It was an ordinary day on Veldin, a backwater planet located in a remote corner of the Solana Galaxy, where the people worked hard to maintain the farms and settlements that were scattered all over their world, which was hard considering Veldin was a desert planet and good places for vegetation were hard to come by.
In this universe, humanity finally managed to complete space travel and sailed to the deepest depths of the cosmos to find planets that could sustain life. Soon, not only did they find plenty of galaxies with planets that had sustainable life, but they were already inhabited by various intelligent species, helping prove that life did exist beyond Earth.
Veldin was one of the many habitable planets, located in the Solana Galaxy. It didn't have much going for it, but for the folks living on it, the planet was home. Many of the inhabitants of Veldin, besides farming, also made a living doing ship repairs and one of the most prominent was the garage owned by Grimroth Razz.
A Fongoid who migrated to Veldin, Grimroth, or Grim for short, wanted to work a quiet life as a simple mechanic, having always had a fascination with ships and wanting to repair them. He spent his days tending to any ships that came to him in need of fixing, hanging out at the watering hole and chatting with the other residents, and visiting the farmer's market.
However, one day, a small pod had crashed down near his garage, and moving to investigate, he discovered a curious feline-esque baby that could only be identified as one of the enigmatic Lombaxes. Seeing that there was no note and he couldn't bring himself to just dump the baby in an orphanage, Grim took it upon himself to raise the child and when he came of age, take him under his wing in mechanics.
As he grew up, Ratchet proved to have an innate talent for mechanics even without Grim's teachings. He couldn't count how many times he had to stop Ratchet from disassembling the television to see if he could upgrade it. When he was able to walk, talk, and think on his own, Ratchet proved to be an adventurous lad who would always explore Veldin and get into all sorts of trouble.
Ratchet also was able to make quite a few friends. One of Grim's neighbors had a son named Ben, who was not mechanically inclined or even one for inventing, but he always loved seeing robotics in action and seeing how people made them work. He always tagged along with Ratchet simply for the sake of having fun and living life to the fullest.
Another of Grim's neighbors had a daughter named Hilda, who was spunky, confident, and had a love for action and danger, taking risks that even Ratchet wouldn't dare attempt. She also wasn't afraid to get into scraps, especially with bullies.
One day, the galaxy-spanning company Gadgetron had arrived, trying to make a sale. Horned Toads had attacked but the vendor representing the company was impressed when Ratchet, Ben, and Hilda demonstrated their skills in defending the town that was being attacked.
The vendor had offered the three youths a patented Bomb Glove and had taken a shine to the three, as he also threw in a Gadgetron Help Desk uplink and arranged to get them Hunter's Guild licenses.
The Hunter's Guild was a galaxy-wide organization that functioned on a simple premise: if there was something anywhere in the galaxy that was dangerous, or just living, somebody somewhere would pay to have it killed. The Hunter's Guild made contact with those who would pay for something to be killed, negotiate a "per head" price, and then post that to all Guild members, with a discount for Guild processing.
All Hunters kept their bolt accounts with the Guild and bought things electronically. Any bolts that were 'found' by the Hunters - from, say, smashing crates - could immediately be transferred to the account electronically using the Guild License, which also acted as a charge card.
Thanks to this, Ratchet, Ben, and Hilda always had bolts to make, which also helped out Grim's business as well since Ratchet had wanted to support his adoptive father as best he could besides helping him with ship repairs. However, Grim could see the kids wanted to go beyond just Veldin, to see all the other planets in the Solana Galaxy and beyond. He knew it was only a matter of time before the three chicks left the nest.
We officially start our story with three ten-year-olds. Ratchet, the Lombax, and Ben and Hilda, the Humans, just lounging together and gazing at the stars in the night sky.
"So, how's the new power generator coming along?" Hilda asked Ratchet. Unlike him, she and Ben didn't really have much in the way of techno mechanic knowledge, so they often relied on him for help in those regards.
"I just finished it. The folks in town are pretty grateful they don't have to worry about Horned Toads getting into their crops anymore." The young Lombax replied.
"Still, things have been getting pretty boring, haven't they?" Ben pointed out. "I don't know about you guys, but I wanna get out there and see the rest of the galaxy!"
"We ALL do, Ben." Hilda scoffed. "You just don't want to be bored all the time reading fanfics and watching Let's Plays on your holo-computer."
"Yeah, even I know that's not a way to live," Ben admitted with a sigh. "I just wish something could happen..."
"You and me both, buddy," Ratchet said.
However, it was then that the stars seemed to coalesce. They soon formed six constellations, each taking a different shape; a star, a balloon, an apple, a thunderbolt, a diamond, and a butterfly.
"Uh...do stars normally do that?" Hilda asked.
"No..." Ratchet said as the three amigos stood up to look closer at the strange phenomenon.
The six constellations started spinning around, forming a mesmerizing lightshow. For a moment, the trio feared it might be a blackhole starting to form but instead, a shooting star shot out and seemed to fly past them.
"Whoa! A falling star!" Ben exclaimed. "You don't see those every day!"
The falling star crashed down nearby in the plains. The trio quickly made their way to the impact site, Ratchet making a quick call to Grim to let him know he was okay as the three friends soon arrived at the crash...and saw a large glowing basket.
The basket was the same kind one would expect someone to leave a baby in on a doorstep. It was even the same size as the pod that Ratchet had arrived on Veldin in. The real surprise was what was in the basket.
The creatures lay huddled up together. They all were oddly colored, each one being different and unique from each other. They all had strange marks on their rumps that each seemed to resemble one of the constellations in the sky, two of them had feathered wings and one had a spiraled horn while another had both wings and a horn.
They were vaguely equine-like, with slight muzzle-like noses, plus tails on their backsides and hoof-like feet. On the basket were six inscriptions: "Twilight Sparkle", "Pinkie Pie", "Applejack", "Rainbow Dash", "Rarity", and "Fluttershy".
"Is this supposed to happen?" Ratchet asked.
"Oh...my...goodness!" Hilda gushed. "They're soooo cute~! Can we take them home with us?!"
"Shhhh!" Ben shushed. "Yes, they're adorable but not so loud! It's best not to disturb them!"
With nothing else to do, the three friends gently and carefully carried the basket out of the impact site and back to Grim's Garage. Hopefully, with an adult on standby, they could figure out what to do from here.
Meanwhile, far away in the Polaris Galaxy at the exact center of the universe (give or take 50 feet), an elderly Zoni was overseeing events on Veldin with an intrigued look on his face.
"Well well well, it seems that the timeline is being diverged by this new development...then again, it already was with the colonization of humans throughout the various galaxies." The Zoni Elder, Orvus, chuckled. "And something tells me things are going to be fun!"
This is my Remaster/Rewrite/Inspired Work of Tatsurou's story, 'The Sparkle in his Eye'. Basically, instead of just Twilight Sparkle, Ratchet is now adopting all of the Mane 6! Thankfully, he's got my SIOC and Hilda from Pokemon Black & White helping him out. Also, the Mane 6 are Anthro in this setting, just FYI.
There'll probably be a few other crossover elements included in this story but for the most part, it'll strictly stick to Ratchet & Clank with My Little Pony.
I want to try and avoid making this just a rehash of Tatsurou's story, so if anyone has any ideas for what Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Rarity could add to the world of Ratchet & Clank besides what Twilight did in the original story, I'm all ears!
Also, yes, I will be mixing the original Ratchet & Clank game with the 2016 Reimagining.