Notes : This story isn't directly linked to my other Samurai Jack fanfics, therefore you don't have to read those to understand what is going on.
Obviously, I don't own Samurai Jack or any other character from this show. If I did there would be new seasons and a couple of movies. ^^
The closer the samurai got to the shore, the stronger the wind got ; however the buildings nearby the harbour offered numerous shelters. When rain suddenly started pouring, he hurried to find the nearest inn. He soon found his path blocked by two large vehicles which stopped right in the middle of the street. The drivers, two four-armed creatures, stepped out of their vans and took a look at the building before them. Its dark and metallic appearance made it look like any other in the futuristic cities of this world, however the markings above the entrance indicated it was a school.
But what really got the warrior's attention was the gapping hole on the left side of it at street level. The two creatures examined it and what was inside, got back to their vehicles in order to take some tools and materials from them and walked to the school again. From the look of it, they were here to repair the damages. What caused them in the first place was a mystery.
The scene attracted the attention of the few passerbies brave enough to be outside in the rain, including a pair of three-eyed women sharing an umbrella. As they stopped within earshot of the samurai simply known as Jack, he listened to their conversation in case it could bring him some information.
"Isn't that your little brother's school?" asked the tallest one of the two.
"It is" her friend replied. "The freak in his class got emotional again. He told me 'bout it this morning. And his teacher said they finally kicked her out and sent her to that clinic, you know in the next town?"
The tall one nodded.
"I say 'good riddance'", the short one continued. "Once Aku's doctors will be done with her she won't get emotional ever again."
Jack frowned. Whatever was happening couldn't be good, especially not if Aku and his servants seemed to be involved in it.
He decided to forget his plans of finding an inn : whoever the three-eyed women were talking about must be in great danger. This was all he could be certain of at the moment, but it was enough of a reason to head to the next town right away, despite the rain pouring down everywhere and the wind making his wet clothes feel colder than they already were. The man in white clung onto his straw hat to keep it from flying away as he walked.
It was only when he reached the outskirts of the city that the rain finally ceased ; however the wind remained constant.
Luckily, the next town was only a couple hours away by foot. Jack politely asked the first local he encountered there, a humanoid robot with two wheels instead of legs, where the clinic was, then left with a thank you once he got the information he needed.
This city was bigger than the other ; it took the samurai a good half an hour to find the river the robot had mentioned while giving him direction. Now all he had to do was to follow it to where it joined the ocean to find what he was looking for. While he kept walking, Jack wondered what he would do once in the clinic. He had so little information to work with he didn't know where to start.
Sneaking into the building to look for the child wouldn't do any good if he didn't even know what she looked like. He had to collect more information. Simply asking whoever was working here seemed risky but it was the only plan he had…
He had now found the clinic nearby the junction of the river and the ocean. From the outside, it would have been just another dark and metallic building had its windows not been barred. Above the main entrance, a large red plate indicated it was indeed a clinic.
One of the samurai's hands clutched the hilt of his katana while the other slowly pushed the door opened.
Inside were a waiting room and a front desk. A few people of various species were sitting there in silence while the blue-skinned person behind the desk was frantically pushing various buttons on a small device in their hands and completely ignoring everyone and everything else.
Jack carefully approached the receptionist, never loosing his grip on his weapon.
"I beg your pardon?" he asked. "I wish to -"
"Hey, you just made me lose my game!" the blue person shouted angrily as his device flashed red.
Even though the man from the past had no idea what the alien was talking about, he quickly apologised. The receptionist fell silent for a few seconds and put the device in their pocket. As they stared at him, the warrior thought he had been recognised and that he was stupid for even thinking he wouldn't be.
"Another Samurai Jack cosplayer I see…" the alien said. "Where did you get your costume?"
Under his straw hat, Jack raised an eyebrow in confusion. Did this oddly androgynous person really think he was some other man in a costume? And what was a cosplayer?
"I, hum, made part of it myself", he replied, slightly tipping his hat forward in an attempt to cover more of his face without it looking too suspicious. "I did not mean to startle you in any way ; I am simply looking for someone. She was brought here from the next town after an incident at her school."
"Oh, patient forty-four… I heard she was to receive brain surgery or something. Let me see…"
The receptionist pushed a button on their desk and an image appeared in thin air right in front of them.
"According to the schedule they should have finished the operation", they told the man in white. "If everything went well, they're waking her up now. Take a seat and wait until she can leave her room on her own."
Did that mean he was too late to help the child? Jack had to make sure. Plus, even if he indeed couldn't save her from Aku's doctors, he might still be able to prevent them from doing evil deeds in the future.
He asked where patient forty-four was but the receptionist laughed at him, then told him that unless he was from her family he wasn't allowed to enter her room. The idea of pretending to be a relative crossed his mind, obviously. However, if the girl didn't look like him or wasn't human (which was likely to be the case given the number of sentient species living in this world) the lie wouldn't work. Therefore, he took a seat in the waiting room as instructed and waited a couple of minutes until the receptionist started playing with their device again. As the warrior stood up, the other people waiting here stared at him but remained silent, even when he left the room while the blue person was distracted.
Jack was now in an empty corridor. The doors on either side of it were numbered. Maybe if he tried the number forty-four…
The room he was looking for was at the end of the corridor. One hand still on the hilt of his sword, the samurai opened the door just enough to be able to peek inside without being seen by whoever was in the room.
