The attack came on a night with no moon.
One moment, the fleet was at peace ships rocking gently on calm seas, watchmen drowsing at their posts, the ordinary quiet of a military force at rest. The next moment, darkness erupted from the water like a living thing, swallowing light, swallowing sound, swallowing everything in its path.
Teach had found them.
Ace was on the Moby Dick's deck before he was fully awake, his fire already blazing, his eyes searching the chaos for the enemy. Around him, the crew scrambled to respond Marco's blue flames rising like beacons, Jozu's diamond body catching what little light remained, Vista's swords singing as they cleared the darkness from their immediate vicinity.
And in the center of it all, wreathed in shadow and laughter, stood Blackbeard.
"ACE!" His voice carried across the water, amplified by darkness and malice. "I knew you'd lead me here! I knew you'd run home to Daddy! And now " He spread his arms wide, and the darkness surged. "Now I get to take everything from you. Just like you took everything from me."
"I took nothing from you, Teach. You threw it away yourself."
The laughter redoubled. "Is that what you tell yourself? That I'm the villain, you're the hero, and everything is simple?" Teach shook his head, still grinning. "There are no heroes, Ace. There's only power. Only strength. Only the will to take what you want and hold it against all challengers. Your father understood that. Whitebeard understands it, even if he pretends otherwise. And one day soon now you'll understand it too."
Whitebeard's voice rolled across the water like thunder.
"TEACH!"
The darkness wavered. For just a moment, something like fear flickered in Blackbeard's eyes. Then it was gone, replaced by that same hungry grin.
"Old man. Still alive, I see. Still pretending to be a father to children who aren't yours." He chuckled. "How many of them will die tonight, do you think? How many will fall because you couldn't protect them? Because your time is past and you're too stubborn to admit it?"
Whitebeard's answer was a punch that cracked the sky.
The Gura Gura no Mi's power rippled outward, shattering the darkness, splitting the sea, sending ships rocking on waves that shouldn't exist. Teach absorbed some of it with his Devil Fruit Ace saw the way the darkness drank the shockwaves, swallowed them into nothing but not all. Never all.
The battle had begun.
What followed was chaos given form.
Ace fought through it on instinct, his fire blazing against the darkness, his body moving faster than thought. He'd never faced an enemy like Teach never faced someone whose power directly countered his own. Every flame he threw was consumed. Every attack was absorbed. And in the gaps between, Teach's crew struck with brutal efficiency, targeting the weaknesses in the Whitebeard Pirates' defenses.
This is what he wanted. This is what he planned for.
The realization came to Ace in a moment of terrible clarity. Teach hadn't just attacked blindly. He'd prepared. He'd studied. He'd found the exact pressure points that would cause maximum damage to Whitebeard's forces.
And he'd used Ace to find them.
The messenger. The warning about Luffy. All of it was designed to make me react, to make me reveal
"Ace!"
Marco's voice cut through his spiraling thoughts. The First Division commander was locked in combat with one of Teach's new crewmates a massive man with a crocodile's jaw and a Devil Fruit that seemed to turn everything he touched to mud. But Marco's eyes were fixed on something behind Ace, something urgent.
Ace turned.
And saw Whitebeard fall.
It wasn't dramatic. There was no great cry, no moment of theatrical collapse. One moment, the Strongest Man in the World was standing tall, his fist crackling with the power to destroy islands. The next moment, his knees buckled. His eyes widened. And Ace saw, with horrible clarity, the knife that had been driven into his back.
Teach's hand was still on the hilt.
"Pops never could resist protecting his children," Blackbeard said, almost conversationally. "It's his greatest strength. And his greatest weakness." He twisted the knife, and Whitebeard's roar of pain shook the sea. "You see, Ace? This is what I've been trying to tell you. Love makes you weak. Family makes you vulnerable. The only path to true power is to cut away everything that can be used against you."
Whitebeard's hand shot out, catching Teach by the throat.
For a moment one glorious, terrible moment Ace thought his father would survive. Thought the old man would find strength one last time, would crush the traitor who had killed his son and threatened his family. Thought
Teach's darkness consumed Whitebeard's arm.
The Gura Gura no Mi's power flickered and died as the darkness drank it, absorbed it, made it nothing. Whitebeard's eyes widened in shock the first time Ace had ever seen him truly surprised and then Teach's other hand came up, holding a second knife, driving it home with surgical precision.
"No," Ace whispered. "No, no, no "
Whitebeard fell.
The sea fell silent.
And Blackbeard stood over the body of the man who had once been his captain, his father, his king, and laughed.