CHAPTER 76

Robby and Tory didn't say another word to each other as they completed their task and put up all of the tents. Both were silently seething, Robby still processing Tory's words. They were harsh, there was no doubt about this. As always, Tory didn't bother sugarcoating her message. But was she right? His emotions went from anger to indignance to confusion to deep thought. Had he taken a step back as a leader since returning to Miyagi-Do? Was he content to just sit back and not help others?

The answer to that question was a layered one. On one hand, he wasn't an idiot. He knew that he had taken charge much more back in Cobra Kai than he had been in Miyagi-Do. The real question was, was that actually something to be concerned about?

He knew that the reason for him taking a step back was that in Cobra Kai, he had a lot more to offer to all of them. He brought with him a completely different style, a unique method of fighting that all of them could learn from. They were the established underdogs so needed all the help they could get, and learning Miyagi-Do under Robby's teachings was absolutely vital. In contrast, Miyagi-Do were all adept in both styles already, having learned under both Daniel and Johnny, so didn't need this extra help from him.

Robby was also reluctant to take too much of a personal role in anyone else's training after what had happened with Kenny. He had gotten too close, and ended up corrupting the boy to a point of no return. He wasn't going to make the same mistake twice, not with any of the innocent Miyagi-Dos, and the easiest way to do that was to just keep distance and not get too involved. He trained 2 on 1 with just Chozen and Tory for the most part, and when they trained as a group, he focused on himself and left mentoring responsibilities to the senseis.

The evening flew by pretty quickly, Robby's mind drifted off in thought the entire time. After they had finished putting up tents, tables and other things to make the open meadow feel more like a campsite, they noticed the rest of the group beginning to return from their respective tasks. Hawk, Demetri and Chris had collected enough firewood to create a billowing fire in the center of the campsite. Nate, Bert Anthony and Devon's fishing trip had also shockingly been a success. They had found the lake that Daniel had briefly mentioned, and they had caught enough fish to fill an entire bucket. They cleaned them and then speared the fish onto long spiked branches, beginning to cook them. Even Sam and Miguel's mission had been a success, with the couple coming back with a small basket full of strawberries and other fruit that they had found around.

The sun had long begun to set, the temperature dropping in the forest and only a little light left in the sky to illuminate them. The fire was the only thing crucially keeping them bright and warm at this point. It was what allowed them to see movement within the trees up ahead of them, as they all sat in a circle around the fire. Their heads all spun around to see the trees rustling, some of them beginning to stand in case a threat from within the forest was about to pop out, but thankfully it was only their senseis. Johnny, Daniel, Chozen and Barnes all walked over to them for the first time since they arrived, smiling widely.

"Wow. They finally showed up." Sam remarked. "Were you guys waiting until we had died of starvation to finally make an appearance? Or were you going to wait until it was hypothermia that got us?"

"This doesn't look like starvation to me." Johnny responded. "Nor does it look like hypo-whatever you said."

"Yeah, because we did everything!" Anthony exclaimed. "We put up tents, made this campsite, made a fire, caught fish, found food… all of it ourselves!"

"You mean you used the resources we gave and worked together to create a livable environment… we never expected that to happen." Barnes remarked sarcastically. That's when everyone realized…

"Wait… this was all planned?" Miguel asked.

"Come on, you don't think I'd actually forget food, did you? And you really didn't think we'd leave you all to starve?" Daniel chuckled. "Food's in a covered compartment at the bottom of the trunk of Johnny's van if anyone's still hungry."

Shockingly, none of the Miyagi-Dos were though. They were all filled up from the meal that they had prepared and eaten all together. In a way, this training exercise - if you could even call it that - had done exactly what it was supposed to. It had brought all of the Miyagi-Dos together again. A group now pretty separated due to training with different senseis each, they had been forced to work together, and in that, they had all bonded as a whole unit again. They had shared in each other's company, worked together, made jokes together, and it had all brought them closer in a way that class couldn't. It was just them, no senseis and no Cobra Kais around, and it allowed them to be more than Karate students for a while. It allowed them to just be kids.

After a while, however, they all began to grow tired. The senseis had set up their camp a little bit away, so the senseis all returned there, leaving the kids in the company of each other. One by one, they also began to retire to their tents for the night, until there were only two people left. They sat opposite one another on either side of the campfire, seeing the flames reflected in both of their eyes.

