Once this idea came into my head, as crazy as I know it sounds, it just wouldn't leave me be.
So, in honor of the new Space Jam movie coming out, and the one which started it all, here's a chorus of Dai Li agents rapping about how bad-ass they all are! Many parts of the original song have naturally been tweaked to better suit the context. I think you'll like the changes!
Avatar: The Last Airbender, and all its characters are copyright of Nickelodeon, Bryan, and Mike. The song Hit Em' High (The Monstar's Anthem) and its original lyrics are property of Trackmasters Records and the respective music artists. I have no frigging claim to anything.
Your typical agent of the Dai Li tended to confirm to a certain personality type, project a certain aura whenever he was on duty or out in public, and often even when they were at their ease.
Mysterious. Cunning. Confident. Threatening. Stony. Dangerous. No nonsense. Brooding.
Nineteen-year-old junior agent Fang Lin though, wasn't a typical Dai Li member. This became even more evident after he'd had a drink or two.
And so it was, one morning under Lake Laogai in a green-lit lounge, as Fang nursed at a glass of baijiu and conversed with Qiu, a fellow junior agent, an enthusiastic mood suddenly swept over him.
Standing on his chair, stone shoes thumping on the wood, the chamber rang with Fang's gleeful voice as he pointed upwards with a bare hand and shouted, "Guys, I've got an idea!"
Seven other out-of-uniform agents collectively either groaned or rolled their eyes.
"Please don't tell me you're going to try to steal an elephant mandrill from the Ba Sing Se Zoo again," Agent Sying said gravely. "That was both embarrassing and a total farce that saw several blocks of the Middle Ring reduced to shambles, in case you haven't forgotten. Besides," he added "you, me, and several other agents really took some lumps while working to restrain the Avatar's weird-ass flying bull the other day too, and I've really had my fill of having to wrangle enormous animals for the time being, even if they can't airbend."
"No, no, it's nothing like that," Fang replied, waving his hands even as a mortified Qiu began to discreetly pluck at the bottom of the slightly tipsy agent's robe, trying to make him sit back down. "Hear me out. What we Dai Li need," he declared, "is an official anthem!"
The proposal was only met with measured snorts and chuckles.
"What do we need an anthem for?" Agent Boqing scoffed from another table. "We don't parade ourselves through the city streets like the pompous generals or the Terra Team, and our success as officers, as partners on the streets, depends on maintained silence. We work behind the scenes, and the citizens call us Dai Li 'green ghosts' for a very apt reason, as you well know."
"And there's already plenty of anthems being sung in this city," Agent Yong added. "An anthem that praises the Earth Kingdom, an anthem that honors Ba Sing Se itself-"Children of The Four Vast Walls"-even a special anthem that everybody has to sing each morning in tribute to whoever happens to be the current Earth King," he snorted in contempt.
"I'm not saying this anthem is something we'd be singing while out on patrol, carrying out a mission, teaching groups of kids about our city's culture, spying, or anything like that," Fang replied as he sat back down.
"But those types of songs are so boring and formal," Agent Deming interjected. "I have enough tedious ceremony in my life already to put up with as it is. No thanks."
Other agents nodded.
"Oh, this anthem would be anything but boring," Fang grinned. "It would be bombastic, celebrate our power, speed, precision, psychological manipulation, everything that makes us such a bad-ass police force and deadly guardians of Ba Sing Se!"
"I was thinking," he went on, "it would serve a purpose somewhat like the creepy haka dance the tribesmen of White Cloud Island do, get us excited, pumped up for the task at hand, heighten our aggression before an assignment or a shift. Something we as a force, a division, or at least assigned partners, could sing together-a fighting song, in other words!" he enthused.
Laughs rang through the still, humid air. Agent Sying's was especially loud and derisive as he sneered, "Singing before we go out to carry out one of Long Feng's orders, or out on patrol. I'd love to see his reaction to that," he guffawed.
Stung, and further prodded by the liquor in his blood, Fang snapped back, "I hate to speak ill of our exceptional leader and master, but truly, Long Feng is a huge, stodgy bore that wouldn't recognize fun and true camaraderie if it bit him in the ass!"
That statement caused some serious shock and consternation.
"Holy," Yong said as he blinked. "I can't believe you said that Fang. You're sure set on this anthem thing."
