Weird Ranma reincarnation oneshot

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

Actually, and I really am trying to be civil (this isn't intended to be offensive, just a bit of logic), the curses being cured only push this into multi-chapter territory if they get mentioned. Say that they "awaken" on a schoolday, or just want to leave the house to clear their head (something that's hard to do in a place that's so familiar and so strange, even if they don't have little brothers and sisters running around making noise); if one of the parents gets splashed with cold water, they won't be seeing that what happens isn't what would have happened a lifetime ago, now would they? Alternatively, the parents could simply mention that they "got rid" of their old curses (which may mean a cure, or may mean a substitute- I know the words I chose weren't that ambiguous, but that's the feeling I'd go for), and Akane and Nabiki would simply shrug it off, being far too focused on what concerns them, personally, to give a damn about how Ranma & Shampoo have changed. At most, the curses being switched would affect them only if it's had some influence on them, and that could be given a brief handwave from one of their friends/siblings ("don't you remember? You've always turned into a wolf-girl when you get splashed with cold water- it's some kind of family curse.").

But yes, I do understand that some detail would be required if it comes out that Ranma & Shampoo have altered their curses, but it's not like there's any word limit on a oneshot. I've read oneshots that were thousands of words long. Not to mention that a vague part of this story is how disorientated the Tendo girls are to wake up to such a changed environment.

Edit: besides which, leaving them the same simply because it means less work offends me sensibilities. I can understand the reasoning why if others do it, but if I do it, it feels like sloppy work. And I'd never be able to live with myself for it; I can't stand slacker writers.

[Spokavriel]

I see what you mean. And for the sake of your stress levels I'm going away to work on something to eat and I wish you luck in making this. Too bad so many reincarnation names have already been taken finding a title could be tough.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

Anyway, enough of controversial topics that are simply making us both mad at each other; let's move on to smoother waters, shall we?

Question: do you think that Ranma and Shampoo would have had more children? I mean, Ranma would feel semi-obligated (or at least be encouraged by his father) to have at least one son to carry on the school, and as Shampoo would "know" that her little girls will stop being her girls once their past selves awaken, I can't help but think she'd want at least one "legitimate" offspring of hers and Ranma's.

Statement: you brought up the idea that Kichi Saotome's boyfriend might be the son of Ryoga and Kasumi. Response: that is a brilliant idea! It provides a rather vicious touch of irony to the affair, and gives Nabiki a caltrop in her new road- while her memories of being Kichi tell her she loves him, her memories of being Nabiki can't help but liken him to a nephew, even though there's no genetic relation. I love this suggestion.

Question: do you have any thoughts on what Sakura and Kichi might look like? I was thinking that, for the sake of... something... their faces are more or less identical to Akane and Nabiki's, but they have the hair coloration, eye coloration and bodies attributable to their Saotome/Amazon hybrid genes. Not to mention different styles in hair and clothing, but that was kind of unspoken.

Edit: I see. Enjoy your meal. Also, I want to apologise again for offending you as well. I know we have different stances on certain aspects of the series, but I really shouldn't be so vulgar. I'm sorry.

Edit: they have? I've never read any Ranma 1/2 fanfics that based around reincarnation... well, a few here and there that had Ranma as the reincarnation of someone... but still, damn. I don't suppose you have any suggestions on a better 'theme' to use for naming this when I get around to writing it? I was actually planning on using this more or less as part of an... 'anthology'... for oneshot works of various natures, but it'll still need a name.

[Mark Davis]

I think you need to put a lot of thought into who the two girls are for the 16 years or however long it is *before* Nabiki and Akane wake up. Because in essence it's almost as if you they were being murdered... what I mean is, one day you have two 16 year old girls that you've raised from birth, the next day you have Akane and Nabiki in their bodies. Their entire personalities are wiped out in an instant, or so it would seem at first.

Even if Ranma and Shampoo know exactly what has happened and how they had a part in it, it's going to come as a huge shock to them. I would expect Shampoo to be VERY conflicted about this... she has no real love for Akane or Nabiki and they've replaced her children. Ranma to some extent too, especially where Nabiki is concerned, and even though he was once in love with Akane, what he has now is someone who's possessed his daughter's body and is openly hostile to her own mother... and probably still in love with her own father. He'd have a problem with that, too.

People in real life go through drastic personality changes sometimes, and their friends and relatives can have a very hard time dealing with it.

