Chapter VIII
A/N: Credits are at the bottom of this chapter to avoid minor-ish spoilers.
"R.Y.N.O. for your robot… trade ya."
Rivet looks the shady salesman up and down and smirks, crossing her arms. She's seen a couple of wanted posters for the guy throughout the city, although at the moment she's more keen on giving him a piece of her mind than anything else. "Your bounty for a Hero Charter… trade ya."
The shady salesman has barely enough time to choke out a "Wait, what?!" before Rivet whips out her FissionMallet and charges at him with a yell.
Less than a minute later…
"I have recorded the whole incident," Klunk declares as the Lombax hoists the unconscious body of the salesman over her shoulder with some difficulty. Understandable, considering he's twice her size. "We should be able to turn in this squishy reprobate in exchange for the Hero Charter you mentioned."
"What? Really? I was just adlibbing because he was dissing my partner." Which is partially true. She wasn't nearly as concerned about getting a reward for the salesman's capture as she was about teaching him a lesson or two.
If Klunk is surprised by this declaration, he doesn't show it. "Applying for an actual Hero Charter would still be a good idea. Partner."
"Oh, wow!" A wide grin breaks out across Rivet's muzzle. "I've finally been promoted past squishy status!"
"Do not push it," Klunk tells her, a thick note of warning in his voice. "But yes, you are no longer a mere squishy."
After finding one of the many wall maps scattered throughout Blackwater City, they locate the local police station— which happens to be in the same section of the downtown area where they are— and drop the salesman off there. After relieving him of his R.Y.N.O., of course, with the excuse that it would be a waste to just let it collect dust in an evidence locker.
Klunk mostly agreed, given they could still turn him in based on the charges on his wanted posters. Although he couldn't help but wonder if Rivet posed more of a danger to herself with that thing than anything else.
"Come back in a few hours with this card, and we'll give you the registration form for a Hero Charter. We just need some time to process your bounty to make sure it's legit. You would not believe how many people come in here a week with a fake bounty just to make a quick bolt…"
So with that, Rivet and Klunk return to the streets once more.
And apparently, in the time that it took for them to fill out the entrance forms and drop off the salesman, countless swarms of Amoeboids had slithered out from the sewers below the city and started wreaking havoc wherever they went.
"Well, this is just great— the day we come here is the same day these doofuses decide to come out of hibernation!" Rivet grumbles in annoyance as Klunk clambers onto her back. She tele-equips her Spiral of Death and takes aim at the nearest Amoeboid— who'd spotted her and started charging— before pulling down on the trigger. "Take this!"
What Rivet had been expecting when the circular blade made contact with the Amoeboid was for it to… well, die. Instead, the slimy creature splinter into two smaller versions of itself. The pale blue spinning blade boomerangs back towards Rivet, hitting one of the split Amoeboids along the way.
Said Amoeboid is torn apart into three tinier ones. "… I kinda forgot they could do that." Once the Spiral of Death's blade has returned to its sender, Rivet switches over to her Bomb Glove and starts lobbing explosive after explosive at the slimy creatures.
"That they could do what?" Klunk asks. Rivet frowns, and then remembers he's facing the opposite direction and can't see the carnage. Although he could probably hear it just fine.
"I'll explain when we're not still being swarmed by these guys," Rivet finally tells him, engaging her hoverboots and hurling herself over the swarm to reach the other side. Just as she's about to sprint towards the elevator, the double doors enclosing it slide open, revealing a small group of Gadgetron Extermibots on the other side. "You've got to be kidding me…"
The Raceway Plaza…
"I can't believe we almost drowned in a sewer just to get to the hoverboard races," Rivet grumbles in annoyance, still so soaked with sewer water (thankfully clean sewer water, although it did still smell kind of funny) that she leaves a trail of puddles wherever she walks. Meanwhile, Klunk is already almost dry, being made of metal.
"Correction: you would have drowned," Klunk tells her. "I would have been perfectly fine. At least until my battery ran out of power."
Rivet snorts as they trudge towards whom they assumed to be the race's hosts.
"Welcome to the Hovercon Intergalactic Hoverboard Competition!" the host on the right— whose name is Starlene and pronouns she/her, according to her nametag— greets pleasantly. "Are you the Lombax and 'bot Skidd's sponsoring for the race?"
"Yup, that's us!" Rivet gives her a small smile and fingerguns.
"Actually, I think it would be best if I did not join you in the race," Klunk speaks up. Rivet turns her gaze onto him as he adds, "My time would be better spent searching for more information related to our primary objective."
Rivet nods, seeing his point. But she's still concerned that this might not be the course of action. "Are you sure it's such a good idea to separate now, with all those Extermibots and Amoeboids loose in the city?"
"I have the neural interface and the weapons you purchased for me, and I know better than to do anything too rash," Klunk explains, his tone firm. "I am perfectly capable of protecting myself."
