Heeey I'm back! It's finally time for the full Cakeverse analysis gang!
Ok, so, for a refresher:
There's the Forks, the Cakes and the Plates (normal people), and it goes like this:
Plates are just normal people, the majority of the world population, nothing new here.
Forks: Can't taste and sometimes can't smell either, sometimes they used be able to taste but lost it with age; either way, they can only ever taste cakes.
Cakes: Basically normal people except that they're delicious, everything from them (flesh, tears, saliva, etc) tastes like cake (or other foods if you want). You can't tell who's a cake or not unless you're a Fork that's tasting them in some way.
Now, I have to add some stuff that's really interesting and that the og author said, that we'll be getting into today.
• Forks go absolutely bat shit insane when they taste the Cakes most of the time, that can lead to a lot of things, cannibalism, sex, or (if you're cultured) both.
• Both Cakes and Forks suffer from their own societal plights. Cakes die a lot, and Forks when discovered are instantly pinned as murderers, criminals and perverts, even if they haven't done anything wrong yet.
• Cakes can derail a Fork's entire life, and Forks are like sin and temptation to Cakes.
Now, I want to talk about these because they absolutely fucking vexed me and now I want to make this all of y'all's problem.
「The First Taste」
It's essentially a common rule as said by the author that the Forks go insane after feeling the taste of a Cake, now, let's talk about: Why?
See, Cakeverse is technically an Au based from the likes of Omegaverse, which you can see by the structure being similar to Alpha/Beta/Omega with the three types of people out there. But, in ABO the Alphas going insane is due to a specific event, heats, which are there specifically for reproduction and are said to bring out animal instincts out of people's control, while Forks are based on simply taste, food, and not something as biological.
Of course it's up to the individual writer to an extent, but my interpretation of why Forks lose it when they taste Cakes is more psychological when compared to Alphas in the Omegaverse.
Imagine that you are completely unable to see color, never once have you seen one, you grew up hearing all about how wonderful colors are, you saw others compliment the colors of several works of art, you heard all about the colors of the world around you, but all that you see is beige and grey. Now, imagine that one day you bump into someone, and suddenly you're able to see all the colors, for the first time ever in your life, you can finally experience blue skies and green grass, you can see the same way the rest of the world sees, something that was fundamentally missing from you is finally gifted to you by this stranger on a silver tray.
You're finally complete.
That's the reality of what Forks go through, years of eating tasteless food, seeing people enjoy food wholeheartedly and rant about the tastes, hearing about the differences between expensive food and cheap food, and then suddenly finally tasting cake. Of course they go insane and fixate on it, it's like the final puzzle piece finally sliding into place, something that they've been missing this whole time being manifested with only a taste.
Before, eating was a chore, something simply to survive there was no joy in it, no fun to be found in desserts or snacks, but with only a single kiss the Fork finally feels what it is like to crave food, to want food for the taste.
Cakeverse in nature is oddly psychological, playing with the concept of taking away something extremely core to the human experience, taste. It's inherent and everyone has it, you'd probably feel like a freak of nature if you didn't have something while everyone else has, right?
That's what Cakes bring Forks; normalcy, joy and purpose, it's basically like a shot of endorphins all at once straight into your bloodstream, there's a good chance it'd hit like a truck and fuck you up majorly.
Forks acting rashly probably looks different than when Alphas do the same, because the motive is inherently different, but the desperation is arguably more raw.
A lot can be written on what that reaction would be:
Immediately trying to taste the Cake (kissing, licking, biting), trying to play cool only to strike later (potential kidnapping, manipulation, planning and scheming in general), the Fork can try to resist temptation or maybe the Cake can notice the extreme reaction and run away, maybe the Cake can instigate and bait the Fork to take a bite.
It could lead to fluff, to relationships starting, relationships ending, it could smut, it could be gory cannibalism, hell, it could be both.
Either way, the sheer amount of character study that could be made out of this tidbit alone is insane, and the story concepts don't stop there!
「We Do, In Fact, Live In a Society」
Cakes don't know who they are until it's too late, but I can imagine that in society they'd be treated with a lot of extra care if they are known beforehand, as they are constantly in risk of dying.
Imagine that they'd also be majorly babyfied, the "nooo poor babies that can't do anything wrong, poor helpless and weak Cakes, they clearly can't take care of themselves, they're so vulnerable, don't worry I'll speak for you to protect your honor" would be insane. Any Cake that consensually and willingly gets with a Fork will be doubted if they truly wanted to do it, think nosy people pulling them aside to ask if they're ok and pressing to see if they're abused, think people immediately thinking that Cakes can't consent to anything with a Fork on principle despite them being grown adults.
