Rivet stared out the cockpit at stars that whipped their way past them, still feeling the rock that had settled in her gut as they left Corson V, dense as a black hole. She stole a glance at the only other occupant of the ship.
Ratchet didn't even have the luxury of piloting the ship to distract him at this point from the deathly silence, the auto pilot taking care of getting them to their destination. When she looked over at him, he took notice and looked back. The visible regret on his face did little to comfort her, so she decided to break the silence.
"Where are we even going?" She asked.
"Some place safe hopefully. Then we'll make a plan."
"Flying by the seat of our pants again?"
He glanced over at her. "I thought that was how things worked in this dimension?"
She sighed, taking stock of her own words that had been used against her. "Fair enough. Can we at least make a stop on Sargasso? I left most of my weapons there in a locker."
As she finished talking, she felt the ship decelerate as they arrived at their destination, and upon seeing the planet a wave of defeat washed over Ratchet's face. "Apparently not." He said and gestured out the front.
Following his hand and gaze, her eyes found her home beset by a fleet much like the one currently over Corson V. She launched herself forward from her seat, hands pressed against the glass. "NO! My home! We have to do something!" She turned to her counterpart in a panic, but was met with nothing but a guilty look. It took her only a moment to realize what it meant.
"You want to leave them too!?" She was shouting now, but didn't really care. "Those are my friends down there! The Morts! Trudi! I can't just leave them like we did Kit and Clank!"
Ratchet sighed and looked into his lap. "What can we do?" He simply asked and pointed at the fleet. "We are one ship, two lombaxes, against an armada. Even if we had most of our weapons…" He trailed off and shook his head.
Rivet peeled her eyes from her home, letting her gaze land on her feet. "So what? We just keep running forever? Keep leaving people behind to cover our trail?"
Now when Ratchet looked at her, there was a fire in his eyes. "I never said that. We'll come up with a way to hit them back, and hard. We'll make them pay, I promise."
She had no choice but to be satisfied with that answer, and sat back in her chair as he set in a new course. "I'll hold you to it."
"Believe me, I've never let a cragmite beat me before, and I'm not about to start now." He remarked as he corrected the ship's direction and engaged the jump.
There's that name again, 'cragmite.' She thought. After a pause, she asked again. "What is a cragmite?"
Ratchet hesitated before he answered, preceding it with a heavy sigh. "I can't be sure it happened the same way in this dimension, but in mine cragmites were the age old nemeses of the lombax. We fought them in something called the great war a long time ago before we finally used the dimensionator to beat them, banishing them to a dying star on a rock where they couldn't hurt anyone else." He looked over to make sure she was following his explanation, and sure enough she seemed to take in every word.
"Once we banished them, my universe was mostly at peace. The lombax stepped up and played the role of galactic peace keepers, using their advanced tech to beat any new threats that came up. That lasted until some trillium miners found an egg on a comet… A cragmite egg."
"Uh, so?" Rivet interrupted. "Why would a cragmite egg break the peace? Wouldn't they just… break the egg first?"
Ratchet shook his head. "I don't know why they did it, but they decided to keep the egg, even letting it hatch. They raised it like one of their own, like a lombax. From what I was told, that worked right up until it found out the truth about what it was. It discovered the truth of its people and swore a silent oath of vengeance against the lombaxes.
"It-ugh" He shook his head before correcting himself. "HE worked for years to build an army, an empire, in secret to destroy us. The final nail in the coffin was when he was given lombax technology by one of our own."
"Who would be stupid enough to do that?" Rivet cut in once more. It made memories flash through his mind and a pain grow in his heart. His hand absentmindedly slipped into his pocket where his fingers played with the pocket watch within.
"An otherwise great lombax. He wanted to protect everyone, and he thought the weapons that the cragmite promised would let him do just that. He was warned by many against doing it, including my father. In the end, he did it anyway.
