LOMBAX A-GO-GO (a semi-SI Ratchet & Clank fic)

[Tangent]

Prelude: Drift

The Lombaxes did not abandon the Polaris Galaxy lightly. Tachyon's War had been a losing struggle from the very beginning, shaped entirely by Percival Tachyon's aggression and escalation. The soon-to-be Emperor of the Tachyon Empire had begun the war by turning the Lombaxes' own greatest weapons - sealed away since the last Lombax–Cragmite War - against them. From that point forward, every projection run by Lombax command converged on the same conclusion: the war could not be won with the resources they had. What remained was not victory, but the rate at which their civilization would collapse if nothing changed.

The Great Exodus was born from that certainty. Fastoon was meant to be the final staging point, where the Dimensionator would open an escape route into another universe beyond Cragmite reach. Every surviving fleet was directed toward that goal, but the war did not allow time for perfect coordination. As pressure mounted, the evacuation fractured into two parallel efforts: one still attempting to reach Fastoon, and another forced into the Dysporia - escaping the Polaris Galaxy by any available route while rear-guard forces delayed Emperor Tachyon's advance.

The Solana Galaxy became one of several unintended refuge points, though it was never prepared to receive them. Arrival records were incomplete, inconsistent, or missing entirely. Surviving crews were absorbed piecemeal under emergency asylum protocols, and in the process many families were separated permanently.

One unregistered Lombax child arrived on Rilgar during this dispersal period with no accompanying guardians and no recoverable identity record. She was transferred into Blackwater City's foster system as an administrative case, where she would eventually be given the name Rocket…​

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Chapter One: Blackwater City Hoverboard Raceway Registration Pavilion, Rilgar

The registration pavilion smelled like ozone, overheated capacitors, and fried street food, offset by the cool night breeze carrying in the salty scent of Blackwater Bay. Which was itself visible just over the balcony on the South side of the pavilion. The view was, as always, incredible. It didn't matter what time of day or night it was, or if the weather was fair or foul, Rocket was positive that the location for this pavilion was picked for precisely this effect: Just close enough to the bay to get the full impact of the experience, while still being far enough away that the only seaside scent was the salty tinge in the air…

…and not the smelly sewer waste outlet just down the coast to the West.

Not that most of the waste wasn't fully inert by the time it got washed out into the bay. Environmental protectionism might not be a big thing across most of the heavily industrialized Solana Expanse, but nobody wanted to repeat the mistakes of the Blarg either.

You'd think that, after overpolluting Orxon to the point where even they required environmentally sealed habitats to live there, that the Blarg would have treated their first colony world better, but Quartu was fast approaching being rendered uninhabitable as well.

So much for second chances.

The hoverboard course sprawled between buildings and over the bay in a looping series of ramps, obsticals, and death-defying shortcuts. Sunlight flared off anti-grav stabilizers as racers tuned boards, checked harnesses, or pretended not to be watching one another.

Rocket was keeping a casual eye on everyone. Not out of suspicion, really. At this point it was more of a people watching thing than a precaution against would-be muggers and pickpockets. Not that she didn't guard against that sort of thing, of course. She wasn't stupid. Registration days always came with a certain kind of chaos. Some of it good, some of it bad, and almost all of it the sort that didn't announce itself until it already mattered.

Her Gold-tier status was still valid this season, which meant that Rocket should be cleared to compete in the tournament circuit. But she still had to register anyway, just like everybody else. Tier approval handled eligibility. Pavilion registration handled placement, brackets, and whatever last-minute qualifiers the system decided to throw at people before locking the board.

Paperwork never really ended. It just changed shape.

She didn't mind it. Much

Even Skidd McMarxx, reigning champ of the Rilgar Raceway Circuit, still had to register in person like everyone else. Gold tier or not, you still showed up with your board, signed in, and got slotted into a bracket - because the system didn't care who you were if you missed the window, and getting bumped down a tier meant losing access to the better prize payouts.

Not that Rocket raced for the prizes. Well, actually she did race for the prizes - they were nice extra income whenever she hit one of the top three places, and she now had almost enough to seriously think about what model snub fighter she wanted to buy, and she wasn't even twenty yet. How many teens could say that, in or out of the foster system?

But the prizes were still secondary to why she raced at all: She flew because it was fun.

She flew because flying was where she felt the most alive. The most free.

It was where she breathed.

