Relatively Absent

"I have need of... a Warrior ... a Guardian if you will. The position is permanent and long-term, and will provide both difficult challenges and potentially vast rewards. The tasks involved follow your basic martial artist’s credo quite nicely; defending and protecting those less powerful than yourself. I would also hope that we could eventually become ... friends."

—The Gate of Eternity

Relatively Absent is a long-lost (and incomplete) Ranma ½/Sailor Moon Crossover Fic written by Mark Shurtleff (AKA "Togashi Gaijin") between 2002 and 2009, and suddenly yanked from the net with a surprising thoroughness when Shurtleff abruptly abandoned fan fiction.

When Sailor Pluto kills herself with a timestop at Mugen Gakuen, the Gate of Time Eternity decides it wants a different guardian, one who will not impose her own agenda on the Gate's ancient mission and on the course of the future. The only suitable candidate it can find within 500 parsecs, though, is a critically-injured Ranma, locked in her female form and buried deep under a landslide in the aftermath of a failed confrontation with Prince Herb over the Chisuiton. Accepting the offer made by a mysterious voice in her head saves Ranma's life and just incidentally gives her a second chance at breaking the lock on her curse.

Partly healed and thoroughly turbocharged by the Gate's limitless ki, Ranma digs her way out of the rockfall and into the middle of the camp of four girls -- Tsuya, Kioko, Midori and Harukichi -- who have been surveilling her for a year. To her astonishment, they turn out to be her cousins, watching her on behalf of a family she never knew. They bring Ranma home to her grandmother Aiko Yamada, matriarch of the powerful and influential Yamada clan -- the family which disowned her mother Nodoka when she married Genma Saotome. Through them Ranma discovers a heritage of wealth, influence and martial arts beyond her experience.

With the cousins' help she finally makes her way to the Gate to complete the bonding process. In the process she alerts the Senshi to her existence and makes an enemy of the resurrected Sailor Pluto, who wants the guardianship back but can't understand why the Gate won't accept her. Bonding with Ranma not only gives the Gate its new guardian, it also wakes up the controlling intelligences of the Silence Glaive Glaive of Space and the Silver Imperium Crystal Crystal of Life -- and the behaviors and priorities of these non-human intelligences suggest that whatever Queen Serenity intended for their use, it wasn't their original purpose.

Complicating matters beyond Magical Girl politics, Ranma's apparent death in the avalanche on Mount Horai sets in motion events far beyond the parochial concerns of Nerima, the Tendos and the fiancees. These events involve the Yamada -- and also the Japanese government all the way up to the Emperor. And why has the Japanese National Intelligence Directorate been watching Nerima and its martial artists? What is Project Chameleon? And why is the US Navy involved?

And unknown to the Sailor Senshi, they are far from the only people with paranormal powers in the world...

A well-written fic that was already building up to epic length when its author renounced fan fiction entirely and tried (with surprising success) to purge it from the Web, Relatively Absent was clearly still in its early, establishing chapters when it was abandoned. It's an enjoyable read, but a heartbreak to finish, because so many plot threads had been set in motion with nothing close to a resolution anywhere to be found in the extant material. Where Shurtleff was heading with them all is a mystery, with so much in play that it's impossible to guess how it all would have been tied up at the end.

Before he abandoned Relatively Absent, Shurtleff wrote a prologue, eleven chapters and an untitled side story. Two more side stories were written by authors other than Shurtleff. One, Illusions of Honor, was written by Andrew Norris in 2004 and was considered "official" enough that Shurtleff included it with the story on his website; Norris apparently yielded copyright on the story to Shurtleff as it too has been subject to take-down requests. The other, called Dust, was written by an author called only "K.C."; no online copes of it are known to exist as of 2020, and virtually nothing is known about it.

While Relatively Absent is no longer hosted anywhere online, if you're lucky you can find a complete off-line archive maintained by a fan who is willing to share.

Tropes used in Relatively Absent include:
  • A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Edges sideways into this trope. The magical A.I.s in the Ginzuishou, the Gate of Time and the Silence Glaive have their own purposes and priorities that didn't align with those of their Silver Millennium owners, which is why they were "reprogrammed" and (mostly) driven into a state of "hibernation". Once they awaken again, the actions the Gate and the Glaive take to pursue those imperatives makes them appear to be going rogue. (The Crystal seems to be less inclined to buck her altered programming, but it's hard to be sure with the extant material.)
  • Abhorrent Admirer: Cousin Taro, to Midori. In fact, all of his cousins find him creepy, but his obvious interest in Midori disturbs her.
  • Abusive Parents: This fic implies that Genma is abusive beyond even the usual fanfic standard, hinting strongly that he is behind the "weak neural inhibitor" magic that damped down Ranma's intelligence and libido, and showing that he only cares about his wife and son to the degree that they can get him access to the Yamada money.
    • Aiko implies that before she was adopted into the clan, Harukichi's birth family was abusive.
  • Accidentally Accurate:
    • In-Universe example: early in the story Ranma is comfortable wearing a sports bra because she can view it as a "jock strap" for women. The very first sports bra was created in 1977 by sewing two jock straps together.
    • Genma refuses to believe that Ranma is actually dead -- not because he has any information to the contrary, but because Ranma is so critical to Genma's plans for his own enrichment that he can't conceive of her not being there for him to exploit. From his point of view, she must be lollygagging somewhere he can't find her, depriving Genma of whatever benefit he thinks he's due at the moment.
  • Adaptation Dye Job: Sort of. Ranma initially has black hair in her female form, matching the manga. However, becoming the Gate's guardian and undergoing her first Transformation Sequence turns it to a red hue to match the anime version.
  • The Ageless: This is an immediate benefit of being an artifact's Guardian. (It's later implied that if a Guardian finds a soulmate, they too get this benefit.)
  • Air Travel: Ranma takes only her third plane ride ever in chapter 11. She's disappointed that the plane is too big for her to properly "feel" it flying ("I might as well be riding a bus," she says), but she can't deny that traveling First Class makes up for it.
  • Altar the Speed: The wedding in chapter 10 was in some ways a foregone conclusion (although its participants weren't), but no one expected it to happen right then.
  • Alternate Universe: One key divergence is that Ranma does not escape the battle with Herb at Mount Horai unscathed, but instead was buried alive in the avalanche it caused.
  • Ancient Artifact: The Gate describes itself as "constructed so long ago that not even I have a recollection of my own creation." Despite this, it knows that it shares a common origin and history with the Crystal of Life and the Glaive of Space, which could be inferred before it informs Ranma of this by the communication network and information-sharing protocols they possess. (This does not make them necessarily allies or friends. The Crystal, for instance, considers the awakened Glaive a threat, at least initially.) It's all but stated outright that they long predate the Silver Millennium and were "repurposed" by/for Queen Serenity and her Senshi.
  • Angst Nuke: While Ranma is exploring hew new abilities for the first time, the Gate counsels her that now that she has access to magic and unaspected ki to stop using her emotion-driven ki abilities. It explains that persisting in their use so will inevitably force her into a feedback loop where the emotion will come to dominate her personality. To further explain why this is bad, the Gate points out that Ryoga's depression-fueled Shishi Hōkōdan will only make him more and more depressed, to the point of suicide.
  • Animal Eye Spy: Probably the closest trope to the way the Gate can only perceive things beyond its immediate physical location through its Guardian's senses.
