I now give you chapter 22. And there's not much to really say here other than I got two new reviews that need replying. Once again I thank you for these reviews. And I cant say this enough because really guy, I like treat these things like fan mail, so if you want to send some fan mail, I mean you know send a review. Go ahead and do so. I'm only going to reply to one review however as the second review was pretty much replied in a PM. But I do wanna say something to that person, which is TheWhiteGuardian and its just a little something I noticed in this story that I wish he mentioned.

Review Replies:

TheWhiteGuardian- I do like what you've done here. But I wish you actually mentioned about Jordan's still broken nose, and how the group got their weapons back. I do realize they go to a vendor in this, but its just for ammo and you didn't mention how they got their weapons back, due to the fact that they were taken away on the prison ship. But I forgive you for these mistakes as I will explain how they got them in the concluding author notes.

Alright, now the new review.

Ratchet227-I appreciate your concern with my well being. I mean the cold happened like two months ago. But I do thank you for your concern. And thank you for your little critique on my One For All story, its very much appreciated. And the bond between Jordan and Sophia is awesome isn't it. You will slowly see their relationship build up in the future stories and who knows, maybe they'll reach a father/daughter relationship in a future story. We'll just have to wait and see. And dont worry about thanking me for the comment. It what you get in a review reply. I always read my reviews for all my stories. So if you send a positive review, you'll get positive feedback for me. Its how I roll with reviews.

Now as I said in the first review reply, I'll explain at the end of this chapter how they get their weapons back.

If your enjoying the story so far, feel free to review, favorite, or follow, and please know that any feedback is much appreciated.

Disclaimer:

Ratchet and Clank, associated characters, weapons, locations, etc. belong to insomniac games. some real world companies and organizations belong to their respective owners, etc. I only own the right to some characters and some weapons and events introduced in the story.

As the group flew to Planet Snivelak, Jordan slouched in his seat and his mind began to drift away. Jordan looked down at his hands and saw that the blood was now dry. But he decided to focus on something that didn't remind him of violence, so he looked away and simply looked out the cockpit's window, at the beautiful cosmos. But he failed to hear Ratchet calling for him until he heard it for the third time.

"Jordan!" Ratchet called out.

"What?" he said as he turned to look at him.

"You okay?"

"Uh..yeah, I'm fine."

"You sure?"

"I'm sure."

Knowing that his friend was okay, Ratchet focused on flying again as they were approaching the smouldering planet of Snivelak.

Thug HQ

Planet Snivelak

6:15pm Local Time

Jump pads and Giant Mechs

The sky was deep crimson and the temperature was just beyond tropical as the group landed on a small landing pad on a lonely rock a few cubits away from the fortress that was the Thugs-4-Less HQ. As they got out of the ship, they could see large structures scattered throughout the area and saw a large skyscraper in the distance. "Do you think Angela is there?" Ratchet asked.

"Let's hope so." Jordan replied.

"Well, we better get moving then."

After making a quick stop at a Megacorp Vendor to restock on ammo, they turned to the path ahead and saw a building that, with a long detour, led to the Thug fortress in the distance. The bad thing however, is that the only way to reach the building was by versa targets above a sea of molten rock. Ratchet equipped his Swingshot and Jordan held on. Luckily, they made it across in one piece, and even better: the small building was deserted. They moved on and saw that they had to cross another gap using only versa targets. Jordan held on again and they slowly swung across the large gap to a rectangular platform.

However, they immediately that the only way ahead was by a grind rail that had a blue target attached to it. Ratchet fired the cable of his swingshot at the target, using it as a grappling hook and pulled the rail down. Ratchet then hopped onto the rail, followed by Jordan. They slowly went down the spiraling rail and saw that the top of a support column was blocking their way. Jordan wasn't ready to jump over things and land perfectly, but he and the Lombax jumped over the first one with relative ease. But once they jumped the second one, Jordan lost his balance.

