Notes : thank you so much for the review, K! You made my entire year! *hug*
Anyway, here's the second half of the story :)
Jack swam to the shore as fast as he could and stood up on the wet sand. He had lost his hat, his soaked gi clung to his skin and the wind coming from the ocean was chilling him to the bone, but otherwise he was unhurt. It was far from being over though, as his enemy was following him by walking on water.
The samurai stepped back. He couldn't harm an innocent, possessed or not, and Aku knew it well ; he had to find another way to defeat him. He ran away from the sandy part of the shore to a nearby group of rock formations and hid behind a boulder to buy himself some time.
Meanwhile, Aku reached the shore. Since the glasses of patient forty-four were now lost, everything in the distance looked blurry. However, that didn't prevent him from identifying the white shape that was running away. The demon laughed and followed the human to the rocky terrain, certain of his soon-to-be victory. Using the girl's power, he dried her clothes as he walked.
"You cannot hide forever, samurai!" he stated as he reached the first boulders.
Finding him would probably take him a bit longer in the girl's body than in his own though : just like every member of her kind she had no sense of smell.
"I know you well, samurai. You slaughter all the drones and bounty hunters I send you daily, and yet you are unable to harm a child, even to save your own pathetic life. Your foolishness will LEAD YOU TO YOUR DOOM! HAHAHAHA!"
Aku's laughter was interrupted by a sharp pain in the foot ; his first thought was that he had somehow stepped on the sword but it turned out it was simply a very pointy pebble. Since he couldn't use his laser eye beams to destroy it, he picked it up and threw it away in anger.
He would never have used this body this way had he not been certain his foe wouldn't kill it : mortals couldn't even walk barefoot on pebbles without injuring themselves!
The demon gathered the water around him and shaped it like a spear before freezing it. When he saw a white shape jump from behind a boulder, he threw the ice spear at it right away.
Aku squinted : he could have sworn his weapon hit his enemy and yet he didn't hear either a scream or the sound of flesh being impaled, only the ice breaking on solid rock. He got closer to where the spear landed and found out that what he had mistaken for the samurai was nothing more than a soaked piece of clothing.
He gestured towards the shards of ice on the ground and they got back together, this time in the shape of a sword. He didn't get to actually use it though, as Samurai Jack jumped from behind a large boulder and knocked the demon's weapon out of his hand, or rather, the hand of his little puppet.
"Laveda, if you still can hear me, do not let Aku control you! You must fight his influence!" the warrior said, now facing his opponent but still not touching his sword.
"You are wasting your time, samurai! The girl is mine! If you want to free her, you will have to kill her."
Aku raised his host's hand and soon, Jack witnessed the water of his own body leaving him and spilling on the ground.
"NO!" Laveda shouted, interrupting the spell.
The samurai took a step forward as the girl clutched her skull with both her hands but then stepped back as she once again started talking like the Shogun of Sorrow :
"You insolent brat! Your body and mind belong to Aku!"
"No! Get out of my head! Out, out, OUT!"
"I will stay as long as I please, foolish girl!"
"I won't let you kill him!"
The girl fell to her knees on the cold wet stone, still clutching her head. Her inner struggle reminded Jack of one of the darkest moments of his life, when evil almost consumed him ; Laveda needed his help more than ever.
However, before he could approach her any further, she let out a loud scream and then passed out.
Jack put his gi back on then carried the unconscious girl once more. His mouth was dryer than any desert he had travelled through, he felt more and more dizzy each step he took, and yet he kept walking. He wished he could drink salt water.
Before he could reach the town Laveda lived in, he stumbled on his feet, accidentally dropped her on the beach and fell.
The child opened her eyes, blinked, saw the samurai lying face first in the sand and crawled towards him.
"…Sorry", he said, "I -"
"No, I am sorry… Sorry I can't give you your water back. I… can't control it. That's why I ended up in that clinic in the first place."
Laveda stood up. She didn't know how long she had left before Aku would take over her body again, but she was sure of one thing : she didn't have any time to lose.
"Stay right here, I'll go get some help", she told Jack as he got in a sitting position since he clearly was too dizzy to stand at the moment.
The girl ran to her hometown as fast as she could, ignoring the wound in her foot that left traces of blood in the sand.
As she reached the outskirt of the town, she bumped into a red-haired giant of a man with a machine gun as a peg leg.
"Hey, watch where yer goin', lad!" he shouted.
"Sorry, myfriendneedshelpdoyouhaveawaterbottle?"
"Slow down a bit, will ye?"
"Jack's dehydrated, he could die if no-one helps him!"
"Did ye say 'Jack'?" the man asked, grabbing both her shoulders and shaking her as he spoke. "Where is he?"
Laveda pointed at the direction she came from. The giant picked her up from the ground and carried her on his shoulder as he ran towards the beach. He let her climb down on the wet sand once they reached the samurai ; the red-haired man then proceeded to ask him tons of question while rummaging through the tiny cat-shaped pouch on the front of his kilt.
After a dozen grenades and four bottles of sarsaparilla (three of them empty) were dropped in the sand, the Scotsman finally found what he was looking for : a full two litre water bottle he gave to Jack.
It was obvious from the way the giant called the samurai "friend" and "Jackie boy" that they knew each other well.
"Thank you both for you help", Jack said while putting the cap back on the bottle and standing up on his feet.
He wasn't exactly back to full health just yet but at least he felt a bit better.
"Don't even mention it, Jackie!" the Scotsman replied.
"It's the least I could do…" Laveda added. "Anyway, I don't know how long it'll be before he comes back, but I'm sure my mum could help. She's a surgeon too, you see, and -"
"What're ye talkin' about, wee lad?"
