Planet Aridia
Time: 8:30...ish

Nighttime had fallen on the desert planet Aridia. The purple quick sans lagoon bubbled as Sandsharks grazed the sand surface with their fins sticking out of the ground, waiting for prey to come by for dinner. The Skidd McMarx Sports Shack stood next to the purple lagoon, devoid of any sign of life (except for Sandsharks). It was definitely a normal night on Aridia. It would have been a quiet night as well, but the sound of the Starship Phoenix's low rumble as it laid stationed at the ship landing area. Several rocks laid on the dusty ground, crumbled and in pieces after being broken by the large ship.

Inside of the ship were the all famous Galactic Rangers, gathered in the conference room to discuss their plans for Aridia. It was this planet's turn to have a twenty four hour patrol, something that they had to do with one planet every month. Most of the Rangers were very reluctant on coming here, mostly because of the fact that no danger ever came to Aridia. The only time this planet had anything to do with danger that they could recall was when the Blarg invaded it to get the Hydrodisplacer schematics. And even then, they were cleared out within a matter of minutes. So there was really no reason to be there, and the Ranger still didn't want to be there. Even now, most of the Rangers who were at the conference table looked extremely disinterested in what was going on. Even if Qwark tried to make it sound exciting.

"You guys know the protocol," the captain said, "we'll be stationed in nearby areas and keep an eye out for any danger. Whether it be Blarg, space pirates, or zombie ninjas!"

"Zombie ninjas...?" A bored Ratchet mumbled confusingly.

"We'll all keep in contact and have our telequippers on in case villainy decides to show its ugly face. Alright, Rangers?"

"Yeah..."

"Yep..."

"Sure..."

Qwark sighed, "Okay, look, I know that scouting on a boring planet isn't great, but I'm sure we'll find something to get excited about! Though...I doubt there is anything..."

"Actually, Captain," Elaris suddenly spoke up, making everyone look at her. She sounded eager. If someone had been looking at her, they could have told that she was dying to share something. And there was a tablet in her hands, so she had something to show them. She stood up, "There is something that we can be excited about."

"Oh boy, nerd alert," Brax mumbled, making Ratchet snicker and Cora roll her eyes.

Elaris ignored their mockery and walked to the front of the room. She placed her tablet on the table and tapped on it a few times (Captain Qwark already looked impatient). A hologram was projected from the tablet and it showed the blue, purple and black sky of Aridia. Elaris used her finger to move the sky around and stopped at the part of sky that they would see if they looked outside.

"Trust me guys, this is going to be really cool. Tonight in Aridia's night sky, several rare constellations are going to be visible." She drew a square around a purple nova and zoomed in to it, drawing the constellation by playing connect the dots with the stars. "Over by this nova, we'll be able to see Francis the Great Argorian, who, according to legend, took down an entire mountain range just by smashing his head into the base. And over here, by this blue nova, we'll see Angstro-"

"Uh-huh, very interesting," Qwark said, taking Elaris's tablet and turning it off. He slid it down the table, where it fell off at the very end of it.

Elaris looked at her captain in disbelief. "Sir, I wasn't done."

"Look, Elaris, I'm sure that you put a lot of thought into this little presentation, but I think that I speak for all of us when we say: we don't care," Qwark said, the other Rangers nodded in agreement.

She wasn't convinced though, "Y-You don't know that! I'm sure that they want to hear about the rare constellations. Or at least someone!"

"Uh-huh, sure. Look, I'll tell you what. If we can find one person who wants to hear about your sparkly starry boredom, we'll let you continue." Qwark cleared his throat and stood up straight, making the other Rangers sit up straight. He looked at them with an 'I already know what the answer is going to be smile', "Who here wants to hear Elaris's boring presentation about stars and the pictures that they make?"

A silence filled the conference room. The Rangers looked at each other, mumbling about how much they didn't want to hear it and shaking their heads. Qwark 'counted' how many votes there were, and he turned to Elaris with an 'I told you so' look. "Well, I'm no math teacher, but I'm pretty sure that the number of people who want to hear your presentation is ze-"

"I would like to hear her presentation." Everyone's heads turned to the other side of the conference table, where a three fingered metal hand was raised in the air. Clank's brilliant green eyes shined with interest. "You did not look over here and see my hand, Captain."

Qwark looked between Clank and the bored Rangers. There was no way that he was going to listen to a presentation about stupid stars. So, he looked at Elaris, who looked happy that someone wanted to hear about the constellations. "Welp, sorry Elaris, but it looks like you'll have to present to yourself."

