As Ratchet, Clank, Starlight, and Angela prepared to leave the Phoenix, so that they could start their infiltration of Nefarious' secret base, Starlight thought of something that would change their entire approach; the Hyperion itself. She had taken some time to think about what they were doing and decided that they should leave the Hyperion near the Phoenix, because Nefarious was sure to have some sort of security system that would warn him if uninvited guests were anywhere near the planet. The Hyperion would be easily spotted if they got too close to the planet, so Starlight proposed that they leave the starship behind for the moment so that the element of surprise was on their side. Ratchet, Clank, and Angela seemed hesitant to leave the ship near the Phoenix, but in the end they agreed with her and climbed into their smaller ship.
Starlight understood why they had hesitated in making a decision, because if they left the Hyperion here, with Sunset still aboard it, there was a greater chance of Qwark messing with their sister. That was why she had made sure that Sasha agreed to keep Qwark 'grounded' on the Phoenix until they got back, because the last thing they needed at the moment was Searing running around the galaxy. She also made sure to shoot Qwark a glance as she climbed into the ship, hoping that it would dissuade the man from making any decisions that he might come to regret, before they finally departed from the Phoenix.
Qwark, on the other hand, decided not to pay attention to the look that Starlight threw at him, as he turned around and made his way towards the room he had been given.
"And just where are you going Qwark?" Sasha asked, making sure that the man didn't try to leave the starship and visit the Hyperion, because after watching that video she knew that releasing 'Searing' would be more disastrous than helpful.
"To my quarters," Qwark replied, waving a hand back at her without turning his head in her direction, "I have some reports to read on Nefarious' other movements and an afternoon nap to follow. I'll let them enjoy their adventure on Aquatos."
Sasha shook her head as the man walked towards the room that he would have been sharing with Ratchet, until she had discovered that they had their own starship, because she knew that Qwark was planning something... something that involved Sunset and Searing. She made a mental note to ask Al to keep an eye on Qwark, because everyone on the Q Force agreed that there had to be little interaction between Qwark and Sunset. She only hoped that this was enough to prevent that demon from resurfacing in Solana... and prayed that Sunset was strong enough to keep Searing contained.
Clank and Starlight received a call from the producer of Secret Agent Clank on their way towards Aquatos, though by the tone of his voice it was painfully clear that he wanted them back so they could finish filming the next episode of the show. It then developed into a back and forth between them and the producer, where Starlight mentioned that if the galaxy was destroyed or enslaved by Nefarious then there would be no one to watch the show. After a few attempts to get them back to quickly film the next episode, some of which would have enticed people like Qwark around, the producer finally gave up and let them have their way, knowing that they would eventually return to the studios when they had an opportunity to do so.
When the group arrived at their destination, and somehow managed to get into the secret base without any alarms going off, they climbed out of their ship and noticed that there was a second ship docked in the area they had landed in. They knew that Skid was planning on meeting them at the base, and they figured that they would have arrived before he would, but they were surprised to see that he had actually arrived before them. They quickly visited the weapon vendor and restocked their weapons, before they picked up the latest weapons that were available; the Agents of Doom and the Flux Rifle.
Starlight was, once more, delighted to see that more of her weapons had made it to the market, but she was also disappointed that the RY3NO had yet to appear yet, or the fact that Mr. Gadget had yet to email her about it.
The moment they had all of their ammunition situated, and they were familiar with their new weapons, they rode the elevator down to the sewer, where they found Skid waiting for them. He was still dressed in the same strange clothing that Qwark had given him, showing that he was a member of the Q Force, but he wasn't carrying any weapons on him. It made sense considering that the three of them were supposed to be the muscle that fought their way through the base, though Angela noticed that Skid was carrying a hacking device that reminded her of one of Megacorp's hacking gadgets.
"Hey there dudes and dudettes!" Skid said as they approached him, a smile appearing on his face, "I take it that your ready to get the operation underway?"
"Correct." Ratchet replied, pulling out one of his weapons, the N60 Storm, while Angela and Starlight did the same with their chosen weapons, "Let's just hope that Nefarious' defenses don't reveal our infiltration mission to him... otherwise we'll have to literally tear our way out of this place with whatever we find."
Their first enemies happened to be the amoeboids that they had seen back in Blackwater City, making Ratchet wonder if that had been Nefarious' attempt in overrunning the city without directly attacking it. The slimy creatures separated into two separate beings when they were hit, and then into a group of four when smacked a second time, but even their ability to rapidly divide themselves couldn't stand up to the pressure the group put on them. When they opened the door in front of them they found what appeared to be a pair of security robots, who were firing at the amoeboids that jumped out of the liquid on the right side of the room. They waited until the slimy creatures were dealt with before they opened fire on their new enemies, quickly removing them from the area as they moved onward.