"I am," Fang resolutely replied. "And it's going to be good, trust me."
"Well, all right," Qiu thinly smiled. "We'll humor you and try your idea on. You must've written some suitably bombastic lyrics for us already, no doubt?"
Fang sort of shrunk in on himself, staring into his glass and fidgeting. "Well, er, not right now. But I can whip up something great, I guarantee it! Just give me some time."
"We'll be waiting," Agent Boqing smoothly smiled.
Fang slid down the green-lit tunnel in almost uncontrollable zeal on his stone shoes towards the underground chamber where nearly all of his fellow Dai Li agents had gathered. They all had an ungodly amount on their plates to deal with of late, but somehow Fang had found the time to sit down at his stone desk and write what he knew in his heart was an excellent anthem for the protectors of Ba Sing Se's peace and traditions!
Now it was time to see what the others made of it.
When Fang swooped into the chamber, he did it with such alacrity that he came close to doing a faceplant against the unyielding granite as he used his bending to brake to a stop.
Panting, he regained his composure and took the scroll out of his robe, waving it in the air as he shouted, "It's done! Our anthem is complete! Everyone come and read it!"
And that's what the other Dai Li officers did.
As they scanned Fang's lyrics, reactions varied. There were some impressed smiles. Many expressions of ridicule.
"Oh, come on!"
"That's way too over the top."
"You're kidding right? Dai Li agents don't dance, kid."
"I'm not going to make myself into a laughingstock."
"Sorry Fang, but this is cringe."
It really looked like the junior agent's ambition was on the verge of becoming a pipe dream.
Then, a new, powerful voice was heard, from the other end of the cavern.
"What are you all up to?" the grim, sonorous speaker inquired, the low pitch seeming to make the stone walls vibrate.
Fang and all the other agents immediately turned around to face the newcomer, and prostrated themselves before him.
"Agent Pengfei," Deming said by way of greeting as they stood. "Does the day find you well?"
Fang couldn't help but still be awed whenever he crossed paths with Pengfei. Very understandable, for what even Long Feng was blissfully unaware of was that it was Pengfei, not him, who was the true head of the Dai Li, even as he smoothly played the role of his understudy and right-hand man.
He had been the one to personally arrest and re-educate that country bumpkin with the hook swords, Jet, was the spokesperson and representative for their elite police team.
And although Long Feng was always treated with respect and deference, it was Pengfei to whom the rest of the Dai Li were truly dedicated, who they actually answered to.
Fang supposed Pengfei's experience and magnetic personality had a great deal to do with that. Certainly, he was one of the few people in Ba Sing Se, along with Fang's girlfriend, parents, siblings, who the junior agent would gladly lay down his life for.
The head of the Dai Li also commanded great respect due to the chilling fact that if brainwashing, threats, gaslighting, and other methods used to suppress those who would disturb the harmony of Ba Sing Se and tell of the war failed to work, Pengfei and his partner Bohai had no qualms in the least about acting as official hitmen. Pierced, crushed flesh and smashed bones would be left in their wake.
As with police forces across the Four Nations, even the reserved Dai Li couldn't help but assign their brothers-in-arms nicknames once they came to know each other well enough-some of which weren't always courteous.
Bohai's nickname on the shadowy force was "Bang." Pengfei was fittingly known as "Pound."
"Ni hao Pound," Agent Cao also greeted.
Pengfei lightly, mechanically smiled. "All things considering, yes, the day finds me well," he replied. "It seems that I've interrupted some important discussion. Or perhaps a private joke among comrades?"
"Oh, it's a joke all right," Agent Yong snickered. "Fang here thinks our force should have an official anthem, and then perform a dance number to it as well?"
"Really now?" Pengfei replied with interested amusement as he looked at Fang. "I had no idea you were into theatrics, Agent Fang. May I read your little script as well?"
Fang sighed. "I suppose. Here," he said as he handed his superior the scroll, a stone-sheathed hand lightly closing around it. "I still think this wouldn't be a bad idea to put into practice though, to help rally us as a team at times."
The other Dai Li agents watched as Pengfei, the true head of the force, no-nonsense hitman and commander, scanned Fang's scrawled characters, the lyrics and descriptions of actions and poses which the junior agent had worked hard to plan out.