Online discourse would definitely have people saying "Cakes are minor coded" or some shit, mark my words.
While Forks would be instantly persecuted for everything. Because of something they didn't choose, that was inherited at birth, they now are fully seem as murderers, kidnappers, rapists and just the lowest of the low. People will gossip, people will get defensive, people will cower any time you slightly raise your voice, you're seen as a predator, treated no different than a wild bear. To society at large, you're an unruly dog, and all eyes will be on you forever, watching, waiting for the day that you take a bite.
In a sense, it's almost like any Forks that do commit crimes instantly have a justification to do so, it's expected, really, you're a Fork, if course you'd snap one day. It's both maligned and normalized, everyone expects it and it almost gives Forks a reason to do so. Forever a self fulfilling prophecy.
Now I'm sorry that I'll keep bringing the Omegaverse up, it's just that it's really handy for comparison, but I find it fascinating that in a way, the societal effects of this are a mish mesh of the societal views seen in ABO, but like, in a way that doesn't make me want to vomit.
Can I be so fr with you guys right now? I don't like the societal parts of the Omegaverse, ever since I was a kid in the early hay days of the internet, that always made me uncomfortable, and it's also a bit lazy in a way. The problems in society with the Omegaverse are basically just Sexism, it's misogyny with mpreg, and a lot of fics end up feeling like a Handmaiden's Tale with mpreg. Replace Alphas with men and Omegas with Women and you get the Omegaverse, though it gets a bit interesting since there technically is a built-in "fuck or die" and aphrodisiac system with heats/ruts, but very few writers do something interesting with it.
My problem is that it's always either uncomfortable or outright boring, very little fics do it well and most of the time authors simply choose to side step it altogether, which I completely understand and actually prefer at this point.
I bring all this up because Cakeverse actually brings a lot of interesting concepts up in it's consequences on the world at large, the nature of Forks and Cakes mirrors a lot of real life concepts, but leaves enough fantastical elements that there's still intrigue in what could be explored and seem from authors writing certain details of it.
Would there be Cake support groups? Would there be Fork rights activists? Would there be people who are both Forks and Cakes, like a hybrid type? What are different relationship types seen as in the eyes of society as a whole?
It's all so complicated and the problems are different between the both of them, also, they're evenly split, which is a breath of fresh air.
Now, it's time to get even deeper into this, what are exactly Forks and Cakes relationship with each other like?
「Would You Still Love Me If I Was Cake?」
According to the author, Cakes can derail a Fork's life and Forks are temptation to Cakes. Now, why is that?
Imagine you're a Fork, living your life trying to do what you can with what's been handed to you, probably being discriminated against if you haven't been able to hide it well, when suddenly you taste someone (kiss or by accident, like a shared water bottle), and next thing you know you lise your mind. Your entire world falls apart, thoughts of dreams, future, your own sense of morality, it all melts away like sugar in water because you just experienced heaven and now it's all you can think about.
Someone completely normal beforehand, suddenly driven to obsession with just one moment, an entire life detailed into the unknown because they just had a taste of cake, thoughts being all about one person and their taste, the inability to stop even you're desperate to do so. It's madness, and almost like a tragedy, doomed by their own personal narrative of Fork meets Cake, the Forks turns into a starving beast whether they want to or not.
But Cakes? Imagine you have someone you love, and they want you so badly it drives you mad, imagine kissing the same lips that want to be stained with your taste, imagine putting yourself in the way of jaws that any of these days can close down on you and swallow you whole. You're constantly in contact with someone that could just straight up eat you, consume you whole and leave nothing behind, but your heart aches for them, you present yourself in a silver platter again and again.
Maybe you want to be eaten, to be consumed. Maybe you like being wanted, maybe you enjoy providing something to to others, you made them so happy that it doesn't even matter to you that they are taking chunks out of you, you'll gladly let yourself be torn apart if it means someone else is satisfied.
It's all about the usage of "Cannibalism as a Metaphor for Love™", it's all about loving someone but constantly wanting to eat them into non-existence, it's about to struggle between your brain heart and stomach.
It's about having your cake and eating it too.
The themes, the metaphors, the opportunities are endless and frankly I'm driving myself insane just imagining all of it, the angst also would be utterly fucking insane, imagine you live someone and you eat them, wouldn't you be upset? You loved them and you killed them yourself, with your own hands, their taste is on your lips and you locked your plate clean.
