A/N

So numerous people have let me know that the actions of the characters in the story, particularly Miguel, is extremely out of character for him. Personally, I don't see it. I think most people, if someone says about their girlfriend what Sam said about Tory, anyone would react the way Miguel did. If not, what would you do? I'm genuinely curious. But anyways, if you have a problem with how out-of-character some of the characters are, I don't recommend you reading the following chapter…

CRACK!

As Miguel unleashed a vicious uppercut at Sam's defenseless jaw, time slowed to a halt. Split seconds seemed to last an eternity as Miguel's fist connected, and Sam went crashing into the pool. The first thing Miguel thought was 'serves her right'. He was so wrapped up in his anger that it took several moments for it to sink in. What have I done?! That was the next thing he thought, as he watched Sam slowly emerge from the water, her body shivering and freezing but her ocean eyes blazing with fury.

"What the hell, Miguel?!" Sam snarled, facing him again, extremely wearily. She was drenched in water, absolutely frigid after being sent into the icy pool water, but that paled in comparison to the numbness she was feeling inside. She was briefly immobile in shock, like she was frozen in an ice cube, but as it melted away, unbridled rage took its place.

"I, um… I'm so sorry, Sam. I…"

"Save it." She snapped, shoving him away as he hurried closer to try and see if she was okay. Any lingering romantic feelings Sam had for Miguel were now surely gone, drowned in the water that Miguel had punched her into. She was now feeling the exact same fury Miguel had moments before, letting it burn through her veins as she scowled daggers at her ex-boyfriend. All of that anger, combined with the humiliation after Miguel had rejected her, created a volcano of emotion and it took every ounce of her Miyagi-Do training to stop her from fighting back. "You know, you and Tory are perfect for each other. Let's just hope you get adjacent cells in juvie."

Seriously?! She wasn't done?! Miguel's initially concerned expression instantly darkened as he heard Sam's snide remark. He glared angrily at her, the cobra within him hissing and spitting furiously, egging him on to punch her again.

"Say one more thing about Tory, I dare you." Miguel growled, his voice no higher than a whisper, and yet dripping with more menace than if he yelled it at the top of his lungs. The silent fury… that was when Miguel was at his most lethal. Sam, however, was too angry to be fazed by it. She had her hand in a rattlesnake's cage and was dangerously close to being bitten.

"Or what?! You'll hit me? Yeah, you've tried that before. Twice! And neither time has it clearly worked in shutting me up! You don't scare me, Miguel." Sam spat, her rage clouding her better judgement and removing whatever filter she had so that she was spitting out unbridled remarks. "You know what my dad always says? There's no such thing as a bad student. Only a bad teacher. And he believes that religiously. He doesn't think that any of you Cobra Kais are bad people. Just misguided kids who have been brainwashed by your senseis. But honestly… in my eyes, that's all bullshit. You, Tory, Hawk, all of the Cobra Kais who are constantly starting fights and trying to beat up Miyagi-Do… that's not you guys being brainwashed. You're 17 years old. You're old enough to make your own decisions, to think for yourselves. The actions you guys commit… that's on YOU. That's you guys showing your true colors, being the pieces of shit all of you are, not you being brainwashed by your senseis.

Miguel chuckled mirthlessly at this comment, a dry chuckle not unlike the rattle of a rattlesnake, warning its prey that battle was fast approaching.

"Ah yes. Scary Cobras are the problem for everything. Every conflict's our fault. We're always the enemy. It's honestly adorable how you Miyagi-Dos find ways to absolve yourselves of all blame. You're not better than us, you know? You're not the good guys, we're not the bad guys, don't you get that?"

"Hmmm… is that right? And is that why you start every single fight?" Sam snapped. Miguel rolled his eyes. He had heard that argument about a million times and honestly, he was tired of it.

"Start every fight? Sure. But start every conflict? No. So many of these scraps between our dojos have had you guys at the root of the issue."

"Ha. Well that's just bullshit." Sam snapped. Miguel raised an eyebrow.