As he did so, the normally smooth, taciturn head agent began to nod, then grin, even chuckle as he approached the end.
His green eyes flashed with delight as he looked back up at Fang.
"I love this idea!" he proclaimed. "Why, it would serve us well as a diversion alone to perform, especially with all the various tasks and plans we've been pressured by of late!"
"I just want to ask though Fang," Pengfei added, "this style of music you've written for this anthem, its beat and composition, is so innovative and strange and more wildly different than anything I've come across before. I suggest in fact, that it should have an equally unique name. Any ideas on what it could be called?"
Fang grinned in pride before stopping to brainstorm.
Well, he thought, the rhythm rather sounds like a boulder being lightly banged against another stone surface in a sort of staccato fashion. So, what would be a fit name, a cool name for this beat? Knock? Tap? Thud? Whack?
Then it hit him.
"Rap, Pound," he wryly grinned. "I call it rap."
"A great name indeed," Pengfei replied. "We should practice this 'rap' anthem of yours-and then perform it by Dai Li, for Dai Li!"
It took place in one of the biggest caverns carved under the lake, eerily lit by green fires and luminous crystals.
Jinhai, the agent with the shark-pike's smile who brainwashed and trained the young women chosen for the roles of Joo Dees, strode out into the center of the space, dressed in full uniform except for his tasseled hat.
There, he pulled up a short, stumpy pillar of stone before resting his arms across the top and grinned again as he announced to the shadows, "Greetings, Earth Kingdom citizens. We have now taken over your concert haaallll…"
A chant went up from all corners of the cavern as the rest of the emerald robed agents, also lacking their hats, queues dangling, either scrambled down from the top of the cavern before leaping down to its floor and making the stone crack, shudder with a brutal punch to the ground from a stone glove, or came pounding out of three different entrances.
Both groups of agents had one member of the same working duo, and the men grinned at each other as they regarded and came up to their partner, pointing at one another with a stone-gloved hand as they mutually circled about, skating over the stone with the lethal grace of a sting-hawk swooping on prey in their rock shoes.
"If I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low," they sang huskily as each agent shot a stone glove forward to give his buddy's a fist bump in midair. "If I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low."
A series of graceful, muscular backflips, queues lashing the musty air, and the agents had formed a circle of tall green forms, pulling upward until they were standing on knee high pillars of bent stone.
Bohai and Pengfei leapt into the middle of the ring, and raised their voices to the arching ceiling far overhead together.
"Blasting walls into holes!" they proclaimed as the duo made random, clawed-finger gestures with their stone gloved hands.
"You ain't got no game, I'm breaking ya down to your frame,
Coming through like a train.
Looking to take the Earth King's throne is my goal,
With my unstoppable crew taking all control.
You can't get none of this, we're running this,
Well taker, earth shaker, three-ways gunning this.
Get out the lane, I'm coming though,
And if you don't wanna move then I'm coming right through you."
At that, Bohai and Pengfei went back to their stone perches, bobbing and lightly stomping to the rhythm as Cao and Yong took center stage together.
"We stalk inch by inch and step by step,
I'm closing in on your position and destruction is my mission,
Four is not enough, your whole squad better duck,
It's like switch when I bust,
Now your whole crew is dust.
Coming through my area, I'ma have to bury yeah," both agents snapped as they showily shrugged.
"The real green team on your green scene.
It's like showdown on the range,
Go tell me who wanna tangle with the Lower Ring witch-doctor neighborhood and city superhero?"
Cao and Yong then retreated to their pillars.
Then Fang himself burst into the middle of the space, rising up on a two-story bent pillar of stone before engaging in a call-and-response chorus with all the other agents, their gloved hands shooting into the air.
"We want it all!" Fang howled.
"All!"
"Unstoppable, we run the floor!"
"Run the floor!"
"You can't take none of this hardcore!"
"Hardcore!"
"In this game of thrones, we take you to war!"
"War!"
"You ain't seen nothing like this before!" Fang cried as he pointed at a random section of the cavern.
Then he used his bending to lower himself back to the floor as stone crackled, and rejoined the group as once more, patrol partners ebulliently sang to each other and punched at the air.
"If I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low.
I I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low."
Now Jinhai and Qiu were the center of attention.
"Insane like a runaway train, I'm in your lane.
