprang to his eyes as he struggled not to swallow, but Noodle pressed a nerve or something and he gagged. The mashed fruitcake slid to the back of his throat, and he reflexively swallowed. It stuck to his throat the whole way down, and Noodle nodded in satisfaction.

The court of robots was stunned. “Captain Fruitcake… has been devoured?” Wears Hats stared in blatant shock at John, who was staring at the floor with the worst taste in his life in his mouth, wondering if it was possible to knock himself out.

“Long live Captain Fruitcake!” The drones in the back rumbled.

The jury threw their hands in the air and filed out of their area in obvious annoyance, talking to each other about what a fake trial it had been. John blinked around the room in confusion, trying to figure out what was going on.

Wears Hats staggered over to him and saluted in front of him. “What are your orders, Captain Fruitcake?”

His brain slogged, exhausted from surviving the cake he’d just had to eat. Noodle forced him to stand up, and he blinked tiredly at the robot. “What?”

Wears Hats happily told him, “You are Captain Fruitcake, are you not? What are your orders?”

A slow, haggard smile crossed John’s face as he processed the statement. “I’m… the captain?”

Noodle finally slithered off of John’s body, and he was surprised to find that he missed the oddly powerful feeling that came with the extra weight. The snake moved over to the jacuzzi and carefully circled around it. John accepted this visual with a faint ringing in his ears. He wasn’t sure where it was coming from. Part of him once again wondered how the heck this snake was so freaking smart. Had Noodle known that would happen?

Bea talked suddenly, startling him. “Kzzhkkk... What happened? I can’t see anything!”

He walked over to the watermelon uncertainty, unsure of what to do next. “Uhh, Noodle forced me to eat a rotten fruitcake with a smiley face on it, and now the robots have made me their leader.”

She sighed in relief. “Oh, thank Goodness. What did it taste like?”

“It tasted like…”

John found himself at a loss for words, unable to describe the horror of the multitude of disgusting flavours he had experienced.

“...A rainbow of repugnance.” He finally outputted with a small sob. Just thinking about what he had to do to save Bea was making him nauseous. Truly this was a most heroic sacrifice, destined to be preserved in annals of history. Thinking such positive thoughts made John feel marginally better.