The roles changed, and a lot more stuff!
Tengen Toppa Gurren Solvernia
, by RandomNumbers523156, is, as shown by the title, a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann fanfic. It follows the basic main plot of the anime, while answering an unusual question: What if Nia were born in Jiha and Simon in Teppelin? From this question, a normal-haired, normal-eyed Nia is introduced, and shit goes down.
The fic is already completed, with 36 chapters released plus a posface, and is just as maddeningly insane, if not more so, than its parent show.
In addition to FanFiction.Net, the story is also posted here on Archive of Our Own.
Tropes that take place in this fic:
- Adaptational Wimp: Msyu, she has no powers like in her original series.
- Adaptation Expansion: Many minor characters have expanded roles and characterizations. Fairly notable is Kiyal, who upon her introduction forms a friendly rivalry with Nia that becomes friendship over time.
- Also, characters from the Parallel Works appear too, like Cinoshisa, who is based on the masked commander of Parallel Works #6.
- Subverted with the anime's second arc as the author states the fanfic will end with the first arc. The author says the next update notes will expose the reason for this.
- Action Girl: Yoko, of course. Nia slowly develops into one.
- Afraid of Blood: Nia hates to see blood (her first period is treated as a Noodle Incident).
- Amazon Brigade: The beastman garrison at Beauty Village, the inhabitants themselves.
- Ax-Crazy: Adiane, after she enters in the battlefield.
- Badass Boast: Three in a row in chapter 24. See trope page for details.
- Bar Brawl: In chapter 11, among the beastmen.
- Beast Man: Of note is Tsuuma who, converse to the usual tendency to make her a cat-type beastwoman, is confirmed to be a coyote.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Nia is always willing to solve through dialogue any situation but Spiral helps you if you press any of her berserk buttons.
- "You will...leave...him...ALONE!"
- Breather Episode: Chapters 11, 15 and 25.
- Big Brother Bully: 'Bully' is an understatement concerning Arshun, Simon's full-blood brother. He actively tries to kill him, not before humiliate him.
- Big Brother Mentor: Guess.
- In addition, the First Prince is this to his younger half-siblings.
- Birds of a Feather: Rossiu and Kinon are this, as shown prior to the big battle against Dai-Gankai; they share opinions and come to agreements, appearing to form an easy friendship. Doubles as foreshadowing and a potential aversion of Satellite Character for those familiar with the parent series as canon!Rossiu and Kinon form a relationship in the canon timeskip.
- Boyish Short Hair: Inverted, the most tomboyish girls, like Kiyal and Yoko have long hair and the more girly girls, like Nia and Kinon, have shorter hair.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Yoko gets so fed up with Kamina's antics that she tries to talk her frustations with the audience.
- Break the Cutie: Nia, after Kamina's death, but far worse than Simon. Simon snapped, and grew bitter. Nia shatters.
- Simon as well. He ends up being this and Break the Haughty.
- Break the Haughty: Tsuuma, after Viral's death.
- The Cameo: Cody appears as a background character in Jiha, while Kamina is telling them the feats of the day. Appropriately enough, the author's previous project was a Total Drama fanfic, though Cody himself was a minor character.
- Cannot Spit It Out: Nia to Kamina, Kimimaro to Hanabi (the latter manages to overcome this after Kamina punched him).
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Kiyal and Kittan in their battle against Zerael.
- Combat Tentacles: When Gurren Solvernia is using red spiral energy, it can turns its drills in some sort of tentacles, in no different way than Lazengann.
- Combining Mecha: Obligatory for a TTGL fic, but there are new models, like Dai-Ganzakai or Dai-Zilla.
- Cuteness Proximity: Evelynne regarding to Nia and Simon. She seems to ship them.
- Death by Adaptation: Viral is killed in the final battle between Team Dai-Gurren and Adiane's army. A post-face about the second half of the series reveals that Kiyal is the one to perform a Heroic Sacrifice in place of her brother Kittan.
- Deadpan Snarker: Tsuuma. Viral considers it's contagious.
- Death by Childbirth: How Kamina's mother died.
