CHAPTER 190

As Sarah walked up Terry Silver's packed driveway that evening, she felt her hands trembling in her pockets. Her face was pale, and it surely wasn't because of the temperature outside, as in mid June, the temperature was close to 30 degrees celsius. Certainly not cold enough to be wearing a jacket, but Sarah wore one anyways, if nothing else then to disguise her slight trembling in fear.

Sarah had spent the day working. Literally. She had left the dojo shortly after Marcos that morning, and while she had debated following him to his house, she knew that convincing him to follow her and leave was a lost cause. With someone as stubborn as him… not a chance. So instead, Sarah found herself dwelling on Marcos' words.

'There's something bigger going on,' he had told her. Marcos had no clue what it was - neither did Sarah - but as Sarah spent hours pondering the snippets of information she had, all of a sudden, at the snap of her fingers, a theory materialized. It was a haunting, terrifying theory if true, one that would instantly put them all at DEFCON 1 if true.

It was just a theory, a shot in the dark, but as Sarah spent her entire day researching all over the city, unfortunately the theory seemed more and more likely to be true. It went from a theory to a developed hypothesis, one that sent shivers down her spine just thinking about. But she needed more information, decisive proof, before she would cause a panic.

Which was why Sarah found herself walking up Silver's driveway alone. Normally, she would've called Marcos, especially if she was entering the belly of the beast like she was theorizing, but she decided not to. Marcos was already dealing with so much, and he was in an incredibly emotionally volatile state, so bringing him in now would only put him at serious risk. Especially if her prediction was true, Marcos flipping out and going off the handle would only endanger both of them, so she decided to keep him safe and keep him in the dark by now.

To Sarah's surprise though, Silver wasn't at home alone. Cars, in particular SUVs, were littered all over his driveway, causing her to have to weave her way to the front door, where she promptly rang the doorbell.

No answer.

That was strange. For what was clearly a party going on inside given the number of cars present, it took a surprisingly long time for the door to open. She could hear loud voices coming from inside from the second the bell rang, and yet nobody came to open the door. Not until nearly an entire minute and 3 more rings of the bell had passed, when none other than Terry Silver himself opened the door for her.

"Ms. Gledhill!" Silver exclaimed. As Sarah stared at him face to face, the first thing she noticed was his attire. The man was dressed to t, wearing a custom-made, expensive tuxedo, a glass of champagne in his hands. "If it isn't Cobra Kai's latest… Cobra Kai's only Sekai Taikai champion. Come in! Come in!"

The man cheerfully swung the door open and led Sarah into his house. As soon as Sarah heard the door slam shut behind her, her head nervously whipped around, trying to survey the scene around her, gauge any imminent threats. At first glance, there didn't seem to be any. Silver was clearly throwing a party, as tuxedo/dress laden people were scattered all over the main floor of the house. Sarah looked at each and every one of them, and they all gave her exactly the same vibe. They might all be wearing fancy clothing and be sipping on the alcohol that Silver had provided for them, but there was nothing disguising the looks in all of their eyes as they looked at her. Loathing, disgust, fury; that's all Sarah saw when she looked at them. Not only that, but their built physiques, stone-cold stances, emotionless gestures… these were all soldiers. Soldiers that Silver had probably brought in from somewhere, but from where and more importantly, for what purpose?

All of them, all of the tens of people who were occupying the house, caused Sarah's hair at the back of her neck to stand up on its end, her hands twitching anxiously as she felt herself surrounded by nothing but what could only be described as enemies that hadn't been identified yet.

Silver, however, was nothing but jovial as he skipped around the room to a bartender, grabbed another glass of champagne and brought it back to her.

"Would you like to stay? As Cobra Kai's only champion, you're more than welcome to stay. We've got plenty of refreshments, and I've sure I've got a cocktail dress somewhere around here that's about your size for you to change into." Silver suggested. Sarah narrowed her eyes at him as she shook her head.

"I'm not here to drink." She said, loud enough that a few of the nearby onlookers from the party began to eavesdrop on her conversation. "I'm here to talk to you about Marcos Oliveira. Or rather, his father."

Immediately, a few of the people listening perked up, as if they had recognized the name, before silent anger began to take over their faces. Interesting, Sarah thought to herself as she noticed all of this. So they clearly recognized Marcos' name…

Silver's face flashed with worry for a moment, but as quick as it appeared, it disappeared and his beaming smile returned, even if it was a little more on edge now.