Luckily, thanks to Sophia's shift in weight, Jordan was able to recover in time. At last, after one last turn, they had reached the end. They then saw that the only way ahead was by walking up a set of moving metal panels. Recognizing the situation, Ratchet was already equipping the gravity boots. Jordan then held on and the Lombax began to walk up the shaft, muscles working overtime to compensate for Jordan and Sophia's additional weight.

However, they quickly concluded that there was no way around the back as once thought, but a conveniently placed Dynamo target gave a hint of what to do next.

Ratchet equipped the Dynamo and fired at the target, resulting in a metal panel starting to move into view. However, there still was a small gap between the moving panel and the panel Ratchet was standing on. He had to jump. Ratchet immediately knew that this would be a problem thanks to the additional weight on his back, but he was determined to get to the fortress. Ratchet used all of his might and jumped as high as he could and thankfully landed on the metal panel instead of the superheated metal underneath. He then saw another target above him and zapped it with the Dynamo immediately. Once it was in front of the Lombax, he jumped and landed on the second one. He then saw another target, shot at it, waited and landed on the third one.

With one more platform to go, he shot at the last target, waited, and jumped on the final platform. He then saw another metallic shaft running along the side of the building they were on and jumped to it. He slowly walked along the side of the shaft.

The shaft ended on a metal ramp that led back to a horizontal area. However, by the looks of it they had either been spotted or had unfortunate timing, for a few Thug helicopters suddenly came to life with a loud roar and started to ascend. Ratchet barely got out of the way before getting chopped to pieces.

After the helicopters were gone, Ratchet walked down the ramp and let Jordan release his grip. The group walked down a long bridge leading to a metal pillar with a strange glowing pad on it. It had a triangular shape and was glowing in a color similar to Clank's eyes. "What do you think it does?" Jordan asked.

"I'm not sure, I've never seen this kind of pad before."

"Well, I guess there's only one way to find out, right?"

"Seems like it."

"After you then."

Ratchet stepped onto the pad, and immediately a chill went down the Lombax' spine. "Whoo, this thing apparently has some effect on the planet's gravity, I feel really light! I bet I can jump really, really high! Watch!"

Ratchet jumped, and he did indeed fly quite far, but not exactly up. He was launched at a large metal bridge in the distance. Jordan closed his eyes when Ratchet landed, but he opened them ever so slightly after hearing a yell.

"That was insane!" Ratchet yelled from the bridge with a voice that was, to Jordan's surprise, filled with excitement.

Coming to the conclusion that Ratchet had not been harmed in any way by the fall, Jordan felt a bit less nervous, but the idea of flying over a pit of lava wasn't exactly calming. However, it had to be done, and thus Jordan stepped onto the green pad. Sure enough, he experienced the strange feeling of gravity being lowered. "Whoa," Sophia spoke from Jordan's back. "Ratchet was not kidding."

"No, he was not. Are you okay?"

"I... I feel a bit nauseous."

Jordan sighed. He really did not want to jump, but Sophia clearly did not enjoy being inside the pad's local gravitational distortion, and thus Jordan took a deep breath, and jumped. He yelled as he was suddenly hurled into the air and at the bridge. Jordan bent his legs to cushion the fall but once he landed, he felt no pain whatsoever. However, he did not see Ratchet. But the sound of explosions gave a good indication. Jordan looked to the left, and barely jumped out of the way as a missile flew past his head. Looking down the bridge, he saw Ratchet taking fire at a hovering tank while taking cover behind the wreck of another hovertank, with two dead Thugs lying behind the wreckage.

Jordan carefully ran over to Ratchet and took cover next to Ratchet. "You didn't wait for me?" He asked.

"I didn't have time to wait, one of those tanks had seen me and was coming straight at me. As soon as I had destroyed it, those two guys (he nodded towards the dead thugs) came jumping out and took cover behind the wreckage before opening fire. As you can see, they were no match for the Mini-Nuke. Now, I doubt this wreckage-cover will last much longer, so shall we take down the other tank?"