"And with lombax technology to bolster him, the cragmite finally attacked. Fastoon burned in his wake, and a lot of people died. Including my mother. There was panic, hysteria, as defense after defense fell until they were left with no choice but to flee to another dimension."
"How do you know all this?" Rivet asked, bewildered. "They must have disappeared from both our dimensions around the same time, and I have no memory of anything like this."
"The lombax that gave the cragmite the technology was banished from joining them in exile. I learned all this from him, and I've been looking into it on my own ever since."
"Did…" Rivet hesitated before she asked her question, trying to find a better wording for it. Failing, she asked it. "Did you find out why you were left behind?"
Ratchet didn't seem offended by her question, instead shaking his head as he answered. "No. The lombax in exile, Alister, was a childhood friend of my father, Kaden. From what he told me, my dad left me on a backwater planet in a different galaxy to hide me from the empire, but why he didn't send me through the portal with everyone else... I'll never know."
"What happened to the cragmite?" Rivet asked.
"Eventually, I made enough of a name for myself as a hero that he heard and came after me, looking to finish what he had started. That led me and Clank on another adventure that ended with us discovering the dimensionator and beating him once and for all. If I had to guess, that cragmite back there on that ship was this dimension's version of him."
Rivet hummed in thought. "Maybe. But any of them could have been, I think."
Ratchet's head whipped towards her. "Them?! There was more than one!?"
Rivet remembered that Ratchet had been in Aphelion through most of the battle, and so hadn't fought the cragmites on the ground. "All the forces they landed on the ground were cragmites as well." She told him.
His eyes went wide as he slumped back into his chair, practically looking like that fact alone meant they'd already won. "There's only supposed to be one." He muttered under his breath. "I guess this just got a lot harder than last time."
As he finished talking, the ship dropped out of jump once more, this time in orbit of a desert-like planet with no visible bodies of water. More importantly, there was also no cragmite fleet.
"Where are we?" Rivet asked.
Ratchet couldn't help but grin. "Welcome home Rivet. This is Fastoon, home of the lombaxes."
He could see her eyes light up in her reflection on the cockpit glass, (and maybe stared for a bit too long) before he took the flight controls once more and flew them closer in. Working off his memory, he eventually located the Court of Azimuth. It seemed like the overall city structure before the attack had been very similar between their dimensions.
Finding a clearing large enough to land, he settled the ship and opened the canopy. Both lombaxes climbed out and took in deep breaths of their ancestral home while they stretched after the long flight. Rivet looked around wide eyed at the ruined and collapsing buildings.
"This is where we came from…" She said quietly to herself. "Why come here?" She asked.
"I thought it would be far enough out of the way that the invasion wouldn't be here yet. Guess I was right. Now we can come up with a plan for what to do next." He hopped off the edge of the ship, feeling the soil under his feet. He had nearly forgotten what it felt like, it had been so long since he last visited.
"Do you have any ideas?" Rivet joined him, but she went so far as to touch the ground with her organic hand.
"Well, the only two things we know they want so far are the dimensionator and the two of us." He started.
"Right. And you threw the dimensionator into a portal, so that just leaves you and I." Rivet finished for him, but he raised a finger at her.
"Ah ah. I threw MY dimension's dimensionator into the portal. The dimensionator used to defeat the cragmites. And if there's a cragmite here then-"
"Then there's probably another dimensionator!" She cut him off and finished again excitedly. Ratchet nodded.
"In mine, it was hidden as something called the Lombax Secret. Ever heard of anything like that?" He asked, but she shook her head after thinking for a few moments.
"Under Nefarious, word couldn't really spread easily between planets. Legends like that were few and far in between."
Ratchet put his hand to his chin. "Well, I know where it was hidden in my dimension, but that might be different here."
"Is there any way to be sure?" She asked. Ratchet thought for a moment before he had an idea.
"Would you say you know Sargasso pretty well?"