"Let's talk in my study, shall we?" Silver suggested, leading her further into the house and into the private confines of his in-house office. Shutting the door behind him, he then turned back to her. "So… what can I do for you, Ms. Gledhill? Why are you here?"

"I'm here… well, I'm here to tell you about my day actually." Sarah told him. "It was pretty interesting, if I should say so myself."

"Well don't leave me in suspense! Enlighten me! Tell me all about it!" Silver chuckled. Sarah wasn't laughing though. Her face was stoic, stone-cold as some of Silver's guests outside, as she forced herself to keep all of her stored rage off her face as she looked the vile man in the eye.

"So… like I was saying earlier, I came here to talk to you about Marcos' father." Sarah said. "As I'm sure will come as a massive shock to you, Marcos ran into his father last night at his home. Somehow, the man was out of prison, instead put only on probation, but free to roam the city like nothing happened."

"I'm sorry for Mr. Oliveira. I remember things between him and his father are complicated. But what am I supposed to do with that information?" Silver asked.

"Right… well it got me thinking this morning when I found out: how does someone get their life sentence not only shortened, but completely removed altogether?" Sarah asked. "Maybe you might have some insight on that."

Silver shrugged, his poker face absolutely superb.

"Must have a mighty great lawyer." He remarked. Sarah smiled thinly and nodded.

"My thoughts exactly. Which is weird given that Marcos' family hardly have a penny to their name. Definitely not for some top quality lawyer. Not unless he knew someone who volunteered to connect him with a lawyer for free."

"I don't understand what you're implying." Silver lied shamelessly through his teeth, but Sarah simply laughed his comment off.

"Come on. I did some reading and apparently, Marcos' dad was released from prison due to his actions supposedly being influenced by illness. Does that sound like somebody you know?" She remarked.

Sarah had known about the nature of Silver's incarceration - Kreese had told her about it a long time ago. But it was only that afternoon that she had managed to link the dots between Kreese's incarceration, Silver's incarceration, and the recent release of Marcos' father.

Silver didn't respond to Sarah, so the girl decided to keep talking.

"Him being able to have a lawyer that already successfully helped a convict reduce his sentence to less than a year… a man with absolutely no money… that doesn't sound fishy to you? And if it's not bad enough, the man who I think connected him with the lawyer is also supposedly tight with the D.A, and possesses a hell of a lot of sway in that department too."

"What's your point?" Silver asked, his smile fading rapidly from his face at the sound of the thinly veiled accusations. Sarah wasn't in the mood to stop though.

"Well… imagine my surprise when I learned that you fit all of the criteria above. You have money. You have a great lawyer, who already saved your ass by using the exact same playbook as Marcos' dad used to get out of jail. And to top that off, you're also tight with the D.A."

"What an interesting coincidence." Silver muttered, through gritted teeth, sensing that Sarah had managed to somehow get him. However, even now, the temperature of the room amping up, Sarah still wasn't done yet.

"Ooh, funny you should mention coincidences. Another interesting coincidence I found out while going over all of the facts was that the two of you overlapped in jail for around 3 months. And then his release just happened to overlap with the week and a half that Marcos was out of town. It's almost as if you didn't want Marcos to find out his father was in town until you got back."

Silver's face finally knitted into a death glare.

"What exactly are you accusing me of, Ms. Gledhill?" Silver growled. Sarah shrugged.

"I think you know exactly what I'm accusing you of." Sarah stated bluntly. "I think you helped Marcos' dad get out of jail in a bid to get back at him and Kreese for what they've done. I think this is your sick way of trying to get revenge on us."

Silver chuckled mirthlessly.

"And what reason would I ever have to do that? At the time that all of this would have happened, I was a part of Cobra Kai. Johnny only kicked me out last week. Why would I plan an attack on my own dojo?"

"Why else would you have come back in the first place?" Sarah shot back. "Because I'll tell you, 'sensei', nobody buys that whole repenting, regretful act for a second. What better reason for you to want to come back than to be able to get revenge on the dojo that screwed you over?"

Sarah took a deep breath to steady her nerves as she kept going.