  • Anime Hair: Generally averted except where imposed by the source material, with one odd exception: in chapter 8, an American Naval officer who meets with Aiko Yamada is a Nisei, an American of Japanese descent, and he is described as being platinum blond. The description comes from a third-person narrative view of Aiko's thoughts, and she doesn't seem to think it odd or unusual.
    • There also appears to be at least one ethnic Japanese agent in Hiroyoshi's team at the JNID who is a natural blonde as well.
  • Arbitrary Skepticism: Averted (as is common in fanfic) for Ranma, who has seen so many weird things just in the last few years of her life that she has absolutely no problems accepting the mysterious voice in her head that claims it's feeding her ki to keep her alive.
    • Also averted in the way Aiko Yamada does not dismiss Ranma's story about the Gate and her new guardianship, but rather accepts the story, although she does have considerable proof for its truth beforehand. (Even if she does draw a wrong but reasonable conclusion about what the Gate is.)
  • Arranged Marriage:
    • The Saotome clan had a long history of arranged marriages leading to combining different families' martial arts schools. The current ... problems ... stem from a marriage arranged between Aiko's brother Naosuke and Ranma's paternal grandmother Yasuko.
    • In chapter 10, the Emperor of Japan arranges a marriage between Ranma and her cousin Midori (wearing a male form thanks to instant Jusenkyo powder) on very short notice, as a ploy to keep the Yamada ninja clan alive and to preserve their ninjutsu ryu. Not the purest example of the trope, as both Ranma and Midori are given the opportunity to object and back out -- but the dire political and social consequences of doing so are impressed upon both of them, and neither feels they can decline honorably. (And Midori has a crush on Ranma -- to which she admits -- which makes her decision to go along with it much easier.)
    • Midori also notes during chapter 10 that if she doesn't marry Ranma it is likely that she will end up in an arranged marriage with her other cousin Daichi should their aunt Tomoko try to marry her daughter Hiroko to him in a ploy to gain control of the Yamada estate.
    • In chapter 11, Aiko informs Lieutenant Commander Kuroi (the Japanese-American naval officer who will be one of Ranma and Midori's guards during their honeymoon) that he is now affianced to Tsuya thanks to a (disguised) omiai during the tea ceremony at the Imperial Palace the day before. She might be teasing him, but Tsuya certainly takes it seriously. (Unfortunately, the extant material ends shortly afterward, and we will never find out.)
  • Australia: The Gate directs Ranma to the Southesk Tablelands in Western Australia -- a remote bit of the Outback -- when she wants to try out some of her more destructive guardian powers for the first time.
  • Australian Aborigines: Walkabout, a member of the Australian superteam that shows up to investigate the section of Outback Ranma devastates while training, appears to be an Aboriginal shaman despite dressing like Crocodile Dundee.
  • Bad Liar: In the sidestory Illusions of Honor, Nodoka (just a few years after Genma left with Ranma on their training trip) attempts to hide her near-impoverishment from an old friend whom she had come upon by accident. The friend is able to determine her true circumstances despite her best efforts (but is kind enough not to let on that he's figured out the truth).
  • Bastard Bastard: Genma, who was born over a year after the death of his mother's husband. He's Happosai's son, so this is understandable.
  • Best Her to Bed Her: Inverted. When the Gate's defense of Ranma's mind knocks out the telepathic security agent who was probing her, he decides he's in love.
  • Bond Creatures: This is perhaps the closest trope to the relationship between Ranma and the Gate, although which one counts as the human partner and which is the bond creature is a bit hard to determine.
  • Bi the Way: Chapter 3 makes it clear that Ranma's four female cousins who are training under their grandmother Aiko have enjoyed some kind of sensual/sexual play together, particularly in the context of learning about hojojutsu and shibari ties and how to escape from them.
  • Big Brother Is Watching:
    • In chapter 3, we learn that the Japanese National Intelligence Directorate is very aware of Ranma and the rest of the Nerima Wrecking Crew, has a group which maintains surveillance on Ranma (at least), and has some kind of project planned called "Chameleon" that will make use of her (or them) which goes active when they learn she survived Mount Horai.
    • The Americans have a spy satellite watching the Yamada compound specifically to track Ranma. Unfortunately for them, she's learned to teleport by then.
  • Big Fancy House: The Yamada compound is huge and opulent without being crassly showy.
  • Big No: Ranma's reaction in chapter 8 to learning that her mother has declared blood feud against the Tendos, after several Little Nos and before abruptly teleporting to points unknown.
  • Big "What?": From Aiko upon being informed in chapter 3 that Ranma is alive.
  • Body Language: Control of one's body language is an important part of the Yamada martial art, and leads directly to the complex and detailed communication possible with their Signed Language. Aiko notes upon first meeting her that, in contrast, Ranma has been deliberately taught to essentially broadcast all her thoughts through her body language.
  • Brainwashed: The Gate all but tells the Crystal that she's been subject to mind control since the Silver Millennium, and suggests that she work with Sailor Moon to clear up her programming.
  • Break the Haughty: This happens to Nodoka in the years after she is disowned, until she reaches a point during Ranma and Genma's training trip where she is willing to be a High-Class Call Girl to feed herself.
  • Broken Masquerade: In the final paragraphs of chapter 6, a panic-stricken Luna rushes in and reports the theft of the Time Key to Usagi and the other Senshi, only to realize that Usagi's mother Ikuko is present and heard every word she said, and is apparently furious at the revelation. It's actually a subversion. Ikuko and members of the other Senshi's families already knew they were the Senshi, and Ikuko was annoyed because she'd just lost the standing bet between them all over who would blow the secret first. (She'd bet on Minako.) At the same time, this is a proper example, as the Masquerade had been broken for them -- just not on-screen during the events of the story.
    • The Japanese government -- and presumably the other governments of the world -- are aware of at least some paranormal phenomena, given that in chapter 9 we see that the Imperial Palace has a telepathic security guard whose tasking includes confirming that all visitors are human, and that his organization has rules and regulations for the use of powers like his.
    • Ranma's aunt Suzu has the Masquerade broken for her in chapter 10 when in a private audience Japanese Empress Chikako casually mentions Ranma's curse; she is later witness to a use of Instant Nannichuan. It leaves her stunned and shaky.
  • Buried Alive: Ranma's state at the start of the story. It takes the entire first chapter (and the Gate's help) for her to dig her way out.
  • Changing Clothes Is a Free Action: Outside of Transformation Sequences, this trope is very specifically averted for Ranma twice during the visit to the Imperial Palace in chapter 9. First she has to change as quickly as possible into a formal kimono after their arrival. And afterwards, she has to don a wedding kimono. Realistically, neither change is anything close to instantaneous.
  • Chekhov's Gun:
    • The short scene in the "Temple of Layiru" in chapter 6. Clearly Foreshadowing for something, we never got enough of the story to find out if the mysterious alert (in the form of a flaring gemstone in an intricate mosaic) was because Ranma became the Gate's guardian, because the Gate had just accidentally unleashed the "spiritual contamination" that was the Neko-ken, because the Gate went into Alpha Override to deal with it, or because of something else entirely. Or who "Layiru" was other than (presumably) a god, nor what they were god of, and why the Gate and/or Ranma or their actions mattered to them. Readers have been Left Hanging on this detail since 2009.
    • There has to have been a reason that the three artifacts are subtly but explicitly gendered male, female and neuter.
    • Lampshaded in chapter 9, when Happosai indirectly receives a pendant from a dragon that he's informed he should wear for at least a year. he muses:

