Now that Shawcross was distracted by Toño's sudden appearance, Sofia took the opportunity to rush to Vark's side. He was unconscious and badly bruised, but still breathing. She sighed in relief and dragged his body behind a dumpster, a place that she hoped would be relatively safe for him.

Shawcross's movements were definitely slower than before he took Toño's attack, but he could still comfortably dodge all of Toño and Hunter's long-range Electric and Fire attacks. On top of that, he was easily able to keep them both at a distance with his vast arsenal of Water-type attacks, leaving them with no options.

"Hey!" Hunter yelled, looking directly at Sofia. "Don't just stand there! Help us!"

Sofia stared at the ground. "I- I'd just be getting in the way!"

She rolled her eyes and swung her bone in Shawcross's direction, forming an intense stream of fire headed his way. Before the Flamethrower attack could reach Shawcross, he countered with a Hydro Pump that dissipated the flames and only narrowly missed Hunter.

In an effort to be useful, Sofia started running around the outskirts of the battle zone, trying to find Fitz. This turned out not to be very hard, as he was screaming just about every swear word in the book while under a pile of soaking-wet debris, his head the only visible part of his body sticking out from underneath.

"Are you alright?" Sofia asked.

"Do I look alright?!" Fitz barked, struggling against the rubble. "There are pebbles in my ass! Get me out of here!"

She pushed and pulled at the largest boulder on top the best she could, but it wouldn't even budge. "I can't! I'm sorry!"

Fitz groaned. "Damnit, you're useless!"

Sofia's body froze up, save for her trembling wings. "He's right, I am useless! Of course I can't help anyone! I've never been able to before! I shouldn't even be alive right now, why am I still wandering around here taking up space-"

"Jeez, calm down!" Fitz shouted, breaking Sofia out of her stupor. "What are you hyperventilating for? Look man, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it!"

Sofia blinked a couple times, and her breathing gradually slowed. "N-No, You're fine, you don't have to say sorry."

Fitz squirmed under the rubble some more to no avail. "Whatever, if you can't help me, don't worry about it! Deal with that weirdo first!"

She nodded, feeling a little shaken. Shawcross and Hunter were still engaged in a long-range duel, though judging by how the droplets coming from missed attacks alone were enough to make her wince, it was clear that she wouldn't be able to handle a head-on blow.

All the while, Toño was a few feet away from Sofia, firing off several balls of electricity at Shawcross. Although that attack worked very well when Shawcross wasn't expecting it, and it probably wouldn't take more than a single well-aimed ball to K.O. him, the Empoleon was too agile for Toño to deal a finishing blow.

That gave Sofia an idea, and she had no time to waste wondering if it was a good one. "I'm going to try and trip him up," she whispered. "Hit him while he's stumbling!"

"Are you sure?" Toño asked. "If you get close enough to trip him, you'll probably get hit by my Electro Ball, too. Are you a Flying-type?"

Sofia nodded. "Don't worry, I'll be fine." Truth be told, Sofia was well aware that an Electric-type attack strong enough to deal considerable damage to a fully-evolved juggernaut like Shawcross might end up killing her, but she was okay with that possibility. "Just get ready! If we mess this up, he won't ignore me again!"

Toño stared at her for a second before nodding. "Whatever you say."

Heart beating out of her chest, Sofia had her eyes locked on Hunter, waiting until the moment she went for another attack. After all, this was only going to be possible if Shawcross was already preoccupied.

A notably weaker Flamethrower spurted out of Hunter's bone, proof that she was at her limit. And as soon as it did, Sofia took off towards Shawcross. He was more than a meter taller than her, so by ducking low enough, she could stay out of his sight.

Toño charged up another Electro Ball. Just like before, Shawcross tensed up his legs, ready to jump out of the way.

On the last possible moment before Shawcross left the ground, Sofia clamped her beak into his ankle and dug her talons into the ground as firmly as she could.

One second, the crackling of electricity was all she could hear.

The next, everything was pure white, then pitch black.

Minutes that felt like seconds passed with no pain, and no sensation at all.