For a long while, they were both silent. Both were in deep thought, neither the most talkative person in general anyways. However, after a while, they decided to move to sit beside each other so they could talk, quietly enough to not wake the people sound asleep.

"Can't sleep?" Miguel asked Robby as the two teenagers sat next to each other. As Robby poked the flames with a long wooden stick, he sighed and shook his head.

"Not tired. You?" He replied. Miguel shrugged.

"Same." He murmured. There was a long silence that then overtook the two boys, before Miguel eventually spoke again. "Can I ask you something?"

"Fire away." Robby told him.

"Why is it that you're so adamant to keep everyone from going to the cops on Marcos?" Miguel asked. Robby sighed. This again. "Look, this isn't me trying to convince you of anything. Hawk said no. I respect that. I'm just curious, because you seemed pretty strongly against it."

"I just… I don't buy that he deserves it. Especially when others have done worse with much less consequences." Robby said.

"Doesn't deserve what exactly though?" Miguel asked gently. "You got 3 months in juvie after… what happened at school. Marcos would get a month maybe, if that."

"You're forgetting he's not American." Robby murmured. "You could get him deported."

"Right." Miguel said, realizing this. Robby nodded, still prodding at the fire with his stick, staring at the way the orange embers fluttering into the sky.

"That's not only why I don't think he deserves it though." Robby said quietly. "To be honest, after going through it myself, I don't think anyone deserves it."

"What? Juvie?" Miguel asked. Robby shrugged.

"Any of it. Tory didn't go to Juvie and she had it just as bad. Because being a juvenile criminal… it doesn't go away after your sentence. You can try and move on with your life, but the tag always follows one step behind. Anyone hears that you're an ex-juvenile convict and they treat you completely differently. You should've seen the first day of school this year, even now to this date to be honest, the other students… they treat me like I'm a bloodthirsty murderer who's about to target them or something. They're all terrified of me. I'm not just Robby Keene anymore. I'm Robby Keene, the convicted attempted murderer. And that goes for the kids at school, job employers, everyone. For the rest of my life. I don't think we should be knowingly subjecting anyone to that unless they've done something truly, truly bad."

"Even if that risks others getting hurt in the future?" Miguel asked. It wasn't an accusatory question in any way. He was genuinely just trying to get answers and understand better.

"Look, you're going to have to trust me when I say this, but nobody's at risk." Robby said. "I know him. He's not an idiot. Nor is he some bloodthirsty person, hell bent on revenge and destruction like some of the others. If you leave him alone, like properly leave him alone, then he won't bother you. Because his ambitions aren't to destroy Miyagi-Do. He wants to win the Taikai. That's why he's even training with them in the first place. Ideally, he doesn't want to have to fight you guys beforehand. It's only when he's pushed into a fight that he comes out swinging."

"Let's not be stupid here though, even if he doesn't want to fight before the Taikai, more likely than not, that's going to happen anyways. Whether it be a misunderstanding, whether it be one of the morons in Cobra Kai or even on our side starting it, chances are we're going to have to fight them again at some point. And that… that doesn't scare you? Having to fight him?"

"No, I'm not." Robby replied honestly, surprising even himself with that fact. Because he wasn't. Beating Marcos the other night, if nothing else, had proven that the man was human. He wasn't some undefeatable barrier that they couldn't get through, like he had seemed up until that point. "Why? Are you? Is that what this is about?"

It was Miguel's turn to sigh, looking downwards and avoiding Robby's gaze.

"I know. Not very leader-y, huh?" Miguel remarked. Robby chuckled, remembering his confrontation with Tory earlier.

"Trust me. Of all people, I think I have the least room to say anything about being a leader. I spent about an hour this afternoon getting a lashing from Tory about how I'm such a shitty leader and so everything bad that happens now to anyone is automatically my fault." Robby responded. "Anyways though, what's wrong? Is it your injury?"

"Kind of." Miguel replied. When he saw the concerned expression on Robby's face, he shook his head. "It's nothing like that, don't worry. It's not acting up again or anything. This… nah, this is more mental than anything else."

"What is it?" Robby questioned. Miguel took a deep breath before forcing himself to look at Robby once more.

"I don't know. I know it might sound stupid or whatever. It's just… for the past few months, it always feels like I'm like one step away from reinjuring myself, whenever I'm ever in a fight. Since the tournament, it's always felt this way. And since Marcos arrived, it's just gotten so much worse."

"But… you're no longer injured, right? The back's healed?" Robby asked. Miguel nodded.