A gift from a dragon was not something one could simply refuse, and even though you could never be sure if it was a boon or a bane, the one thing that was always consistent was that the item would be critically important. Somehow.

    • The Australian superteam gets way too much characterization in their two scenes in chapter 9 to be mere throwaways.
  • The Chikan: In chapter 6, in response to Ranma's reluctance to ride inside a train, Harukichi prompts her to tell the story of a time she was on a train with Kasumi and punished a groper with a Groin Attack.
    • Later in the same chapter, Harukichi herself drives a throwing spike through the hand of a groper on a train they took on the way to Prince Arisugawa Park.
  • The Chosen One: When Ranma, faced by the magnitude of some of the tasks facing her as the Gate's guardian, has a crisis of confidence in chapter 5, the Gate blandly informs her that because of her talents and skills she is literally the only person on Earth capable of being its guardian and handling the challenges that the role will throw at her.
  • The Clan: The Yamada. While for the most part we see only Aiko Yamada and Ranma's four female cousins (and a couple servants/family friends), Ranma has several uncles and aunts and numerous other cousins, none of whom are involved with the family's ninja tradition (and a few of whom are would love to see it die). Most of them show up on-screen during the wedding.
    • Several other ninja clans are mentioned, but none appeared "on-screen" before the story was abandoned.
    • The recent history of the Saotome clan is also explored in an early chapter.
  • Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends: And other kinds of loose ends, as well -- throughout chapters 9 through 11, the JNID or its proxies are seen dealing with virtually everyone in Ranma's life known to still be alive except for Happosai, Genma and Nodoka. Soun, Nabiki and Akane are arrested; Ukyo is paid off; some kind of investigation is going on about the Amazons, who are at Mount Horai and not easily rounded up; and the Kunos, including the principal, are taken in. The Throne is apparently acting to make sure nothing and no one can threaten Ranma and Midori's marriage. Nodoka is excluded because she has been repatriated with the Yamada clan; Genma is on the run and/or in hiding; and Happosai was literally in Limbo when last seen.
  • Cloudcuckoolander: "Misha-san", from Shurtleff's side story. While he says nothing "on-screen", Cologne's short conversation with him is enough that she calls him a "howling loony" afterwards.
  • Compelling Voice: Aiko can lace ki into her voice to add a level of command to it, but more for immediate imperatives ("SILENCE!") than compulsions or manipulations.
  • Conditioned to Accept Abuse: As a result of epic exploitation of the Double Standard Abuse (Female on Male) trope by the fiancees, Ranma has been essentially "trained" to stand still and be a target for "punishment" after encountering anything that he's learned a girl might take offense to, most especially anything to do with female sexuality. Kioko is horrified when Ranma reacts to accidentally seeing her in the nude by cringing and waiting to be beaten.
  • Conspicuous Consumption: Generally averted by the Yamada, although not from Ranma's point of view, what with the family providing the cousins and her with cell phones (in 1989!), Japan Rail passes, credit cards, and an allowance that could masquerade as a salary.
  • Cool Old Lady: Aiko Yamada, when she isn't wearing her "clan matriarch" hat -- and sometimes even when she is.
  • Covert Pervert: Midori, at least where Ranma's concerned. In chapter 3, when Ranma idly (and innocently) speculates on re-training in her girl form how to get out of rope ties, the image it produces (plus Ranma bouncing her own breasts to demonstrate the "obstructions" she now has to work around) cause Midori to imagine playing BDSM games with Ranma. After which she blushes furiously and rushes off to calm herself. At several other times she ends up utterly distracted by (and sometimes drooling over) Ranma.
  • Cursed with Awesome: The Gate, from its own perspective. It has vast and literally cosmic power, but almost no ability to use it on its own volition.
  • Darkest Hour: The story starts at what is clearly Ranma's Darkest Hour: locked in girl form, the only hope for unlocking the curse destroyed, defeated in combat, buried in an avalanche, and hours from death. Fortunately, It Gets Better.
  • De-Power: Many of Sailor Pluto's trademark abilities come not from her Senshi empowerment, but from being the guardian of the Gate of Time. They are stripped from her after her temporary death at Mugen Gakuen, and when Ranma accepts the Gate's guardianship they're permanently denied her (and the Garnet Rod taken from her). Their loss is both inconvenient and personally humiliating -- and turns Crystal Tokyo from a guaranteed future to ... something far less so.
  • Death by Fanfic: Herb, Mint, Lime and Ryoga all died in the collapse of Mount Horai. At least, Mousse and the Yamada clan believe -- with good evidence -- that this is the case. (And none of them reappear in the extant material.) However, Ranma's confident Ryoga survived, based on past experience.
  • Death Is Dramatic:
    • Ranma's apparent death at (or rather just before) the start of the story -- caught in an explosion and a subsequent avalanche -- is very dramatic, especially as it was caught on video by the cousins.
    • Nodoka intends for her own Seppuku to play out with all the drama possible from making sure every part of the tradition is played to the hilt. Subverted when her mother -- herself a very traditional Japanese matriarch -- takes her tanto away and tells her to stop being silly.
  • Deprogram: Part of what the Gate does in the process of Bonding Ranma in chapters 6-7 is clear out some magical effects -- presumably applied by or for Genma -- which limited her intelligence and ability to approach things in any manner other than as a combat situation. Ranma comes out the other side more thoughtful and well-spoken, although she doesn't seem to notice.
    • The Gate also suggests to the Crystal that she engage Sailor Moon to help her deprogram herself from whatever blocks and reprogramming Serenity imposed on her.
  • Despair Event Horizon: Kasumi reaches this in chapter 11 after a Trauma Conga Line that starts with Ranma apparently dying, continues with her entire family getting arrested and culminates when she realizes from the Chrysanthemum seal on the orders to arrest her sisters that the Yamada family -- to whom she had planned to go for help -- had to know about their arrests and either would not or could not help her. Just reading the arrest warrants for her sisters was nearly enough by itself.
  • Disaster Dominoes: The JNID sector chief for Tokyo is clearly of the opinion that the day after Ranma and Midori's wedding is a bad case of this; he resigns himself to working very late dealing with everything happening and asks his administrative assistant to get him an entire bottle of aspirin.
  • Disney Death: Twice In-Universe: First, the misapprehension that Ranma died at Mt. Horai, which is corrected (for the Yamada, at least) by chapter 3. Also, Aiko believes that her youngest granddaughter -- who by all appearances is Hotaru "Sailor Saturn" Tomoe -- died in an explosion with her father. She is, of course, not dead, but is currently in infant form after the events of Mugen Gakuen.
  • The Ditz/Genius Ditz: There's a little bit of this worked into Tsuya's personality.
    • JNID agent Yumi Yosano, who appears in chapter 11, apparently enjoys pretending to be a ditz for its humor value.
  • Domestic Abuse: As noted in Abusive Parents above, Genma who while he doesn't commit any in the existing material, clearly intends to: when he finds out in chapter 9 that Nodoka has cast him out of the Saotome clan, he explodes in rage and begins to plan what he's going to do to her when he meets up with her again.
  • Doorstopper: The prologue, eleven chapters and one untitled side story which Shurtleff completed total nearly 750Kb of text, and their content barely sets the story in motion. (And including the "official" side story Illusions of Honor by Andrew Norris pushes it over 750Kb.) If it had been finished, Relatively Absent would likely have been at least 1.5 Mb in length, and probably longer.
  • Double Standard Abuse (Female on Male): This being a Ranma ½ story, it's of course inherent in the source material. But the double standard is very much averted by the Yamada, Midori in particular; she holds an especial grudge against the fiancee brigade for how they treated Ranma -- and is furious with herself in chapter 3 for accidentally triggering Ranma's defensive reflexes with a ill-chosen comment that echoes that mistreatment.
    • And because of the fiancees' acceptance and exploitation of the double standard, Ranma starts the story with an ingrained terror of anything even hinting at female sexuality, and conditioned to accept physical punishment for the slightest, most innocent encounter with it.
  • Dramatically Missing the Point: Nodoka. Every time she learns more about Ranma, she draws exactly the wrong conclusion about what Ranma wants or needs. For example, upon learning that Ranma is stuck in girl form, she immediately assumes it's permanent (despite being told otherwise) and that Ranma consequently has to live as a woman in all ways. Nodoka is helped in this by her tendency to only listen long enough to anything to jump to a conclusion about it. She also draws the wrong conclusions about the involuntary post-transformation hairstyle Ranma's wearing, as well as the feminine clothing she's been wearing because it fit her better.
  • Emergency Transformation: The Gate doing a remote, incomplete bond with Ranma as a way to save her life and get a new guardian, loosely speaking.