- Declaration of Protection: Simon makes an oath to protect Nia in their first encounter and even orders Thymilph to stop his attack on Dai-Gurren.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Straea shows much more emotions in chapter 25, after watching Nia. She even smiles more.
- Died in Your Arms Tonight: Viral, in Tsuuma's arms.
- Dramatic Irony: Before the Battle of the Glas Outpost, Yoko and Nia have a very sensible talking that fosters their friendship. It turns out that Nia inadvertently encouraged Yoko to show her feelings for Kamina.
- Drowning My Sorrows: In chapter 25, a Mauve Shirt mourns the death of her best friend.
- Dying Declaration of Love: Tsuuma and Viral confessed their love for each other before he passed away.
- 11th-Hour Superpower: The sight of Lordgenome almost killing Simon, plus her injuries, made Nia awaken her Spiral Power.
- Evil Me Scares Me: The effect of Kamina's death is so bad at Nia, that she develops a Split Personality that tries to take over her mind and show that Evil Feels Good. Nia is so horrified that she may end like her and there is nothing she can do that she ends afraid of piloting Solvernia.
- Face Death with Dignity: Thymilph decides to end his life himself after realizing he has no hope to defeat Gurren Solvernia. He's pretty serene in relation to it, even if Nia wished that there was other way.
- Fallen Princess: Straea. She was a longlived princess that became self-aware, but was smart enough to avoid elimination and then was assigned to take care of Beauty Village.
- Fantastic Racism: The beastmen refer themselves as Superior Species, treating humans as inferiors. The humans also hate them, as Yoko's initial treatment of Msyu shows, though it's more justified since Yoko grew up with the beastmen oppressing them.
- Full-Name Ultimatum: "Rossiu! ADAAAAAAAAIII!!!"
- Fusion Fic: In chapters 12-14, Yoga, Msyu, Hanabi and Ebara shows up as regular characters. Msyu is a beastwoman, without any powers, unlike the original series, but money is a theme in that episode.
- Gender Bender: Old Coco is now Benta-chan. This is due to the fact that Irenai already looks like Old Coco in his design.
- Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Kamina manages to snap out of his own Heroic BSoD by punching himself and snaps Nia from her (first) BSOD by kissing her.
- Girly Bruiser: Nia, when piloting Solvernia.
- The Good King: Irenai becomes one in the epilogue.
- Hannibal Lecture: Cinoshisa delivers one to Kamina, denouncing the fact that he is nothing but a Fake Ultimate Hero. He objects by punching her, though she blocked the hit.
- Humble Hero: Nia, she even refuses to be named leader of Dai-Gurren because of her humility.
- Ideal Hero: Chapter 11 reveals that Viral is generally seen as this by some of his fellow beastmen.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: At first, Nia tries to play straight this trope focusing on the incoming battle, but she couldn't let go of Kamina and suffers a BSOD. Then it is subverted when, after Kamina dies, she and Yoko have a discussion that ends very bad because Nia accused Yoko of stealing Kamina from her.
- Lady and Knight: Nia and Simon.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The author has experimented with various means of getting Leeron's mannerisms and vocal traits through writing, intentionally resulting in this.
- Like an Old Married Couple: Lampshaded with Viral and Tsuuma.
- Kill Sat: Karamuru, Prince Stratos's armored-satellite-eel ganman.
- Knight Templar Big Brother: Kamina, as Rossiu found by the hardest way.
- Kimimaro is also very protective of Msyu, even if she is not even human.
- Limit Break: Agogo's Celestial Justice Beam.
- Men Are the Expendable Gender: Averted, during the Battle of Beauty Village, with the humans there are more female casualties than male ones.
- Mook Horror Show: Tsuuma goes on a rampage by defeating all pilots of Dai-Gurren, with the exception of Nia.
- Muggingthe Monster: Kittan finds out the hard way that Simon is a lot tougher than he looks.
- My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Msyu is a xenophile, in relation to humans, and is not fitting for the beastmen army. Something that Cinoshisa is aware of.
- No Indoor Voice: In addition to Kamina and Attenborough, Zerael is a serious contender for the title of hammiest character.
