Imagine if TNP was a parody of TPB. Like okay:
Squirrel is obv Firestar 2 except facing the struggles of being a girl in wc and having the weight of being his daughter on her shoulders. Does the same things he does but is punished for them.
Leafpool is Spottedleaf- healer with a misguided heart um but she doesn’t die ofc and suffers because of it. Distantly helping her sister as she tries to save the clans from a new, somehow bigger threat.
Bramble is built up to be Tigerclaw/star through being suspicious and actively plotting as he does in canon, though he chickens out- but Hawkfrost is actually Tigerstar (successfully and fully into evil, killing cats, taking power)- but is actually Ravenpaw, harmed and terrified until he turns away from his father aka also power. He’d never become deputy and accepts that.
Crowfeather is Graystripe 2 since his “love interest” dies tragically and he becomes worse for it. Never changes, always shitty, just all around the character you like as a kid but upon reflecting and rereading realizing is actually the worst guy in the world. Except the narrative loves him.
Feathertail is Sandstorm- unexplored love interest with a tough heart, who’d do anything for others and dies for it. I’d also want her to explicitly not like Crow. He’s convinced they’re soulmates and she’s very much a lesbian.
Stormtail is Dustpelt- stock stoic type with a soft heart and a dutiful side. He’s a family guy what else is there to say?
…. And if I’m allowed to go mega divergent:
Mothwing is Scourge. Mysterious stranger who comes in last moment to kill the big bad guy. Has a backstory with him (as his sister) and victim in his plots for power, but cuts him down before he can reach it. Unlike Scourge she’s not then the true final boss
The lake scene happens earlier and actually ends in a lot more deaths, causing a battle to happen in the afterlife. It’s built up for Bramble to step up and kill his father (he’s already killed hawkfrost after all)- except Mothwing flies out and does it first. Not quickly, not with precision or practice, in a brutal, nauseating, emotional fit, tearing everywhere and anywhere until he’s unrecognizable- and very double dead. For everything. All the blood he’s spilled both before and after death. For her mother, her brothers, her friends, his victims, the clans, the twolegplace- for every single thing living and dead that had the misfortune to be anywhere near him.
She turns, long golden hair weighed down with an ichor that smells like rotten meat, towards Squirrelflight and bows. What is there left, but to finish the tale they all know. To walk away, Firestar’s daughter, just as he once did. “Tear out my throat and taste victory-“ Mothwing laughs without any light or humor in her tone, only the slightest tremor from the crash of her adrenaline spike. Squirrelflight steps forward, jaws parted in indecision. She knows the story of the final battle like like she’d been there that night, tearing into traitorous Tigerclan warriors and Bloodclan scrappers alike. Like she’d been the one- not her father- to spring back to life and slay Scourge. But she hadn’t, and she’s no more Firestar than Mothwing is Scourge. She leans down and gags on the smell from the stained tabby’s pelt, before swallowing her bile and reaching forward-
And licking the back of Mothwing’s neck sending a jolt down the tense golden warrior’s body. Clearly she’d expected anything else- teeth or claws- anything besides a playful tease. She opens her large amber eyes and looks upwards at Squirrelflight before cracking into a smile- and then a full laugh- in moments the two mollies are out of breathe from their uproarious laughter.
Squirrelflight swats at Mothwing’s ear and Mothwing chokes on another wave of laughter that threatens to break out of her. If she kept making her laugh then maybe Squirrelflight would actually kill her, Mothwing thinks lightly with no hostility at all, barely able to believe just a bit ago she’d fully surrendered her life to the cat in expectation to be killed by her.
They’ve made their own story, walked out as twin heroes, now unbreakably bonded. Neither are their fathers nor the same cats as the story dictated. They are themselves, and together, friends.