    • A better example would be the Crystal triggering Usagi's transformation into Super Sailor Moon at the end of chapter 6 -- because the Crystal couldn't contact the Gate or the Glaive and assumed there might be a crisis situation where she would be needed.
  • Emotion Eater/The Empath: The Gate's relationship with its guardian includes a certain amount of this, although not in a harmful or malicious way. What emotions it possesses are (usually) muted and low-key, but along with other sensory input it enjoys from its symbiosis with a guardian, it can experience (and enjoy) their emotions. However, it receives only stimulation, not sustenance, from them; it also knows enough to recognize when its guardian might be reaching dangerous emotional extremes, and will take steps to help them stabilize themselves.
  • The Emperor: Emperor Hitomaro (who appears to be a fictional counterpart to former Emperor Akihito) plays a critical role in the events of chapter 10, and presumably would have kept playing a role had the story been continued.
  • Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The Gate, Glaive and Crystal. Although they are all sapient, they are addressed (and address each other) solely by the object they embody, without the definite article.
    • Averted by Ranma with regard to the Gate; she shortens the Japanese for "Gate of Eternity" down to "Eiko" and uses this exclusively to address it.
  • Everything's Better with Monkeys: Cologne clearly doesn't think so; she and Shampoo had to deal with a large number of free-range monkeys on their way to Mount Horai.
  • Exact Eavesdropping: NJID agent Mugonno is able to hear an entire conversation between Ranma's uncles Jiro and Ichiro at the Palace in chapter 10 without being noticed. (It might be justified as we've seen a number of NJID agents with psionic powers by this point, and he may be using one to remain unnoticed.)
  • Eye of Newt: Although the Ritual Magic Happosai performs in chapter 8 uses a number of physical components, including a hair comb, a censer and charcoal, a vial of unidentified golden liquid, and a silk cloth embroidered with arcane symbols among other things, the most critical are a set of fragile, crystalline eggs -- soulstones -- one of which is permanently expended every time he performs the ritual; he has three left when he starts.
  • Face Fault:
    • Luna's response to Ikuko Tsukino's first comment in chapter 7 is to plant herself face-first in the carpet.
    • When Cologne finds out who actually runs the village where she and Shampoo have found themselves in Shurtleff's untitled side story, she falls off her staff.
    • Aiko wants to perform one when she enters the tea room at the Imperial Palace in chapter 9 and realizes the implications of the seating arrangements.
  • Face Plant: In chapter 5 Ranma face plants into a maple tree when distracted by a call to breakfast while practicing the morning after arriving at the Yamada compound.
  • Fainting:
    • Ranma, still weak and recovering from her escape from the avalanche, briefly suffers an Emotional Faint when she learns from the Gate that she is effectively immortal as long as she is its guardian.
    • Several chapters later, Nodoka suffers a somewhat less brief Emotional Faint when she learns that Ranma is in fact alive, contrary to what she's believed for several chapters now. It doesn't help that she's not eaten for a couple days at that point.
  • Faking the Dead: Done accidentally on Ranma's behalf by Aiko before she learns that Ranma has survived, when she sends a video documenting Ranma's curse -- and ending with footage of her apparent death -- to Nodoka, to indulge Harukichi's (and Aiko's) desire for a little vengeance. Nodoka then "shares" the video with the Tendos after marking Ranma and Ranko as dead in the Saotome family registry.
  • Family Honor: An important element in both the story and the Backstory. Nodoka is disowned to protect the Yamada family honor (and finances) from Genma and Happosai, forcing Ranma to grow up unaware of any family other than his parents; the Yamada did not rescue him from Genma out of uncertainty whether Ranma was a willing participant in Genma's continuing honorless behavior; Nodoka considers Genma's inaction resulting in the apparent death of Ranma the final dishonorable act from him she can stand, and she also accuses the Tendos of being honorless. Other acts have ramifications on one family's honor or another, and the demands of family honor drive key moments of the plot, sometimes to whipsawing extremes.
  • First Law of Gender Bending: Subverted -- although Ranma never returns to male in the extant material, the Gate assures her that with sufficient experience she will be able to toggle her gender-switch curse at will. And even if she doesn't, it will eventually wear off on its own over the course of Ranma's now immensely-prolonged lifespan.
    • When Ranma douses herself in chapter 4 with water sneaked from the Chisuiton by Harukichi during the fight on Mount Horai, it's too degraded to completely break the curse, but it still erodes the lock, decreasing the time needed for it to decay on its own.
    • Naturally, Nodoka buys into this trope full-force, even when expressly told that the lock on Ranma's curse will be broken one way or another.
  • Fish Out of Water/Country Mouse: Ranma as she tries to adapt to life with the Yamada clan. The sheer opulence of the family home and the wealth and resources they possess (and casually distribute to family members) overwhelm her; the amount of the cousins' allowance alone boggles her.
  • The Force Is Strong with This One: Aiko, Seiko and other members of the Yamada household are able to sense ki, to the degree that they can tell apart family influences (Ranma's ki apparently has markers of both Yamada and Saotome), in addition to strength, aspecting and other qualities. It is detecting the Gate's vast, pure, "unflavored" and inhuman ki feeding into Ranma's that convinces Aiko that her grandchild is not insane but is in fact in communication with something that she perceives as a kami.
    • Kasumi Tendo possesses a simple ki sense that helped her balance the "wa" of the Tendo home, and allows her to detect individuals in her unspecified but apparently large range. (She detects the brief presence of Ranma in the dojo when Ranma accidentally teleports there, but dismisses it as wishful thinking since she believes Ranma to be dead.) And she somehow draws strength and emotional support from something she attributes to the presence of the Tendo ancestors.
  • Four-Temperament Ensemble: The cousins, but only in the broadest strokes: Harukichi (Phlegmatic), Midori (Choleric), Tsuya (Sanguine), Kioko (Melancholic).
  • Fridge Brilliance: On the part of the author. Fans have long pointed out the disparity between the names of Sailors Pluto and Saturn, and their functions. You would expect Pluto would be the Senshi of death and destruction and Saturn (the Roman version of Khronos) that of Time. Here it's because they were the guardians of the opposite artifacts, giving them the "wrong" powers for their planets. This is supported by the fact that once Pluto loses the guardianship of the Gate, she loses all time-related powers -- but keeps the ones that have death as a theme, like "Dead Scream".
  • Friend or Foe?: A critical question in chapter 10. Setsuna/Pluto regards Ranma/Khronos as an undisputed enemy, who must be defeated so that Setsuna can regain control of the Gate. Usagi, on the other hand, intends to befriend Khronos and will not hear of violence against her.
  • Frills of Justice: Ranma is very personally offended when she learns that the allegedly "sophisticated" guardian uniform is (in her opinion) covered in these, despite the Gate's assurances otherwise. Later, though, she discovers that some of those frills disguise very effective armor and no few weapons.
  • Fuku Fic: Like Ozzallos' Heir to the Empire, Relatively Absent comes at the idea of the Fuku Fic from an unusual direction, with its own unique spin on the concept.
  • Gentleman and a Scholar: The Gate's removal of a "neural inhibition" spell combined with its repair of the portions of Ranma's brain damaged by the accidental release of the Neko-ken construct, and subsequent upload of expanded vocabulary and language skills to replace what was lost, applies a degree of this trope to her -- her speech and the third-person narration of her thoughts both become more eloquent and quite a bit less informal, and she clearly comes across as more intelligent.
  • Get a Room!: Suzu and Ichiro Yamada's children tell them this when they get affectionate once home after the wedding in chapter 10.
  • The Glomp:
    • Harukichi all but tackles Ranma when she first enters the Yamada home. Afterward, Ranma explicitly calls it a glomp -- and Harukichi a "red-haired glomp missile".
    • In chapter 10, Nodoka is explicitly described by the narrative as glomping Ranma when she and Aiko arrive to help her get into her wedding kimono. (It Makes Sense in Context.)
  • Gold Digger:
    • Genma, who had ulterior motives for marrying (so he thought) into the Yamada clan. Nodoka was disowned in part to keep him from access to the Yamada wealth and connections.
    • Ranma's aunt Tomoko, who's been trying to get control of the Yamada estate since she married Aiko's son Ichiro, and would go so far as to force an Arranged Marriage between her twelve-year-old daughter Hiroko and her cousin Daichi to do so.
  • Gone Horribly Wrong: The Japanese National Intelligence Directive's plan for the arrest of Soun and the Tendo sisters in chapter 9. It was apparently supposed to be handled with delicacy and class -- and instead ended up being performed by a set of Dirty Cops with a grudge against the girls and no compunctions about applying as much Police Brutality as they felt they could get away with. When the JNID finds out, they stage a jailbreak to get them out of the cops' clutches.