Jordan nodded. While Jordan threw a few bombs over the wreckage, Ratchet fired three HK22-drones, and nine highly-explosive drones targeted the tank, blowing it to smithereens.

The group then crossed the long bridge until they finally reached the end, and waiting for them was... a moving laser?

Ratchet and Jordan stared at the laser, wondering why there was a surprising lack of defense. They were entering the headquarters of Thugs-4-Less, but here, out of all places, there was nobody?

But they had to move on, odd circumstances or not. They took a few steps back and got ready to jump over the laser, but as they ran at it, five Thugs suddenly got out of cover and started to fire at the group. Ratchet and Jordan quickly dove sideways and hid behind a wall just in time.

But with time clearly not on their side, Ratchet grabbed his HK22-gun with a grim expression. As soon as the Thug fire ceased, Ratchet peeked out of cover and fired his gun twice, sending six drones at the Thugs who were reloading.

After the sounds of explosions had been heard, Ratchet peeked out of cover and saw that two thugs had been blown to bits while the other three had taken very little damage. Jordan then peeked out of cover whilst firing his Heavy Lancer, raining plasma on the Thugs and killing one of them by hitting him in the chest multiple times. However, he had only been able to hit the arm of the second one before being forced to take cover again as the two remaining Thugs started to fire once more. Once the firing ceased, Ratchet and Jordan both used their Lancers, hitting one in the stomach and head a couple of times. The last Thug didn't stand a chance against the never ending stream of plasma sent his way by not one but two Heavy Lancers.

With the threat gone, they jumped over the laser and walked down the deserted streets of the Thug fortress. That is, until a tank suddenly came flying around the corner, though it was quickly mowed down by several HK22-rockets and Heavy Lancer rounds.

With the tank gone, they hopped over the two lasers blocking their path and walked into what appeared to be a dead end. They were dead wrong.

A purple forcefield suddenly activated and trapped them, and if that wasn't bad enough, six guards popped out of two different glass doors and started to fire at the group. There was no place to hide.

With no means of escape, Ratchet and Jordan were forced to jump and run back and forth, barely avoiding the rain of fire sent their way. But as the Thugs fired more and more, their guns emptied further and further, and inevitably they would have to stop to reload their weapons. Ratchet used his MiniNuke to send any Thug caught in the blast radius flying while Jordan used his Blitz Cannon and gave every Thug nearby a mug full of buckshot for their trouble.

Ratchet was able to clear out the first three with four bombs, but Jordan was having some trouble as he was only able to take out one with a convenient headshot. Ratchet quickly aided his friend by firing a Mini-Nuke at the Thugs from behind, sending them flying towards Jordan who finished them off with a blast of buckshot at point-blank range.

For a moment, it seemed as if everything was peaceful again.

They were proven wrong when a titanic hand suddenly slammed through the wall behind them. "Run!" Ratchet yelled just in time.

They sprinted away and got to a safe distance just in time as the wall came down, and it would have crushed them had they still been standing there.

Turning around, their hearts skipped a beat. Staring down at them was a gigantic mech, and standing on it's shoulder, was the Thugs-4-Less leader himself. What worried Ratchet more though was the figure trapped in the mech's chest, held in place by a few sturdy bars made of solid titanium.

Angela.

"Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haaaaa!" The thug laughed maniacally.

"What's so funny?" Ratchet asked.

"Oh. Uh….nothing I guess. Prepare to die!" The Thug Leader shouted whilst getting into the mech's head through a hatch in the side. The mech started to move again, running towards them.

Luckily, salvation came in the form of a familiar green, triangular pad behind them. Seeing that it was their only chance, Ratchet and Jordan made a run for it. "Where do they get the money to get this stuff?" Jordan asked himself.

Ratchet got to the pad first and launched himself to the rooftop of a nearby building. Jordan followed suit.