They opened the next door that was blocking their path and spotted a bridge that happened to be out at the moment, though while Skid worked his magic on the terminal to their right Starlight grabbed the security robot that was coming their way and dragged in into their line of fire, allowing them to tear it apart in seconds. Once the bridge was fully extended they crossed into the next room, where they encountered another security robot that happened to be silently waiting for intruders to come by. This time Angela threw her twin sided beam sword at the robot and cut into its chest, before she jumped up to her weapon, pulled it out, and beheaded the robot.
"Seriously dude, if you weren't dating her I'd be trying my chances with her," Skid told Ratchet, just as Angela walked by them, opened the door to the next room, and spun the weapon around, "She is one smoking hot babe."
"If it weren't for Ratchet dating her, she'd be back in the Bogon Galaxy," Starlight commented, though she was somewhat amused that Skid even thought that he had a chance with Angela.
"Can we please focus?" Angela asked, cutting through another of the security robots with her beam sword, though it was clear that she actually enjoyed the weapon more than the guns that Starlight had made so far, "I'd like to be out of here before our enemy realizes that we've invaded his 'secret' base."
Ratchet nodded and the group fell in behind Angela, who apparently had become the second in command for their little group, before they stopped at a door that had the switch to open it on the other side. They noticed that there was a pool of water that they could swim through, but before anyone could speak their mind Starlight teleported to the other side of the door and stepped on the switch, allowing them all to continue forward. To the right of the room they walked into appeared to be a sealed off drainpipe, which they assumed that they would have had to find a way to unblock if they had gone for a swim, but they paid it no mind as they approached the next bridge in front of them.
As Skid worked on the terminal the rest of the group took down the security robot that was coming their way, though once the bridge was extended they approached another sealed off door that required the use of the switch in front of it. When they opened this door, and got a good look at what was waiting for them, Starlight held them back for a few seconds as the three security robots went to town on the amoeboids that were walking around the room. Once the amoeboids were taken care of they charged out of where they were standing and attacked the three robots, rapidly destroying them before they really had a chance to fight back, though their progress was halted when they came to another door that had the switch on the other side.
Starlight sighed and repeated the process she had used to get around the first door, allowing them to approach a small chamber that had a third bridge for them to walk across. Skid went to town on the terminal while the others removed the three security robots that came to fight them, though once the hacking was complete, and the bridge was extended, they approached an elevator that took them to another section of Nefarious' secret base.
There Ratchet and Starlight found a character that they had assumed they had left behind in the Bogon Galaxy; Slim Cognito, the man they had purchased all of their ship upgrades from so they could best the flyers from Thugs-4-Less. Slim offered them some more weapons upgrades, and maybe some Bogon weapons in case they wanted them, but Ratchet merely told him that they would be back if they ever wanted them. Skid, on the other hand, declared his part of the operation a success and walked onto the teleport pad that was sitting nearby, heading back to his ship so that he could rejoin the rest of the Q Force.
Unfortunately Angela was doing the same thing, because she had powered down her beam sword and had taken a few steps towards the pad before Ratchet had stopped her.
"This next part of the operation is best left to you and Clank, though I suspect that you'll need Starlight once you reach Nefarious' office," Angela commented, though she gave Ratchet a hug before he and the others rode the pod to the area they needed to infiltrate, without being caught, "I'm just going to go back to our ship and see if I can't get an update from those AI that are controlling the Hyperion, just so I can see how Sunset's doing."
Angela could see that Ratchet was used to his other sister being beside him, because he had turned to his left as if he was expecting her to be there for a moment, but then he sighed and nodded his head. They all knew that Sunset needed time to relax and seal Searing once more, all because of Qwark being a complete idiot when it came to dealing with Nefarious. Once they were back in the mindset they needed to be in Angela departed from this area of the base, while Ratchet, Clank, and Starlight got in the nearby pod and began the journey to the area of the base that held the information they needed to acquire.
It didn't take them very long to reach their next destination, though when they arrived Starlight noticed the vent that Clank was able to climb through and knew that she'd have a hard time fitting inside it. That was why she gave Clank an experimental device that looked like one of the teleport pads they occasionally used, though she claimed that this was a modified one that locked onto her magic so she could teleport to it. Clank stowed the device away and climbed through the vents, while Ratchet waited until his friend was where he was supposed to be before watching Starlight disappear completely. Ratchet then breathed a sigh of relief when he heard that Starlight was with Clank, to which he activated the device that Angela had won in the arena and got the show on the road.