  • Government Agency of Fiction: The Japanese National Intelligence Directorate appears to be a fictional counterpart to the Public Security Intelligence Agency; they both handle internal security and operate out of a headquarters in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo.
  • Gratuitous Australian: Walkabout, one member of the Australian superteam that shows up in chapter 9, very deliberately embraces the stereotype to the point that his speech is all but unintelligible to other English speakers, including his own teammates. Oddly, he also uses Cockney Rhyming Slang, just to add another layer of impenetrability to his speech.
  • Gratuitous Japanese: There's very little to start with the occasional "gomen" and "kawaii" slipping in here and there, along with a few other terms (like "butsudan") whose meanings can be inferred from context. However, the further along you go, the more random Japanese terms -- like "uchikake" and "oshugi", just to mention two -- appear without explanation. Sometimes Shurtleff provides enough context to guess what they probably mean, but honestly, most of them could certainly have been replaced with English without diminishing the narrative.
  • Great Escape: When the JNID finds out that the arrest of Soun, Akane and Nabiki -- which was supposed to be done with care and respect -- ended up in the hands of a set of Dirty Cops with a grudge and a taste for Police Brutality, they stage a jailbreak to get them out of the cops' clutches.
  • Grey and Gray Morality: Appears to be the ethos of the Gate. When describing the events Sailor Pluto was facilitating to bring about Crystal Tokyo, particularly the canonical Class 3 Planetary disaster that ushers it in, the Gate responds to Ranma's horror by blandly noting that there was nothing inherently wrong with Pluto's plan and that many of its guardians had chosen to prioritize the survival of their own species over others. It does admit, however, that the plan is draconian and that there are less extreme alternatives that would still guarantee the survival of humanity, in larger numbers than Pluto's plan would have.
  • Half-Identical Twins: The Imperial Throne formalizes the convenient fiction that Ranma's two forms are actually a pair of fraternal twins, providing her with separate paperwork and legal existences for each.
  • Hammerspace: As the Gate tells Ranma, each guardian has a "storage area" in subspace which, while limited, is still large enough to hold a few personal items and several changes of clothing. Putting things in and taking them out is a matter of simple visualization. (Which apparently does not apply to the transformation into guardian form.)
    • Apparently the Senshi do not have this storage area, as Setsuna laments its loss after Ranma becomes Guardian Khronos.
  • Healing Factor: Ranma's canonical healing speed (a consequence of the manga/anime's slapstick violence) is turned into an actual ki skill for enhanced healing in the story, which then gets supercharged by the Gate's endless supply of pure ki.
  • Healing Magic Is the Hardest: For the Gate at least, because of how delicate the work is when it has to heal Ranma's mind and brain after the magical construct that was the Neko-ken damaged both before the Gate was able to destroy it in chapter 6-7. But not beyond its abilities.
  • Heavy Sleeper:
    • Tsuya is apparently on a par with Ranma's canon behavior in this regard, judging by Midori's thoughts in chapter 4.
    • On the other hand, Ranma discovers to her annoyance that, after the bonding with the Gate is complete, she now has a built-in alarm clock and cannot just sleep as long as she'd like any more.
  • Hidden Depths: Ranma is surprisingly conversant on varieties of tea, and knows how to comport herself properly when drinking tea with others, thanks to time spent with Kasumi. She recognizes and understands the social implications of seating positions during tea. She's also much smarter than she comes across in both canon and fan fiction, which becomes more obvious when the Gate removes a "weak neural inhibitor" effect on her, and later rebuilds her speech centers and language skills after accidentally causing damage during the bonding.
  • High-Class Call Girl: What Nodoka was almost reduced to doing to support herself, before she was offered a contract to remove an "unwanted individual".
  • Hollywood Healing: What Ranma's ki mastery gives her. The avalanche utterly shattered one forearm, and she insists it'll be fine in two weeks, to the utter bafflement of her cousins. (It actually gets better much faster, thanks to her connection with the Gate.)
  • Hyperspace Mallet: Not literally, but the trope is invoked in-universe in chapter 9 when a telepathic security agent at the Imperial palace attempts to enter Ranma's mind. The Gate takes offense, and knocks him out with a telepathic image of a gigantic wooden mallet.
  • Hyperspace Wardrobe: Ranma learns she has a literal "wardrobe" in subspace, in which she can store multiple outfits she can choose to change into when releasing her Guardian Khronos transformation.
  • I Am Not Pretty: Ranma suffers from this in spades. After reverting from her first transformation into Guardian Khronos, she retains the gorgeous mass of red hair she gained and is even more stunning in appearance than she was to start with -- but despite the obvious effect her appearance has on the residents of the Yamada compound and their verbal reassurances -- some very enthusiastic -- to the contrary, she is convinced she looks like "a complete idiot". "a total doofus" and "awful".
  • I Have No Daughter: Subverted. While Aiko is forced to disown Nodoka for marrying Genma in order to protect the clan, it is reluctantly and without rancor. She hopes for a reunion someday, and she sets up a monthly stipend so that Nodoka is taken care of, regardless. (Unfortunately, the stipend is embezzled by an investment banker whom Aiko had thought trustworthy, leaving Nodoka nearly penniless, believing that this trope is the case and that she is The Unfavourite.)
  • I Have You Now, My Pretty: The Dirty Cop alone with Nabiki in her room, allegedly to retrieve all her blackmail material and proceeds. Because what she's retrieved and handed over allegedly isn't "everything", he orders her to strip, followed by a Villainy Discretion Shot. (It turns out he forced her to pose for nude photographs.)
  • Ignored Enemy: Ranma abruptly breaks off her fight with Sailor Pluto in chapter 6 to yell at the Gate for misleading her about the appearance of the Guardian uniform. While Pluto doesn't mind the break (she was already starting to get the worst of the battle), she ends up having to shout at Ranma to get her attention back. "Oh, so NOW you want to talk?" Ranma snarks.
  • In Medias Res: The story starts with the final moments of Ranma's battle with Herb on Mount Horai.
  • In the Name of the Moon: Explicitly averted for Guardian Khronos. Ranma doesn't want to make any speeches, and her Transformation Sequence does not force her to give one at the end (and she is very glad of it; the enforced poses are bad enough).
  • Insistent Terminology:
    • Aiko makes a point of addressing and referring to Ranma with masculine pronouns and other terms, to reassure her that she is perceived as the man she was and is, despite the locked curse.
    • The Crystal consistently refers to individual Senshi as "Protector (Planet Name)" instead of "Sailor (Planet Name)".
    • Similarly, the Gate calls its bonded partners "Guardians".
  • Instant Awesome, Just Add Dragons: Although it never appears on-screen, the spirit of Happosai's daughter Yasuko spoke with a dragon named Tokoyo to determine if Ranma actually died or not. (She gets a vague answer that seems to imply Ranma's survival but leaves some doubt.) The dragon also gives Yasuko, unasked, a pendant for him that it recommends he wear for at least a year, suggesting it might have played a larger role in the long-term plot.
  • Invisible to Normals: Stunningly averted in chapter 7 when we learn that at least one parent or guardian of each of the Inner Senshi already knew they were Sailor Senshi -- one of them from the very start -- and socialized because of it (as well as had a running bet on which of the Senshi would blow the "secret" first). The Japanese government is very aware of them as well, thank you.
  • Involuntary Shapeshifter: In the sidestory Illusions of Honor, Nodoka appears to unknowingly possess some manner of ability which changes her appearance. While going on interviews for low-level hostess jobs, she attempted to disguise herself, and was unusually successful despite her limited resources. She noted that the cheap hair dye she used inexplicably looked like natural hair color, and that her face seemed to have changed shape slightly. And one woman she spoke with asked her where she purchased the contact lenses which made her eyes blue -- when she had done no such thing and her eyes were maroon. By the end of the story, though, it's strongly hinted that she has gained some measure of control over the ability, which she uses in her occasional job as a government assassin. Given the title of the story, it seems likely to be some manner of illusion power rather than actual shapeshifting.
  • Ironic Echo: When she confronts Genma in chapter 6, Nodoka angrily describes Akane as a "violent maniac", unknowingly echoing Kasumi's far fonder description of her sister from the first episode/chapter of Ranma ½.
  • "It" Is Dehumanizing: Explicitly invoked by the Gate regarding itself. It takes the time to correct Ranma when she tries to assign a gender to it, telling her that "it" is the most accurate pronoun to use because it isn't human, or even alive, precisely.
