fandomhigh | Cupcake War Crimes, Week 1 (Tuesday, Period 1)

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cupcake war crimes

Cupcake War Crimes, Week 1 (Tuesday, Period 1)

The Home Ec room was set up to look -- like a Home Ec classroom, if one with a very single-minded purpose: every station was set up with stand mixers and a generous supply of cupcake trays and cup liners, plus frostings and sprinkles and all kinds of cake-decorating paraphernalia. The teachers . . . didn’t look like the type of teachers you’d expect to see standing at the front of the room. Well, anywhere outside of Fandom, anyway.

"Hey, everybody," said the guy who wasn’t wearing the shiny mask. "Welcome to Cupcake War Crimes. I’m Samuel Anders, and you can call me Anders -- none of that ‘mister’ stuff, okay?" He turned and gestured to the guy who was wearing the mask.

"I’m called Stark. Not a mister either. Just Stark," said the previously mentioned masked fellow. Who was looking a little bewildered to be up in the front of a classroom.

That was Anders’s ~~adorable~~ persuasiveness at work. Or possibly just the allure of the subject matter. "So." Anders smacked his hands together loudly. "Cupcake War Crimes. Sounds pretty fr-- Ahem. Pretty serious, huh? Way more serious than baked goods should be? Wrong. Cupcakes are serious business. And that includes doing ‘em right."

"Very serious," Stark said. "Very, very serious." Stark took his baked good seriously. Especially cupcakes. "Most serious when the cupcakes are done wrong. So we want to show how you not to do that. Not to do them wrong. Not like they do on the cupcake war show on the tv." Stark had seen one episode of Cupcake Wars and been horrified by it. Further episodes had only led to more horror.

Anders turned to one of two trays of cupcakes up on the front counter. "Like this," he said, indicating what seemed like a totally innocuous, yummy-looking treat. "Wasabi and tuna have no business being in a cupcake. Neither do beer and sauerkraut."

"No business at all," Stark added, glaring at the offending pastries. "Some things should never be done to cupcakes. Ever. At all. It’s not right. Chocolate goes in cupcakes. Not fish. Fish go in water!"

Anders let the appalling concoctions stay on display for a little while longer, so the true horror of them could sink in, before finally taking pity on everyone and covering them up. It was okay, though! There was a second display on the tray he uncovered next. "Chocolate marshmallow cupcakes, for example. Or ginger lemon. We’ll go into a little more depth about ways to do cupcakes really right and really wrong for the rest of the term, but for this week, take a cupcake, introduce yourself if you feel like it, and try to come up with things you think should never go into cupcakes. Easy enough, right?"

"Don’t take the bad cupcakes," Stark advised. He had tried one in an attempt to be open-minded and would likely never recover from the trauma. And considering some of Stark’s other traumas, that was really saying a lot. "And we need someone. One of you. To assist with the cupcakes. Or the teaching. Or both. If anyone wants to do that, tell us. Please."

[OOC: ETA -- argh, I knew I forgot an OCD thread, so feel free to mingle all you want in the introductions thread. Sorry, guys. Really off my game this week.]

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Raven was too depressed upon returning from Italy to have much of an appetite. Or to wonder just how she'd gotten assigned to this class. So she eyed the first tray of cupcakes suspiciously, but she wasn't sampling from either. Especially the first.

"I am Raven," she said quietly. "I do not believe animal flesh has any place in a cupcake."

EVEN BACON. SO THERE.

"What about bacon?" Alex had to ask. "Bacon goes in everything." It was bacon.

He couldn't read narrative, sadly.

"I do not consume flesh," Raven said. "I am a vegetarian."

Bacon was forever denied.

"But that just means you wouldn't eat the bacon cupcakes, it doesn't mean bacon doesn't go in cupcakes," Alex said. "Right? Unless you think no one should eat meat because you don't, but that would be kind of judgey."

"I do not begrudge others if they wish to eat meat," Raven said. "I would prefer they did not, but I understand the culture in which I was raised is not the same as everyone else. So if others wish to add bacon to their cupcakes, they certainly may."

Her brow furrowed. "Though I do fail to see why meat of any kind would belong in a cupcake, since it is a sweet."

"You can put bacon with sweet stuff and because it's salty and smokey it's good," Alex said. "Bacon goes with everything. It's nature's perfect food." He wasn't dealing with her whole "I'm not saying I judge people for eating meat, but I wish they wouldn't," or whatever thing, because: her problem. Not his.

Also, she talked kind of like his dad did sometimes.

Edited 2011-05-10 21:07 (UTC)

"I understand it is a very popular food with many people," Raven said, nodding. "Though I would consider something such as an apple to be a more perfect food."

She clearly did not know what she was missing. It was sad. "I'm sorry."

"There is no need to apologize," Raven said, mistaking his meaning. "Those of Azarath believed all sentient life to be sacred. We would consume what gifts animals would give us in the form of milk or cheese or other such things, but not their flesh."

Oh, she was in a cult. Right, then. "Well, um, I respect your lifestyle choices." That seemed safe enough, even if it did make him kind of a wuss.

"Thank you," Raven said, giving him a tiny smile. "I am Raven -- you must be one of the new students for the summer?"

"Yeah, I'm Alex. Hi," he said with a tiny wave.

"It is nice to meet you," Raven said. "I hope Fandom has been treating you well so far."

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"It probably doesn't."

Stark hadn't caught on to the bacon idea yet or he'd be disagreeing with you right now Raven. But don't worry, Anders is sure to suggest it soon enough.

Raven smiled, pleased he had agreed. "Thank you, Professor Stark," she said.

"Just Stark," Stark said quickly. "No Professor. Just Stark." He wasn't a professor! "I'm not. I'm just me."

"But you are my teacher," Raven said, her smile fading with confusion. "I must use your proper title as it is respectful."

"I like just Stark better," he protested. "I'm not really a professor I just like cupcakes." Somehow, apparently, that qualified him to teach. Who knew? "I don't have a title. Well. Stykera, maybe but that isn't anything to do with cupcakes. Just Stark. Please?"

There was a bit of flailing, a bit of babbling, and what would be an even more effective sad face if he had two big sad eyes in it instead of one. Business as usual for Stark.

"But to call you by your name is a familiarity I have not earned," Raven said, distressed. She didn't want to disobey, but what he wanted contradicted her upbringing.

"Everyone calls me Stark," Stark pointed out. "Well, not everyone. Sometimes there are much less pleasant things but you aren't going to call me any of those." He hoped. "You don't need to earn it. It's just my name. And I told you you could use it."

He really ought to just let this go. But he probably wasn't going to. He did tend to get hung up on things.

"But that is disrespectful," Raven protested. "You are my elder."

Look, she was hung up on this, OK?

"But I want to be called Stark. And I said that. So it is not disrespectful. Since I said I want to just be called by my name."

Perhaps they could be hung up on it together. On opposite sides. Stark really ought to just be glad he wasn't being called anything unpleasant but no. He had to protest.

"I will do my best not to cause you distress," Raven promised.

She'd just not call address him by name at all. That would solve the problem, right?

"You could just use my name," Stark pointed out. Again. "That would be fine. And I won't feel disrespected." Really, any time he wasn't getting called 'slave' or even 'Banik' in certain tones he would be feeling perfectly respected. "I promise."

"I will try," Raven said solemnly.

She'd fail. It was just unnatural to address a teacher by name. She even called Max "Professor," after all.

Re: Introductions/Cupcake Tasting [CWC, 5/10]

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