It was where she could forget, at least for a little while, her own horrible luck with a foster system that continuously refused to place her with a qualified Lombax family even though there was a Fastoontown right here in Blackwater City.

Overburdened refugee support system her furry ass. Blackwater City Foster Services made thousands of bolts by keeping her in their system instead of transitioning her over to a smaller bureaucracy that was better focused on her actual needs.

But that train of thought was for another time. She flew because it was fun.

She also flew because piloting translated. Reflex conditioning translated. Situational awareness translated. Training hours stacked whether you were in the atmosphere or vacuum.

Even the nuances of hoverboarding, where your own body was the control system, counted.

And, perhaps most importantly, she flew because she could. She flew because in this universe it was not only possible but entirely plausible for a spunky kid barely halfway through her teens to just pick up the skills, get in a machine, and fly.

God, she loved being a Lombax…

A flash of sandy orange and gold fur and green fabric passed through the pavilion entrance.

Rocket's ears twitched at a semi-familiar sound. Bare feet on tile. Better than average litter and debris control aside, few races considered footwear to be optional in Blackwater City. That was a Lombax footfall. Quiet enough that she had barely heard it. Distinct enough that it had caught her attention even so.

So she turned.

Male Lombax. Sandy fur. Lean build. Green cargo pants. No shoes. No shirt - just a harness. Pilot goggles set high. Board slung casually over one shoulder like it belonged there.

Veldin, if she had to guess, which pinged something vague in her memory, but she had seen so many male Lombaxes that could have been Racket or Ratchet or Ricket or whatever the name of the guy in her dreams really was that it hardly mattered anymore.

Fastoontown was five blocks from where she lived, so she had seen Lombaxes that came close to the hero in her dreams almost every day. She was kinda desensitized to sandy orange-gold fur now. So, instead, she focused her attention on the board, since he might be a competitor, and thus actually worthy of interest.

And stopped.

That scratch pattern—

Left underside rail. Diagonal gouge, shallow at the nose, deeper mid-body. A second nick near the stabilizing aileron. The fact that said aileron looked brand new while the other, as polished and well maintained as it was, still bore signs of accumulated impact stress from months of smashing through crates…

Seriously, she knew that being able to take a hit and keep going had become an industry standard for these things, but Rocket still wondered when taking out as many crates as you could in a pass had become a prestige stunt in almost every major hoverboard competition. There were even mini-prizes assigned by how many crates any particular racer managed to smash during any given race. Smash enough crates and registration was practically free.

It was silly and stupid and Rocket swore that it was like living in a videogame.

Which was as blatantly ridiculous as it was frustratingly true. That, or her half-forgotten dreams and vague memories of a previous life meant nothing other than the possibility that she had caught some weird illness during the Grand Exodus that left her with delusions. Which was a distinct and uncomfortable possibility that Rocket chose to ignore.

Recognition clicked.

She had seen that damage before. Just last month, really, at a hoverboard park across town, when a certain celebrity showoff hadn't been paying attention to who else was already using a stunt track and had entered too hot and clipped her edge mid-drift.

Rocket hadn't forgotten the board. She rarely forgot hardware - especially not a hoverboard that had bent the support frame of hers to the point where it had been cheaper to just scrap and replace the whole thing than to repair it.

Rocket turned away so as to avoid staring too long at the unfamiliar Lombax. Just because he somehow had Skidd McMarx's hoverboard did not mean that he was the guy she barely remembered from a previous life she might not have actually had.

The loudspeaker crackled overhead: "Attention racers! Final call for bracket verification!" Chaos swelled in the registration pavilion as some people shouted, others laughed, and everybody who had been waiting for the lines to get shorter - as opposed to those waiting for their friends in line to be done - rushed to take their place in line.

When Rocket got to the head of the line, she just accepted the pad from Starlene, filled out the appropriate spots on the displayed registration form, signed it, then handed it back over. Given that it was the final call, she chose to not waste Starlene's time, nor anyone else's, with idle chitchat, so she turned to walk away, stepping past the guy from Veldin (probably) in the process.

And then…

The first warning was boots. Hard-soled boots like those used in construction or by the authorities, as opposed to the softer, more cushioned soles favored by athletes and most civilians. Rocket's ears twitched toward the pavilion entrance a half-second before the shouting started.

"Stop right there!" an authoritative male voice called out.