Clank and Starlight navigated their way through the upper levels of the building they were in, using Starlight's magic to distract any security devices that appeared along the way and cross any gaps that needed a switch pressed. At one point they stopped so Ratchet could raise a girder that was blocking his path, allowing him to speak with the rest of the Tyhrranoids that were working in this section of the base. It was at that point that both Clank and Starlight learned that Ratchet had studied the manual that had come with the device that he was now wearing, allowing him to easily maneuver his way to the girder in question and get it out of his way.
With the girder raised, and Ratchet continued on his own path to the end, Clank and Starlight resumed their own trek as they navigated through a spinning laser and passed through an area that required one of them to hold the door open, which Starlight was happy to do considering that she could easily teleport to Clank once he was on the other side. Starlight, again, used her magic to remove a spinning robot that was blocking her way, before using it once more to get both her and Clank past a pair of security devices that were floating around the area. She then allowed them to pass through the security door, thanks to teleportation, before they lowered themselves into the room where Nefarious kept all of his plans, where Ratchet was already searching for what they had come for.
It was then that Starlight used a duplication spell, allowing her to make an exact copy of the computer's hard drive, which she carefully stowed away in her bags. It also served as an amusing distraction from the fact that Nefarious apparently liked Secret Agent Clank, because there was a bookshelf that had almost every episode of the show on it... including some figurines of Secret Agent Clank and Android 18. She also knew it made sense not to see a figurine of Ratchet's character, as he wasn't one of the most popular characters according to the various polls the producer did, or Sunset's character, as she had yet to show her face on screen and that prevented most companies from making any 'Darkstar' figurines.
Just as they were about to depart, however, Starlight noticed something that made her pause, because she noticed a light blue crystal that was sitting on the bookshelf with the Secret Agent Clank merchandise that Nefarious had either bought himself or had stolen.
"Is that the third Raritanium Core?" Ratchet asked, spotting the gemstone at the same time that Starlight did, though as he reached out to take it he found that his hands were bound by magic, "Hey, what gives Starlight?"
"If we take this Core off of the base than I'm sure that Nefarious will hear some sort of alarm go off," Starlight commented, pulling Ratchet away from the Core before releasing him, "We know where it is for the future, so let's get out of here while we still can. We'll come back for it once we've defeated Nefarious."
Ratchet knew that Starlight hated to leave the gemstone in the base of their enemy, because it would allow them to gain more control over Searing and allow Sunset to be with them more often, but he knew that she made a valid point. It would be unwise to take the Core away from this place, not when their enemy might be returning in the near future and discover that the stone had been taken, revealing that his base was no longer a secret.
With the job done they jumped into the nearby tube and began their descent into what they suspected was the sewers, but before they reached the bottom Starlight caught them with their magic and levitated them to the very end of the massive sewer system... where they found someone working on a much smaller pipe.
"As, right on time," the man said, turning around to face them, only to discover that there was someone missing in their group, "I guess introductions are in order... I am the Plumber!"
"I... I can see that," Ratchet commented, not really knowing what else to say at the moment, "What are you doing down here, in the bowels of a sewer?"
"This here's one of the nastiest, smelliest sewers in the galaxy." the Plumber replied, taking a deep breath while both Ratchet and Starlight engaged their O2 Masks to keep the smell out of their noses, "Most guys wouldn't set foot in a place like this. But me? Ah, I just can't get enough. But to actually answer your question, I'm looking for sewer crystals. Gonna make somethin' special for the Missus."
He showed them the harvested version of the crystal he wanted, mentioning that if someone didn't know how to clean them up then they would shatter the crystal into a pile of dust. He also mentioned that he was willing to buy any crystals that they might have found on their journey through the base, at two thousand bolts per crystal no less. Starlight knew that they didn't need the money, as they had enough bolts thanks to all the weapons that she had given Gadgetron over the last few years, but she was eager to gave the man everything that he was searching for.
She looked at the crystal with her magic, examining the matrix of the stone, before she threw a spell into the nearby sewer tunnel and waited for a few seconds. That was before they heard the sound of crystals breaking and what they could only assume was the death screams of some rather large amoeboids, to which Starlight summoned a pile of stones in front of her. The Plumber was impressed that she had gone through the effort to gather every crystal that was ready for harvesting, giving him plenty to work with in case he screwed up in making whatever he was designing for his wife. Before the group departed the Plumber pulled out his own tablet, something that none of them even expected him to have, and made a quick transfer to Starlight's account, giving her the payment for collecting all of the crystals for him.
With their actual mission completed, and a rather interesting side mission fulfilled, they boarded a nearby pod and rode back to where their ship, and Angela, were waiting for their return. Once they were back together they hopped back into their ship and took off, though they were all interested in seeing what Nefarious had planned for the galaxy now that they had a copy of his hard drive.