Finally, her eyes adjusted back to the city's light level. She was on the ground, wings twitching involuntarily and a light trail of smoke emanating from her chest. A Midnight Lycanroc standing above her– she barely recognized him as Fitz– was yelling something she couldn't quite hear at first. A Pachirisu was there, saying something as well.

"Oh my God, she's dead, isn't she?!" was the first sentence spoken that Sofia could fully understand. "I killed her!"

With tremendous effort, Sofia moved one wing to rub the back of her head. "N-No, I'm fine…"

Both of them heaved heavy sighs of relief. "Oh, thank Arceus!" Fitz said. "That was great! We got Shawcross all tied up now, thanks to you! You don't gotta move another muscle, alright? Just sit tight here with Vark and we'll handle the rest!"

Toño chuckled nervously. "I… uh, I'm really sorry about that, Miss… Uh… Sorry, what was your name?"

"Sofia," she muttered. "Don't worry, I told you…" she needed to take a deep breath to finish the sentence, "I'm fine. Do you guys know about our plan?"

Hunter nodded. "Fitz filled us in. I can't say I'm confident that we'll stand a chance against Quincy, but we have the type advantage and the element of surprise. Though, if luck is on our side, we won't have to confront him at all."

"And worse comes to worse, I'm happy going down if it means taking that winged dirtbag down with me," Toño chimed in.

Sofia sighed, not pleased with the fact that tripping Shawcross once was the only thing she'd be able to contribute. "Good luck, you three. Once I'm back on my talons, I'll do whatever I can to bring you guys some backup."

"Don't push yourself," Hunter said. "You were instrumental in taking down Shawcross, and that's already more than any of us could ask of you. Just focus on staying alive."

"I… really needed to hear that, thank you," Sofia said, giving them a weak chuckle. "You guys stay safe too, alright?"

Toño, Fitz, and Hunter each nodded, and they marched forward.

"I should probably get Shawcross out of sight, shouldn't I?" Sofia thought. Even if he was injured, he could still cause problems if any of his allies happened across him and tore his bindings off. In extreme pain, she hobbled over to the limp Empoleon body on the ground and was about to grab him by the beak– the only part of her body that didn't hurt to use– until she noticed something peculiar beneath his Syndicate armband. Some sort of pattern, like a tattoo.

Yet, it wasn't a tattoo. It was red, and the texture wasn't at all reminiscent of ink. It was more like a branding mark. A mark that was all too familiar to Sofia.

She pulled the scarf down to reveal what she already knew would be there. Three equilateral triangles, two smaller inverted ones and one larger one flush to their bases. The unmistakable logo of Croft and Sons Slave Trading Company.

"Congratulations on your victory," Shawcross suddenly spoke, startling Sofia. "I fought poorly. It was careless of me to disregard you."

As usual, Shawcross had a completely listless expression, but now that Sofia knew the reason why he wore it, she couldn't help but pity him. "I… I'm so sorry about what they did to you."

Shawcross glanced at his branding and shook his head. "I lack any capacity for the regret you're ascribing to me. And besides, my experience doesn't compare to that of my peers. I opted into this lifestyle willingly."

"You… what?" Sofia asked. How anyone could willingly consent to the Psychic procedure that came with being enslaved was so utterly beyond her that she was at a loss for words. That procedure took everything from its victims: their capacity to feel emotion, their ability to disobey orders from their designated master, their very sense of who they were, all stripped away. "Why?" she managed to ask, her voice wavering. "How could you ever want that?"

He paused for a moment before giving his answer. "I can't recall the details. I remember that I had some sort of far fetched ambition, and I remember the anguish of realizing that it would never come to be. I requested that the memory itself be purged so that I may serve Commander Moreno with more efficiency."

"But that- that's insane!" Sofia cried.

"You are quite young, Archen. I suppose then, it makes sense that the experience of a shattered dream would be foreign to you." He strained his neck, reaching his beak over to his armband and pulling it back, covering his branding. "Your Croconaw friend is plotting to raid Renegade's Edge to save his mother, right?"