"Wh-What? But, Clank-"

"Ehh, he doesn't really count as a full person. He's more of a ...point-five kind of guy, ya know? Now then, let's try to turn this trip into a fun one!" Qwark telequipped two Combustors as Elaris stepped away. The Rangers looked more excited about the appearance of the guns instead of her, so should she stay up there? The captained twirled his guns, "Alright, here's what we're gonna do...person who shoots the most Sandsharks wins! Go!"

Captain Qwark rushed out of the room, the other Rangers quickly telequipping weapons of their own and following their commander with enthusiasm. When they left, silence filled the Starship Phoenix. Elaris stared at the door that the other Rangers had left out of and sighed. Why did she even bother? She should have known that no one would listen to her. It wasn't like it was new to her. Defeated, Elaris turned around and started walking towards the other end of the table, but she jumped when she was met with two bright green eyes.

"Clank," Elaris gasped, placing a hand on her chest, "you scared me. What are you still doing in here? Shouldn't you be with Ratchet?"

"Ratchet is not my master," Clank replied, shaking his head. "I do not have to follow him everywhere. Besides, I am still waiting to hear your presentation."

The blue alien shook her head and walked to the other side of the table, picking her tablet up off of the floor, "Forget about it, Clank. After all of this, I'm just not in the mood anymore. I'm barely in the mood anymore..." She brushed off her tablet and headed towards the exit, looking behind her shoulder before leaving. "Look, you go out and have fun with Ratchet. If you need me, I'll be in my travel office."

Elaris grabbed the metal door and slid it open. She looked down the dark hallway and grimaced. Her eyes drifted down to the tablet in her hand, which was showing a starry background and prepared to show off the constellations. Elaris sighed. How could she have been so stupid? Why did she even bother with the constellation presentation? She should have known that next to no one would care. It looked like that this patrol would be better if she just sat in her office and stayed out of the way of the other Rangers and keep them from calling a 'nerd alert'...

...!

Elaris jumped a bit when felt something touch her leg. She took a second to realize that she was still standing in the doorway and not moving at all, probably due to being lost in thought. She then looked down to see what had touched her, but she could take a pretty good guess about what it was. Sure enough, she saw Clank looking up at her with a sad look on his face. Elaris slightly copied that sad expression, she didn't like it when Clank was sad.

"I really do not like the way that the Rangers treat you," Clank said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, well, I don't think that your opinion is going to their minds about me...n-no offense, of course," Elaris said, removing Clank's hand from her. She began walking away, "Now go outside with the others."

"But I wish to stay in here with you."

"No, Clank, I don't want you to stay stuffed up in here because of me. You already do that at the Hall of Heroes. Go outside."

"I want to hear about the Aridia constellations, though," the little warbot said, following Elaris.

"You don't want to hear about them, Clank. No one does. It's just a boring story about, like Qwark said, 'pictures in the sky'. It's just a presentation...a stupid presentation. So just drop it, please."

Clank stopped walking with Elaris and just stood in his place, hanging his head a bit as Elaris once again denied him the constellation story. He was really disappointed that he couldn't hear it, it sounded very interesting and educational. He hadn't been in this universe for long, so there were still things that he wanted to learn about. Of course, he could just look up the information about the constellations and just put the information into his database, but...he wanted to hear the information from Elaris. He didn't know what it was, but it seemed like getting a lecture from her would be one hundred times better than looking the information up. But sadly, it didn't look like that Elaris wanted to teach him, and it was all because of what the others said. Those rude Rangers, how dare they put her down like that! If he was as big or strong as them, he would teach them a lesson! But he wasn't as big or as strong as the others, so he just had to hope that they realized that they had done something wrong on their own.

For right now, Clank had to figure out something with Elaris. He wasn't just going to leave her here by herself. After all, he was her assistant, he had to help hre in some way. But how would he help her with this constellation trouble...

...

...

...He had an idea.

Clank suddenly broke into a run and ran the length of the hallway, making it to Elaris right before she turned. The blue alien looked alarmed when she heard the sound of running, and she grasped a bit when she suddenly felt metal fingers wrap around her hand.

"Clank, what are you doing?" Elaris asked.

"Well, I have decided that if I cannot stay in here with you, then you should come outside with me," Clank replied, looking at the exit.

The blue alien gave him a look, "Nice try, little guy, but I never go out into the field. Besides, shooting Sandsharks for fun isn't exactly my thing."

"I did not say that we were going to fight Sandsharks." Hearing this made Elaris feel surprised. The war nodded his head to the exit again, "Please, Elaris, come outside. I want to take you somewhere."

"I don't know, Clank, I just don't..." Elaris looked at Clank, who was putting on a particularly cute face...on purpose. She tried to look away as he smiled adorably at her and his brilliant green eyes shined a bit brighter. She shook her head and smiled, "Oh come on, don't give me that look. It's so...adorable! Come on, stop it! I can't handle it!"

