The angst that comes with Red being in the battle spotlight and putting up a facade for so long that she forgot so much about herself. She forgot most of her interests and hobbies and even parts of her personality. After finally retiring from battling, she felt like a hollow shell for a while, aimless and clueless about what next.
But then there's the fluff and joy that comes with rediscovering herself. She never forgot her love for Pokémon, but it helped her rediscover her love for exploration and observation, rediscovering why Blue and Leaf liked her, and her old hobby of reading and love for sweets, (and her twin cousin happened to find his calling as a baker!) Embracing who she truly is and not letting anyone else force her into being something she doesn't want to be after her childhood had been robbed by disaster after disaster.
Hehehehe swap au I'm going nuts I'm having thoughts
So, this is a mostly role swap au. Their personalities and interests stay mostly the same, but there are some differences due to the plot.
Rambles under cut
Personality and interest changes
- Thad's main interest is still sports, but he's got some skill in technology, not as good with it as Uzi, but still notable. He's probably not as friendly as he is in canon with most of his classmates, but still a chill dude otherwise.
- N is meaner obviously, but there's still parts of his golden retriever personality still in him, which come out more as the story progresses. He also lies to himself and acts like he enjoys murdering worker drones, but deep down, he's not happy about having to do murder. While a drone pleaser, he is capable of setting some boundaries.
- V is shy and sweet like she was in the mansion! This makes her an easy target for C to push around. V has very mixed feelings about murdering worker drones. She enjoys it like in canon, but also doesn't at the same time. Just because she's shy and nicer than canon does not mean she's completely innocent, it's important to remember she's still good with combat.
- Ron is pretty racist towards disassembly drones, that's obvious. But instead of being completely rude towards them, he's extremely passive-aggressive.
Now the plot changes!
- Thad and Uzi are childhood friends! Uzi is actually the reason Thad gains an interest in technology and teaches him about it.
- Uzi has no respect for Teacher as a result of this, seeing from a young age how his actions affected Thad. She also questions why the WDF doesn't train in combat.
- Uzi basically is the fourth member of the main squad, she's deserves to be more important to the story. Not only does she help teach N to be less of a drone pleaser, she also is there to guide Thad with hacking so he can keep Jade from deleting V and N's memories. Figuring out how she helps in The Prommening and Mass Distruction, but she'll likely be present for those as well.
- Thad's railgun will likely be replaced with something else, but I'm still figuring out what.
- Pretty obvious change but Nori, Uzi, and Doll don't have the Absolute Solver. Ron, Thad, and Lizzy do.
And now the relationship changes. Some of these are more important to the plot than others.
- Nori and Khan are married, like in canon despite the role changes. Ron and Teacher are also married despite not being so in canon.
- Thad and Lizzy are half-siblings, both of them being related to Teacher. Lizzy was gonna live with her other parent and step parent, but they got killed by N.
- Yeva and her husband are alive offscreen, Doll and Uzi are cousins.
- Khan is a better father in this au.
- Vhad and Nuzi endgame!
- Uzi still gets bullied, but less so than in canon. She's not the most popular drone, but she's got a few admirers.
There's still other things I need to work on, but these are what I got for now. It's fun thinking about this au!
I keep forgetting that Red is often interpreted as this edgelord because I associate the uncaring and cold personality with his FACADE.
The moment you truly get to know Red? The guy is a fucking loser (/positive) who will ramble on and on about pokemon when given the chance. He is mischievous and silly. His favorite game is Minecraft. He's gotten banned from a Costco after eating too many of the free samples.
A large part of Hibiki's story is that he's a mix of Kantonian (Miyuki) and Johtonian (Kazuki) in a time period where Kanto and Johto had a fierce rivalry.
In the past, Kanto and Johto used to be one region, but after some conflicts and a civil war, it split into the two regions we know today, which was the source of the rivalry. The Blackthorn Dragon Clan is the only clan left from that time period and also the reason why history of the old region isn't completely lost. Many members of the clan have bloodlines that were present back in the time where Kanto and Johto were one region, including Lance.
So for a while, there was a time period where most Johtonians and Kantonians hated the other region, with the exception of those in Blackthorn City and many who moved there. Those who remained intolerant ended up moving to another place, Kazuki's parents being an example.
As the generations pass, some people start to question the rivalry, especially since they still trade with the other region. Some people like Elm wondered why they were raised to be kind to everyone but Kantonians. Kazuki used to visit the Dragon Clan a lot before his family moved away and because of the Clan, he grew to respect both regions. Miyuki thought the rivalry sounded like bullshit (Hotaru wouldn't word it like that but she agreed with her sister,) and moved to Goldenrod after their parents kicked them out of the house.
So Hibiki and Ken grew up being judged for their heritage in both regions. They were homeschooled because their parents feared what would happen if they went to a public school. They were both bullied by other children for it, except for Blue and Green, childhood friends of theirs, and Krystal and Kotone after Kazuki died and Elm moved to New Bark, both of them being Elm's daughters.
Because of his experiences, Hibiki would go on to end the KanJoh Rivalry for good when he turned 15 with a speech, after 4 years of taking steps one by one dismantling it. By the time Hibiki takes a 6 year break from championship at 27 to raise his kid, the regions have become allies, a friendlier rivalry replacing the harsh old one.
Fun fact: Hibiki drinks coffee like it's goddamn water. At his worst, he'd carry the entire coffee pot with him and drink straight from that.
The reasons he'd drink so much of it is because not only does staying awake mean he can do more work, but also because Hibiki has awful nightmares half of the time he sleeps so sometimes he'd avoid sleeping just for that.
As the years pass and Hibiki gets better coping mechanisms for his grief, he drinks less and less coffee but still has a cup or two most mornings.
God, Blue's calls about missing Red hit so different when you headcanon Ethan as Red's cousin.
They both clearly miss him. Red had been gone for a few years and they just wanted him to come home. They didn't know if Red was safe or not wherever he was and the fear that something had happened to him was a worry both of them shared.
But also Blue is clearly crushing on Red so sometimes Ethan is just like 'Dude are you serious? Why are you telling me about how you're yearning for my cousin.'