I'm screaming and crying and throwing up as we speak, the number of things you can do here are endless, soooo. . . Let's talk about some of my ideas!
「All My Fanfiction Titles Are Just Songs」
Last post I basically tagged a bunch of fandoms that I wish would use this trope (I'll also be doing that with this post), so now I'm going to showing some of the ideas I had for this AU that I might or might not write in the future, all of which you guys are totally free to use as prompts as well (just tag me on them lmao)
So, going ship by ship:
「Loveit」: Dead Plate fanfic, Vincent x Rody, Fork!Vincent and Cake!Rody. I imagine that the moment Vincent finds out is during the Best Served Hot ending, after biting Rody's ear, his reaction would show instantly on his face and Rody would notice right away. After that it can lead to a lot of things, fighting, smut and cannibalism galore, their relationship would only get more complicated after such a discovery. Hell, you can even have Vincent find out earlier, if you truly want more juicy drama, maybe Vincent will attempt to make Rody into the meal instead of Mason this time? For funsies you could even reverse it, Rody as a Fork would be fascinating to see, him bonding with Vincent that he also can't taste anything, only for him to find out later that he can taste Vincent himself, holy shit the intrigue.
「Eat You」: Death Note, Lawlight, Fork!Light and Cake!L. Imagine Light both having to hide the fact that he's Kira, but also having to hide the fact that he's a Fork, imagine the never leaving stain that being a Fork would be on his own self-perception of perfection, imagine the so called god that punishes criminals also being considered a criminal by default in society's eyes if he's ever found out. Kira selling out his own kind because most criminals would likely be Forks (whether they were rightfully convicted or not), and then comes in L, a detective, a nuisance, Light's equal and a Cake. Maybe Lights would find that out later on, maybe while they're playing as friends in college or while chained together, and now L had effortlessly thrown another wrench in his life yet again by default, like they're meant to be opposed by fate itself, where Kira is a Fork L is a Cake. L would likely goad Light on, trying to bait Kira out, by any means necessary, even if it means being eaten.
「Eat You Piece by Piece」: Hear me out, Batjokes. Fork!Bruce having to hold himself back from breaking his own morals due to finding out Joker is a Cake, Fork!Joker only getting deeper into his Batman obsession after tasting a Cake!Batman, Both Forks bonded by not having taste, maybe both are Forks that differ on how they react to Cakes (Joker regularly eating them while Bruce retains his morals and chooses to not hurt them), maybe both Cakes that got here because they were almost eaten (different Batman and Joker origin stories?). The opportunities are all intriguing and promptly end in bloodshed, expect angst and discussions of what is moral, also just so much angst holy shit this shit hurts.
「I Eat Boys Up」: Dungeon Meshi, Labru, Fork!Laios and Cake!Labru. I'm thinking post canon by accident, maybe something like sharing utensils, and I'm going to be so fr with you right now, this story coming from me would be a lot of romanticism through food metaphors and unending smut, feral Laios is my equivalent of heroin and I could imagine him describing Kabru's taste in detail to him while eating him out. But if smut isn't your jam, exploring how Laios and his monster obsession, especially in the form of food, as someone who can't taste would be intriguing, in a story so closely tied to food, you have to wonder how it would all change if the main character couldn't even taste. Also, I doubt Kabru would take the knowledge of him being essentially prey well, so there's that bag of worms to go into if you want.
「Blame Gluttony」: This one is purely self indulgent but like, Re:Zero with any ship, Cake! Subaru and Fork!anyone else. Imagine Subaru's world doesn't have this Cakeverse nonsense at all, but the world he's transported to has, imagine how scary it would be that one loop he suddenly finds out that he's essentially universal prey here (maybe in the second loop with Elsa), imagine the weight of all the things that already are trying to kill him along with the fact that he's also got a new thing to worry about? Maybe instead of just the rabbit loop, there's now multiple loops where Subaru is eaten alive, maybe there's loops where his dear friends themselves are eating him. Can you imagine if Emilia was a Fork? If he found out after the kiss of death and she commented on the taste of his lips as he was dying, if it came up again after their kiss, Subaru having to tackle with his love and heart belonging to someone that would one day eat him whole. Imagine the witch not longer just wants to touch his heart or kiss him, but she also bites him when he tries to tell the secret. Imagine maybe Rem is also a Fork, imagine that his death by her hands also involved her tearing into him chunk by chunk. What if Otto was a Fork, what if Reinhard was one? Seriously all the opportunities are equally traumatizing and I'm living for it!