If you think harder about how the two girls grew up and how they interacted with their parents, then the whole idea of "we taught Nabiki martial arts to help her with her issues but we wouldn't let Akane learn martial arts *because* of her issues" makes even less sense. Parents can rarely force their children into a certain path with complete success -- if Ranma had not enjoyed martial arts, then all of his father's training would have been for nothing. Likewise I'm sure Soun was disappointed when Kasumi and then Nabiki did not show much interest in the arts.

Working along those lines, it makes a lot more sense that the child Akane would become simply didn't take an interest in martial arts for whatever reason, and maybe Ranma and Shampoo figured it was for the best.

Now... if it were me, I would do two things:

1. Rather than have everyone in the know that Akane and Nabiki will "wake up" in 16 (or however many) years, I'd suggest that they really don't know what the results of their reincarnation experiment are going to be. Thus, when the two children seem to have no memories of their past lives, Ranma and Shampoo assume that it might well always be that way. Cologne may warn them that they might one day remember some or all of their past lives, but... I think it makes for a much more interesting and compelling story if their sudden awakening comes as a complete surprise to everyone involved. Not that they haven't always known it might someday happen, just that they really didn't know *what* might happen, and had long since assumed that their daughters would never remember much, if anything.

2. If all of this is the result of some ritual that takes place before they are born (or before they are even conceived) and if the girls are born as twins who do not remember their past lives, then how would anyone know which is Akane and which is Nabiki anyway? I realize you can come up with some sort of spiritual mumbo jumbo Joketzu wave-of-the-hands explanation if you want to ^_^ But isn't it more interesting if nobody actually knows? That avoids the whole "we refused to let Akane learn martial arts" thing right there... it's just Ranma and Shampoo's two daughters, who are who they are (just like anyone else) without any of the baggage of their past lives interfering with anything... until they wake up. Before that, people can speculate on who might be who, but they wouldn't really know.

I just think that that makes for a more interesting story, myself. ^_^

Also, another idea... I think it would be more fun to have one of them wake up before the other one. Let one sister suddenly insist that she's Akane... the other is mystified, telling her that no, she isn't... and then by the next day or whatever that sister remembers that she's Nabiki. But Akane has something to think about because she got to what her sister was like before she morphed into the reincarnation of her sister from her past life, or whatever... that could help her understand that *she* was a different person before she woke up... that the part of her that is Akane has taken over the life of someone else, and that someone else is a part of her too....

Finally... it seems like you're going in this direction already but I really think a major part of the story needs to be how Akane and Nabiki integrate their past lives with their present ones... if they remain Akane and Nabiki and never integrate with Sakura and Kichi then it's a tragedy, and the daughters that Ranma and Shampoo knew really have, in effect, been killed off. As they remember more about their lives as the daughters of Ranma and Shampoo, they need to find a way for both lives to coexist and integrate into a new whole person.

I really do have a problem if it's planned out from the beginning that, on their 16th birthdays, Nabiki and Akane will suddenly emerge and supplant the personalities of the two daughters who had existed for 16 years before then. First, I think that would be pretty difficult to arrange, second, I think it's more interesting if it just happens unexpectedly, gives you more to deal with that way, third, the way you describe it it's like two 16 year old girls are essentially murdered -- premeditated even. I mean, if you're going to go with "Nabiki and Akane have access to the knowledge and memories of their past 16 years, but they are otherwise the Nabiki and Akane -- then Sakura and Kichi will die on their 16th birthdays. If their own personalities never reemerge or integrate with those of Nabiki and Akane, then that's not going to sit well with a lot of readers, nor should it sit well with Ranma, Shampoo, and the others who know these girls.

I'm going to say this part again, because I don't think I can stress this enough. If the plan from the beginning is to have Akane and Nabiki wake up on their 16th birthdays, and whatever personalities the girls develop before then essentially go away forever, that is a type of premeditated murder. Maybe nobody thinks so at the start (although I would expect Cologne to understand this), but by the time their daughters are growing, Shampoo and Ranma are going to understand it, too. It's not a case of, "Shampoo wants another daughter because she understands that these two aren't really her daughters and are destined to become Nabiki and Akane". No, these two girls are her daughters. She's going to raise them for sixteen years, they're going to develop into normal fifteen-year-old girls... and then their personalities vanish forever on their sixteenth birthdays? That's going to seem like murder no matter how you write it, and Ranma and Shampoo will feel complicit in that murder.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

...Incredible. You somehow managed to vocalise the very worries that were clinking around in the back of my mind and lay them out clearly, as well as giving some possibilities on how to fix the problems that spawned them so as to make things work better. Many, many, many thanks.