There were three people standing next to a bed ; he couldn't see who was laying in it as one of the doctors blocked his view. He could hear them mumble something about the operation going well.
"Do you think it'll work?" the one in front of the bed asked her colleagues standing on either sides of her.
"It better", the one of the left replied. "Or Aku would be furious."
So the ageless demon had indeed something to do with all of this ; whatever was going on had to be stopped.
"Be quiet" the one on the right ordered, "she's waking up."
They gave the girl her glasses and white hand-knitted hat then turned around when the door was suddenly flung open.
How did Samurai Jack himself end up here without being stopped by the receptionist?
"What have you done to this girl?" he asked while partially unsheathing his sword.
"Exactly what she asked for", the doctor right in front of him replied.
Jack didn't believe it one bit.
"I… I asked for something?" the girl in the hospital bed said while trying to sit up, visibly still groggy from the anaesthesia. "I don't remember…"
The doctor on the right hit a button on the wall and a deafening alarm rang ; soon enough, two robots entered through the door. More were waiting in the corridor, as the room was too small for all of them to fight in.
Jack was used to deal with mechanical creatures by now ; however he also had to get the girl out of the clinic. In one single move, he unsheathed his sword completely and sliced the two robots in front of him, then pushed the doctors away from the girl. Two more robots entered and moved the remains of their fallen comrades aside.
The samurai took a glance at the child ; by the way she was struggling to get out of the bed it was obvious she wouldn't be able to run away. The robots readied their guns, he destroyed those in front of him before they could fire, helped the girl climb on his back and cut his way through the mechanical security guards, spilling oil everywhere.
As he got back to the waiting room, Jack found it empty. No more people, no more machines ; even the person in charge of the front desk was gone. He sheathed his sword and walked towards the door, but halfway through the girl's grip on him loosened and she fell to the floor. He picked her up and carried her in his arms.
"Sorry…'still feel a bit weak… and my head hurts…" she mumbled as they got outside.
"I understand", the samurai replied, "but now isn't the time to talk."
The girl's empty eyes stared at him blankly as he took the first motorboat he could find, laid the girl in it and set sail towards the ocean, away from the clinic. Once they had left the river, Jack turned the boat around so its course was parallel to the shore. He had the occasion to sail small motorboats before, however he would never get used to the sound they made. He wouldn't be able to explain it had he needed to, but he felt such a small boat shouldn't be that noisy.
The girl sat up and adjusted her glasses. She looked about twelve or thirteen years old, almost a teenager and yet still a child.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"Back to where your parents live I suppose" Jack replied. "What did these doctors do to you? From what I've heard, it cannot be anything good."
"I… don't know. They just told me my power would be under control from now on. By the way, I'm Laveda. You… you're the real Samurai Jack, aren't you? Can you sign my – wait, I don't have a pen… or anything for you to sign… oh poop", she said, realising the only things she had on her were the white robe she was given at the clinic, her glasses and the hand-knit hat covering her bald skull.
"What kind of power do you possess?" Jack asked Laveda.
It was most likely what Aku was after this time.
"Well… I can't control it so… it feels more like a curse or something. Sometimes when I'm angry or really sad...miserable… water starts destroying things. After I accidentally destroyed the ladies' room at school they sent me to the clinic. They didn't actually ask me or my mother. They said they didn't have much time…or something like that."
The warrior frowned. If it was Laveda's power over water Aku was interested in, why didn't he simply enlist her in his army? And why would he have his scientists restrain it?
There must be some key information he didn't know about. At least not yet. However, both instinct and experience told him he would find out soon enough, and not in a pleasant way.
He kept sailing towards the town he visited in the morning regardless. It's not like there were many places to go around here. Beside, he had to take the child back to her mother.
The effects of the anaesthesia wore off completely, allowing Laveda to stand on her feet without trembling or stumbling and observe her town appear on the horizon. She had her back turned to Jack, who was at the astern of the boat, making sure its course remained steady despite the wind blowing sideways. Meanwhile, he also kept an eye on the girl.
Air currents up high chased the rainclouds away, letting the midday sun shine in all its glory.
Even though the samurai couldn't see Laveda's expression, he was certain something about her had just changed but he couldn't quite put his finger on it yet.
Jack could have sworn she was taller than she was a mere seconds before. Actually, her actual size hadn't changed one bit : she just stood differently. Slowly, she turned around to face the warrior, stretched her arms and took a look at her surroundings before fixing her gaze on him.
It felt like the confused and groggy young girl was no more and a completely different person was on the boat with him, standing there as though she owned the place and seemingly staring into the depths of his soul. Her body language was drastically different from how it was moments ago, yet Jack couldn't help but think he had seen it before.
Unexpectedly, the girl started laughing. It wasn't the kind of laugh he would expect to hear from a child, but the kind that sent chills down his spine, the kind that meant bad news. He had heard it coming from someone else's mouth before…
"Laveda?" he asked.
She stopped laughing to answer his question :
"No, Samurai Fool!"
Even though the voice was still Laveda's, the words and way of speaking weren't hers.
"The girl was promised her powers would be under control", the person who had taken over the child's body explained. "What the doctors didn't tell her was whose control."
Then, with a snap of Laveda's fingers, a wave much too tall and powerful to have possibly formed this close to the shore the natural way hit the boat and sent Jack overboard.