CHAPTER 39

Daniel led Miguel, Johnny and Hawk into the house. Johnny and Miguel had already briefed Hawk on the situation on the way there so he was up to speed.

"What's up, Johnny? What are you doing here?" Daniel asked again.

"We need your opinion on something." Johnny said. Daniel raised an eyebrow, confused. This was NOT what he expected when he saw the three Eagle-Fangs at his doorsteps.

"Um… okay? What's up?" Daniel asked as he led them into the living room, where Amanda and Sam were sitting. When Sam turned towards them, Miguel's eyes widened. The whole of Sam's face was covered in massive bruises, and she was holding an ice pack to the side of her face.

"Jeez. What happened to you?" Johnny asked.

"Tory." Sam murmured in reply.

"Oh, my God. Are you okay?!" Miguel exclaimed, walking over to her.

"Fine. She only beat me up for like 30 seconds before security arrived and she disappeared to avoid being thrown in juvie." Sam replied. "What are you guys doing here?"

Johnny and Miguel then told the Larusso family the whole situation, and by the end, they had all gone pale and silent. Eventually it was Amanda who broke the silence.

"Miguel, you can't seriously be considering it?!" Amanda exclaimed. "I mean, what possible reason does he have to live up to his side of the deal if he loses?"

"What other options do we have, Mrs. Larusso? Please, give me any other better options that get Kreese out of town and I would LOVE to hear them."

"We wait and think of a better plan." Daniel replied. "Having Kreese around an extra day, or an extra week, or an extra month, or even an extra year is better than you sacrificing your life."

"Why are you all so convinced I'm going to die?!" Miguel exclaimed. "You ever consider that I might succeed?"

"Look, Miguel, we have to look at the worst possible outcome. We can't afford for you to sacrifice your life!"

"And it's okay for innocent people to get hurt instead?" Miguel asked. "What do you think will happen if Tory and Shawn and Kyler and all of the other Cobras run rampant on the Valley, knowing that we are too scared to stop them? They're going to be leaving a pile of bodies higher than Mount Everest and we're just going to be sitting here on our asses, thinking why didn't we stop them!"

"Miguel, we can't let you do this. I'm sorry." Daniel said. Miguel scowled at him.

"And who are you to stop me?" Miguel snapped.

"He might not have the power to stop you, but I do." Johnny said. "And I will do literally anything to stop you from going, even if I have to physically drag you away myself."

Miguel was about to throw an insult Johnny's way, but he bit his tongue and stopped himself just in time. He eventually went from extremely worked up, to just defeated. He sighed.

"Fine. Can I quickly go use the bathroom?" Miguel asked. They nodded and Miguel walked out of the room to the upstairs bathroom, his Swiss Army Knife bouncing around in his pocket as he left the room. When he was gone, everyone turned to each other.

"We're making the right call here, right?" Johnny asked, looking at Daniel and Amanda for guidance. Despite his massive differences with them, couldn't deny that they were both good parents, especially Amanda.

"Yeah, of course we are! Miguel's going to get himself killed if he goes." Amanda said. "Sometimes we have to make decisions because they are in the best interests of our kids, even if they don't see them themselves."

"Yeah, but something tells me he isn't getting over this one anytime soon." Johnny remarked.

"He will eventually. I mean, he knows you have his best interests at heart, and you know what's best for him. Today's tournament proved just that. That was some fighting, Johnny. Didn't realise Karate had become the UFC, what with all of your students' grappling and wrestling."

Johnny shrugged.

"Benefit of having two nerds as your students…"

"Hey!" Hawk spat, indignantly. Johnny continued, ignoring the protests.

"Is that they know how to read and manipulate rules without breaking them. Everything we did was completely legal."

"Well, whatever it was, it hurt like hell." Sam stated. "That throw Miguel did is still killing my back."

The group were extremely engrossed in talking about the tournament, so engrossed that 20 minutes passed without them realising that Miguel hadn't yet shown. Only at around 25-30 minutes, Hawk realised.

"Hey, where the hell is Miguel?" He asked. Everyone looked around, confused.

"Yeah, no way he's still in the bathroom." Johnny stated. Everyone looked at each other, nervously. They were all thinking the same thing.

"You don't think he left and went to fight, do you?" Amanda asked slowly.

"No, impossible. We would have heard him walk out of the bathroom. The only possible way he could have escaped is from the bathroom window, but because he's on the second floor, he'd need something to help him climb out and not break his neck."

"The tree!" Sam cried, putting her head in her hands. She had been so dumb. How did she not see this coming?! "The tree right outside the bathroom. It also reaches outside my bedroom too, and I know Miguel knows how to climb it because back when we were dating, he… I mean, we were training, and um..."

Sam's voice trailed off when she remembered her audience. She was in front of her mom, her dad, Miguel's dad, and Hawk. Maybe not the best people to mention Miguel sneaking into her house late at night and out early in the morning to.

"Well, as much as we need to discuss the problem with you sneaking your boyfriends in and out of this house, we don't have time for that right now." Daniel said. "If Miguel's actually gone to go fight, we need to catch him NOW."

"Hey, guys, calm down. For all we know, Miguel is taking a massive shit." Hawk remarked. Everyone glared at him.

"For half an hour? Really?" Johnny snapped, as the group all ran towards the bathroom door. Daniel quickly ran into the kitchen and grabbed a massive ring of keys.

"Okay, one of these open the bathroom door." He said. Johnny shook his head.

