Chapter 15: Deductive Reasoning

June 6th

Several days after Ace had left for Foodvalten, Marco sat back in his chair and stared up over his glasses at the ceiling. He could do no other; after weeks of his own investigating, his efforts had finally borne fruit. The report bearing the news sat on his desk, just one more paper amid a dozen others, but it was worth more than all the others combined.

Found you.

He exhaled, adjusted his readers, and sat forward in his chair to look over the numbers again. As reports went, it was at first glance unremarkable. Merely a combining of a few months' treasure and expense summaries, divvied up first by division and then by division member. Hours upon hours and hours of painstaking work to dig up all that raw data, but worth it now. Worth it all.

Ever since Thatch had raised the issue of Ace's reactions to Teach and Marco had sent the man off to the North Blue, Marco had been casually collecting information about Teach. Nothing serious, nothing that would make anyone think he had a vendetta against one of his own brothers, but enough to be an insurance policy. A just-in-case thing, just in case he had to dig deeper.

And ever since Ace had told him to watch Teach when—not if—Thatch got the Yami Yami no Mi, Marco had found his reason to dig deeper. The implications were clear: Ace thought Teach was a traitor of some kind. In that instant, all of Ace's reactions to Teach this whole time made so much more sense. All along, he'd known something they hadn't.

Something like whatever happened with Blackbeard at Impel Down and Marineford.

His lamp abruptly burnt out. Left blinking in the dark, he glanced out the window and realized it was well past midnight. It was late, late enough that he should just get some rest and pick this up in the morning, but…He glanced down at the paper in his hand and set his jaw. He needed Thatch's opinion on this and it was something best explained when the rest of the ship was quiet and not at risk of overhearing.

So he stood, tucked the paper into his waistband, and headed for Thatch's quarters.

Three knocks. "Thatch." Two knocks. "Thatch!"

Thatch's muffled, groggy, and slightly annoyed voice came through the other side of the door: "Yeah, yeah, what?" He yanked it open and leaned on the frame, squinting against the light from the blue flames on Marco's shoulder. Clothed only in loose pants and with his hair falling loose to his shoulders, he was the picture of a man yanked from sleep. "Marco? Something wrong?"

"Can I come in?" Marco held up the papers. "It's important."

"Figured it had to be, considering." Thatch spared a second for a massive yawn and then gracefully bowed out of the entryway so Marco could step inside. After closing the door, Thatch joined Marco by the desk and spared a second to light a lamp so they didn't have to see by Marco's flames. "So, what is it?"

"This." Marco spread the papers out and pointed at the summary table. "Mostly that."

Thatch peered at it. "Right…I'm going to need a bit more context for this one."

So Marco ran Thatch through the hours and hours of investigation he'd poured into one simple question: who is Blackbeard? Once Ace had pointed the finger at Teach himself, connecting the two men was a logical step since everything else he and Thatch had tried until that point to discover the man's identity had been a dead end. Marco would be dreaming of crunching numbers for weeks, he was sure.

"Which leads us to Teach's finances." Marco pointed at the second-to last summary sheet. "He's claiming as much treasure as anyone else of his tenure-yoi, maybe even a little less—but I can't find where it's going."

"He's got some luxury stuff in his quarters, I've seen it."

"That's what I thought at first too, but look—this is how much he's made, this is how much even a liberal estimate of those costs totals to."

Thatch rubbed at his chin. "Maybe he's giving it to the Second Division?"

"That would make sense, but look—no bumps in the Second's treasury. Nor in any other division's."

"He could be sending it home, or to someone important to him. Whatever bakery gave him a taste for pie as a kid."

Another shake of the head. "I looked into his home island. It's poor, and nothing about it indicates it's receiving this much-yoi."

"So where's the money going?"

"Here." He pulled out one last paper and held it out for Thatch to read. Months and months of business deals painstakingly collected onto a page, front and back, absolutely inundated with Marco's notes about the veracity each one. "He's careful-yoi. The name 'Blackbeard' doesn't crop up until well after we're gone, if it even gets mentioned at all. But it's never come up at a place we haven't visited, or one that Teach hasn't been near-yoi."

"You're not seriously suggesting Teach is a…I don't even know what you're suggesting. A two-timer? A traitor?"