    • By comparison, the trope is very oddly averted with the Glaive of Space (which is explicitly a "he") and the Crystal of Life (which is a "she").
  • It's All About Me: Genma, to a ridiculous extreme. Because Ranma is so important to Genma's plans for his own enrichment, he refuses to believe that Ranma is dead. And in chapter 11 he spies on Kasumi as she's crying over the Imperial arrest warrants for Akane and Nabiki. His thoughts make it clear that he thinks they are for himself and Soun, regardless of the evidence of the aftermath of the police raid.
  • Justified Tutorial: Over the course of chapters 7 and 8, the Gate walks Ranma through all her basic powers and the major functions of the Gate she can access.
  • Kamehame Hadoken: Ranma's moko takabisha attack -- already impressive before her partial bonding -- becomes a solid bar of incandescent energy when the Gate is supplying her with ki. She has to make an effort to force it down to a non-lethal level when fighting Sailor Pluto.
  • Kid Samurai: Midori, who alone of the four cousins favors direct combat and as such is training in the Yamada sword styles.
  • Kids Are Cruel: Before she finds out "Ranko" and Ranma are one and the same, Nodoka blames "Ranko"'s loneliness, "tomboyishness" and desperate desire to please her on presumed mistreatment by her peers, and cites this trope by name.
  • Knight Templar: Haruka definitely comes across as one; Michiru less so.
  • Lazy Husband: One of the charges Nodoka makes of Genma, as a symptom of his lack of honor and status as an unfit spouse.
  • Left Hanging: Pick a plot thread, any plot thread. We'll never know if Ryoga survived, just what was up with Happosai and his late daughter and why it was so important, what was going to happen when Ranma met the Sailor Senshi (other than Pluto) for the first time...
  • Little No: In chapter 9, Ukyo mutters this in the middle of a pair of Imperial agents settling the now-defunct Saotome clan's last debts with the Kuonji clan, when she realizes this must mean that Ranma really is dead, as Nabiki had earlier implied.
  • Loophole Abuse: The Gate of Time is unable to disobey its guardian, who has for many thousands of years been Sailor Pluto. Nor can it choose a different guardian -- unless its current guardian is dead and there is no third party present to select impose a candidate, which is the case with Pluto in the aftermath of Mugen Gakuen. The Gate takes advantage of its brief window of opportunity before Pluto is automatically resurrected to select and bond with a new guardian of its choice.
  • Love Confession: Midori makes one to Ranma at the end of chapter 10, as part of trying to explain to her why she was willing to go along with the instant marriage arranged for them by the Imperial Throne. Ranma, used to the Clingy Jealous Girls of the fiancee brigade, can't grasp at first Midori's quiet willingness to sacrifice her own happiness for Ranma's.
  • Ludicrous Precision: The Gate does this on several occasions, such as giving the duration of Sailor Pluto's multi-millennia term as its guardian down to the second, or the actual objective time of Ranma's Transformation Sequence down to ten-thousandths of a second. Then again, the Gate is something like a Magitek computer designed specifically to measure and manipulate time, so it's kind of justified,
  • Magical Girl: In addition to the Sailor Senshi, the artifacts' Guardians are also Magical Girls, a fact the Gate was not clear on when offering the position to Ranma. Ranma is somewhat upset about this when she finally puts it all together and realizes what she's agreed to.
  • Magical Girl Warrior: The artifacts' Guardians are very much warriors, being explicitly tasked with fighting off and putting down anyone who wants their power for themselves.
  • Magnificent Bastard: In chapter 10 Ranma's aunt Suzu credits Aiko with being one of these for "hiding" "Ranko"'s birth, and apparently disowning Nodoka solely to add a further level of deception and protection, among other clever moves. Aiko may well be an example of this trope -- indeed, it's almost certain that she is -- but Suzu is attributing unrelated events to her mother-in-law's foresight and planning.
  • Magitek: The Gate (and perhaps the Crystal and the Glaive, as well) appears to be some manner of magitek device, and it views magical effects in terms more scientific than mystical -- such as when it interprets the web of curses and other magic on Ranma as mutually reinforcing and interfering fields of energy.
  • Manipulative Bitch: Nabiki Tendo, even more so than in most Ranma fics. When Nodoka informs the Tendo sisters that Ranma is dead, Nabiki's response is to ask, "what proof do you have that Ranma is dead anyway?" Her only reaction to seeing that proof is to say, "Well, it was certainly fun while it lasted," and to regret the loss of the income and entertainment Ranma had provided her. She then goes on to cheerily sell a copy of the video of Ranma's "death" to Ukyo for 9000 yen (approximately US$90).
    • Nabiki is not a Karma Houdini like many Manipulative Bitches, though, and gets what many might think is Disproportionate Retribution at the hands of the police who arrest her and Akane, at least in the revised version of their arrest.[1]
  • Manly Tears: Averted when Ranma briefly falls to pieces in her mother's arms in chapter 9, giving out huge wracking sobs (which also averts Men Don't Cry).
  • Masquerade: Despite what they might think, the Sailor Senshi are far from the only paranormals on Earth, nor are they Invisible to Normals. Leaving aside all the magic, ghosts, monsters and other supernatural elements present due to the crossover with Ranma ½, there are apparently Superheroes and other metahumans all over the world; the Emperor's security staff alone has an entire troop of psionically-active agents.
  • Master of Disguise: A part of the cousins' training according to Midori in chapter 10, although more of an Informed Ability as we never get to see them use it in the extant material.
  • Mayfly-December Romance: When Ranma is fretting about marrying Midori in chapter 10, specifically about how it's for "the rest of her life", the Gate points out that Ranma's lifespan is now potentially measurable in thousands of years, and being married to Midori for a mere 50 or 60 years is a mere blip on that scale. Ranma's not entirely sure that that's much better, but the Gate implies that if she meets her soulmate, said soulmate will also gain an extended lifespan.
  • The Men in Black: Various government agents of different kinds appear in the story, but the ones that most closely embody this trope are the field agents of the Japanese National Intelligence Directorate, who wear a "uniform" of a black suit, white shirt, and a red tie.
  • Metaphorically True: Once Nodoka seals the Saotome clan register, the legal entity going by the name "Ranma Saotome" is officially dead. Of course, Ranma is alive, but is legally a different person entirely (two, actually, as the Imperial Throne has formalized the convenient fiction that Ranma and "Ranko" are Half-Identical Twins).
  • Mind Virus: The Neko-ken turns out to have been a magical example of this trope. It's only because Genma (predictably) bungled the ritual (which he thought was a martial arts training method) that it only barely had a toehold on Ranma.
  • Miniature Senior Citizens: Aiko Yamada. Although she's not as exaggeratedly short as Cologne, she's still petite enough that she has to look up into the faces of three of her four teenaged granddaughters -- all of whom are of a size with (or smaller than) Ranma's female form. The narration explicitly calls her "diminutive".
  • Mood Whiplash: It's rare, but it happens. One example occurs in chapter 8, when we go from a very serious scene between Midori and Aiko regarding Ranma's reaction to his mother declaring blood feud on the Tendos, to a short scene from Shampoo's point of view, on the trail to Mount Horai, trying to figure out why her great-grandmother (currently riding on top of the massive backpack she's wearing) is whooping and shouting the unintelligible English phrases "ride'em cowboy" and "git along little dogie". It almost immediately whiplashes right back.
  • Morton's Fork: Cologne, in Shurtleff's side story, realizes that she was stuck in one with Ranma -- his skills and ability to teach them were of paramount importance to the tribe, but he was unwilling to join the tribe and effectively immune to "softer" methods of persuasion. But using the most extreme methods she had available to her would break him and make him useless to the tribe. So she was caught in a situation where she both had to use those methods, and dared not use them.
  • Motor Mouth: Usagi gets out an impressive stream of unseparated phonemes when Setsuna comes to visit her in chapter 10.
  • Mugging the Monster: Subverted in chapter 9 by the police who come to arrest Akane and Nabiki. In canon Ranma ½, they would have been cannon fodder for Akane (and for Soun, who is enraged by the arrests of his daughters). However, they have been watching the Tendos for a while, have come equipped with high-powered electrical stun batons and high-tensile-strength cordage for securing Akane.
  • Mukokuseki:
    • Harukichi is a Significant Green-Eyed Redhead and Tsuya is a blue-eyed blonde.
    • The American naval officer mentioned under Anime Hair above is supposedly very visibly Japanese in heritage, but has platinum hair and blue eyes, which evokes no response other than simply cataloguing them among his features.
  • Narrative Profanity Filter: Occasionally used. For instance, in chapter 6, when the Glaive awakens and discovers his guardian (Hotaru) is an infant and can't tell him why he was in Emergency Core Override (and effectively unconscious) for at least a thousand years:

His personality matrix permitted him to swear. He did so. Profusely.

  • Necromancer: Happosai performs a ritual in chapter 8 to allow him to communicate with his dead daughter/lover regarding the fate of Ranma.
  • Nepotism: An Obstructive Bureaucrat in the JNID who has a history of impeding active ops for trivial reasons can't be fired because he's the brother-in-law of the agency comptroller.
  • Never Mess with Granny: Aiko Yamada, as the matriarch of a ninja clan, is no less skilled than any of her descendants still pursing the art, is very politically savvy, and has the ear of the emperor.
  • Nice Hat: Ranma's reaction to her first try throwing a "Khronos Tiara Action" attack is, "Whoa. That’s some headgear."
  • Ninja: Nodoka was born into the Yamada, one of the last surviving ninja clans in modern Japan. (She herself is not a ninja, but a kendoka.) Ranma's four female cousins are also being trained as kunoichi.
    • According to the Emperor in chapter 10, there are only 15 ninja clans left in Japan, and all but two (one of which are the Yamada) are either affiliated with organized crime or are involved in blood feuds with other ninja clans. He asks Ranma and Midori to marry to preserve the near-extinct Yamada and their art.
  • Noodle Incident:
    • A significantly less comedic example than usual is found at the beginning of chapter 9, when Happosai and the spirit of Yasuko Saotome, his daughter, discuss something that Happosai did that seems to have resulted in her death but also gave her five years of motherhood. From what little is actually said, whatever it was seems to have been more -- and more damaging -- than the Parental Incest that resulted in Genma's birth.
    • Also in chapter 9 is a throwaway line about the origin of one of the Australian superteam investigating where Ranma did her "practicing" with her Guardian powers, when one member of the team shudders at the unspecified memory of "the terrible price Lizzy had paid for her powers."
  • North Korea: According Ranma's account of the training trip, Genma originally wanted to go through North Korea on the way to Jusenkyo, but there had been a big troop build-up and he couldn't figure out how to do it without getting them both shot full of holes.
  • Nosebleed: Midori gets one in chapter 4 when a braless Ranma stretches after a nap.
  • Not Listening to Me, Are You?: Ranma is so sure upon meeting them that the cousins are new fiancees that while ranting about what Genma might have sold her off for this time, she misses the first few attempts Midori makes to tell her they're family. Midori finally has to resort to yelling at her to get Ranma to listen.
  • Not Now, Kiddo: Cologne invokes this trope way too many times in Shurtleff's untitled side story.
  • Obfuscating Insanity: Tatewaki Kuno and Kodachi Kuno are both faking their apparent mental issues, apparently to give them excuses for running off in the middle of the day to deal with supernatural threats.
  • Obstructive Bureaucrat: Someone named Ito in the NID impeded the mysterious Chameleon project by preventing payments to informants and contacts for over two months, apparently for a petty reason related to a Noodle Incident that reflected badly on him. Ito apparently has a history of getting in the way of active operations for stupid reasons, but he can't be gotten rid of because he's the brother-in-law of the agency comptroller.
  • Oh Crap: Aiko gets two in rapid succession in chapter 8.
    • First there is her discovery of how... thorough Nodoka was in ending the Saotome clan and the repercussions it has on the Yamada -- although with the lack of later material in the story, it's impossible to understand just why it prompts Aiko to enact a number of Yamada contingency plans including dispatching Ranma and the cousins to overseas safe houses.
    • Then there's the invitation to tea with the Emperor that interrupts Aiko's panic over Nodoka's actions. If only because it specifically mentions Nodoka and Ranma (as "Ranko") by name -- and a distraught Ranma had just teleported to points unknown only a few minutes before.
    • In chapter 9, Nabiki gets several of increasing severity in a row when she, Akane and their father are arrested; every time she thinks things have gotten as bad as they're possibly going to get, it gets worse, with a corresponding Oh Crap at the realization.
  • Old Man Marrying a Child: Perhaps not to the extreme typical of the trope, but Soun's (canon) threat to marry Ranma himself if she fails to break the lock on her curse is viewed in this manner by the Yamada.
  • Original Character: The entire Yamada clan, but especially Aiko, the cousins, and the servants.
  • Overprotective Mom: Strongly implied of Minako's mother Akiko, who is not the parent who knows she's Sailor Venus; her father Hiroshi has apparently been running interference for her in this regard.
  • Parental Incest: It's revealed that Genma is Happosai's son -- by way of Happosai's adult daughter -- and that the Yamada have long suspected this is the case. Intriguingly -- and surprisingly given Happosai's personality -- it appears to have been a mutually loving and consensual relationship between two adults.
  • Perfectly Arranged Marriage: The story never gets far enough to be sure -- it ends before they even get back from their honeymoon -- but it certainly looks like Ranma and Midori got off on the right foot with their marriage.
  • Pimped-Out Kimono: Ranma is put into a series of these, including the kimono counterpart to a Fairytale Wedding Dress (all provided by the Imperial Throne) during her wedding to Midori and subsequent reception in chapter 10. We don't actually see most of them, but they're quite prominent in Ranma's thoughts.
  • Place of Power: Happosai travels a considerable distance, carrying a large backpack of supplies, in order to visit a hidden building which is apparently the only place where he can perform the necromantic ritual that allows him to speak with the spirit of his daughter.
  • Police Brutality: In chapter 9, Akane and Nabiki (along with their father) are arrested by police from the Chiyoda-ku precinct, who mistreat them when they're incarcerated at the local station. (And in the original version of the scenes, rewritten by Shurtleff after reader complaints, the mistreatment was onscreen and detailed, with Soun subject to a brutal beating, both girls blasted with fire hoses, and Nabiki sexually assaulted. References to the events in the lost material can be found in the final paragraphs of chapter 11.)
  • Power Glows: A side effect of Ranma's Power Incontinence before she finishes the bonding with the Gate. Just as in real life it indicates that energy is being used inefficiently and wasted, as Ranma and the Gate both note several times.
    • The obviously magical pendant Happosai receives from a dragon in chapter 9 briefly glows with brilliant light when he puts it on.
    • In chapter 11, Kasumi (unknown to herself) glows a soft white when drawing on what she perceives as the Tendo ancestors for support and emotional strength.
  • Power Incontinence: Until Ranma can complete the bonding process with the Gate, she suffers from having more ki than she can use, almost more than she can control, and too much to use with any kind of fine control. And the Gate eventually admits she will lose control of the ki within days if she doesn't complete the bonding quickly.
  • Power Strain Blackout: Ranma passes out from overexertion shortly after tunneling her way out from under the avalanche at the end of chapter 2.
  • Power-Up: In a non-video game example, Ranma explicitly describes the impending completion of her bond with the Gate as this. She's still surprised to find that even before the completion of the bond, her Ki Attacks have been turned practically into strategic weapons. And after, her pre-existing combat training combined with the implantation of the knowledge of how to use her tools and abilities allows her to start at the third of five tiers of power with those abilities, giving her access to attacks and defenses that Sailor Pluto never even knew existed.
  • Praetorian Guard: The Imperial Palace is guarded by at least some psionically active agents.
  • Precision F-Strike: In chapter 6, Nodoka calls the Tendos "an honorless family of eta." "Eta" is an especially nasty term for burakumin, the unspoken-of outcast caste of Japanese society. It's about the worst thing you can call someone in Japanese, tantamount to "diseased, shit-covered subhuman unwelcome in the company of proper people."
  • Pride: In chapter 7, Haruka demonstrates a truly appalling level of arrogance about how much "better" she and Michiru are than the Inner Senshi, Usagi in particular. She catalogs everything she believes they need to learn that Haruka and Michiru are just right people to teach them and "push Usagi into greatness". She is also harshly critical of the very qualities that make Usagi The Messiah, seeing them as inappropriate and unworthy of the kind of Princess that Haruka thinks she should be.
    • Pride is also behind almost all of Nodoka's missteps throughout the backstory.
  • Professional Killer: According to the sidestory Illusions of Honor, one of the ways Nodoka made ends meet over the years is by taking the occasional assassination contract for the government, which also allows her to keep her kendoka/kunoichi skills sharp. It is clear that these contracts are a kind of charity from someone in the government aware of her situation and wishing to give her a means of supporting herself while making use of her family skills. Given the interest the Emperor has in maintaining the Yamada as a living ninja clan, it may well have been at his orders. Empress Chikako's casual acknowledgment of Nodoka's service in chapter 10 seems to confirm this.
  • The Promise: In chapter 10, when the Emperor gives Ranma and Midori permission to be informal with him, Ranma is certain that one (made, as usual, on her behalf without her knowledge) involving a potential fiancee is about to be sprung on her. She's wrong, but there still turns out to be a potential fiancee involved.
  • Psychic Link: One exists between Ranma and the Gate; establishing this was the first step in the bonding process, and required the injured, semi-conscious Ranma's agreement in chapter one.
  • Punch Clock Spy: In chapter 11, NID Chameleon project chief Hiroyoshi picks up data disks from a contact -- a hot dog vendor -- who complains that his invoices haven't been paid.
  • Random Teleportation: During her first few tries at teleporting, Ranma discovers if she loses focus on her intended target, she may go somewhere else familiar which is similar to where she actually wanted to go, or where she subconsciously wishes she were (like the Tendo dojo).
  • Ransacked Room: The police arresting Nabiki did this to the entire Tendo home, looking for any contraband or other evidence of her activities. Kasumi is grateful that they did not indulge in wanton destruction during the course of it; most of the family's breakables remained intact afterwards. But that is small comfort in the wake of a search which included torn-out walls.
  • Rapunzel Hair: The guardian transformation, among other changes, gives Ranma a thick, curling mane of red hair down almost to her knees. As an unanticipated side effect (which even the Gate has no explanation for), it doesn't go away when she changes back.
  • Rich Bitch/Upper Class Twit: Tomoko Yamada, although we only see her at a remove, presents herself this way whenever she appears on-screen -- her entitled attitude comes across strongly with her insistence on wearing modern/Western clothing to tea at the Imperial Palace in chapter 9, and her visible anger at not being invited to a private audience with the Emperor when others are so honored. Her husband Jiro is warned during the events at the Palace (by his brother Ichiro) that her behavior is close to costing him a lucrative government contract, the loss of which will have a domino effect on other possible contracts.
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Nodoka after she learns of Ranma's apparent death from the videotape given to her by Harukichi. She publicly declares the end of the Saotome clan; she closes and seals the Saotome family registry, officially "killing" the clan; she declares blood feud on the Tendos; and she reverts to her kendoka training and garb to literally hunt down and kill Genma.
  • Royals Who Actually Do Something: Emperor Hitomaro and Empress Chikako of Japan. Interestingly, they admit that normally they work to avert this trope, trying not to interfere in the affairs of the clans and people. But sometimes they find they must act, as they do to preserve the Yamada clan and its heritage by arranging the marriage between Ranma and Midori, and when they do they are very effective.
  • Sailor Fuku: Ranma is appalled when she realizes that the guardian's uniform is a variation on a seifuku, and accuses the Gate of misleading her.
  • San Francisco: The Emperor and Empress give Ranma and Midori a honeymoon here as their wedding gift.
  • Saving the World: Ranma nearly undergoes a Heroic BSOD when she realizes that one of the first tasks facing her as the Gate's new guardian is undoing Sailor Pluto's plan for Crystal Tokyo and saving as much of the 95% of humanity who would have died as she can.
  • Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: At the end of chapter 6, when Luna realizes she's just spoken, loud and long, in front of Sailor Moon's mother Ikuko, she looks up at Ikuko and says, "Umm, meow?"
  • Selective Obliviousness: During the events of Shurtleff's untitled side story, Cologne admits to herself that the Amazon tribe's arrogance and self-importance are rooted in a profound level of willful blindess about the rest of the world and their place within it.
  • Seppuku: The final step Nodoka intends to take at the end of her Roaring Rampage of Revenge, only to have it interrupted by a messenger from her mother, and then rendered moot when Aiko informs her that Ranma is alive.
  • Shaggy Dog Story: Shurtleff's untitled side story is effectively a shaggy dog story, in which Cologne struggles to get information out of the inhabitants of a village while ignoring the one person who not only could answer all her questions, but is actively trying to.
  • Shapeshifter Mode Lock: Part of the key divergence of the Alternate Universe -- a canonical lock on Ranma's gender-bending curse is not undone as it was in canon. Ultimately subverted, as Ranma learns that it will wear off by itself in no more than seven years, or if she trains sufficiently in magic, she can break it faster.
  • Schmuck Bait: The police who arrest Nabiki and Akane in chapter 9 have no warrant for anyone else, but they lure Soun into attacking them so they can stun and arrest him as well.
  • Signed Language: The Yamada clan ninja. We see them using it from the very first moments of the story, when Midori gives a new assignment to Harukichi with hand signals. And there's at least one scene where Matriarch Aiko has one conversation with one of her granddaughters on a verbal level, and a completely different one in the clan sign language. Further, the Yamada sign language is not limited to hand signals -- it incorporates full-body communication, using everything from posture to eyebrow twitches to communicate as clearly as speech.
  • Significant Green-Eyed Redhead: Harukichi, who is described as "striking", even in comparison to the other cousins, none of whom are anything less than beautiful.
  • Silk Hiding Steel: Aiko, to be sure, but this is a fundamental element of the Yamada ninjutsu.
  • Slapstick: Usagi's panicked reactions to the Crystal's first communications with her in chapter 7 devolve into this, including flailing her ponytails around and getting them in Rei's mouth while the latter is trying to get out her transformation phrase.
  • Sleep Cute: Midori is of the opinion Ranma does this, even commenting "kawaii" when seeing her napping.
  • Small Name, Big Ego: During the events of Shurtleff's untitled side story, Cologne muses on how she was forced to acknowledge that this is the case for the Chinese Amazons -- that as far as the rest of the world is concerned, they are a minuscule tribe of backwater barbarians whose martial arts prowess is only exceeded by their ignorance and arrogance.
  • South Korea: In chapter 11, as they fly to San Francisco, Ranma tells Midori the story of the training trip that ended with Jusenkyo, and how one leg took her and Genma through South Korea from the southernmost tip all the way up to the DMZ.
  • Spoiled Brat: Tomoko Yamada comes across, admittedly at a distance, as a grown-up version.
  • Spoiled Sweet: The cousins come across this way, if you ignore that they are being intensively trained as ninja.
  • Spy Speak: The cousins use classic "squad in hostile territory"-style code speak over their radio headsets when searching Prince Arisugawa Park for Chibi-Usa (and the Gate's Lesser Key) in chapter 6:

"Check four. Delivery complete, five is in route. Repeat: delivery complete, five in route."

    • The American naval officer visiting the Yamada compound in chapter 8 also uses this manner of veiled speech when trying to find Ranma:

"Shinobi Two, status on Wild Colt."
Kuroi frowned a moment later. "Negative, Wild Colt has left the stable."

Averted when -- contrary to expectations -- they can't find Ranma, and his careful Spy Speak goes right out the window.
  • Stable Time Loop: Played with/averted. Sailor Pluto was forcing one into existence with Chibi-Usa's visit to the current era (among other tactics), in order to guarantee that Crystal Tokyo came to be. However, with Ranma's ascension to the position of Guardian Khronos, the time loop is destabilizing, and what was previously the inevitable future is now only a remote possibility.
  • Stepford Smiler: During the wedding in chapter 10, Ranma is described as "plastering" her best "Ranko's Auntie Saotome smile" over her face.
  • The Stoic/The Spock: The Gate, by its very nature, is calm, dispassionate and logical but also aware of the cost of using its power. While it does possess emotions, they are generally muted and low-key, which makes the time it expresses anger about Sailor Pluto's behavior such a surprise to Ranma.
    • Subverted by Setsuna, who enjoys projecting this image and tries to live up to it. But she's actually very passionate and very emotionally invested in Crystal Tokyo -- when she finally realizes that Ranma is truly replacing her as the Gate's guardian she breaks down in tears and despair at the thought that it may be relegated to a "might-have-been" future.
  • Stuff Blowing Up:
    • Ranma's combat abilities as Guardian Khronos start at "quite destructive" and rapidly escalate from there, as she discovers (and inflicts on the Australian Outback) when she first learns how to use them. A "Khronos Lance" cast in chapter 8 results in the impressive obliteration of a large rock outcropping, for example.
    • The JNID operation to rescue Soun, Akane and Nabiki from the Dirty Cops who arrested them includes a lot of breaching charges -- to get into the station through a wall, to break the Tendos out of their cells, and to get into the evidence room to retrieve the evidence collected from the Tendo home. Unfortunately one of the charges took out a structural support column and the entire south wall of station ultimately collapses from the damage.
  • Suddenly Always Knew That: Ranma discovers that the knowledge of how to use her various tools and powers as Guardian Khronos was "implanted" in her by the bonding process. ("Isn’t that like ... well ... cheating?" she asks the Gate. No, because, as the Gate explains, knowing how to use her powers is not the same as having experience and skill in using them, and there's more to what she can do than the simple pre-programmed abilities built into the transformation -- making this a simultaneous invocation and subversion of the trope.)
  • Super Registration Act: Explicitly averted, at least in Japan. The Emperor has expressly forbidden the National Intelligence Directorate from tracking down and essentially drafting the Sailor Senshi and other powered vigilantes/heroes. (We see a couple of JNID agents complaining about it at one point.)
  • Supernatural Martial Arts: In chapter 8, Ranma begins combining her martial arts training with the explicitly magical abilities she gets from being Guardian Khronos. The Gate is intrigued, as none of its prior guardians had been explicitly trained as warriors before their empowerment.
  • Surprise Jump: Ranma makes one when Kioko startles her in chapter 3.
  • Swiss Army Weapon: Ranma, being all about the uses of anything to hand in fighting, discovers that the Garnet Rod can shift its shape from a giant key into a more traditional quarterstaff, the better for use in combat. She also discovers that the bow on the front of her uniform can come off and be used as a whip similar to Kodachi's gymnastics ribbon.
  • Tea and Tea Culture: Thanks to private times with Kasumi, Ranma knows enough to be able to comport herself properly at a chanoyu and recognize different blends, and even has favorite teas. She also knows enough to know when she's out well of her depth at the tea ceremony with the Emperor in chapter 9 and is missing a great deal of important information encoded in the seating arrangements and other details.
  • Teleport Spam: When Ranma learns one of the guardian powers she gains whether transformed or not is Teleportation, and better yet it was designed with combat in mind, she immediately begins considering how to use it in this manner.
  • Teleportation Sickness: To her surprise, Sailor Pluto suffers a mild case when Ranma teleports her to the Hikawa Shrine, due to how long it had been since she'd been a passenger on a teleport.
  • Tension-Cutting Laughter: Midori cracks up and the Emperor is openly grinning in chapter 10 when Ranma demands to know what promise her father had made with him on her behalf. He reveals no such promise is involved and Ranma and Midori both relax into what was already made out to be an informal audience.
  • Third Law of Gender Bending: Ranma works assiduously to avert this trope, starting from the moment she realizes she's giggling the day after she tunnels up out of the avalanche.
  • Thou Shalt Not Kill: When Ranma speculates about engaging future enemies in Non-Lethal Warfare, the Gate warns her that it would be an unwise tactic, because most potential foes will not do so. Ranma acknowledges that, and also acknowledges that she has been able to kill with her hands for years, and has had to pull her punches to avoid killing or injuring her opponents.
  • To Be Continued: The untitled side story written by Shurtleff ends in this way.
  • Transformation Sequence: Ranma gets one as the Gate's guardian, and is somewhat less than happy about the outfit it puts her in, not to mention the massive waterfall of red hair it gives her. (Although she doesn't mind the added height.) Ranma is even more unhappy with the "naked whirly light show" which accompanies the guardian transformation, until she learns it's an "incentive" built into the magic to encourage its users to master the transformation and not just rely on the "pre-programmed" change (and vows she'll master the magic faster than anyone else in the Gate's memory).
    • She's even more upset when she discovers that -- for reasons even the Gate cannot determine -- the change in her hair color and style doesn't go away when she reverts to her "normal" form.
  • Trauma Conga Line: Inflicted on Kasumi starting with the (seeming) death of Ranma and Nodoka declaring blood feud against the Tendos, escalates when her entire family is arrested and her house all but torn to shreds by police looking for evidence, and topped off with the discovery that those to whom she was going to go to for help were probably aware of, if not responsible for, the police raid. She crosses the Despair Event Horizon, but how she comes back, if at all, is unknown because the extant story material ends shortly afterward.
  • Turned Against Their Masters: Definitely how the Crystal perceives the actions of the Glaive when they both wake up after the Gate bonds Ranma. She has her doubts about the Gate, too, being the only one of the three artifacts which still seems inclined to follow the programming imposed on them by Queen Serenity during the Silver Millennium.
  • The Un-Reveal: In-Universe: Luna accidentally gives away Usagi and the other Senshi's secret identities to Usagi's mother Ikuko in the final paragraphs of chapter 6 -- only to find out in chapter 7 that she already knew (and so do at least one parent or guardian for each of the girls, and at least one has known since the very beginning).
  • Uncle Pennybags: Aiko comes across a bit like this where Ranma and the cousins are concerned, although there's a whole lot more to her than that.
  • Undisclosed Funds: The Yamada are incredibly wealthy, but the exact specifics of their assets are avoided, other than to demonstrate they are very, very rich. For instance, when Aiko hires Dr. Tofu as Ranma's personal physician, they buy him a building to be his clinic. Unfortunately, due to what was available on the market, they had to get a bigger building than they'd planned. The exact cost is never mentioned.
  • Understatement: The Gate's warning to Ranma that the diagnostic scan needed to complete the bonding process might be "slightly painful", followed by a comment that the final imprinting might be "disturbing". Two profoundly unpleasant experiences later, Ranma lampshades it: "You have a positive gift for understatement, you know that?" (The Gate admits it's not the first time's been told that.)
  • Unexpected Inheritance: In chapter 9, Ukyo receives 200 million yen from the Imperial Throne to settle the outstanding debt of honor and cash owed to the Kuonji clan by the now-extinct Saotome Clan. It is as a pair of Imperial agents are explaining this and why she is getting it that she realizes that Ranma is really dead.
  • The Unfavourite: Nodoka believes that she is this, because she was disowned by her mother for marrying Genma. She isn't by any measure, but her mother was forced to do so to protect the clan from him. This is reinforced by the embezzlement of a monthly stipend set up for her, leading her to believe she had been completely abandoned by the clan.

It’s rather difficult to ignore the existence of a talking cat when it sits outside of your bathroom and has a loud conversation with your daughter.

  • Upgrade Artifact: The Gate is this for Ranma, taking her from an exceptional martial artist to a mystically-powered warrior who, it is implied, can defend an entire world by herself.
    • To a lesser degree the Primary Key (aka the Garnet Rod) is also this, as its use is required to access Khronos' mid- and higher-level spells.
  • Villainy Discretion Shot: The scene of Nabiki's cooperation with the Dirty Cop who's arrested her in chapter 9 ends with the cop instructing her to strip, supposedly so he can do a full strip search. We later find out he forced her to pose nude for several rolls' worth of photos.
  • Wedding Day: Ranma (as the bride) and male!Midori (as the groom, thanks to instant Jusenkyo powder) are married at the behest of the Emperor of Japan in what is the last major set-piece of the extant story material.
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Sailor Pluto long ago stopped communicating with the intelligence within the Gate of Time, considering it nothing more than an inanimate object. When Ranma explains to her that the Gate doesn't want her as a Guardian any more, Pluto refuses to believe it at first. It's only when it's obvious that the Gate is prompting Ranma with the instructions on how to finish the Guardian bonding process -- something that Pluto is the only person left alive who knows -- that she even considers the possibility.
    • On the other hand, Sailor Moon has no problem accepting that the Ginzuishou has her own controlling intelligence once she starts talking to her (and anyone else who'll listen -- the Crystal is a bit of a chatterbox).
  • What's Up, King Dude?: Despite her improved eloquence and vocabulary (thanks to the Gate) and better grasp of social graces (thanks to Kasumi), Ranma still has a bit of trouble maintaining proper etiquette when meeting with Emperor Hitomaro and Empress Chikako until the Emperor gives her and Midori leave to address him informally during a private meeting.
  • Whip It Good: While exploring what her guardian form is capable of, Ranma determines that the bow on the front comes off and can be used like a whip (or Kodachi's gymnastics ribbon).

Eiko chuckled to itself when it noticed a hint of swirly spirals in Ranma's eyes.

  • Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Although Genma is not normally so restrained, he can only flee or defend himself against the furious Nodoka, because to actually defeat her would require not only knowledge and skill he doesn't possess, but the willingness to hurt her, which he can't do. However, when he finds out that she's cast him out of the Saotome clan in chapter 9 and explodes in rage, this apparently is no longer a concern.
  • Yakuza:
    • The Emperor notes that many of the fifteen surviving ninja clans are associated with organized crime.
    • The police who arrest Nabiki and Akane appear to legitimately believe Nabiki has Yakuza connections -- and that Akane works as her enforcer.
    • The JNID team who rescue Soun, Nabiki and Akane from the cops plan to frame the local Yakuza for the spectacularly pyrotechnic jailbreak they perform, as well as link Cologne, Shampoo and Mousse to them.
  1. ↑ There was no doubt it was disproportionate in the original version of those scenes, where among other humiliations a Dirty Cop explicitly assaulted her sexually. Now the scene ends as a Villainy Discretion Shot as the cop instructs her to strip, allegedly for a through search.
  2. ↑ In an earlier version of the story, the cop very clearly commits sexual assault upon her; in the final version he forces Nabiki to pose nude for several dozen photographs, in what he thinks is poetic justice.
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