Honorable mentions include: Persona Shuake and Shuada (Fork!Protags and Cake!Detectives) for the optimal mutual murder extravaganza, Okegom DSP Satanivlis (Fork!Ivlis and Cake!Satanick) for a rare case of role swapping, South Park Kyman (any way works tbh) for mutually assured destruction, Slay the Princess (Fork!Princess and Cake!Birb) because themes, Soukouku (Fork!Dazai and Cake!Chuuya) for making canon even worse than it already is, frankly any investigrave game would be peak here, Hannigram for obvious reasons.
But that's all I have for now, so, what have we learned here?
We learned that: I'm mentally ill and you need to write about the Cakeverse NOW.
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I want to rant about them. Buckle in, this is a long rant.
I want to just say that I love TNT Duo. Just as a whole. In whatever form they take. These stupid little men and their stupid little rivalries and tension.
I am not a "DSMP" fan in most senses of the term. I never really got into the story all that much (though the lore was cool and more well thought out than most people give it credit for) and there wasn't much to really keep me interested. But these two characters. These two.
shakes them
I love them. I love how Wilbur is emotionally unstable even on his best days and his entire arc of going from a leader that others looked up to slowly devolved into a man driven mad by his own legacy. Writing Arsonist's Waltz made me really take a long look at his character and how I wanted to write him in that fic and it really made me think about how young the character must've been when he died and how tragic that is. I think about him a lot. He's my favorite blorbo to torture for a reason he's the perfect character for tormenting really. And it's so easy to write him with a strained relationship with his family, seeing how Phil did the bare minimum for him and his mother is either a Fridge or The Goddess of Death depending on how you interpret the lore because personally I don't see either as being wrong. Or him being married to a fish (Sally go brrrrr). Or canonically being the one to give birth to Fundy. And the idea that he was usually such a doting father but the second Fundy needed him most he was just gone and the complications that brings to their relationship. I love him and how it's so easy to either make him just a guy or some eldritch FUCK. I can make him BIRD. I can make him FREAKY and INHUMAN and I love to torment him.
And then Quackity. Fuck let me talk about Quackity. This is the BEST EXAMPLE of a FALLEN HERO character I have EVER SEEN in my LIFE. And if you know me you know I am WEAK for Fallen Hero shit.
C'mere shrike bitch we're talking about you now!
(just picture me grabbing him by the back of his stupid little button up and holding him like that, I've scruffed his dumbass)
This FUCKER went from being one of the most goofy, joking, just fucking around and having a good time person, to one of the most well thought out and interesting character arcs in the ENTIRE SMP if you ask me. This man went VILLAIN no matter how you want to slice it and that idea of someone who GENIUNELY tried to see the BEST in others deciding "fuck it, I've had enough of this" is just. The best kind of Fallen Hero to me. I love his entire casino theme. Gambling is one of my favorite aesthetics, and I love how when I came into this fandom despite the overwhelming amount of Duck Q stuff I found I managed to find ONE PERSON who made SHRIKE QUACKITY and it was SO PERFECT FOR HIM! Like there's nothing wrong with Duck Q and I recognize why that's the most common thing in the fandom because obviously the fucker's name is QUACKity and he has his whole thing with ducks but like. Shrike Q tho. The leader of the Butcher Army being a Butcher Bird. One of the most violent songbird species known for brutal kill methods and eating other birds being reflected in the man who ATE THE FUCKING HEART OF HIS EX. Like C'MON.
(Yes other birds will eat other birds all the time but I'd like you to point me at another songbird species that has the absolute BALLS to attack something so much bigger than them) ((seen a video of what I think was a loggerhead shrike attacking a duck once)) (((though if you can find more aggressive songbirds like this I would LOVE to see them and learn about them))) ((((FUCK I LOVE BIRDS))))
It's perfect. I don't care. I love him. I love him and his Loggerhead/Northern Tendencies.
I love him for all the ways he didn't START violent and cruel but BECAME that way because he felt like he HAD TO. His arc is SO GOOD. The way he manipulated others he perceived as being "forgotten" like him to try and join him. I just. This man. This man. I'm going to shake him. I'm going to put him in a jar in the /affectionate way.