"I'm suggesting he's doing dangerous things behind our backs and taking pains to make those things hard to find-yoi. Think about it—if I hadn't known to look for this, I never would've found it."

"And you knew because," he pitched his voice up in question, "Ace told you?"

"I know because Ace told me to watch him when you got a devil fruit."

"Yeah, but—wait, what?"

"According to Ace, you get the Yami Yami no Mi. When you do-yoi, I'm guessing Teach's act breaks down for a second."

"Wait, wait, wait. Back up. First: you know I don't really want a devil fruit. Second, 'act' is a hell of a way to describe the way Teach has always been since he joined this crew. Third, when I get the fruit? Is Ace seeing the future now?"

Marco held up a finger for each point he was addressing. "I know, but what you want and what you find don't need to line up. Yes, it's a serious accusation and one I don't repeat lightly-yoi. And yes, I think he is. He's had events described in his journal that came to pass when and how he'd written them to happen."

"Marco, this is—this is crazy."

"I think that's precisely why he didn't tell us the whole truth, why-yoi he's still not telling the whole truth. I wouldn't have believed even this much except for that I started noticing the clues myself." Marco rested a hand on the stacks of papers on the desk. "Look at all of this, Thatch. The people involved, the scale of it."

"It's a conspiracy."

"The kind that could upset the world's balance of power." Marco leaned against his desk and stared at the wall, pensive. "What I still don't understand is how Ace knew about all of it. He knew about Blackbeard weeks ago-yoi. Blackbeard and Impel Down."

"Impel Down?"

Marco flipped through a few reports to find the one he wanted. "Look on the second page. Seems Blackbeard's been eyeing some of the inmates, asking about their histories-yoi and contacting their old connections. Imagine if there were a prison break-yoi."

"Mayhem."

"It doesn't explain everything he was talking about when the fever had him, but it's a start."

Thatch set the papers aside. "He never mentioned Blackbeard before, though."

"Pardon?"

"Before his accident. Nothing of the sort. He treated Teach like everyone else, too."

"Good point-yoi. You think Teach caused that accident? Gave himself away?"

"No, if only because I can't think of any possible way he could've caused Ace's devil fruit to go berserk like that. But this seeing the future stuff and his accident—what if they're related? What if that accident is when he learned all this stuff? Some kind of…I don't know. Something."

"There's no way to prove it," Marco said thoughtfully, "but the timeline adds up."

Thatch snapped his fingers, startling Marco. "The year. He asked me what year it was. I thought he was just out of sorts, but—"

"You're not seriously—"

"—what if he traveled through time?"

Marco's protest died and he rubbed at his forehead. "Thatch…"

"Oh, come on. We've both seen the impossible made possible in the New World more than once. Who's to say Ace didn't run into someone with some time traveling devil fruit in the future?"

Letting out a long sigh, Marco slowly nodded. "It would explain a lot. If his future was bad enough…" he stopped.

"Marco?"

"He also thought you were dead."

"I was kinda hoping we wouldn't get to that."

"If he's from the future," Marco hedged, "if he is, then it was clearly a violent one-yoi. Your death, Teach's betrayal, and some battle at Marineford. A conflict there would cost hundreds of lives no matter what."

"No wonder he was so freaked out."

"He still is, he's just better at hiding it." Marco rubbed his eyes; it was late. "We both should get some sleep, we can talk about it more tomorrow."

Thatch offered a crooked grin. "Says the guy who woke me up."

Ace scrubbed a hand through his hair and sighed, trying to ignore the phantom sensation of dust settling on his skin. He was never going to fully scrub that old warehouse out of his clothes. "No, the hideout theory didn't pan out."

He leaned away from the Den Den Mushi while Marco went on about recommended investigative practice and some other stuff he tuned out. The ocean breeze flowed uninterrupted through his room's open window, carrying with it the scents of a bakery a couple doors down that Ace had been patronizing pretty heavily these last…days. Fuck, he was really almost at a whole week in this place. How long did he have left? How long until that devil fruit decided to take matters into its own hands?