Ratchet immediately got into the turret and saw that the thug was getting ready to strike. The thug started firing four missiles from two large cannons mounted on the mech's shoulders. Jordan grabbed his Heavy Lancer and fired at the missiles like a madman in a desperate attempt to protect what could be their only chance at bringing that massive metal monster down, and to his surprise, it actually worked. Ratchet immediately used the moment to open fire at the Thug Leader's mech, but Angela's position proved to be a problem, for Ratchet almost hit Angela a couple of times. "Watch it!" She yelled as loud as she could.

"You better be careful not to hit Angela, Ratchet." Jordan mumbled.

"I'm trying!" Ratchet said as he continued to fire at the robot. The Thug Leader apparently realized that he was a sitting duck and flew over to a different part of the fortress from where he started to fire again. This time, however, he fired two strange drones that seemed to be unaffected by Jordan's plasma bullets.

But this time, he fired two strange drones that were immune to Jordan's bullets. Luckily the turret's fire proved to be too much for the drones, and thus Ratchet continued to fire at the mech while trying not to hit Angela.

After dismantling various parts of the mech armor, the Thug Leader apparently came up with a new plan, for he came flying towards the turret. Ratchet used the opportunity to fire at the mech's head, but the mech kept going nevertheless. "Ratchet, we better get out of here!" Jordan warned.

Ratchet did not seem to listen. Realizing what the Thug Leader had planned, Jordan pulled Ratchet off the turret "Hey!" Ratchet yelped in surprise.

"Run!"

Too late. The mech had reached them.

It seemed to stare at the turret, until all of a sudden it fired a powerful laser at the turret out of it's eye. The Thug Leader laughed maniacally as he blocked the heroes' way with the mech's arms. "You've got nowhere to run."

"Perhaps so, but we're not out of ammo!" Ratchet yelled as he grabbed the Mini-Nuke and before the Thug Leader could react a miniature nuclear bomb slammed into the mech's head.

The explosion was spectacular... and apparently destroyed some important wiring, for the mech stumbled backwards, then a few steps sideways, and then collapsed. It didn't take long for the Thug Leader to get his mech back up however, though by the time the mech got up again, it was too late. Ratchet and Jordan had both reached a turret and started to shoot at the metallic titan.

Suddenly, a lucky shot from Jordan removed some of the plating off the mech's waist, revealing some glowing wiring. Ratchet and Jordan immediately started to fire at the wiring, effectively disabling the legs and causing the mech to fall to the ground with an ear-shattering thud. "Well. We took care of it." Ratchet said.

"We did, let's go see if Angela is okay." Jordan replied. He held onto Ratchet and using Clank they slowly descended to the streets, towards the chest of the now disabled mech which was lying there with the... well, whatever race Angela was, still inside and waiting for rescue. "Well at least the thing is disabled." Jordan said as he walked over to what was left of the mech.

"Good, now let's go."

"Uh Ratchet?"

"Yeah?"

"Forgetting something?"

Ratchet glanced over his shoulder, and immediately saw Angela staring at him from within the mech with an unamused face.

Realizing what he had almost done, Ratchet turned a bit red and quickly added "Oops. I meant, after we... freed Angela."

As they approached their imprisoned ally, they saw that the thick bars trapping her inside were at least eight inches thick. "How do you plan on breaking these?" Ratchet asked.

Jordan sighed, knowing he had the perfect solution to this problem, and Ratchet wasn't getting it. "Sophia." Jordan said over his shoulder "Do you still have that machete I gave you?"

"Its… right..." Sophia reached behind her back and pulled the machete out of its sheath. "Here." She said as she handed it to Jordan.

Jordan climbed onto the mech's torso and activated the machete, and with a few quick slices removed four bars.