Sofia's eyes shot wide open. "Y-Yeah? Wait- how do you know about-"

"It is categorically impossible for him to rescue Iris Vanadis," he said calmly and with authority, as if explaining a simple math problem. "When the day comes that he can no longer deny that fact, you will see firsthand what happens to a man when he experiences utter hopelessness. It's just a matter of time."

"Y-You're wrong!" Sofia said, trying not to let Shawcross's words get to her. "Fabian's strong, and we'll have Nero's help! I know they can do it!"

"If that were true, you and I wouldn't be having this conversation right now, because if Fabian had the strength to take on Renegade's Edge, he would've killed Quincy in a single blow. There will be dozens of Vice Guildmasters present on the execution date, and Quincy is arguably the weakest of them all."

Sofia didn't respond. Instead, she dragged Shawcross into the shadows of an alleyway and prepared a gag to place on him. Before she did, however, she had one last question. "You called me 'Archen' earlier. How do you know my species name?"

"If I give you my answer, it will upset you," Shawcross said. "Are you sure you want to hear it?"

Sofia was tired of Shawcross and his bleak outlook, to the point that she promised herself that she'd never complain about Nero's comparably understated pessimism ever again. More than anything, she needed to get this over with so she could go looking for Fabian and Nero as fast as possible. "Yes, just tell me, please."

"I know the man who donated the corpse you're inhabiting to the Croft Company."

Her blood ran cold and she curled her wing into a fist. "Who was it?" she demanded with more force in her voice than she had ever used in her life. "What's their name?"

"We called him Director Hubert."

Toño had put on a brave face, but the truth was, he wasn't remotely confident that they would be able to get deep enough into the Mayor's office to make the citywide alert, nor was he sure that it would sway anyone to their side if they managed it. He thankfully never had to see it in person, but ever since Quincy forced them to raise their prices and sabotage their competition just to stay afloat, none of the Melker Motors employees had been especially popular.

"Hey, Toño, you feeling alright?" Fitz asked as they ran. "It's probably not easy, hearing about Quincy so much after… Well, everything. If you stuck with Vark and that weird bird lady, we wouldn't have blamed you."

"What, and miss the look on Quincy's face when we kick his ass into next week?" Toño asked, trying to stay positive. "Yeah, right."

A Rhydon civilian attempted to grab Toño out of Hunter's arm, only for Fitz to swoop in and shatter his nose with a kick. "Oh right, and before I forget." Fitz's smile faltered, a rare sight. "Sorry about not visiting much these days. Believe me, I wanna, but it's just so hard nowadays, y'know?"

"What brought this on?" Toño asked. "Wait, lemme guess, Hunter told you about the escape plan that Fabian peer pressured me into, didn't she?"

Fitz chuckled lightly. "Don't worry, I'm not upset or anything. Believe you me, if the Boss asked me to stay cooped up in that room for the rest of my life, I'd have been sneaking out every night before you even started thinking about it."

Toño forced a smile, though it probably came off as halfhearted. "Well, whatever happens next, I'm probably never gonna be able to live there again. Y'know, even if I make it out of here alive, I don't think the Guilds are gonna buy the freak accident death story for a second time."

"Now's not the time to worry about that," Hunter said. "It doesn't matter what happens, we will find a way to protect you."

That was exactly what worried Toño. He wasn't sure exactly why, but as far as he gathered from eavesdropping and context clues, the Head Guildmaster wanted him more than anything else in the world. And now that his secret was out, every second he spent with the Melker Motors crew placed them in unimaginable danger. It was taking them everything they had just to get a chance to beat one measly Vice Guildmaster, and they needed help from multiple random weirdos to get this far. Even if this was as difficult as things could get, they still wouldn't last long.

"Hunter's right, we'll find a way," Fitz said. "Besides, we've got the Boss on our side! You probably haven't seen him fight too much, but trust me, he's basically a legend. Quincy doesn't stand a chance."

Hunter opened her mouth, but paused before talking. "I'm… concerned about the Boss, to be honest. When we last saw each other, he and Fabian Vanadis were fighting Madame Lydia, but that was some time ago. And if Shawcross really did say that Fabian was captured, then I worry that the result of that battle may not have been as favorable as they hoped."