"Is it?" He remarked. "Look at what JUST happened. You know I'm dating someone and yet you kiss me. Then you proceed to insult the living hell out of my girlfriend behind her back. And when I react, I'm the bad guy."

"Nobody forced you to hit me, Miguel." Sam growled. "That's just your Cobra Kai aggression."

Miguel shrugged.

"It's not aggression, Sam. That's what you guys don't realise. None of us Cobra Kais, not me, not Tory, not Hawk, not any of us, want to get into these fights at the beginning. We're not sadists who take pleasure in others' pain. But you know what else we're not? We're not cockroaches who insult, insult, insult, expecting to be untouchable no matter how much damage they do verbally. It's not brainwashing, what our senseis do. It's them teaching us to rise above this snowflake generation, who think they can write or say whatever they want with no backlash, no matter who it affects. So yeah, we do throw the first punch, but not unless provoked." He stated. "But of course, given that we win the fights, you pussies go home and cry to…"

SLAP!

Once again, a hand drew back and connected with the side of a face, but this time, it was a nail-polished hand that punched their opponent. Miguel went stumbling back as the unexpected blow connected with his face, reeling from the hit but keeping his balance enough to not fall into the pool like Sam did. He teetered on the edge for a moment, before steadying himself and glaring at Sam, new fury and hatred in his chocolate eyes.

"Oh, so we're really doing this?" Miguel laughed as he watched Sam get into a fighting stance. He shrugged and got into his own fighting stance. "Fair enough. Let's do it…"

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

As soon as the fight began, Sam realised that she had made a big mistake. Fighting Miguel was a step-up from anyone she had fought with before. Though he was similar level to Robby, Sam had never experienced sparring with Robby at full strength as he always went slightly easier on her. But Miguel wasn't holding back at all.

It started well enough for Sam. Miguel threw the first punch, a clobbering blow to the side of Sam's head that it took all of her strength to block. Miguel quickly followed up with two more strikes, neither of which hitting their target. They were sloppy strikes, his anger preventing him from thinking clearly, and even allowing Sam to slip in a one-two combination of her own, her punches connecting with his stomach. Miguel darted backwards after this, briefly licking his wounds and righting his mind. This was really happening. He really was fighting his ex-girlfriend. She was the only person in this war he hadn't defeated yet, hadn't conquered yet, so it was bound to happen at some point. But he had to admit he wasn't looking forward to the day it arrived. As Miguel looked into Sam's piercing eyes, he took a deep breath, forcing himself to forget about everything that had happened between them before. This wasn't Samantha Larusso. This was opponent #97. That was the way his mind worked in any fight, in training or otherwise. He cleared any memories, any feelings he had towards the person in front of him. They became nothing more to him than the human-shaped punching bag in the dojo. It was exactly the same now, and that enabled him to calm down and think much clearer.

Miguel entered fight mode. Almost in an instant, the entire fight changed. Miguel stopped the clumsy swings and they transformed into sharp, fierce combinations, short flurries of punches and kicks that were nearly impossible for Sam to parry. She was able to block them for a short while, but was soon running into a problem. One massive problem she was facing as she fought someone a lot physically stronger than her and her previous opponents, was that although she was able to block a lot of his strikes with her hands, the sheer force of the impacts rocked through her body, weakening her with every strike. It was like she was a wall, and although a wrecking ball might not break it on the first try, it would severely weaken it to the extent that there would inevitably come a time when the wrecking ball would break through and collapse the wall. This indeed happened moments later, as one of Miguel's kicks finally broke through the wall of Sam's Miyagi-Do defense…