Just to point out though, Spokavriel already brought up the problem with the "we taught Nabiki martial arts, and didn't teach Akane, on purpose" thing and I agreed with hir that it wasn't right, so I was going to dump that anyway. Thanks for giving me some more material for that though.

Also, I was originally planning that only Ranma & Shampoo knew about Sakura and Kichi being reincarnated, as it was too hard/painful a subject to reveal to their kids, but making it that they never anticipated the precise results of the reincarnation (i.e. the way it turns out, with the Tendo minds suddenly becoming dominant) feels much better to me. I was vaguely planning already that they were determined to bring up Sakura and Kichi as their own people from the beginning, but your insight just makes more sense as to why they did that.

Again, I thank you for the insight.

Also, that idea that one sister wakes up before the other sounds like a real good one! Though... who should it be who wakes up first? Akane? Or Nabiki?

Yes, I was aiming for them to reintegrate, but, as I mentioned here and there, a certain rebellious part of my mind keeps trying to pull this down a more tragic path- I think I've got the little rastard licked now though, thanks to your insight and opinions.

[Mark Davis]

Also, that idea that one sister wakes up before the other sounds like a real good one! Though... who should it be who wakes up first? Akane? Or Nabiki?

That would be up to you, of course. It can make for a lot of suspense/anguish/dread etc. if they don't know if the other one will wake up as well, and/or if, when that happens, who she is previously will vanish forever. The other sister would likely be terrified.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

Do you mean that the sister who "woke up" would be terrified, or the sister who hasn't "woken up" would be terrified?

Anyway, I want to thank you again for helping me both further shape the concepts of this oneshot, and for prioritizing my work. Would you be adverse to helping me build real characters out of Sakura Saotome and Kichi Saotome? Because I now know that I need them to be their own real characters before I can hope to pull this idea off as a viable story.

[Spokavriel]

I thought of a title suggestion. And if you use it a play on part of it could also be used for some appearance clues.

Twin-carnation And since Carnations are well known flowers. And it works to play on being close to incarnation... Carnations also come in many colors like White Pink Red and Purple. And I could see blending of Shampoo with Ranma fitting into a pattern that could go with the blossoms.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

...You know, that is clever. I mean, really, really clever. I mean, bloody brilliant! In case it's not obvious, I like that idea. Hmm... should I maybe rename the girls as well to a more floral theme as well, to better suit? I know Sakura is "Cherry Blosom", which is pinkish-white, and I now know that Ume means "Plum Blossom"... but I don't know what colors those are.

Could you clarify what you mean by that comment about the blending making a pattern to match the blossoms? I'm sorry, I know I'm being thicker than the offspring of a village idiot and TV weathergirl, but I just can't make heads nor tails of it.

[Spokavriel]

When you think of Shampoo's appearance and Ranma-chan's they both have rather thick well bodied hair. Shampoo's flows more while Ranma's is more wild. Now google an image of a Carnation. The petals are kinda wavy chaotic but also are still well defined even with how much they curl around. And in my mind that is what kind of forms you get when you mix the two styles.

Edit: My brain skipped a grove and I didn't finish typing out my first thought completely.

The Plumb Blossom doesn't have to be white. Allot of people see dark reddish purple and think of plumbs. I think the darker shade would probably be better on Akane. Since her hair was so dark in the past life.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

Ah, I see; you're suggesting a carnation petal-like 'style' to the hair of the twins, and thanks to their Amazon genes, their hair colors are actually reminiscent of one (or more) of the colors that a carantion blossom could be? Thank you for clarifying; that sounds very nice. And it certainly beats my pathetic original plans (cherry blossom petal for Sakura's hair, gold, silver or even mottled gold *and* silver for Kichi).

So, it was the color patterning that inspired each girl's name (pink & white for Sakura, red & purple for Ume), and you'd advice that Ume be Akane's reincarnation? Sounds very good to me.

Now then, Sakura and Ume themselves will need to be detailed as characters; their looks will become Akane and Nabiki's after all, and their personalities are a vital part of the story. So, who should I start trying to create first? Sakura Saotome? Or Ume Saotome?

