CHAPTER 36

"So… Coyote Creek." Marcos murmured as he followed Kreese into his office after class that afternoon. Kreese sat in his chair and gestured to Marcos to sit opposite him, a position both had become pretty familiar with over the past month. Both Marcos and Kreese had spent almost every waking moment at the dojo for the past few months. They lived and breathed Cobra Kai, and the reason for that was that neither had much else in their lives other than Karate. For this reason, they had spent a lot of time together, training for the Taikai. It wasn't just Marcos training either. Quite often, Kreese and his student sparred together as a way of getting them both prepared for their respective divisions in the Taikai. The more time they spent together, the more Kreese felt an attachment to this student, a genuine bond that he had felt with only 2 students before (Johnny Lawrence and Tory Nichols). He saw so much of his young self in Marcos, and the more time he spent around him, the more of his younger self he could feel returning to him, an incredible feeling that not only improved him as a fighter, but made him feel like a better man.

In a week's time, however, Kreese would not be fighting alongside or against his student. He would be able to do nothing more than advise him and hope for the best.

"Yes. Are you ready?" Kreese asked. Marcos looked at him and raised an eyebrow.

"Ready for what exactly?" Marcos remarked. That's when Kreese remembered.

"Right. I forgot you hadn't experienced Coyote Creek before." Kreese remarked. And the sensei then proceeded to explain to Marcos all about the infamous training exercise: the rules, the intricacies, the tactics. After he was done, Marcos nodded thoughtfully, having committed all of it to memory and was now actively processing ideas and strategies of his own.

"So what's our play, Sensei? How are we going to do this? Will we all attack as one big group? Will Sarah and I just work as a duo to take them out?"

Kreese chuckled and shook his head.

"Mr. Oliviera, the thing that you're going to have to learn is that in Coyote Creek, just like in life, it's every man for himself. Your number 1 priority, your only priority is to protect yourself. It isn't your job to protect your friends."

"But Sensei, won't that just cause all of us to get eliminated if they gang up on us? Can't really fight a 5 on 1." Marcos asked. Kreese shook his head.

"Simple mathematics… if you separate from the others, Ms. Gledhill included, while at Coyote Creek, it will force Miyagi-Do to split their forces too to try and get to you all. They will be rendered unable to ambush using their numerical advantage, so it would level the playing field. If anything, it would swing the balance in our favor, as there is not 1 member of Miyagi-Do capable of beating you in a 1 on 1 fight right now."

While Marcos appreciated the complement, he didn't allow it to go to his head. This was where his father's tough love was useful. If there was any risk of him ever growing overconfident due to praise, his father's less kind words would balance it all out and keep him humble, eager to improve.

"So working alone… understood." Marcos murmured. Kreese nodded.

"Don't worry so much. Trust me, you've got this." He told him, almost encouragingly, a feeling alien to anyone who Kreese had mentored in the past. "Now… is there anything else you'd like to talk about?"

"Yeah, actually." He replied. "You know how when you sent Sarah and I on the mission to the Larussos' place, you told us to take note of anything interesting that we noticed with the Miyagi-Dos?"

"Did you find something?" Kreese asked, curiously. Marcos slowly nodded.

"Kind of. It wasn't something really to do with Miyagi-Do though. It was something to do with one of the students… Robby Keene."

Kreese chuckled as he leaned back in his chair slightly.

"Ah… Mr. Keene. One of the most naturally talented students I've coached. Even more talent than his father. Strong, intelligent, agile. But unable to win due to getting constantly sidetracked by emotional distractions. He never really took to the Way of the Fist like some of the others I've coached. He always seemed reluctant, scared. If he hadn't been, there was no way he wasn't winning the All-Valley last year."

"Yeah, well, it's about him." Marcos said. "There was something I noticed about him. About the nature of his relationship with the other students."

"What is it?" Kreese's curiosity was extremely high now.

"It's clearly obvious that Robby Keene cares about those around him: his girlfriend, his friends, his senseis. But there seems to be some kind of trouble in paradise. Some kind of resentment he still harbored towards his own teammates."

"Hmmm." He replied. "Are you sure about this?"

Marcos shrugged.