It wasn't like he'd just been lazing around this whole time. He'd explored just about every abandoned place in town on the hunt for the people responsible, with a particular eye for anyone who could've come in on that sunken ship. All that effort, to no avail. He'd found nothing; not in the cliff dwellings, not in the storage warehouses, not in the condemned houses, not even in the ashen remnants of homes burned down before Whitebeard came knocking.

Old Siev's theory about outsiders made the most sense—Ace hadn't seen a single native person on the island who wasn't happy about Whitebeard's protection—but at this point…the outsiders either had someone helping them hide, or they came in on that boat, sunk it, and left on another before Ace showed up. It wasn't like there had been anymore vandalism since he arrived.

Maybe he scared them off.

Ah, Marco had stopped talking. "I'm doing what I can, Marco. I'll figure it out, you know I will."

The snail did a remarkable job imitating Marco's facial expression when his sigh crackled across the line. "I know. Just…take care of yourself, Ace."

Ace cocked an eyebrow at his tone. "Something wrong?"

"No. Any issues with your devil fruit?"

"Not one." Not that he'd had any reason to use it. "Like I said, I'll figure it out. Call ya tomorrow."

He hung up, stood, and stretched. Marco's tone, though, nagged at him. The old bird had been weirdly intent on Ace's well-being, even more so than he'd been for the last near-two-weeks of calls.

Well, if Marco wanted to talk about something, it was on him to bring it up. Ace had an investigation to get back to.

He donned his hat and headed out of the inn. A few passers-by waved at him and he waved back. They all knew who he was and why he was here, but two weeks with nothing to show for his presence was beginning to wear on their goodwill.

The Whitebeard flag, when Ace meandered over to it, was as intact as he'd left it. He eyed his handiwork critically; some of it was sloppy, relatively. Then again, he'd been a little distracted.

Old Siev didn't react to his side-eye.

He rapped a knuckle against one of the wooden posts holding it up; sturdy as ever, like it'd never been knocked down.

He'd tried camping out at the site, but nothing ever happened when he watched, and all he'd gotten for his trouble was every aspect of his appearance and character ripped apart by an old man with nothing better to do.

He sighed and headed away from the port up the main street. His stomach was rumbling.

"Breakfast already?" called Jemi, a grandmother who always seemed to be watering her second-story-window flowerpots whenever Ace was out and about.

"Can't start my day on an empty stomach. How are your plants?"

"Doing very well, very well. You should try Aster's pancakes, they're simply phenomenal."

There was something in the way she voiced the suggestion, some undercurrent in her tone, a tiny fault in her expression—but it was there and gone in an instant, so fast he could've imagined it. "Aster's?"

"You don't know it? You've been there a half-dozen times, so I hear." Another fleeting glimpse of something more. "It's where Emi and her father work."

Multiple days and he'd never actually caught the name of Emi's café. Also, her father? Not someone who'd shown his face thus far. Maybe they traded off shifts and Ace had just always popped by on Emi's turn. "I'll do that. Thank you."

"Think nothing of it."

She gave him a wide smile that made Ace suspect she'd be pinching his cheeks if he was in range. Before she could get any ideas, he continued down the street, returning any greetings thrown his way while he went.

As he hit main street and approached the café, he looked closer at the sign he'd taken little note of on every other approach. He'd just seen the pink many-petaled flower and assumed it was a bit of meaningless decoration, in the vein of one of Luffy's innumerable "creative" flag designs back on Goa Island, and not the actual signpost for the establishment.

He was no flower connoisseur, but he was willing to bet that flower was an aster.

Inside, a handful of locals were scattered around the tables and waiting up by the counter. They all paused when Ace walked in but resumed what they were doing in short order. Mindful of his growling stomach, he joined the back of the line and distracted himself by taking in more about the eclectic décor while he waited.

By the time he made it to the front, the other patrons had cleared out. Ace didn't take it personally; even though Whitebeard was beloved and everyone here treated him and his crew kindly, very few were comfortable spending extended periods with a pirate in the same room. History died hard. Though he didn't remember his only other stop at this island—too busy with the murder attempts on Whitebeard—he was sure the stop had been brief.

"You're back," Emi noted.

"The food here is great. Why did you name it Aster's?"

She blinked at the non-sequitur. "My dad picked the name. It's my mother's."