"I doubt there is any time for lengthy explanations, my friend", the samurai pointed out before turning to the girl. "Where is your mother?"
Soon, Laveda was back on the Scotsman's shoulder, guiding him and Jack to her mother's hospital. It was located on a nearby small island linked to the harbour by a metal bridge.
A few minutes later, the trio entered the hospital on the island. They didn't have to wait for long before Laveda's mother, informed her daughter had returned, rushed to the waiting room and wrapped her arms around her.
"Where have you been, my dear?" the surgeon asked her child. "What happened?"
"I don't know", the girl replied. "The people from the other clinic did something to my brain and… now AkucancontrolmeandmypowerImscaredhelpme!"
Laveda's mother let go of her, took a step back, grabbed a device hanging from her belt and held it in front of her daughter's face. The Scotsman placed himself behind the surgeon to be able to see the screen of the device ; the samurai followed his example.
"The scanner shows an implant in your brain", the woman explained. "But there's also something else… I can't identify it."
"I think I can", Jack stated. "But here isn't the place to talk about it."
The other three gave the samurai surprised looks but agreed to go to one of the few empty rooms in the hospital before asking any more question.
Once there, Laveda sat on the bed while the three adults stood around it.
"May I ask you to remove your hat?" Jack asked her.
As she did so, both her mother and the Scotsman gasped.
"Hey, they shaved my head before opening it, what did you exp-"
"Ye've got a nasty-looking black rash on yer skull, lad", the red-haired warrior interrupted the girl. "I dinna know what that is but it doesn't look natural."
"This is no rash", Jack explained. "This is Aku. He must have inserted a part of himself in that… implant the doctors of the other town placed in your head. He has done something like this before, but with bigger machines."
Silence followed his words, as this was a lot to take in for everyone.
"So…" the surgeon finally spoke. "The unknown substance my scanner detected also was…?"
The samurai nodded.
"Who did that to ye?" the Scotsman asked Laveda while reaching for his claymore on his back. "No-one messes with me friend's friends and gets away with it!"
"Not now, my friend" Jack stopped him. "For now we have to help Laveda fight Aku's influence on her."
"Her? He- she's a lass?"
"I have fought Aku's corruption before", the samurai told the girl. "To vanquish evil you have to use the good within you."
"Wait, how exactly do I -"
Laveda stopped mid-sentence and stared blankly at nothing in particular for a second, then her posture changed. And then she stood up and rushed to the door without any explanation ; however the Scostman caught her with his large hands right before she could leave.
The man from the past knew that, even though the words came from Laveda's mouth, it wasn't her who was shouting and calling his friend a fool.
The surgeon called in reinforcements and the next second a nurse came in with a syringe she used to sedate the child while the Scotsman restrained her.
In her sedative-induced dream, Laveda found herself alone and lost in a black emptiness.
Actually, she wasn't alone : the darkness itself was sentient. However, it was everything but friendly. It was everywhere around her, it was the only thing she could see, and its goal was to control her… and then consume her.
"It is pointless to resist, my child", the darkness told her.
"I know", she whispered.
"You will be a very useful weapon in Aku's arsenal… a weapon that can get rid of the samurai once and for all!"
"Wait, no, that's not what I want to become!" the girl exclaimed, standing up on her feet. "I have fought you on the shore, and I will do it again!"
Waves of light appeared around her, crashing into the darkness and eroding it bit by bit, forcing in to take a shape to be able to fight back. The shape the Shogun of Sorrow appeared in most often.
"I won't tolerate any more insolence! This world belongs to Aku and so does everything in it, INCLUDING YOU!"
"No", Laveda replied. "My body belongs to me, my mind belongs to me, I belong to me! And no-one can ever change this!"
As Aku was about to strike her down with his gigantic claws, she turned the waves into a frozen shield, effectively blocking the attack, then turned the shield into spear she threw right into the demon's mouth.
The girl created more waves of light to drown Aku in it, reclaiming what was hers : herself.
She woke up strapped to a hospital bed, her mother continuously scanning her with her device.
"I don't know what happened, but… there's no trace of Aku in your brain anymore", the surgeon said. "You did it!"
Laveda's mother and Jack, who had remained in the room as well, removed all the straps restraining the child. Once it was done, the woman hugged her daughter tightly.
"Thank all the gods, you're ok now…" she whispered, tears in her eyes.
Jack took a few steps back and finally left the room, letting mother and daughter share this moment alone.
As he was taking one more gulp from the water bottle still in his hand, the Scotsman came back from the bathroom and asked him how things were going for the girl. The samurai's smile spoke louder and clearer than any word could have.
The implant in Laveda's brain still needed to be removed, but without that piece of him in it Aku could no longer take control of her. Though, her mother decided it would be best to wait at least a day or two, as having her skull opened once in the past twelve hours was more than enough.
After saying goodbye to the surgeon and her daughter, Jack and the Scotsman (who promised to keep an eye on his friend until he was certain he was hydrated enough) left the hospital to find the nearest inn.
A few days later, as both the implant in her brain and the bandage on her foot had been removed, Laveda finally left her mother's hospital. However, she didn't leave the island but stood on the shore, observing the waves crashing at her feet.
"Ok… if he could do it, you can do it", she muttered to herself before closing her eyes, taking a deep breath and stepping forwards.
A few seconds later, she opened her eyes again. Thanks to her new glasses she could see very clearly her perceptions didn't deceive her : she was walking on water. She couldn't help but smile from ear to ear.
She snapped her fingers and a wave appeared nearby in the otherwise calm ocean.
Aku did only one good thing a few days ago, although it wasn't his intention : he proved that, contrary to what Laveda used to believe, her power could be controlled.
And here, standing on the surface of the ocean; she swore to put it to good use. It was the least she could do.