A male Rilgarian burst through the open archway at a dead sprint, clutching something round and brightly colored in his left hand. Bluish-grey scales. Greasy crest. Cheap synth-leather jacket. The particular look of someone whose life choices had recently begun catching up with him.

Two raceway security officers were right behind him. Both male Rilgarians and definitely the source of the hard-soled boot sounds from moments ago. The man skidded, looked wildly around the crowded pavilion, and made a decision that was both immediate and extremely poor.

He dropped the device, which hit the floor with a hollow clack and rolled right past Rocket, bumping into the bare feet of the sandy-furred Lombax from Veldin right as he stepped up to Starlene. He looked down curiously, then bent down to pick the object up to examine it more closely. It was rose-gold and chrome, with a cheerful megacorp logo and blinking neon pink indicator lights.

The label rotated slowly into view as the Lombax turned it in his hands.

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BOOB-O-MATIC
Expandotronic Jiggle Physics Wave Device​

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​

"Huh," was all the guy said as he continued to turn the device over in his hands, revealing a copper button. Because of course there was a button. There was always a big inviting all-too-easy-to-press button on these sorts of things. It was how they lured the unsuspecting, or even fully suspecting, victims into pressing it.

So of course the guy from Veldin pressed it.

The device chirped happily.

"PRANK YOUR FRIENDS WITH THE LATEST IN MEGACORP ENTERTAINMENT!"

Rocket turned just in time to see the glow. "…oh no."

The sphere detonated with a soft fwump, emitting a translucent pink wave that expanded outward like a soap bubble. The radius of effect crossed the pavilion floor for a short distance in all directions before collapsing almost immediately.

Rocket staggered as the energy field crawled across her skin like static electricity turned syrup-thick. There was a pressure shift on her chest, under her vest. A sharp, internal lurch as her center of gravity abruptly changed with her newly expanded breasts. Which were barely contained by her now severely overstrained vest.

Rocket heard shrieks all around her. Some female in various levels of fear and outrage (some due to being caught within the effect, some due to missing out on the free boob job due to being too far away to be affected). Some male (most of whom would later vehemently deny shrieking like little girls). But Rocket's sharp ears also caught the pained gasp of Starlene.

Starlene, who was wearing a more protective bodysuit with a lot less give than regular clothing. Starlene, who just got a point-blank dose of mammary magnifying mutagenic energy. Starlene, who was now experiencing a combination of being unable to breathe on top of probably low blood pressure from her freshly expanded biology.

Rocket wasn't just guessing at that last bit, as she felt a bit lightheaded herself from the blood being diverted into her expanded bosom. Which finally broke free of her vest.

Not important - Rocket would be mortified later, but she had an emergency to deal with right now. Her board clattered to the ground as she lunged forward to catch the suffocating Rilgarian. "Easy," she said, catching the other woman before she toppled. "Breathe. Slow."

The Veldin guy at least stepped up and got Starlene's other arm over his own shoulders, and the two Lombaxes started heading towards the hall leading to the air cab balcony…

Only to be surprised when Rocket stopped them at the elevator.

"Why'd we stop here?"

"There's a clinic on sub-level three, where the quickest access to the raceway tracks is. They can see us faster than the emergency room at the hospital can."

"I would think that a major medical facility…" the small robot that Rocket only just now noticed was on the Veldin guy's back like some sort of tool pack or backpack started to speak up before she interrupted him.

"Blackwater City General services the entire city," Rocket explained as the elevator door opened and they stepped in. "Medical Emergency!" she called out, causing the elevator to scan them and then proceed to drop at a much faster (but still safe) speed than it usually used.

"Anyway," Rocket continued, "the Blackwater City Raceway maintains the clinic for employees and racers. Free care at all levels, all paid for by the Raceway Commission in the name of keeping the profits rolling in. Of course, if you aren't an employee or a competitor, you pay through the nose. Veldin Boy here should be fine though."

"My name is Ratchet."

"Rocket. And I'd punch you myself if I thought for a moment that you pulled that stunt up there deliberately."

"How do you know I didn't?"

"It was a weird round ball with a big shiny easy-to-press button on it! Grenades have safeties! Who wouldn't press that button just to see what it did?"

"Is this a Lombax thing?" the small robot asked.

"Probably," Rocket admitted sheepishly.

The elevator continued its swift but safe descent…

Spoiler: Rocket

Spoiler: Rilgarians

From left to right: Skidd McMarx, Starlene, Slim Cognito, and Celeste.

Spoiler: That Guy From Veldin