And then THEM TOGETHER. There is so much APPEAL to this ship in how you can write their dynamic in any way you want. From the more playful early days of the SMP where they were clearly friends and enjoyed each other's company to those stolen tense moments of Pogtopia to the eventual EVERYTHING that was LAS NEVADAS. You can write them on some of the best kind of healing arcs, with the idea that no matter what you did or who you were that you can still find love and forgiveness with the right person. You can have them heal together and learn to love again after so much tragedy. Or you can go down the route of making them ABSOLUTELY tearing each other APART and making each other WORSE. They can be absolute BASTARDS to each other but keep coming back to each other because they are the only two people on the server that have seen SO MUCH of the other person and the paths they went down.
These two characters just. Scream a level of UNDERSTANDING with each other that they wouldn't GET with other CHARACTERS.
And can I talk about how flexible they both are when it comes to AUs? I'm going to talk about them in AUs. They are FASCINATING TO ME in AUs. HEAR ME OUT OKAY!
So as someone who's been in a lot of fandoms there's a keen difference between being into a fandom for the content itself of the world, and being there for a specific character or groups of characters. I was into BNHA because of the lore of the world, not really an attachment to the characters themselves even if I did love them. Persona 5 was driven, again, by a love for the world and also the aesthetic of the game itself (and also a bit of the characters, I'll admit they changed my brain chemistry a little). Danganronpa, in contrast, was something I got into for the driving force of the characters and the murder mystery aspects. Assassination Classroom, obviously more character driven. Fairytail, also more character driven than anything else.
I got into DSMP specifically because of TNT Duo and my friend introducing me to them. But I've discovered something interesting about TNT Duo and why my hyperfixation over them has been lasting for so much longer.
Because they're easier to pry out of their world than other characters are. Which is why I was so surprised when I found so much more Canon Divergence AUs and less AUs in the sense of other universes. Like when I came to this fandom there was: No flower shop AUs, maybe a single coffee shop AU or two, not a single dragon or naga AU, and maybe one Siren AU. And the rest of it was mostly canon divergence! Which felt weird to me because these two feel so adaptive to other AUs you put them in!
While other characters feel, in some regards, tied to their original universe, these two don't feel as heavily weaved into their world. When I try to take them out it doesn't feel like I'm ripping them out and damaging them as I do. I don't feel tearing seams or fabric ripping, they just kinda...pop out. Which let's me take them and throw them into any roles I want, any AUs I want, and what I've noticed is that people do this a LOT with SBI and that they don't feel tied to the universe they originated from either. And I feel like that's in some part due to how the characters have lore from previous SMPs, previous worlds, previous experiences, and even future ones where the characters flow and adapt to fit whatever situation they're put into.
Some people might argue that I'm misrepresenting the characters in my fics or characterize them differently from the original source material, but that's because these are characters heavily formed around their experiences! Which makes them SO COOL for AUs! Because obviously the experiences are going to be different in an AU versus the source material! Making them a superhero or supervillain isn't the same experience as starting a country from the ground up! Making them a prince or king is different from elections and surviving from the land. Or dying and getting revived. Or overcorrecting into becoming a villain so nobody can ever hurt you again. AUs bring different experiences and that's why the characters are so fascinating to put in different AUs. And obviously some characteristics will carry over, but it's up to an author to decide what they carry over from the source material. Usually I carry over Wilbur being related to Phil, Techno, Tommy, Kristin, and sometimes I'll carry over Phil and Kristin's divinity which sometimes makes Wilbur an angel or demigod. Some authors usually carry over his mental instability, I like carrying over his sense of individuality. I like that he's stubborn, good at leading but not always enjoying it, yet always having the qualities for it. For Q? I like to carry over his general gambling aesthetic because I write mostly Las Nevadas Q since that's kinda who I know best out of all of Quackity's characterizations in the DSMP. Which means I write him as a manipulative little shit most of the time, who sometimes has second thoughts but usually pushes through for what he sees as the best outcome. And for their relationship usually what I carry over is this sense of tension or opposition between them. Hero/Villain, Angel/Demon, Human/Fae, Hunter/Vampire. This sense that they are on opposite sides, but not so different from each other when they look deeper than surface levels and titles.
They are such interesting characters. And I love them so much. They give me so much brainrot. So many ideas because they can just. Go anywhere I throw them!
I think I'll write more about them later. How I like to characterize them based on what I know about them from DSMP. Maybe rant more about why I think Q is definitely a shrike and that Magpie Wilbur is the only correct option. I feel like talking about them. I want to talk about them more.
Talk to me about them. I like hearing other people's thoughts about these fuckers.
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