Like it's only three seconds to dodge my thrown chain,
Came to bring the ultimate adjustment to the brain.
Untamed, you won't like it when we change!
And you are type strange.
Make room, manaical monsters in this game,
And I got my eye on you.
Deadshot aim, as stone darts and hunks keep coming down like rain,
You feeling me, I feeling you,
The demonstar again, I'm telling you.
Pass me the rock, now I'm gonna crush a rebel's chest like a basket,
Get up out my way is what you better do,
My tactics is uncivilized conduct,
You'd better ask it.
Don't get no better than this, you catch my drift?
You get stripped by brainwashers ruled by Pengfei who brings down the hammer,
Danger, you're dealing with official roof-bangers,
With air time like a robe hanger.
Strike, with thunderous 360 degree tight jumps,
What up general? The Dai Li funk!"
Fang's moment to take the stage again, along with Liang, another younger agent, singing in unison.
"Lightning strikes and the fires get dim,
Supreme competition is about to begin!
Above the ground, finessin' and moves is animated,
Once the gloves are off, I can't be deflated.
We're rugged raw, we Dai Li is getting supremacy and money,
When clicks get to bugging, I'm snatching up their honeys-Uhh!"
"Every step we take shakes the ground!" Liang and Fang proclaimed as they did just that with their bending skills, the stone cracking like drying mud.
"We'll make you smash your ankles, son, shakes you down.
This is our city, Dai Li bout business.
The best that ever done it, can I get a witness? Uhh!
The cumulus clouds bring darkness up above,
You in it for the balance of the world?
Or in it for the fun, lil' Avatar Aang?
23 ways to make a pay.
Lounging in the private carriage with a cannabis pipe back around my way.
I'm 19 summers old,
If the judges get political, bribe em' like Bai Dol.
Am I getting lyrical?
Daddy, I think so,
Dai Li demonstars dropping flavor fluid, so drink slow," they finished.
Now all the Dai Li agents grouped together, hands on each other's shoulders as they sang.
"We want it all!"
"All!"
"Unstoppable, we run the floor!"
"Run the floor!"
"You can't get none of this hardcore!"
"Hardcore!"
"In this game of thrones, we take you to war!"
"War!"
"You ain't seen nothing like this before!
"Turn the volume up, please!" Fang urged.
"If I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low. If I hit em' high, hit em' high, hit em' high, then you hit em' low, hit em' low, hit em' low."
One agent was so passionate now that he was actually ranting the words out of sync!
Deming and Boqing's turn.
"Yo, Sheshen bless!
Try to put together your chest!
Here's an example of how we can stress your full court press.
With finesse, we bench-press your stress whenever you test.
We're speed skating in the alleys like the ostrich-horse express,
We're gonna put that lantern in your face and wipe that memory off,
Just use your head and don't blab about the war,
The likes of you troublemakers just need to shut up and back off!
Get off my block, bow down to me, I said it's my rock!
I'm starting a re-education line-up by getting y'all to bring the livestock!
Throw all your money in the pot,
And make sure you bet all your gold pieces on my surveyor chain shot!"
Sying and Shirong got to finish up.
"When we come right through tell me what you really gonna do?
We'll leave your team name in shame and take your power from you.
While you abandon your ship, we take it all.
With nothing left for you to do except grieve your fall.
Money spending, culture tending, earth-bending teams like crash cars,
Who do we be?
We are the demonstar Dai Li!" they screeched.
"We want it all, unstoppable, we run the floor!
You can't get none of this hardcore,
In this game of thrones, we take you to war!
You ain't seen nothin' like this before.
If I hit 'em high, hit 'em high, hit 'em high, then you hit 'em low, hit 'em low, hit 'em low.
If I hit 'em high, hit 'em high, hit 'em high, and you hit 'em low, hit 'em low, hit 'em low!"
The agents stopped, panting, flushed, jubilant, and very much pumped.
Suddenly, there was a low chuckle, and the sound of a pair of stone gloves clapping in applause.
As one, the Dai Li agents all startled, whipping around to see the equally implacable figure of Long Feng observing them.
"Bravo," he said simply. "A very unorthodox little display by the fearsome secret police of Ba Sing Se, but quite an enthusiastic and artistic one."
This "songfic" was a hell of a lot of fun to write! If you had as much of a blast reading it as I did typing it, please do leave a review!