"About as well as anyone can know an acid drenched, hyper-deadly swamp. Why?" She wondered where he was going with this.
"Do you remember any lombax ruins on the planet? On my version, they built a weapons testing facility that got us on the right track during our search." He poised.
She had to think long and hard about that. She had been all over Sargasso while helping the Morts and just exploring in general. (She got antsy between jobs) No matter how hard she searched her memory though, she couldn't recall any ruins like what he had mentioned. "I don't think there was, unless it was buried deep underground."
"Alright, so based on that, we can assume that it's probably hidden somewhere different than I remember. Makes sense actually. My dad would have probably talked to the other versions of himself and made sure they all hid theirs differently just in case."
"Your dad hid the dimensionator?" Ratchet nodded at the question.
"He was the one chosen to protect it, and then the one to close the door after the lombaxes left. He had to hide it to protect everyone, and died doing it. So I'm not about to fail him again by letting it fall into their grubby claws." He said with fire in his eyes.
"We won't." Rivet assured him, her hand landing on his shoulder. "But we still need a place to start our search."
Ratchet nodded again. "It might be best if we split up for now then. You can follow the trail of a lombax historian from my dimension, Max Apogee. He found an artifact that gave a hint before, maybe he found it again here."
"What about you?" She wondered.
"Do you remember when Emperor Nefarious returned from his conquest and took the dimensionator from us?" He posited, and she nodded in response, remembering the defeat well. "He mentioned a resistance other than yours, only briefly though."
"You think they might be able to help?"
"More than that, I think it's this dimension's version of Alister. Even in exile, he couldn't sit back and let evil have its way in the universe, and even fought against Dr. Nefarious. No reason this version would act any differently given how similar you and I are."
Rivet nodded along, agreeing with the plan all the way. "Okay, sounds like a plan. One problem though." She said, watching Ratchet start to walk towards the ruins of the city around them.
"And that would be?" He asked back to her, not breaking his stride. He seemed to be on a mission.
"We can't split up if we only have one ship." She pointed out. Ratchet climbed up a collapsed building and looked over to the other side before smiling and looking back down at her.
"Good thing this place has one to spare then." He said and offered her a hand to help her up. Once she was on top of the pile, she saw what had brought a smile to his face and couldn't keep one of her own down.
Resting in a crater a few dozen meters ahead was a (mostly) intact ship that looked like Aphelion in shape but differed in color with a deep, almost rust red body and yellow orange accents. She ran forward, sliding on her knees to a stop right next to the wreck as she looked it over, brushing dust from its surface. She looked back over her shoulder at the other lombax.
"Can you fix it?" The hope in her voice was palpable. Ratchet's omniwrench appeared in his hand before he brought it up and propped it on his shoulder.
"Me? Puhlease, I can fix anything." He brought his free hand up to his ear to activate his radio. "Aphelion, scan the local area for compatible parts." A robotic, but distinctly female voice answered in the affirmative before she saw the ship lift itself off in the distance and start circling them high above.
"That ship has an AI?" She asked, quietly wondering if hers would as well.
"Used to. She grew self aware and independent enough that I eventually just gave her her own body. Now it's just a general systems VI that the original Aphelion helped me program. Now." He took his wrench off his shoulder and let it land in his hand with a quiet thud. "Let's get to work."
Minutes quickly became hours as they first dug the area immediately around it up, clearing it away so Ratchet could get at all the vital systems. Once that was done, Rivet started to track down the spare parts that Aphelion found while Ratchet started his repair work.
She didn't have that much trouble. While a fair share of varmints had settled into the ruins in the absence of their owners, it was nothing she couldn't handle with what weapons she did have. The parts she found though gave her far more trouble. Ratchet had his hands full taking the ship apart, and more often than not Aphelion couldn't come down close enough to help her move them, so she was left to drag them back to the crater by hand.
She didn't let that daunt her though, and set about her task with gusto. Over the course of a day she had managed to recover another set of wings for them to use, some programming cards, and even some spare engine parts, all while taking the time to clear out more than a few nests.