"Hehehehehe!" Clank giggled, finding amusement in Elaris's weakness to his begging face.

"Aww, not the laugh! Ugh!" She placed a hand on her forehead, but a smile was still on her face. Defeated once again, she shrugged and looked down at the cute warbot, "Alright, you win. But where are you taking me?"

"It is a surprise," the warbot said, removing his cute expression from his face (though it didn't do any good to Elaris because she thought that he was adorable in general). Clank chuckled to himself; the cute expression, it worked every time.

The heat of Planet Aridia lingered even at nighttime. Though it was much more cooler than the temperature it usually was during the day time, Clank's systems gave him an alert about a sudden change in temperature, and he should be careful to not overheat. That didn't surprise him; he got this message whenever he came to a hot climate planet. What he was surprised about was that his systems didn't warm him about all of the gunshots going through the area. The other Rangers were going to town on the Sandsharks, blowing them up one by one and destroying the hive plants that produced them. It looked like they were having the time of their lives. Of course, what they were doing didn't interest Clank and Elaris as all. They would never kill a creature just for the fun of it. Besides, Clank had something on his mind that was more important than killing Sandsharks.

Clank led Elaris, who was watching the Rangers in case they mistook them for Sandsharks and decided to start firing in their direction, to a hill that was next to the landing platforms. They stepped onto a metal plate and it took them up to the top of a cliff that led to a plateau. Clank took Elaris across the plateau, staying alert in case any enemies decided to show their face to him. When so such thing came, the warbot brought his friend to a raised part of the plateau that stood at about eight feet tall. Luckily, there was an elevator that took them right to the top so they didn't have to climb up the side of the platform. When they reached the top, Clank walked to the middle of the platform and looked at Elaris, who seemed confused.

"Umm...why did you bring me up here again?" Elaris asked the warbot.

"Well, you said that the rare constellations would be visible at a nearby area. Luckily, before Qwark turned your hologram off, I managed to pinpoint the location of the constellations and found the place where we would have the perfect view of them," Clank replied.

"Wait...what are you saying?"

"What I am saying is to look up."

Both Elaris and Clank looked up at the sky, and Elaris gasped as she saw the purple and blue novas that were in her hologram. And sure enough, next to them were the two constellations that she had talked about: Francis the Great Argorian and legendary space pirate Angstrom Darkwater. There lots of others as well. Ones that Elaris had wanted to see since she was little. The blue alien sat down on the ground as she looked around the beautiful diamond studded sky, location all of the rare constellations. There was the Ancient Fongoid staff, the Medium Dipper, the Technomite Creature, the Eye of the Zoni, and some that she had never seen before! Elaris was almost overwhelmed by this sight. Her feeling of dread about the Rangers was slowly melting away, mostly because she knew that they were wrong about what they had said. They had no idea what they were missing by not looked up and seeing these stars. And it wasn't just the constellations, just the sky itself was beautiful. Aridia had one of the most beautiful night skies in the galaxy. It was too bad that not too many people stopped to take a moment and enjoy it. But she was glad that she did. And it was all thanks to Clank...

Elaris looked down as she remembered the warbot. He was standing a few feet away, looking quite pleased with what he had done. So this was the reason why he had brought her out here, because he knew that seeing this would make her feel better. Elaris smiled and picked Clank up, placing him in her lap and hugging him lovingly and kissed him on the cheek. The small robot giggled as he blushed.

"Thank you, Clank," Elaris said, placing another kiss on his head.

The small robot smiled at her, showing that he was always happy to help her. Elaris smiled again and kept the robot in her arms as they both looked up into the sky, watching the constellations come together and form a masterpiece in the multi-color sky. Watching the stars on Aridia and seeing the rare constellations, this was one thing that Elaris always wanted to do when she was little, but she was never able to. But one of her dreams had some true thanks to the Rangers...thanks to Clank...Elaris blushed a bit at the thought of him. Clank ditched the idea of hanging out with his best friend and instead went out of his way just to cheer her up. This was something that she knew no one else would do for her. She smiled one more time, this time to herself. It was times like these that she knew that she truly loved this little robot.

Whoo! I am tired! So Imma make this quick so I can go on to bed.

I ship ClankxElaris so much, I'm pretty sure that it's my most favorite ship in the Ratchet and Clank franchise. I hope that the love of this ship spreads and becomes as popular as RatchetxTalwyn or RatchetxAngela. Especially since it's a Clank ship. There are, like, no actual ships for Clank out there, and he finally for one after fourteen years, and it's a really good one. Good for him, right?

Make sure to leave a review while picking up your complimentary toaster!

This is Amberdiamondswords, Lordess of Diamond Swordness, pledger to Tobuscus, signing off!