"I want to be a doctor, you know?" Sarah remarked. "I'm a person of fact and logic, not conspiracy theories. But if I did happen to be a little more inclined towards superstitions, I might be inclined to believe that was the reason you were trying to get into Marcos' head during the tournament. You were trying to intensity his aggression, push him to the edge, only to have to come up against his father as soon as he got back, with nobody there to support him or save him."

Silver didn't say a word as he listened to her, internally calculating and debating what to say next. Eventually, he decided to take the easiest route out.

"We're done here." Silver informed her, before turning to walk out the door of his study. Sarah chased after him though.

"We're not! I'm not done talking yet!" Sarah shouted, not caring that everyone in the room could now hear her.

"I am. I think we're going to need security!" Silver called. Sarah did not know exactly who he was calling, as almost every single person in this room looked like they possessed the skills and strength needed to be security.

"It's time to go, miss." As the security put a rough hand on Sarah's shoulder, Sarah spun around to shove the hand away, but she was rendered immobile in shock as she found herself face to face with Marcos' father.

Sarah wasn't a complete stranger to the man. She had met him once, briefly, when she had been at Marcos' house towards the beginning of their relationship and he had arrived from work before she left. She hadn't met him up close as Marcos had rushed her out the door pretty quickly, but that face was implanted in her mind forever, especially after everything that had happened afterwards. But even if Sarah had never met him, she would've identified him instantly. Now that she was only inches away from him, she couldn't help but see all of the similarities between him and Marcos. His eyes; his face; the way he spoke; the way he carried himself… it was like looking at Marcos 35 years in the future.

"You…" that was all Sarah could stammer. She was right! She had finally lost her voice upon seeing the man, and by the time she turned back to Silver, the elderly sensei's smile had returned.

"Trust me, Ms. Gledhill. What you think you know about this plan… you don't know the half of it. You think this is all about Mr. Oliveira and Cobra Kai? No… by the time we're done, the entire Valley will be nothing but ashes."

Sarah forced herself to remain calm as she fearlessly moved closer to Silver.

"Not if we can help it." Sarah replied firmly. "You know what? You're right. I think it is time to leave after all."

With that, Sarah turned on her heal and began to move towards the exit. But just before she did, she caught a glimpse of someone. Someone in the house, not Marcos' father or Silver, that she instantly recognized, and terrified her in a whole different way. It proved that what Silver was saying was true… that what she thought she had discovered was only the beginning.

Sarah hurried out the door, and as soon as she was gone, Silver quickly summoned a meeting in his study between the 4 leaders of this plan: Terry Silver, Hector Salazar, Felipe Oliveira and Kim Da-Eun. He had recruited them from all corners of the globe, none of them needing very much incentive to want to get back at their mortal enemies. They had traveled to the Valley as soon as the call had come in with Silver, and everyone in the living room were their respective hench people or fellow goons, all of whom would be helping them carry out the plan successfully. Tonight's party had been to celebrate the plan coming along spectacularly and their revenge about to begin, but that looked to be in serious jeopardy with this latest development.

"Stupid bitch is going to wreck the plan. FUCK!" Felipe Oliveira, Marcos' father, shouted, slamming his hand against SIlver's desk in frustration. The other 2 people who Silver had recruited were equally fuming, though Silver himself was completely at ease.

"Relax. All of you. Ms. Gledhill hasn't ruined anything. We're just going to have to improvise a little, and work a bit faster. We begin tonight."

"Wait… are you serious?! We're not supposed to be starting until tomorrow? You told me that we're just going to be fucking with them, making appearances here and there to scare our enemies, until then?" Felipe asked. Silver shrugged.

"Plans change." He replied. "For as long as everything's ready, we will be able to do everything today. Hector, are you ready with the extraction part of the plan?"

"My men are on standby with the helicopter whenever we need it, boss." Hector Salazaar, one of the leaders of the Ecuadorian Cartel, responded. Silver smiled at him.

"Good. Now… Hector, you're still going to do what we had initially planned, but you're going to do it tonight rather than tomorrow. While Felipe… now that Ms. Gledhill knows about the plan, you're going to have to seize her before she runs her mouth to anyone. Call me when you've both done your tasks, and then we'll rendezvous at the final location."

The group of 4 leaders split up, prepared for their assigned tasks. Their plan had been bumped up from tomorrow to today. Meaning that Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do Karate, if things went their way, would officially be buried tonight. The grand finale was about to begin…