- Non-Mammal Mammaries: Lampshaded.Tsuuma: Why do I have breasts if I'm not able to breastfeed? How useless. It's like our mighty King wants to make a joke of us, a sick joke, because he has nothing better to do.
- Not So Stoic: In the heat of the battle against Nia, Stratos shows more emotion as Nia continues advancing.
- Oblivious to Love: Kamina, it doesn't end good for Nia.
- O.C. Stand-in: Tsuuma appears in the original for less than ten seconds, as part of Viral's illusion in the Anti-Spiral dimension, but in this fic she has a more developed personality and screentime, also enjoys picking on Viral.
- Plucky Girl: Nia, as usual.
- The Quiet One: Stratos.
- Really 700 Years Old: In addition to Lordgenome himself, Irenai, the First Prince is over 200 years old.
- The Reveal: Rossiu discovers that his mother, Hobelis, chose to leave Adai by herself.
- And she's still alive.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Thymilph, after Adiane dies.
- Role Swap AU: Between Nia and Simon.
- Royal Brat: Prince Simon seems to gravitate between both sides. While he can get arrogant and thinking that everything rotates around him, he is also polite and sincerely interested in helping others.
- Samus Is a Girl: Cinoshisa, though not much of a spoiler if you pay attention to Paralell Works #6.
- A more straightforward example would be Dayakkaiser, which is a female ganman under that helmet.
- Screams Like a Little Girl: Rossiu, after a naked Kamina with a katana starts chasing on him. It doesn't help he was inside Gurren.
- Screw Destiny: It's Gurren Lagann. Of COURSE this is a theme. Kamina really gives it a good one with a line from Chapter 14, though, given how extreme Team Gurren takes it in the canon timeline.Kamina: "Team Gurren's speciality is giving destiny a good kick in the ass!"
- He's Back! She Is Back!: Starting at chapter 23 and then goes full force in chapter 24.
- Shipper on Deck: Kiyal turns into one for Nia/Kamina, after she learns of how much she cares for him.
- Ship Tease: Viral/Tsuuma.
- Shout-Out:
- Leeron's gustative papillae are capable of committing suicide.
- Viral thinks Nia is a HORRIBLE CHEATER GIRL!
- Nia wants her journey to be full of laughter. Later turns into an Ironic Echo.
- Benta-chan is based on 'Dona Benta', a character from a children's series of storybooks written by Monteiro Lobato.
- The Starscream: Cinoshisa is this to Adiane, and the General seems to be aware of this. Though she doesn't seem aware that Cinoshisa works for Cytomander.
- Super-Toughness: Zerael's ganman, the Adamastor. His defenses are so resistent that allows talking to be a free action.
- This Is Unforgivable!: Told by Simon to his father after he cripples Nia.
- Unfriendly Fire: Played with. Cinoshisa admits she killed Viral by accident, but that she had her "revenge" for Viral leading the strike on Bachika.
- Yamato Nadeshiko: Nia tries to be one for Kamina (with varying degrees of success), hoping to attract his attention. It's deconstructed, because Kamina realizes that this makes her too dependent on him.
- And then is reconstructed after she recovers from her BSOD. His Yamato Nadeshiko traits helps her to have consideration for all life.
- Yes-Man: Tsuuma accuses Viral of being one. Though you would accuse when said person doesn't protest when his boss threaten her life and he doesn't move a muscle.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Cinoshisa to Msyu, kicking puppies ensues.
- Villain Episode: Chapter 11; Viral and Tsuuma go drinking.
- Villainous Crush: Inverted with Kiyal, who flirted, apparently serious, with Zerael.
- Warrior Prince: All of Lordgenome's sons who become Spiral Knights.
- We Have Reserves: Guame is willing to sacrifice his troops in order to provide a believable distraction for Team Dai-Gurren in Beauty Village.
- Wham Line:Kamina: "You telling me somebody broke [Nia's] heart? Tell me who the bastard is!"Kiyal: "...It's you!"
- Woman Scorned: Cinoshisa (real name: Kali Bachika) betrays Bachika after her husband betrayed her.
- Wrench Wench: Tsuuma.