Ratchet wasn't having nearly as much luck. He hadn't been lying when he said he could fix the ship, but he may have been slightly overconfident given his experience fixing Aphelion. This experience certainly came in handy, but with every piece he pulled out of the ship to fix, it seemed like five more problems presented themselves.
It was a good thing Rivet had found the engine parts in good condition, because the one the ship already had was little more than scrap at this point. If he had to guess, the shot that grounded it had been straight to the engine. Combine that with about twenty five years of exposure to the elements and it was toast.
And even once all the spare parts in the area were gathered Rivet had to lend him a hand in fixing everything wrong with the engine alone. She proved to be really good at the microengineering side of things, working with the smaller, more intricate parts, while he showed off his skill at macroengineering. It made sense though once he thought about it, she did make her own prosthetic arm after all.
Between the two of them it took nearly the entire day to get the ship in flying shape, by the time the sun dipped beyond the horizon the only thing left to do though was to boot up the onboard computer. While the programming cards worked their magic and Aphelion supplied power until its reactor came back on, the lombaxes sat off to the side around a campfire they had thrown together to keep warm.
Rivet gazed over at the ship that she could now call hers, amazed at the thought. And even more amazed that they had gotten it running in the time they had. She turned her gaze back to the lombax who had mainly fixed it as he laid on his back by the fire, exhausted. She felt tired as well, having hoofed it around the entire day playing pickup, but pulling an entire starship apart and putting it back together again seemed to be as taxing physically as it was mentally.
"You gonna be alright over there?" She asked jokingly. She knew he still had plenty in the tank if it came down to it.
"Nope." He responded. "I think I'll just lie here for a few days. You can go do the whole adventure this time."
"Mmmm, tempting. But you won't get out that easily."
"Crap." He simply said before sitting up with a groan. His hand absently rubbed a sore spot in his neck while he admired his handiwork from afar. "At least the hard part is done."
She laughed at him. "There's no way you think that's true."
He shrugged. "No. But we did just do something impressive, so I'll be happy about that." He raised his container of water in celebration before taking a drink.
"Did you have to fix Aphelion when you found her?" She asked and he nodded.
"She wasn't as beat up as yours. It only took a few hours to get her online, not a whole day."
She paused before asking the next question. "How did you learn to read her name?"
He looked over at her. "Um… a… friend taught me how to read lombax." He didn't seem to want to go any further than that and quickly changed gears. "If you want, I can show you how." He offered. Her ears perked up when he said that and she nodded a bit too hard.
He stood up, grabbed a stick from the firewood pile and sat back down next to her, though the seat was a bit small so they were pressed together to stay on.
"It always seemed to me like it was meant to be stamped into metal, not really drawn. So I hope you forgive my terrible handwriting." She nodded along, more excited to learn than anything else.
He spent a while drawing out each letter of the lombax alphabet and translating them for her. He started off slow, making sure she knew each one before moving on, but at her insistence he picked up the pace. She proved to be a fast learner, even at a faster pace and quickly picked up most of the letters in just over an hour.
At that point Ratchet stopped the lesson. "You know, I never really looked at the nameplate on your new ship. I think you know enough at this point to translate it yourself if I remember my quick glances though."
Her head whipped from the ground to look at him, and for just a heartbeat they were practically nose to nose while they locked eyes. Ratchet was in that moment very aware of how close they were, and just how blue her eyes were. Plus, as weird as it was, how nice she smelled, even after a long day's work.
The moment was broken however when she whipped her head back the other way, the significance completely lost on her. As she turned around her ears slapped him across the face. Not taking notice, she got up and ran over to her new ship while quickly finding the name plate. She traced her hand along it, doing her best to translate all the letters.
Ratchet caught up to her while he rubbed his cheek where it had been slapped, now twice in one day. She turned around to face him. "I think I've got it! Periapsis, right!?"
