Jetko Meme

[weirdlet]

Okay, folks- I got art I need to be doing, stories I'm working on but which aren't gelling, and some things have been said that are setting me off in a 'yeah, you're right!' direction.  SO.  What we have here, is a Jetko meme.  I get to work on one of my favorite pairings whilst trying to get more into their heads (Jet in particular is a slippery bugger), and we all get some hot starcrossed boy-love.  Or hate.  Whatever you like.

Give me a prompt, a sentence, a song, whatever; any AU/universe in progress you like, just so long as you keep to this restriction- no rape.

Two prompts per person, promise of one ficbit, standard not-very-fast warning applies.

Do have at it!

Comments

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

The same little voice that makes me inject angst into every crack meme is blasting images of Ember Island Player!Jet/Ember Island Player!Zuko at me, but don't write that, please no, don't. I don't want to see that.

Zuko is arrested along with Jet by the Dai Li after the sword fight.

Zuko and Iroh find dying Jet on the way back from Zuko's aborted capture of Appa and rescue him.

Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (1/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

In the years after the fall of the Phoenix King and the renaming of Sozin’s Comet, many traditions were revived in the Fire Nation that had been dampened or diverted from their original course in the hundred years preceding. Among them was the reinvention of the Imperial Dance Corps, which soon became famous and was known to perform all over the world.

Their most revered performances, however, were often reserved for their homeland’s audience- and it was just such a spectacle, done in collaboration with the famous Ember Island Players and the Earth Kingdom writer Chander Gita, that was intended to make the anniversary of Firelord Zura’s coronation a memorable one.

When the curtain went up on The Bandit And The Blue Spirit, a new fusion of dance and opera, the Firelord herself attended in the royal box and received first the cheers of her subjects, and then the reverent hush as the score began to play.

Ba Sing Se bustles on stage, the markets, the ports, the merchants and pedestrians and here and there guards on patrol- and here at the docks, at last, disembarks the first half of the principal cast, a colorful band of back-country bandits who doubled as guerilla rebels during the end-days of the War. Their leader leaps out on stage, a lean, vibrant figure in constant motion, tousle-headed and grinning around the prop straw, classic mark of a country bumpkin. And true to form, the first scene is filled with the usual missteps and pratfalls when country meets city and finds out the effect is very like head meeting wall.

The first fight scene is in a teashop that looks like a bar, and the waitress there sings a quiet aria, turning her ‘scarred’ face away from the audience as she means to hide her identity, before the titular bandit crashes the scene and things go to well-choreographed madness. The guards arrive, the bandit is dragged away, and the leading lady is left to clean up the crockery.

That night, the Blue Spirit, mysterious and beautiful, arrives to rescue the bandit-boy from his dire fate in the stony jail-cells of Ba Sing Se. Reduced to silent communication, the spirit engages him in a rooftop dance with a grace and flair Zura is quite certain she never displayed. The two of them flit across the scenery, acrobatic and daring and young, and the stars witness their wordless love.

Thus begin the escapades of the Bandit and the Blue Spirit, and they lead the guards of Ba Sing Se a merry chase in the night-time, whilst during the day the teasing courtship of the bandit and his tea-shop girl begins its ever-so-inevitable descent into seriousness. But ‘even in the bright light of day, she is shadowed,’ for the waitress has a secret beyond merely her scars, and the bandit can never find out lest their love be destroyed and her very life in danger.

It’s a ricochet between the ridiculous and the sensational, hysterical laughter and gasping drama as the invasion and the revolution build to opposing crescendos- but when the lead actor leans down and stage-whispers “There’s something wrong with this city, baby, and I mean to find it out,” the Firelord breaks down weeping, and the Lord Consort Mao is seen sweeping shut the curtains on the royal box.

Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

There’s a short intermission, and the royal audience members appear once more, composed and steady as if nothing had happened. The play proceeds apace, and the Blue Spirit arises from the depths of Lake Laogai, clutching the body of her dead lover before burning through the mist and the mask and the costume and revealing herself as the fiery hawk of vengeance, conquering the city before leaving it at last for home, duty fulfilled but heart full of ashes. There is an implication, though, that the final aria invokes the symbolism of the phoenix and renewal of life, and thus, the Blue Spirit, all in secret, retains some last trace of her bandit lover.



They got everything wrong, of course. The critics called it a fantastical pastiche, moving, appalling, sublime and very daring for using an alto as lead female instead of the more traditional soprano. The Firelord remained, for the most part, silent on her opinion of the piece, but did present the traditional reward for such a gravitas-laden performance and the skill of her pet dancers.

The tabloids were the only ones to repeat the rumor that a male figure in a Blue Spirit mask had broken into the playwright’s house and left him with a very clear indication that his portrayal was not appreciated. Or possibly it was just the fact that he’d made the Lady Zura cry.

In any case, it proved to be a very brief rumor, and Gita returned swiftly to his own theater company in Omashu while the opera itself went on to a popular run.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[floranna.livejournal.com]

Aww. Sad but still somehow happy.

the Blue Spirit, all in secret, retains some last trace of her bandit lover.

...she is pregnant? And my thought progress is as predictable as always.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

Predictable, but right- or rather, right about what the playwright's wrong about. ^^ The action's better, and Gita brings some snappy dialogue but the writing still has some classic Ember Island 'improvements' for drama.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[floranna.livejournal.com]

*gigglesnort* Well, I am a baby freak. ^^

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

^^

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

*gigglesnort* oh good God, you did...

And then it wasn't crack. Um, wow?

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

I am strange and like weirdness^^ Sorry, that was just *in* my head from the moment you said that, and I knew there had to be the spectacle that is musical-theater! Jetko.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

He could be like my brother, tough, and sarcastic, and swaggering, and IN LOVE WITH MUSICAL THEATER, OMG! It's hilarious.

Your brain and my brain are places of terrifying, cracky, angsty chaos.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

(which 'he'?)

Yeah- Jet is one of those guys who will beat you up for being a jock, but will end up being the punk element of the school dance troupe.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

They'd get along great. The man sings every word of all the songs in My fair Lady with his Che tee shirt on and his pitbull howling counterpoint.

Re: Bonus!fic- Ember Island Follies (2/2)

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

*grins*

*works on collecting Egg and Ashes ficbits*