Miguel danced around Sam for a while, throwing enough strikes to keep her on her heels, but none of them managing to connect. He had realised that although they fought for the same dojo, fighting Sam was extremely different to fighting Robby. With Robby, he knew that the boy would throw just as many strikes as Miguel did at him, so it was more about finding a mistake, or a sloppy moment that would allow him to capitalize. It was different with Sam. She was physically weaker than Robby, as well as being much smaller and having a much shorter reach than her Miyagi-Do co-leader. Miguel knew it, and she knew it too, so she decided to just dig her heels in and weather the storm until she managed to find an opening. Her defense was annoyingly difficult to penetrate. She wasn't particularly good either. She hadn't thrown more than 3 strikes in the entire fight, but managed to parry all of the strikes that he sent her way. That was until he threw an extremely cheeky move his way. He suddenly took half a step back from Sam, before lunging at her legs, preparing to tackle her. Sam noticed, and she braced herself and prepared to counter the tackle attempt. The tackle was never going to work, but it was lucky that Miguel never planned to actually execute it. As he feigned a takedown attempt, he waited for Sam to drop her hands and lean down slightly to prepare to defend it, before shooting upright again. He knew that this would only work if he caught Sam off-guard and capitalized on an extremely short window of time. Because for a very brief moment, a matter of milliseconds, Sam was leaning down with her head unguarded. Miguel took that moment to strike, rearing back and sending a vicious knee strike right at Sam's head.

A sickening crack filled the air as Miguel's kick landed to perfection. It connected right with Sam's defenseless face, driving right through her nose and breaking it instantly. Sam let out a quiet cry of pain as she felt the ruthless blow land, but it wasn't over yet. As she stumbled backwards, clutching her face in pain, Miguel charged again, punching her in the solar plexus to make her drop her hands, and then laying a vicious hook to the side of her head to send her falling to the ground. Sam saw stars after the first knee, but after those two following punches, she very nearly blacked out on the spot. However, she caught a glimpse of the manic fury in Miguel's eyes and knew that there was no telling how far he would go after she was knocked out, so she forced herself to remain conscious. Her body was in a world of pain, agony ebbing from her nose and throbbing around the rest of her body. Her arms, her legs, her stomach, her head, all of the places where Miguel had connected were all in excruciating pain, and she couldn't even gather the strength to stand.

Miguel had fully lost it at this point. He was more furious than he had been in any fight he had ever been a part of. More so than in his fight against Hawk in Coyote Creek. More so than when he had gotten beaten up by Kyler and his gang all those times. More so than any of his bouts with Robby. The whole summer of animosity between their dojos bubbled up at that moment. Sam cheating on him with Robby and then denying it. Making him the villain for getting mad when he was drunk and confronted them. Miyagi-Do's not-so-subtle ad that insulted Cobra Kai. Tory's confrontation with Sam in the beach club. The events of the roller rink. They all piled into one, and caused Miguel to absolutely lose control. He had never felt this way before. On one hand, he felt absolutely emotionless as he stared down at the girl before him. But on the other, he felt wrath like he never had before. There was no mercy in his veins at all on that starless night. He looked down to see Sam trying to scuttle away, too weak to get back to her feet to run away, and he chuckled mirthlessly, grabbing her by the hair and roughly yanking her to her feet.

"Where are you going?" He snarled. "We're not done…"

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Meanwhile, inside the house, tensions were rising even higher between the two factions. So high, in fact, that neither side noticed that their respective leaders had disappeared. Robby had grabbed food and was looking around the house for Sam when suddenly, he tripped over someone's foot. He went sprawling to the ground and as he rolled around, he found himself staring up at a chuckling Hawk.

"Oops. Sorry. Didn't see you there." Hawk remarked, smirking at him. Robby immediately shot to his feet, squaring up to his mohawked rival. In an instant, Tory, Demetri, Mitch, Chris, Bert, Nate and many more Miyagi-Dos had joined them, all of them facing off against each other, preparing to strike at any moment. The gasoline had been poured, the match had been lit, it was just a matter now of who would drop that match on the fire. They all silently squared up to each other, sizing up their opponents and all internally thinking about beating the living crap out of their enemies, when suddenly, the silence was broken as Moon burst into the room.

"GUYS!" She shouted, panting for breath. She had just seen what was going on in the backyard and was racing to get help. "Come quick! Miguel and Sam are fighting outside!"

To be continued…