He leaned over her to read for himself and then nodded. "Yeah! Can you get that one?" He pointed to one near the cockpit like on Aphelion. She jumped up on the nose to get a closer look and stared intently at the symbols.
"It… it's the same as Aphelion's. Angel." Curious, Ratchet jumped on the wing to take a look for himself. Sure enough she had done it correctly, and it really was the same as on his ship.
"Huh. Wonder if it refers to a class of ship?" He wondered aloud. "Anyway, you did good! Only eight more letters t-"
Before he could finish, the ship they were both standing on came to life, its computer having evidently come back online right in that moment. It didn't immediately launch skyward, but it's hover function kicked in and threw both lombaxes off and into the dirt.
"Running self check. All essential systems; nominal. Personality matrix; heavily damaged. Analyzing chronological markers." The system said aloud in a blank robotic tone. "Twenty four years, eight months and eleven days have passed. Scanning surroundings." It remained still for a while while the pair picked themselves up.
"Friendly ship and lombax lifeforms detected. Time frame indicates my previous owner is no longer alive, please advise." Rivet looked at Ratchet for guidance but he seemed just as lost as she was.
"Umm. Since your previous owner is probably gone, can you transfer ownership to me?" She wasn't sure precisely what to do, but she hoped this would work.
"Processing." It hovered in place. "This is acceptable. Present name for ownership record."
She smiled wide. "Rivet."
"Saved. Ownership of Angel class fighter, designation Periapsis, has successfully been transferred to Rivet." Ratchet approached her from the side and when she looked at him she was still grinning wide. Raising her hand, she gave her counterpart a high five to celebrate.
"Alright!" Ratchet said. "With that done, now we can get to work for real!"
"Right!" She responded. "So, any idea where I should start my search for Max?"
"That's actually a pretty good question. I never got to talk to him directly, but maybe his space station is still there."
She raised her eyebrow skeptically. "You never met him?"
His hand rubbed the back of his neck again. "Not exactly. I did meet his uhh… his daughter though." She saw him start to shuffle his feet, almost looking like he was suddenly uncomfortable in his own skin. She decided not to press him further.
"I guess it's better than nothing. Give me the coordinates and I'll check 'em out." Snapping out of the slump he was in, he told Aphelion to do just that. "Any idea where you're going?"
Ratchet had to think at first. "In my dimension he hid out on Torren IV, I might start there."
Rivet shook her head. "Clank and I went there to fix the phase quartz. The locals didn't mention another lombax on the planet."
Both hummed, trying to think of how to track down this potential ally when Rivet suddenly snapped her fingers. "Got it! Before you showed up there was a big resistance attack on Quantos that actually made it to the news. It shut down a whole weapons facility."
"How does that help?"
"Cause none of us actually did it!" She explained. "We all just assumed it was some kind of manufacturing accident that the Emperor decided he could use to attack us in the news, but maybe it was Alister!"
"That's as solid a lead as I'll get. Quantos it is then."
With their destinations set, they both set about picking up the area around them, putting out the fire and cleaning up the various tools Ratchet had needed during the repairs. Once everything was packed away, they both stood by their respective ships.
"All set?" Rivet asked to which Ratchet nodded.
They locked eyes while they stood across from each other. They weren't close at all, maybe a meter between them, but both could make out the worry in the other's face, so they both tried to comfort each other.
"Be careful out there." They said at the same time, shocking them both. It only lingered for a moment though before they both laughed it off. Rivet held out her mechanical arm which he didn't hesitate to take as they clasped hands and nodded readily.
"One last thing." Rivet said as they separated. "If you do manage to track him down, don't go talk to him without me. I've got my fair share of questions that need answering from this Alister."
"I promise, when I find him, we'll go see him together."
"Then let's hop to it!" She shouted excitedly.
Both lombaxes climbed into their ships and took off in opposite directions.
