Look, a journal!

Dear writer,

Thanks for being interested in writing for one of the songs I requested. They are awesome songs and I think they have the potential to be awesome stories, and I'm really excited to see what you come up with.

To start off with my general likes and dislikes: I like speculative fiction of various flavors. I like worldbuilding. I like both action-packed plots and quieter, more introspective pieces. I like reading about family relationships, especially if they're complicated. I like romance as well, and while I have a (probably obvious if you read the prompts) preference for f/f, I'm also okay with m/f and m/m. I don't mind tragedy, although how likely I am to be pleased with a fic that ends with "and then everybody died" varies from prompt to prompt (basically, if the words "dystopia" or "post-apocalyptic" appear anywhere when I'm talking about the song, I will not be surprised if the resulting fic is a bit grim).

As for what I don't want, it's kind of tough to say because I don't know what's likely to come up with such vague source material, but in general I would prefer not to have pure fluff or "people hang out and nothing really happens" fic, issuefic, or straight-up PWP (I am fine with sex being part of the story, I would just prefer that it not be all of it). And... I'm not sure what else to include here, so let's just move along to the prompts, shall we?

Anti Hero feat. Lisa Loeb - Rin' (song, lyrics)

I love the story of this song, but it really glosses over all the interesting bits--we jump straight from "she set out on a mission for the greater good" to "then she took down the villain..." with nothing about how the disgraced princess goes about fighting the bad guy and restoring her honor. And that's what I'd really like to know about.

I confess that in my head this plays out like a Wuxia film*, with the princess riding off on a perilous journey and probably scaling a mountain to consult with a wise hermit or find a mystical MacGuffin that will help her defeat the evil guy, and then there are improbable martial arts battles and all that sort of thing. But that's not the only way it could go. Maybe the skills the princess uses to defeat her enemy are more political than martial. Maybe she studies magic. Maybe she goes undercover among his minions. Maybe she's doing all of this solo, or maybe she gathers some companions to help her (which opens up a whole other host of possibilities). There are a lot of directions you could go with it!

I realize that asking for an epic heroic journey for a fic fest with a relatively short span of time in which to write is a pretty tall order, and I'm not expecting anyone to write a novel--just maybe the highlights of her campaign, or a single scene from that time, or something about her planning or deciding what to do. I'm just interested in getting a glimpse of what happens in between "she decides it's up to her to fight the bad guy" and "the bad guy is defeated, hooray."

* (I know, it's a Japanese band featuring an American singer, so there's no real reason to relate it to a Chinese film genre, but that's what the story reminds me of regardless.)

The Beekeeper - Dessa (song, lyrics)

The lyrics of this song have always evoked a post-apocalyptic and/or dystopian setting for me. Scarce resources, perhaps technological regression ("Sweet Prometheus, come home / They took away our fire"), widespread poverty, despotic rulers. And the Beekeeper is an interesting figure. Is she sinister or benevolent? Is she drugging people to keep them complacent? Is the sleep she brings death? Or is it some kind of respite from the harsh realities of daily life?

Basically, what I would most love to see from a story based on this song is for someone to flesh out the world/society that the song hints at. (The above is just me spitballing; you don't have to use all or even any of my ideas about what that world is like as long as it relates to the song.) What kind of story you want to tell in that setting is up to you--a broad overview of the society? A vignette about one character's daily life? A story about someone trying to stand up to the authorities or find a solution to some of the environmental or technological problems?

I hope I'm not being so vague as to be unhelpful, but there are honestly a hundred stories I can imagine coming out of this song, and there are probably a hundred more I've never considered.

My Little K and J - My Little Airport (song, lyrics)

Okay, this is the exception to my no-fluff request, because it is such a fluffy song. I mean, okay, we know little enough about Kate and Jane that it's entirely possible that they have thrilling day jobs as detectives/superheroes/giant robot pilots/demon hunters (or something more mundane that would nevertheless lend itself to exciting plots), and if you want to try to do something with that, more power to you. But the song is really just about their romance, and I would enjoy anything that ran with that and fleshed the love story out a little more.

You could follow the events of the song or you could do something set after that, with them navigating the early stages of their relationship or dealing with some kind of external problem together or something; I'd just like to see them developed more as characters and get more of a sense of who they are and what draws them together besides, you know, basic attraction.

Since My Little Airport are from Hong Kong, it would be cool to have a story set there, but I also completely understand if you would rather not.

Pick Up the Phone - Dragonette (song, lyrics)

For a song that seems to be about a couple of delinquents on a petty crime spree, this is just so much gosh-darn fun. I don't know what's going on in their lives that makes "fuck everything up and then drive off into the sunset" an appealing option (are they just bored, or is something worse going on for one or both of them?), but the narrator seems so upbeat about it, and I find it hard not to hope it works out well for them.

Mostly I want more of the narrator and Cherry and their relationship, whether that's backstory or fleshing out of one or more of the events mentioned in the song or something that happens after they drive off into the sunset. I love the narrator's sort of affectionately teasing manner towards Cherry and the wild one/serious one dynamic they seem to have going on. I'd especially love to know more about Cherry, maybe see how all of this looks from her perspective.

(I do tend to see both the narrator and Cherry as female, but it's not really specified in the song, so if you see it differently that's okay too.)

re_Cycle - Seiji (video, lyrics)

I'm fascinated by both the central tragedy of this song and the post-apocalyptic and/or generally nasty world it seems to takes place in. A few years ago I jotted down my ideas about what was going on with the plot, setting, and main character in very brief bullet-point format, in case any of that might be useful to you as a jumping-off point.

As for fic, I'd be happy for something that fleshed out the story as presented in the song/video, or if you want a narrower focus, maybe an anecdote or scene from when Luka (the singer/pink-haired robot) is a part of the organization with the recycling armbands. Or even something exploring the setting and not really involving the main characters, if you'd rather do that. In general, I'm particularly interested in how the robots work in this setting--like, for example, is Luka's misunderstanding of what's really going on due to the damage she sustained while rusting away in the scrap heap, or is it a more fundamental confusion about how humans work? Why are the robots that are attacking humans doing that? Is it a bug? Are they being controlled by someone? Is it an ideological thing? Why were the robots created in the first place?

Thousand Yard Stare - No, Really! (song, lyrics)

Yes, it's another dystopian future. I may have a problem.

Compared to the abstractness of "The Beekeeper" or the more fanciful elements of "re_Cycle", though, the society of "Thousand Yard Stare" feels very plausible and grounded in reality--something that could happen, that's reminiscent of past and current totalitarian regimes. I tend to imagine it as taking place in a near-future USA ("the greatest country on Earth was our prison since birth" seems to imply as much), but it's up to you really.

I'd like to know more about the singer and the addressee. Who are they? How are they related to each other (friends, lovers, siblings...)? Why does the singer seem to feel chained to/responsible for the addressee? And what happens to them--do they ever get out? Or, well, maybe I'm taking "burn it down, burn it down, there's nothing here I want to save" too literally, but I wonder if the singer might join a revolution or at least go in for some kind of show of defiance? If so, how does that work out for her?