Author's Notes:  Okay, *this* you can call "bizarre".  ^_^

<shrug>  This didn't come out nearly as well as I'd hoped - too much
yelling, not enough humor.  I *meant* this to be more of a jokefic, but it
turned angsty very quickly, which is why I decided to cut it off.  I had
other scenes in mind:  Nabiki lets her moods be known by her cooking, that
is, initially the Tendo's food is quite good - Nabiki is an excellent cook -
but Ranma and Genma's food, while looking identical, tastes horrible.
Nabiki was also going to force Tatewaki into an early realization of who the
pig-tailed girl was, and was also going to have a long talk with Ryoga which
involved discussions of a cleaver and a wok.  Basically, Nabiki was going to
help Ranma and Akane solve their problems almost as soon as they came up,
and Ranma and Akane were going to have a more normal relationship, in part
because Akane *asked* for the engagement instead of being forced into it.  I
was going to end this story at the end of the second volume of the manga.
Remember that?  Where Ranma and Akane almost kissed of their own free will?
My story was going to end *with* a kiss, and Nabiki watching from the side,
feeling quite good about keeping her mother's promise.

If anyone wants to finish this, by all means.  I just couldn't find the
humor I wanted - my muse always leads me down more serious paths.  :)

-Richard

It's an interesting concept for a story.  If I were to continue it (which, I'm afraid,
I'm not - I have my hands full with "Relentless" and real life, so I'm just going 
to muse a bit about directions the story could run and leave it at that), I don't
think I'd let it run so smoothly as you'd projected (i.e., Nabiki solves most of the
problems in the storyline relatively quickly).  The Nabiki that came out in this
opening part was very abusive and dominating, enforcing her will with threats 
and guilt trips rather than reason and persuasion.  Somehow, I don't see that
kind of person as the sort who solves more problems than they create.

Not that she isn't a sympathetic character, after a fashion.  If I were to write it
Lawson-style (you know, more introspective and thoughtful than original flavor
stuff), I'd try to focus on the burden that Nabiki feels she bears of trying to hold
the family together.  Children of tragedy (death in family, illness, divorce, that
sort of thing) often take this awesome responsibility onto themselves, which 
they are generally not equipped to handle.  They mature very quickly in some 
ways but they lose a lot of their natural growth as they go, and their social 
skills tend to suffer as a consequence.  A Nabiki in this role would probably 
not have very many friends, because her personality is so abrasive.  A person
like this can be very difficult to get along with, but she's the way she is because
of some very noble reasons.  That would be a challenging character to write.

In any case, I don't see Ranma getting along with this Nabiki at all.  I think
they would butt heads from the first moment they met, and keep doing it for
almost as long as the story lasts.  Ranma will allow himself to bow to nobody,
and he never likes to lose.  Nabiki, on the other hand, would probably resent
the hell out of him for coming into their lives and disrupting her home (I've known
some people like this, and they tend to be very resistant to disruptions of the
status quo, even if the status quo is miserable).  You could play it for humor 
(the food thing you suggested is pretty funny) or you could play it for angst, 
but either way I'd see a whole lot of conflict in store around the Tendou dojo.

Akane is pretty much herself in this story, but what of Kasumi?  Deprived of
her role as the family's gyroscope, what does she become?  From the intro,
she seems like a very frail and directionless person, though that may not be
all there is to her.  I'd want to explore what her role in the family is.  She seems
as though she'd feel like a failure, since Nabiki takes care of all the duties
that should have been her responsibility (as eldest daughter).  Perhaps there's
some reason why their mother passed the torch to the middle sister in the way
she did...

Anyway, I don't think life would go more smoothly for this version of the 
Ranma cast.  Nabiki is only seventeen, and this version would be a walking
mass of complexes and old wounds.  She's in a position of authority and she
thinks she knows what's best, but I'd really see her causing many more 
problems with her stubborness and forcefulness than she'd ever end up 
solving.  Again, this could be played for laughs in a Takahashi style (there's
always a melancholy undercurrent to Takahashi's comedy, I think, dealing
with very real problems that people have, like miscommunication, heartbreak,
pridefulness, etc.) or it could be played for emotional drama in a Lawson 
style.  Either version would make an interesting story, I think.  

So many stories, so little time...

Grayson Towler
grayson@rigroup.net

http://www.rigroup.com/~grayson/relentless