"It is. Well, at least as much as it can possibly be. It'll never be how it was. I'll always be a bit more prone to cramps and stuff in that area. But I'm as close to normal as I think I'll ever be. And yet… every time I come to fight, I feel like I'm holding back. Like I'm scared of going 100%, in fear of getting reinjured. Being put back in that fucking wheelchair and being forced to live the same 3 months of recovery again. Learning to walk again, learning to fight again, was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my entire life. Both mentally and physically. I don't think I'll be able to go through it all again if I get reinjured. Don't think I'll have the strength to. So instead, it's like I have a mental block that prevents me from truly pushing myself. And the fear only gets worse when I think about how if I give anything less than 100% against Marcos, there's a good chance I'll get reinjured anyways. It just feels so hopeless."

Immediately, Robby began to understand what Miguel was going through, why he seemed somewhat eager to remove Marcos from the Valley. He was scared. Not necessarily of Marcos, but of being dragged right back into the predicament he had been in at the start of the year, the predicament that he had put the boy in himself. Robby felt real sympathy for what the boy was going through. Things had been going so well with Chozen, he had felt himself soaring so high and pushing past his limits so often, that he hadn't stopped to think about how maybe others weren't doing the same. Some leader he was.

"Do you know what can be done? To clear that block?" Robby asked gently. Miguel put his head in his hands and shook his head.

"I wish." He responded. "It doesn't matter what Sensei says. It doesn't matter who I have to fight. The feeling just lingers all the time. That suspicion that this is going to be the fight where I get reinjured." Miguel said.

Robby slowly processed all of this. After a few seconds, Robby lifted the branch that he was playing with in the fire, blowing it a few times to cool it down a little.

"What are you doi-OW!" Miguel was interrupted when all of a sudden, Robby poked the still scalding branch against Miguel's leg. Although it probably wasn't hot enough to leave a burn mark, it still hurt like a son of a bitch. "What the hell was that for?!"

"It's to prove a point. You can get hurt doing literally anything. Even sitting." Robby replied. To follow up his point, the branch was now cooled down enough for Robby to hold it like a baseball bat, and he stood up and clobbered it powerfully against Miguel's head. "See?"

"Argh! Okay, man, I get it! Stop!" Miguel exclaimed, seeing stars from the hard blow, leaping to his own feet.

"I don't know. Maybe once more to hammer home the point." Robby remarked, raising the small branch again. However, before he could hit Miguel with it, Miguel managed to catch it. But in the process, he hadn't noticed Robby letting go of the branch entirely, not until it was too late and Robby had swept him to the ground, causing Miguel to land not-too-gently on his stomach. He landed in the worst position possible too: on top of the log that they had previously been sitting on, his stomach smacking loudly against the wood as he fell.

"Argh." Miguel groaned, in pain but quickly managed to shoot up to his feet. "What the hell, man?!"

"My point… is that you can get injured anywhere, anytime. There are a million ways here alone that can injure you or worse. You can be walking through the woods, fall and break a leg. You can starve because your idiot senseis forgot to pack the food. You can hit your head on a tree branch and get concussed. You can fall into the fire and burn yourself. You can fall on something hard and hurt your back. You can…"

"I get it." Miguel murmured.

"If your top priority is not getting injured and you do absolutely everything to prevent that from happening, then you're also going to miss out on a whole lot of great things. Because nothing great comes without putting yourself out there, mind and body. Especially with what we do. With the life we've both chosen. If you're too afraid to push yourself out there, then what's the point? In any of it?"

Miguel slowly nodded. He knew Robby was right. Nothing great in his life had come without risk, without putting his body on the line. He got beat up; he got a sensei and a dojo. He fought Kyler; he got a date with Sam. He got beat up on multiple occasions in every dojo he'd been in, and that's how he had built familial-type bonds with all of the other students.

"You're right." Miguel eventually admitted.

"Look, I know it's all easier said than done." Robby said. "So if you ever want someone to help spar with you, help push you to the limits and stop you from holding back, you know where to find me."

"Thank you." Miguel said gratefully, glancing sideways at the boy beside him.

"No problem." Robby mumbled back.

"And hey, whatever you were saying earlier about being a bad leader…" Miguel said, and Robby looked up at him. "Don't worry about it. People just lead in different ways. Some are the loud type who control the entire group together. Others do what you just did now and connect with their group individually. Trust me, you're not nearly as bad as you think you are. You're actually a really good one."

"Thanks."