"Fiiiine…" Rivet rubs the back of her neck, still not too sure about this. "But the second things get too out of hand for you to handle, you comm me, okay?"
"What are you, my mother?"
"No, silly. I'm your partner," Rivet tells him, still chuckling nonetheless at the minor jab. "And partners look out for each other."
Klunk just shakes his head. "As I said, I will be fine."
Rivet couldn't believe the amount of forms she had to fill out just to sign up for the race. Maybe it was for the best Klunk went off on his own— he definitely wouldn't have had the patience for this. In any case, after half an hour of paperwork and listening to Starlene's cohost Helga von Streissenburgen compare her to "a wet noodle" in various manners, the forms are finally finished— and thus Rivet is finally allowed to use the teleporter to get to the racecourse.
Rivet tele-equips her new hoverboard as she walks up to the starting line. She stops a moment, just taking in her surroundings. The long, winding stretch of dark blue metal that serves as the course itself… the tall (and also blue, albeit slightly paler) city buildings with neon blue billboards decorating them, clustered alongside the racecourse… steep yellow ramps designed to launch their users high into the sky…
As she steps into her place behind the starting line, she can feel a light drizzle now coming down.
Rivet climbs onto her hoverboard, and glances towards the racer beside her when she hears a dismissive grunt. "Ye don' belong here, pipsqueak," the racer grumbles, glaring daggers at her. "Ye won' even make it through the first lap. Better to walk away with some dignity than none at all."
"Oh really?" Rivet snarks back at them. "Maybe you should be the one walking away, then. No shame in calling it quits. Or coming in second. Up to you, really."
"On your marks!" Starlene's voice crackles over the speakers stationed along the racecourse. "Get set! Three… two… one… GO!"
Rivet presses her heel back against the button on her hoverboard, engaging the thrust. She nearly tumbles off the thing as it surges forth with great speed. The Lombax settles into a slightly lower crouch, locking her gaze on the yellow ramp ahead. As she reaches the edge of it, the feline presses her toe down on the button on the front end of her hoverboard, activating the burst thrust. Rivet sails through the air and lands safely on the platform on the other side of the gap.
Seconds later, just as Rivet rounds the curve, she hits another ramp and engages the burst thrust again, allowing her to soar through the energy ring floating above the course. And as soon as she hits the course once more, she presses both buttons at the same time— activating the temporary boost and zooming past several racers.
"Rivet moves into third place!"
A much wider ramp comes into view, and Rivet braces herself. She zips up it and bursts through the air and through the bolt crates up on the platform above. She nearly tumbles off the board again from the impact, but just manages to stay on. The feline almost falls off a third time upon meeting the racecourse once more.
You got this… you got this… just one lap at a time, Rivet tells herself as she rounds the next curve. She hits yet another ramp— this one being a good deal longer instead of wider like the last one— and bursts through two energy rings. As soon as she lands, she activates the boost again and zigzags past the next two racers ahead of her as she crosses the finish line for the first lap.
"Rivet takes the lead! Can she hold it for the remainder of the race, or will she lose it to iconic champion Griff Blastex, who has won every race he's competed in so far the past five years?"
I wonder if that's the jerk who tried to talk me out of racing, Rivet thinks as she zooms across a ramp and bursts off. It doesn't matter if they're the same person or not, though.
She's going to win this race today, and that's that!
Rivet won the Bronze Cup— and in turn the bronze trophy to prove it along with three thousand bolts, much to the other racers' chagrin. Which was frankly their problem, not hers.
Since Klunk hadn't returned yet from his search, Rivet signed up for both the Silver and Gold Cups. And she won both of those too— earning both the silver trophy and ten thousand bolts from the Silver Cup, and from the Gold Cup: the gold trophy, twenty thousand bolts, and a brand-new Platinum Zoomerator.
She hadn't been expecting Captain Qwark of all people to show up, but apparently he was the one giving away the Platinum Zoomerator in the first place.
"Look, about Kerwan…" Qwark starts, holding the Zoomerator just out of her reach.
"Don't wanna hear it," Rivet growls, really not in the mood to deal with him right now. "Now either give me the Zoomerator or don't, I don't care. My partner and I gotta get back to the police station so we can fill out the registration form for our Hero Charter."
Qwark laughs as if he's just heard something completely absurd. "You think it's that easy to get one of those?"
Rivet's eyebrow quirks upward skeptically. "How hard could it be? You got one after all!"
"Now see here—!" Qwark starts indignantly.
"Don't wanna hear it, Glory Boy," Rivet cuts him off, her arms now crossed and her voice dry with disgust. "Gotta get the charter, get some food, see what Klunk needs, and fuel our ship! I don't have time, or the patience, for you and your fragile ego."
"You'll never make it as a hero if you can't pass the super-secret training course!"
