The morning air was unusually still. Maye had found herself drawn to the coast, standing on the high, jagged cliffs of the "Gray Terminal" overlooking the trash heaps and the sparkling blue expanse beyond. The ruby pendant was no longer just warm; it was vibrating. It hummed a low, melodic frequency that seemed to resonate in her very bones. She traced the shield-and-sword engraving, her brow furrowed. "Who are you?" she murmured to the necklace. "And why are you so restless today?" Down below, the villagers and bandits were going about their business when a streak of fire appeared on the horizon. It moved too fast for a ship, carving a white-hot wake through the waves. Ace didn't pull into the harbour. He didn't care about the formalities of docking. He ran his Striker straight onto the sand of a secluded cove, the wood groaning as he leapt off before it even stopped moving. He hit the sand running, his lungs burning, his eyes scanning the treeline. He knew this mountain. He knew every trail. And he knew where she used to go when she wanted to be alone. Maye heard the sound of footsteps, heavy, frantic, and filled with a weight that made the air feel thick. She turned away from the ocean, her simple linen dress fluttering in the wind, her spear held loosely in her hand. A man burst through the thicket. He was covered in the dust of the road and the salt of the sea. His black shorts were tattered, his orange hat slung behind his back, and his chest was heaving. He stopped dead ten feet away from her. Ace's world narrowed down to a single point. There she was. The midnight-brown hair, the ocean-blue eyes, the "ASCE" tattoo on her forearm. She looked healthy. She looked alive. She looked like the miracle he had begged for every night since the war. "Maye..." his voice was a broken whisper, a sound of pure, unadulterated relief. He took a step forward, his arms already reaching out, his eyes glistening with the tears he hadn't allowed himself to shed in over a year. "Maye, it's me. I'm here. I'm finally here." Maye didn't move. She didn't run to him. She didn't scream his name. Instead, she tightened her grip on her wooden spear, her eyes narrowing in a look of guarded, polite confusion. She looked at his face, the freckles, the intense eyes, the scar on his shoulder and felt... nothing. Well, not nothing. Her heart was hammering against her ribs so hard it hurt, and the ruby pendant was glowing so brightly it was visible through her dress. Her soul was screaming, but her mind was a silent, empty hall. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice soft and cautious. "Do I know you, traveler? You seem... very upset." Ace froze. The hand he had reached out to her began to tremble. "What? Maye, it's me. It's Ace. Your... your... Your Commander." He laughed, a jagged, nervous sound. "Stop joking around. It's not funny. I thought you were dead. I watched you—" "I think you have me confused with someone else," she interrupted gently, her expression filled with a pity that cut deeper than any magma fist ever could. "My name is Maye, yes. I've lived on this mountain my whole life. But I've never seen you before. And I've certainly never been on a ship." The silence that followed was deafening. Ace looked at her, searching for a spark of recognition, a glint of the girl who had kissed him amidst the ruins of Marineford. There was only a hollow kindness. He looked down at the Vivre Card in his hand. It was pointing directly at her, pulsing with life. Then he looked at the ruby necklace. He realized then that the price of her life hadn't been her blood. It had been him. "You don't remember?" he asked, his voice cracking as he fell to his knees in the dirt. "You don't remember the sake cups? You don't remember the Moby Dick? You don't remember... me?" Maye dropped her spear, moved by a sudden, inexplicable urge to comfort this stranger. She stepped toward him, kneeling in the grass. She reached out, her hand hovering over his hair before she hesitated. "I'm sorry," she whispered, a single tear escaping her own eye despite her lack of memory. "My mind is a bit of a fog. But... for some reason, seeing you cry makes me feel like the world is ending." She reached out and wiped a tear from his cheek, her fingers tracing the same path her bloody hand had taken a year ago on the battlefield. As her skin touched his, a jolt of static electricity snapped between them, and for a split second, the ruby pendant flared with a blinding, divine light. Deep in the woods, Dadan stood behind a tree, watching the scene and sobbing into her sleeve. She knew the truth. The Fire-Fist had come home to find his treasure, only to realize the locks had all been changed.