Despite the screaming and chaos coming from everywhere in the city, the dead silence between the three of them made it feel like there wasn't a noise in the world being made.

Hunter cleared her throat. "In any case, the factory's on the next floor. We'll see what happened soon enough."

The ramp to the next floor was just as long as any other, but in the moment, it felt like it was thousands of kilometers long. Toño's mind was already conjuring up images of Melker's corpse that flooded his vision, and he could vividly hear Quincy's mocking laughter.

The ramp ended, and the full battlefield was visible. It was an utterly desolate wasteland full of smashed, ice-coated cars and dozens of unconscious civilian bodies. Perfectly in the center, there was something that, at first glance, resembled an ice statue. It had a green head sticking out, limp against the ice below it.

Melker.

"Hunter, get him out of there!" Fitz screamed. "Melt that ice, NOW!"

She was already running to his side before Fitz said a word, the flame on her bone burning so ferociously that it singed Toño's fur from over a meter away. He thought he was prepared for the worst, but he couldn't have been less ready. There wasn't even any way of telling whether or not Melker was alive at that moment.

When the ice melted and Melker's body was able to fall to the ground, the only positive thing Toño could say about it was that there was at least some blood still left in his body. From the neck down, all of his skin was a deeply bruised purple, though there was so much flaking and cracking that the resulting coat of blood he had made it hard to tell. Toño couldn't hold back a scream.

Hunter leaned down to his head. "I… I can't believe it, but he's still breathing. I don't understand, would they leave him alive?"

Though Toño trusted Hunter, he had to verify it for himself. He gently placed a paw on Melker's frigid wrist, and he found a faint pulse. Tears of relief fell down his face.

Fitz tugged on his shoulder. "C'mon, let's get moving," he said solemnly.

"B-But, we can't leave the Boss like this!" Toño protested. "Look at him, he's on death's door-"

"There's nothing we can do for him!" Fitz snapped. "There's no way we could drag him off to safety without killing him, his skin'll tear off like wet paper if you so much as touch it! And if we stick around guarding him forever, it's just a matter of time before some other big name like Shawcross comes along and kicks our asses! The best thing we can do for him is stopping the civilians from hurting him, and the only way that's ever gonna happen is if we get to that office!"

Toño bit his lip. Even if Fitz was right, he couldn't help but feel like he was letting the Boss down by leaving him alone in the state he was in, out in the open and more vulnerable than Toño had ever seen him before.

"We'll just have to act fast," Hunter said. "This is our one chance to turn the tides of this conflict. The fact is, we have no choice but to capitalize on it as soon as possible."

Wiping his tears away, Toño sighed. "You're right. We have to keep going."

The faint noise of clamoring citizens coming from the very top floor suddenly grew significantly louder. Having never received an order from Shawcross to return to their search, around half of Ferrumark City's entire population was crowded on the highest floor, and from the sound of things, one of them had spotted Toño.

"What do we do about that?" Fitz asked. "That's gotta be at least five thousand Pokémon up there! Even the Boss'd have a tough time getting through those kinda numbers!"

Toño scanned the remains of the Melker Motors main factory. Most of the cars in the lot outside were destroyed beyond recognition, but there were a few sturdier ones that were only missing a side mirror or a windshield. "Is there any chance that either of you guys have gotten better at driving in the past three years?"

Fitz shook his head. "Last time I drove, I was still a Rockruff. I've got no idea how to drive the biped-friendly models."

"I can't say I've used one recently, either," Hunter added. "I'm still traumatized from when Fitz drove us off that cliff and into the ocean."

"Th-That was five years ago! And besides, it's your fault for making me drive! That model wasn't even built for quadrupeds!"

Toño was probably very rusty after his three years of solitude, but from the sound of things, he was the best shot they had at staying on the road. "Anyways," he said, clearing his throat. "Looks like I'm still the designated driver. Are you guys ready to watch me do something really stupid?"

"Hell yeah I am!" Fitz cheered. "Is this gonna be like the fire hoop thing you drove through? That was the coolest thing I've seen in my life!"