Rivet's eyebrow only quirks higher. "The super-secret what now?"
"You do realize that there is an eighty-nine point seven percent chance that Captain Squishy is trying to goad us into some sort of trap… correct?" Klunk asks, the look on his face mirroring the one Rivet wore when Qwark told her about his "super-secret training course."
"Well, yeah. Guys like that live and die by their ego, and we deflated his pretty hard. Wanna spring it anyway?"
"Tempting, but no. We have our Hero Charter, and I have procured the coordinates for an additional trouble spot where our services may be needed. Let Captain Squishy deal with his bruised ego without us."
The small compartment in Klunk's chest slides open and out slips an infobot. The little bot opens its mouth and plays the transmission saved on it.
Later…
Rivet strolls along the now Amoeboid-free (and in turn, Extermibot-free) streets of Blackwater City, chowing down on a snack bar she'd picked up at one of the stores, with Klunk at her side. The little robot opens his chest compartment and slips in his new charger pack before plugging it in.
Rivet polishes off her snack bar and stuffs it into the pocket of her new jacket. In addition to food for the next few days and the like, she'd also purchased a new set of armour called the "Rebellion Armour" set— which increased her protection from enemy fire. Not that she plans on being shot again anytime soon, but considering how often she and Klunk are attacked, it's better to be safe than sorry.
"I know we originally agreed to go back to Aridia," Rivet starts up as they walk down the street towards the gelatonium pad where they left their ship to be refueled while they got supplies, "but that transmission on that infobot is quite a few hours old. Eudora isn't gonna last much longer if we don't do something soon."
"Agreed," Klunk amends. "While I am not too fond of the idea of meeting Victor Von Ion again, stopping him and his operations is the only way to save the planet from total destruction."
"Wait, you've met that guy before?"
"Yes, so to speak," Klunk answers drily. "He tried to destroy me when I first came online in the warbot factory on Quartu."
"Well, I guess this our chance to rip him a new one!" Both robot and Lombax stop, and the former gives his partner a look. "Get it?" Rivet's smile grows more sheepish by the second. "Cause we have a R.Y.N.O. now…? And according to the Galactic Net, that's what it stands for?" She huffs, shoulders slouching. "Okay, I admit it. That was kinda lame."
"That… is one word for it."
Even LATER… somewhere on planet Umbris…
"Where ARE they!?" Qwark checks his watch and scowls. "They should have been here by now! And my poor Dixie Normous is getting hungry!"
As if to punctuate his statement, a loud, angry roar from within the aforementioned Snagglebeat's containment area reverberates throughout the tower.
Qwark kicks up his feet onto his desk, sighing as he pinches the bridge of his nose. How hard is it to lead one little Lombax and her toaster friend to their untimely demise? If it hadn't been for the fact that they were out in the middle of the plaza, with more than enough people watching to get him convicted, he would have dealt with the problem right then and there.
The comm on his desk beeps.
Qwark knows full well who it is, and he's not in the mood to be getting an earful from his new employer. At first he considers just ignoring it, but then again, he'd rather not be getting said earful while a blaster is pressed to his head.
So he reluctantly answers it.
"Captain Qwark."
"Chairman Drek," Qwark returns, feeling his limbs go numb as he waits for the inevitable chewing-out of a lifetime.
"Firstly, it's now Executive Chairman Drek to you," the miniature holographic form of the greasy-haired Blarg snarls back at him. "You would do well to remember that from this point forward. Secondly, get your feet off that desk! You look ridiculous!" Qwark quickly removes his feet, and Drek's overflowing rage quickly morphs back into that calm and collected, quiet boil. "And lastly, I would like to know why it is that you still haven't dealt with a certain problem."
"I— well— I thought—"
"You thought?" Drek repeats incredulously. "You thought?!" He points at himself as he growls, "I do the thinking around here, you slug-brained idiot!"
"I was going to lead them into a trap, but—"
"Captain… we've talked about this." The Executive Chairman wags his finger in disapproval. "No excuses. Only results! Now, if you still want to be the highly paid spokesman of my new planet, you will track down the Lombax and the defect, and you will eliminate them by any means necessary. Within the next forty-eight hours! Is that understood?"
"Understood," Qwark grumbles irritably.
A/N #2: Credit for the slightly modified dialogue from the start of this chapter to, and including, the line "But yes, you are no longer a mere squishy." belongs to Tangent. The same goes for the modified dialogue from "Look, about Kerwan…" to, and including, "Where ARE they!? They should have been here by now!"
And credit for the concept of the Hero Charter also goes to Tangent! 3
Also, the "Dixie Normous" bit is just a name I found when looking up inappropriate names. It was the funniest (to me) name of the bunch, so that's the one I went with. I've never even heard of Austin Powers, and I don't plan on watching it anytime soon.