[Spokavriel]

Either way. I've always wondered what Nabiki would have been like if she never had to become the Ice Queen to help her family survive.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

True indeed. I wonder if that was why my rudimentary base-concept pictured her as whole-heartedly embracing her life as "Sakura Saotome", who has never had to be the Ice Queen and has a far more enjoyable life, with friends and family. Though I do feel obligated to point out that it was less desire to help her family (she's only making chump change with her canon schemes) and probably more a way of attaining control that motivated her...

Anyway, here are some rudimentary thoughts for the appearances of the Twin-Carnations... personalities will be step two, and I could use opinions.

Ume Saotome (Akane Tendo)
For some reason (and the "logic" of the genetics, strangely enough, isn't the motivator), I was thinking that it'd be an idea to give Ume a build that... um... how should I put it? Doesn't look like her old tomboyish self. Both parents have the genes for rather ample busts, and while Ranma was kind of short as a girl, I think Shampoo's sort of tall... or maybe she was average, I don't remember. Anyway, while Ume might be petite in size, she does't have Akane's figure problems; she lacks Akane's toned muscles, but she has a good metabolism and she does exercise to keep in shape, so she's shapely enough. Figure is... generous, and perhaps be best to leave it at that. If people have any clearer ideas though, feel free to suggest them.

Hmm... her hair is, as was mentioned before, red and purple in color... should this be a 'straight' color (aka all of her hair is reddish-purple), or should she have shaded hair (shifting from red to purple, kind of like how Ranma-chan's hair shifts from red to black in the late anime), or should she have two-toned hair (hair that's purely red, hair that's purely purple, both growing from her head, both completely distinct in color)?

For eye coloration... Ranma's are a color I normally call "blue-steel"; gray with blue highlights (though it's deep blue when in female form). Shampoo has red eyes, can't quite recall the exact shade. Given this, would it be out-of-place to give Ume silver eyes? I don't mean gray, either I mean irises the same color as metallic silver.


Sakura Saotome (Nabiki Tendo)
I'll bring up the hair color right away; as with Ume, should her hair be straight, shaded or two-toned? I was thinking that it would be pink and white, hence the name (the sakura petal, as far as I can see when I've seen it in anime, is a kind of pale pink).

Build... as it's semi-decided that Sakura is the Saotome girl who chose to be a martial artist, she's thusly quite... toned, I think is the word. A slender, atheletic build, well-suited for the aerial and agility-emphasizing Saotome style. That slenderness conceals a surprisingly developed musculature, as Shampoo's personal brand of "Amazon Wu Shu" (as I've heard it called) makes a lot of use of raw strength. The same voice that suggested Ume be quite busty is, for the same inexplicable reasons, suggesting that Sakura be behind her sister in that department. Again, I don't know why.

Now, what on earth could her eyes be colored? Anyone have any ideas?

[Spokavriel]

I'm a little distracted by IRL at the moment but on the hair I think it should be 2 tone but not like say Herb. The hair should have highlights where the brighter shades happen where the sun hits. While some people pay to get highlights like that it can happen naturally if you are lucky to have a threshold hair shade.

On the eyes what about that rich purple shade they used for Yosho in Tenchi Muyo? Eye color isn't always a blending.

Could Sakura be into Martial Arts Rythmic Gymnastics? That would give a team to flesh out some relationships with.

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

For the two-tone with highlights hair color (I like that, by the way), are you suggesting that for a particular girl, or for both?

Hmm... purple eyes sound good for Sakura. Perhaps even have someone comment (not neccessarily a parent; could be a sibling) that Sakura's eye color was a surprise to both of her parents?

Do you mean as a hobby or as her sole fighting style (with some other Saotome kid being the 'heir to the school'? I'm a little leery of the latter, but the former sounds quite interesting indeed. Could lead to a conflict (friendship?) with a daughter of Kodachi or Tatewaki's.

So, do you have any suggestions for their physical appearances? I'm still drawing something of a blank on what their builds and bodies in general look like.

Edit: just putting together a list of "Things to Do"- does this look complete to you?
-Sakura & Ume Saotome
*Figure out their looks
*Figure out their personalities
*Figure out close personas (siblings, friends, love interests)

-Ranma & Shampoo
*Figure out what, precisely, they did to their curses (cured or swapped)
*Figure out how, if at all, said curse changing has affected their kids
*Figure out if they have more kids? (This might blend into Sakura & Ume 3 above)
*Come up with some 'noodle incidents' to mention or perhaps have fallout.

-Notable personas
*Figure out basic concepts (who they are, what they do, what they can do, what their ties to the Saotome family are, etc)