Toño smiled at the fun memories that brought back. He'd almost forgotten about he and Fitz's shared passion for doing incredibly stupid things in cars. "I don't wanna get ahead of myself, but this might end up being even cooler. Here's the plan: I'm gonna grab the biggest car I can find and we're gonna plow through any 'mon who tries to get in the way."

Although Fitz's eyes were practically sparkling, Hunter was slightly less amused. "Our automobiles aren't built to endure collisions. Even the sturdiest truck we have would break down after a dozen or so hits."

"Ah, but do the citizens know that?" Toño asked. "We'll hit one or two of them, and they'll assume we can keep going forever and run away!"

"Toño," Fitz started, his voice impossibly serious. "I don't even know how it's even possible for one tiny little guy to be as much of a genius as you."

"It's hard, being a generational talent," Toño replied, matching Fitz's seriousness.

Hunter facepalmed. "I can't believe we're going to do this."

Even though Hunter was dragging her feet a little bit, the two managed to find an almost-untouched pickup truck with no cargo. Toño remembered the specific model, and knew that it was made primarily for bipeds around twice Toño's size to operate. Not ideal, but it could've been worse. The snake-friendly models, for example, would've been flat out impossible.

Unfortunately, because of his tiny squirrel body, Toño wasn't able to reach both the accelerator pedal and the steering wheel at the same time. "Fitz, you're gonna have to operate the pedals. I need you to do whatever I say, as fast as you can! Got it?"

After nodding, Fitz squirmed his way below Toño in an awkward, cramped fetal position. Meanwhile, Hunter sat in the back and fastened her seatbelt.

"Accelerate!" Toño commanded, and as soon as he did, the vehicle lurched forward.

Apparently, this truck in particular was especially quick about reaching its top speed, as the speedometer already read 200 kilometers per hour, way too fast for Toño's tastes. "Okay, brake a little bit!" Nothing happened. "I said brake!"

"It's not working!" Fitz called back.

"What do you mean it's not working?" Toño shouted, desperately swerving around in circles around the lot.

"I'm pushing the brake pedal and it's not doing anything!"

"Try pumping them!"

A few seconds passed. "Still nothing!"

"Goddamnit, I think the brake lines are damaged!" Toño groaned. "Alright, fine, we can roll with this! What do we need brakes for anyway?"

"I'm going to kill you," Hunter growled, with a white-knuckle grip on her seat.

Now that the three of them had fully embraced the 200 kilometers per hour lifestyle, Toño crashed the truck through the fencing, sped up the ramp, and slammed onto the horn as hard as he could to give the civilians a chance to flee. Toño thought one or two of them would have to get run over before they got the message, but apparently, a lightning-quick, two thousand-kilo metal death machine barrelling down a main city street was all the message anyone needed. Truly, it was a blessing in disguise that the brake lines had failed.

Or at least, Toño felt that way until he realized that they'd have to stop at some point. Since they were driving an automatic, he wasn't able to downshift, so the only hope they had to avoid a certainly-fatal collision with the rapidly-approaching brick wall of the Mayor's office was the handbrake. "Fitz, there's a lever right next to me! You need to pull it really slowly!" As Toño shifted into neutral, Fitz pulled the handbrake with far too much force. The back wheels locked up and made a horrid screaming noise. "I SAID SLOWLY!"

"You were yelling at me, I was freaking out!"

Toño had no control over the truck as it began to drift at unfathomable speeds, launching his tiny Pachirisu body into the door. Everyone was screaming, even Hunter, when the truck started to tip over. It hit the ground and Toño's entire body smashed against the opposite side of the car. Hunter grabbed him, smashed a window, and scrambled out.

The crowd of people who cleared out because of the truck were rapidly approaching once again. There wasn't any time to check on each other's injuries, so Fitz kicked the Mayor's office door down and sprinted in, Hunter and Toño following close behind.

There wasn't any time for them to catch their breaths, however. A Talonflame with a wicked grin sat perched besides the receptionist's desk.

They were going to have to face off against Quincy.