"Oh, you all work here together?"

"No, she's—she's gone."

"I'm sorry."

Emi swallowed and straightened, tossing her towel over her shoulder. "Can I get you something?"

"Jemi told me I should try your pancakes."

"Jemi did?"

"Should I be worried?"

"No," Emi, distracted, worried at her lip a moment before shaking her head and wiping her expression clear. "She's just a bit nosy sometimes."

Ace counted out the beri for his meal and handed it over. Emi took it, clearly still distracted.

"I just ran out of flour up here," she said once she'd rung it up, "so let me grab some from downstairs. It'll just be a minute."

"Do you want any help?"

"What, are you trying to steal what you haven't already eaten?"

He smiled while he tried to figure out if she was just teasing or really meant it. Her tone wasn't clear. Failing, he offered, "Just being polite. I'm the one who's been eating my way your entire stock since I arrived, and you did let me borrow your sewing supplies."

"It's fine. It really isn't much to carry. Besides, you're a customer. Just get comfortable at a table and stay there."

He wasn't about to argue. Shrugging, he did as asked. Between one blink and the next, he somehow ended up falling out of his chair, which, ow. He wiped a bit of drool off his chin and resettled in his seat right as Emi emerged from the kitchen with a plate of pancakes stacked higher than her head.

"I think I'm starting to learn how much you can actually eat," she said.

"Starting," Ace replied with a grin. "Thank you for the food."

A couple more customers came in while Ace devoured his meal, but as he'd expected, no one stuck around. He still wasn't offended, but after two weeks of rooms clearing out when he walked in, he was starting to get a little tired of it. It felt…uncomfortably familiar. His darker days, his worst days, when the world was in his way, when everything in it was a reminder of the monster whose blood he carried, when any bandit or thug who crossed his path was lucky to escape with only a busted lip.

He blew out a slow breath and patted his full stomach, letting his gaze wander the café décor rather than allow his thoughts to linger on that time. Knickknacks, trinkets, doodads…and pictures. Lots of pictures. Mostly of other islands, probably bought from a merchant ship passing through, but plenty of Foodvalten itself. Even a few of this café, the people who made it—a smiling man and woman, and then, in a few, a young Emi, an older Emi, an Emi who looked a lot like the one currently sweeping behind the counter—but the woman who had to be her mother wasn't in any of the recent photos.

Gone. Right.

But…her father was still in those photos. Ace hadn't seen any sign of him around the café, and he was sure he'd remember seeing a guy who had bright purple hair styled in such an elegant sweep off to one side anywhere on the island.

Now that he was looking for them, more details about the café stood out: the men's coat on the coat rack by the door that had been there since Ace's first visit, the specials menu that had two different handwriting styles on it, split between the older items and the newer, and Emi's correction that she wasn't the owner, just an employee.

He eyed her and decided it would be best to be direct. It was always what he'd preferred when this particular topic came up; people dancing around the issue just pissed him off more.

"Where's your father?"

She froze mid-sweep. "I beg your pardon?"

"Your father." He gestured at the photos, the coat, the whole café. "He's the owner, right?"

Her knuckles, he noted, were white from the force behind her grip on the broom. She drew in a shuddering breath and slowly released that tension, then stared at him with a gaze so neutral it was more effective than any glare. "He died, a few weeks ago. Thanks for the reminder."

"I'm sorry." And he was, truly; he hadn't meant to go ripping open a fresh wound, but still, it nagged at him. Old instincts honed from walking through Edge Town, a persistent sense that something is wrong even when all signs indicated no immediate danger—and then a thief lunging from a shadowed alleyway, knife aimed for Ace's chest.

He didn't think Emi would be lunging at him with a knife anytime soon, but clearly, her father's passing wasn't a subject to bring up lightly. Something had happened there. Something bad enough she hadn't even been able to do so much as remove his coat from the rack.

"If it had anything to do with the sunken ship in the harbor," he began, watching her carefully, "I'd appreciate if you could tell me more about it."

Emi swallowed and closed her eyes. "It doesn't. Could you—I think I'd like you to leave, now. Please."

Well aware he'd overstepped, Ace inclined his head in half acknowledgement and half apology, and left.