"Kind of. Like you instructed me to, I took some verbal shots at the Miyagi-Dos. I brought up the fight and the injury. I brought up the infidelity between Samantha Larusso and Miguel Diaz. And I watched Robby's reaction. It's clear he's not all good with them after all of this. If I had to guess, I'd say that none of them have apologized and truly moved on from these events in the slightest." Marcos commented.

Kreese nodded, thoughtfully.

"That's interesting." Kreese eventually replied. "And that gives me an idea."

"Oh yeah? What is it?"

"During my time in Vietnam, I had the opportunity to work with a Special Forces black ops group in the North. There were just a few of us, the very best of the best. We were a team. No… more than that. We were brothers."

Marcos raised an eyebrow questioningly, unsure as to how this was relevant.

"And in order for our unit to function, every single one of us had to be in sync. If even one of us were off, the entire team wouldn't be able to function, and we'd risk one of our men not coming back from a mission. It even happened a couple of times."

"I… I'm so sorry, Sensei." Marcos murmured as he noticed his sensei pause for a moment, looking down as he silently remembered his fallen soldiers.

"It's alright." Kreese gruffly responded. "The reason I'm telling you all this is because I believe that Miyagi-Do functions in the same way. If any of their members are off, that throws off the entire group and prevents them from being able to function as a unit. Especially if that person is Robby Keene. As an original Miyagi-Do student and the son of the Eagle-Fang sensei… he has personal connections with almost every single member of their dojo. And so I believe that if we can convince him to turn on Miyagi-Do, everything else will inevitably crumble and Miyagi-Do would implode…"

Kreese and Marcos were then interrupted by the sound of the dojo door opening once more. They looked at one another, confused. Training was long over for the afternoon, so who could this possibly be? As they walked out of the office, they saw that it was a student, or rather a prospective student. It was someone that they had heard a lot about, but neither had met before, mostly because he hadn't been available to fight for anyone until a few days ago. He was a formidable fighter, even if he was untrained. And as Kreese welcomed the new student into the dojo, he knew that this person would be a formidable fighter for their dojo, and now was the perfect time to recruit him, just in time for him to make his impact in Coyote Creek…

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One week later…

8 am sharp. That's when Kreese had instructed all of his students to be at Coyote Creek, making sure to be early enough to allow his students to walk around the Creek and get a lay of the environment before Miyagi-Do arrived, as well as some of them taking up hiding spots and setting up ambushes for their rivals.

It was the big day, and anticipation filled the air from both sides. The game was on between Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do. And although there was nothing official riding on it, the pressure was definitely higher than ever. All of the burden, all of the weight lay on the shoulders of the students. There was nothing their senseis could do to help them now. Today, the strongest would manage to swim and the rest… they would all sink.

Although there were many of the same fighters as who there would eventually be at the Taikai, they knew that this wasn't a rehearsal run for it at all. Because while the Taikai was a controlled point-scored fight, Coyote Creek's only rule was that there weren't any. The aim of the game was to collect your opponent's headband, and how you could go about doing that was with pretty much every move you had in the arsenal.

Marcos had woken up at the crack of dawn that morning, eager to be alert and get some last minute practice in before the big moment. It was a smart idea, other than the fact that when his alarm had gone off, his father had woken up to it in the next room and had bellowed at him to either turn it off that second or lose his arm. Kreese had risen equally early, and the pair decided to meet at the dojo to do a little bit of training, Sarah joining them shortly after. The rest of the Valley slept in on their Saturday morning. Not them. They were all out in their preparation, and Miyagi-Do were exactly the same.

9 am was the time that Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do had agreed to begin at the Creek, so they had around an hour to prepare before Miyagi-Do arrived. Every Cobra Kai had shown up: Marcos, Sarah, Kenny, Kyler, even their newest student. You either showed up or you were kicked off the team, plain and simple.

While the rest of Cobra Kai ventured out into the Creek to find their hiding spots and plan their upcoming assault on Miyagi-Do, Marcos and Sarah remained at the rendezvous point with Sensei Kreese and Sensei Kim. They had their own unique strategy for the game - they wouldn't be joining the big group and would instead be venturing out alone - so there was no harm in them waiting by the base to greet their opposition, and spar a little together as they waited for them to arrive. Neither of them really said a word, as their nerves were beginning to amp up. They were able to have just a few more minutes to shake out any knots and tightness in their systems, before finally, they saw a convoy of cars pull up to Coyote Creek. The enemy had arrived…