"New plan." Johnny snapped, before kicking the bathroom door down, blasting it off his hinges and revealing an open window but no Miguel. They all groaned. He was gone. On the bathroom counter, there was a note written on a sheet of toilet paper. Johnny picked it up and immediately recognised Miguel's handwriting. He read it aloud.

Hey guys,

I'm really sorry. I have to do this. I don't care what you say. I don't care if I don't come back. And the reason I'm doing this is because of you guys. Not that you guys pushed me to want to kill myself (god no!)... you guys gave me the strength to stand up for myself and stand up for what's right. So no matter what happens, whether I come back from this or not, I want you all to know that I love you guys. All of you.

See you soon,

Miguel

Everyone put their head in their hands.

"Oh, God! He's actually going!" Amanda cried.

"We need to go after him!" Johnny exclaimed. The group all nodded and raced out of the house. However, a disaster waited for them there. As well as Johnny's car being gone (Miguel had clearly found some way to hotwire it), Miguel had covered all possibilities of preventing the group from coming after him. As Daniel, Sam and Amanda walked over to their cars, they saw that Miguel had slashed the tires of all of their cars. Sam noticed a Swiss Army Knife lying on the ground, along with another letter. She picked it up and read it.

Hey again,

Sorry about the tires. If I survive this, I swear I'll replace them.

"What do we do?!" Sam exclaimed.

"Well, we don't have four spare tires to fit on one car, so I guess we can call a cab, but it's nearly midnight so that might take up to half an hour." Daniel said. The group nodded, all of them extremely panicked. For all they knew, at that moment, Miguel could be dead…

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As Miguel walked into the Cobra Kai dojo, his first thoughts of the dojo was that it was so… cold. Not literally cold - it was summer in L.A so that was impossible. It was the atmosphere and decoration that made the room send shivers down Miguel's spine. Last time Miguel had been in the dojo, it was when Johnny was still sensei. Back then, the dojo had been full of life and noise. Now, it was deathly silent.

Kreese and Robby were nowhere to be found in the main dojo, so Miguel walked into the adjoining basement dojo and saw them. They turned towards him, Kreese's facial expression surprised and Robby's straight-up terrified. Miguel knew that Robby did NOT want to be there, but he had no choice.

"Ahh. Diaz. I must say, I didn't think you'd show. I would have thought your pussy of a sensei and stepfather would have banned you from competing." Kreese remarked. Miguel shrugged.

"He doesn't make my decisions for me." Miguel stated. Kreese nodded.

"You know, I'm impressed with you, Diaz. I have been all day. Are you sure there's no part of you that wants to come back home to where you belong, in Cobra Kai?" Kreese asked. Miguel laughed in Kreese's face.

"When hell freezes over." Miguel growled in reply. Kreese chuckled.

"That's fair. The way of the fist isn't for everyone. Now, you both know the rules. Well, the rule. And that is that there are no rules. No holds barred. Do whatever the hell you want. The fight only ends when the person's unconscious. Got it?"

"Got it." Miguel said, raising his hands and getting into a fighting position.

"Got it." Robby replied, preparing to fight too.

"Okay, FIGHT!

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From the get go, Miguel could tell that Robby was far from 100%. He was still feeling the aftermath of fighting 5 rounds against Hawk, 5 rounds against Miguel, and then a brawl against Hawk afterwards. He was a LOT slower than he was before, and he didn't have the energy for any acrobatics.

The two of them fought for several minutes, neither one of them pulling too far ahead. Miguel should have ended the fight by now, but he was holding back. He felt bad for Robby. He could tell the teenager was exhausted and was done with Cobra Kai. Therefore, Miguel didn't want to knock him out and risk injuring him. He had to think of a better plan.

"Come on, Keene. You know what to do." Kreese growled. Robby nodded and lunged at Miguel, sending a dropkick into Miguel's chest and causing him to fall back against the wall, a flare of pain shooting up his bad back. Miguel groaned in pain but forced himself back to his feet. He then a powerful combination back, a flurry of kicks that sent Robby crashing into the framed picture of Kreese in the Army. Kreese scowled as fractured pieces of the picture fell to the ground.

Miguel clenched his jaw. It was time to finish the fight. He had finally figured out a way to win the fight without severely injuring Robby. Using Johnny's wrestling/grappling skills for what was probably the millionth time, Miguel took Robby down to the mat and wrapped his legs around Robby's neck in a fierce triangle choke.

"Tap out, Robby." Miguel murmured to him.

Robby frantically tried to get out of the lock, but that only made it worse. He could feel his airway closing up as Miguel squeezed tighter and tighter.

"Robby, please. I don't want to hurt you." Miguel begged. "Please tap out!"

Robby struggled for several more moments, but just as he was about to pass out, Miguel felt Robby tap on his leg in submission. Miguel let go of Robby, relieved. He had won! It was all over!

However, just as Miguel started to stand up, he felt himself roughly slammed back onto the mat face first. Miguel groaned in pain as he felt his nose crack, and he rolled around to see Kreese standing over Robby.

"Oh, Robby, Robby, Robby." Kreese tutted. "You had so much potential, but you went soft. You gave up. Lost, like a pussy. And I'm going to tell you the same thing I told your father 35 years ago…"

Before Kreese finished his sentence, the door to the basement dojo swung open and the entirety of Cobra Kai walked in, led by Tory, and the group circled around Miguel and Robby threateningly. As Miguel and Robby slowly got to their feet and spun around, looking at the advancing pack of students, Kreese finally finished his sentence.

"Second place just isn't good enough…"