In the meantime Ratchet had climbed on, and together they pulled out the metal bars. Ratchet offered Angela his hand and pulled her up, and together they jumped down from the mech. "Thanks." Angela said as she wiped some dust off her shoulder. "Now before you run off. Take a look at this. I picked it out of Lizardboy's pocket."

Angela pulled out a small HoloVision screen which started to play a video. The Thug Leader appeared on screen, and he seemed to be making some kind of video log.

"Log entry 47-92. Returning from Megacorp's Distribution Center. I'm beginning to suspect Megacorp has lied to me."

The video then showed the Distribution Center, a vast complex of platforms constructed out of hexagonal metal panels built on large metal support struts that disappeared in the thick clouds a few miles below. On top of the platforms were thousands of crates neatly stacked on top of each other. The Thug Leader spoke again. "The extra large decorative paperweights being stored there might actually be an enormous supply of protopets, which might explain why the whole place is guarded by ravenous mutant creatures."

The video then showed three strange, purple, two headed creatures guarding the large crates that actually reminded the group a bit of the aliens they encountered back in their first adventure, in the Blarg Tactical Research Station, or BTS for short. The purple creatures in the video made similar noises, had similar legs and had the same jumpy 'kill-everything-in-sight' attitude. "Their warehouse ship may hold as many as ten million crates, and with a hundred protopets per crate, that could be as many as, um…"

The camera returned to the thug leader. "..Carry the two….three point five zillion protopets! A secret shipment that large can mean only one thing: Megacorp is up to no good. I will confront them, and demand, a bigger cut of the action." The video ended and Angela put the television screen back in her pocket.

"Are they insane?!" Ratchet asked, clearly overwhelmed.

"They must be." Jordan replied, who seemed just as surprised as Ratchet.

"The galaxy is in far more danger than I had imagined." Clank spoke up. "Do you suppose Mr Fizzwidget-"

"We've wasted enough time on Fizzwidget already. I swear that crazy old man is not the same person I used to work for." Angela snapped

'Thank you. Wait a minute did she just say she worked for Megacorp?' Jordan thought.

Apparently Ratchet had noticed it as well, for he asked "Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. You used to work for Megacorp?!"

"Yes. In the genetics division."

"On the protopet?!"

"On fixing the protopet's flaws! And I was this close to succeeding when Fizzwidget suddenly pushed up the release date."

"Is it worth disrupting the protopet shipments?" Clank asked.

"It's a start. But to stop them for good, we're gonna need to break into Megacorp Headquarters."

"Break in? How?" Ratchet asked.

"I have an old Megacorp ID badge on my home planet."

"We'll split up then. Clank, Jordan, Sophia and I will go to the distribution facility. You go grab the ID badge."

While Angela ran to her ship. Ratchet and Jordan were able to find a nearby teleporter that brought them back to their ship. Once they reached their ship. Ratchet set the coordinates to the distribution center, and off they went, to the cloudy planet of Smolg. But then Jordan realized something, as he looked at his right hand. He was still holding Sophia's machete.

"Oh and uh..here's your machete Sophia." Jordan said as he handed the blade to her.

"Oh. Thank you."

"You're welcome."

There's chapter 22 for ya. Now as I said at the beginning, heres how they got their weapons back, I've sorta had this Idea in my head for a while. Imagine they were at that vendor at the beginning of the story. Well you see, there's this special kind of insurance they got when they were training called MegaSurance. It was basically Megacorps own kind of Insurance that insured all their weapons in the case they were stolen or otherwise. And what happened was is the weapons were digitally transferred back to them from the vendor. And all of this shocked Jordan greatly. But once they got their weapons back, they bought the ammo and continued to save Angela. So thats how they got their weapons back. And as for Jordan's nose, that will be in the next chapter. So I hope you enjoyed chapter 22 and stay tuned for chapter 23 where they'll hopefully seek and destroy this protopet madness.

If your enjoying the story so far, feel free to review, favorite, or follow, and please know that any feedback is much appreciated.

Thank you for reading