THE CHAMPION (COBRA KAI)

Survivors

"Silver. Double time." Sensei Kim says to me the next day at our training session and I knew that I was in trouble for missing the exhibition.

"What reason did my daughter give for leaving the exhibition?" My father asks Sensei Kim and I worked twice as hard than the rest of my teammates.

"Lies." Sensei Kim says to him and I felt Xander watching me.

"LaRusso. Lawrence. Toguchi. They'll all pay for that little stunt they pulled with Sekai Taikai." My father says to her and Tory looks at me.

"They are mosquitoes. And the next time an unwanted pest lands on our arm, we will squish them." Sensei Kim says as Robby walks into the dojo to talk to me. My father walks over to him and I kept doing the warmups as I looked over at Tory.

"Mr. Keene. To what do we owe the pleasure?" He asks him and Robby looked at us. We all stop to look at him and my father glances at me.

"I came here to apologize. I let you down. Turned my back on you. I didn't understand at the time, but I realize I was wrong. I shouldn't have just left. I should have taken you all with me. Everything you're taught here is bullcrap. Come on, Ariana. You don't wanna be here." Robby looks at me and I look back at him. "There is pain in this dojo and it's built upon fear, because this man is not your Sensei, he is your enemy. But it's not too late, Ariana. You're not past the point of no return. Ariana, you know deep down inside that I'm right." Tory and I look at each other and then I look at my father. "And I promise, there's still another way." There was so much truth to what he was saying and I felt Sensei Kim watching me as I took his words to heart.

"Bold move, Mr. Keene. Bold move. Trying to get my daughter to turn her back on her home and run back to Miyagi-Do. We hear you." I took a step forward and my father held up his hand to stop me.

"Now it's my turn to speak. Joon-bee stance." My father says as my classmates do it and I don't. My father looks at me and so does Robby. "Right leg back." They do it and I don't. My father shakes his head at me and I look at Robby. "Forward strike, side kick." They do it and still I didn't move a muscle. "There's a difference between being heard and being listened to. They heard you. But they listen to me. Now...if you don't mind, we've got some training to do." My father says as Tory and I both look at him.

"If Mr. Keene or any of his friends step foot in this dojo again, what will you show them?" My father asks them and I shake my head as I look up at him. I never really knew where I stood when it came to karate dojos.

"No mercy, sir." They all said and my father looks at me with a death stare. Robby nods his head at me and Sensei Kim picked up on it. He also nodded his head at Tory too. We went back to our training.

"All right. That's enough. Attention. Bow. Dismissed. Except you, daughter. Nichols, you can stay and watch this." My father says to me and I look over at him. "I need you two to stay a little longer." He places a stone dummy in front of me and I sighed.

"What is that?" Tory asks as Sensei Kim looked at the both of us.

"This is your friend's enemy. Destroy it." Sensei Kim says to me and I touch it before looking at my father. I've broken wooden dummies like this one, but not solid stone.

"Dad, it's solid stone. I'll break my hand." I tell him and I look at Sensei Kim.

"It will heal in time for the tournament." She tells me and I scoff.

"This is crazy. I'm going home." I go to leave and the other senseis stop me. I look at the dummy and I knew the only way I'll get to leave is destroy the dummy.

"You will go home when the lesson is over, my daughter." My father tells me and I took a shaky breath. I take my fighting stance and I punch it. I hold back the pain that I'm in because I developed a pain tolerance.

"Not hard enough." She says to me and I look at her."To break it, you must use all your power." I look at her and then I look at the dummy. I punch it again and she shakes her head at me.

"Are you even trying?" She shouts at me and I keep punching it. Blood spews out of my knuckles on my right hand and I look at her. "Something is holding you back, Ariana." She tells me and she steps closer to me and so does my father.

"I can't do it." I tell her and I look at the dummy.

"It's the dojos, isn't it? You don't know where you truly belong, do you? You act strong, but inside you're soft." She tells me and I look at her.

"That's not true!" I shout at her and I felt tears in my eyes.

"You are friends with Sam, Eli, Miguel, and Robby. Your friendships have clouded your judgment, Ariana." She tells me and I knew what she was doing. She was making me angry.

"They are my friends! I care about them! Yes, I have trained at both dojos, but I'm at Cobra Kai now!" I shout at her and she shook her head.

"You care more about your friends than your own dojo! Do you even like karate?!" She was now standing in front of the dummy and I looked at her.

"Karate is my whole life! If I walked away from it now, who am I?! I wouldn't be me if I walked away from karate!" I shout at her and I go to punch her and she moves out of the way. My fist went flying through the head of the dummy and then I did the "QuikSilver Kick" and took out the middle of the dummy. The adrenaline was pumping through my body and I broke the whole thing with my punches and kicks.

"Lesson over." Sensei Kim says to me and she walks away as my father and Tory kneel down in front of me.

"Sweetheart, look at me." I look up at my father and tears stream down my face as he takes my right hand into his. "I'm sorry you had to go through that. I'm really am. Do you really feel like you don't belong here?" He asks me and I nod my head as he helps me up before he takes me home. Tory came home with us and then Sean tends to my hand. He puts a black hand brace on it and then he leaves our house.

"Babe? Are you alright?" Xander asks me as he looks at Tory and then he looks at my right hand. "What did she do?" Xander steps towards Tory and she shakes her head.

"It was Sensei Kim and Sensei Silver. There was this solid stone dummy and she broke her hand punching it. She has a high pain tolerance because I would've lost it, Xander. She's very brave." Tory's phone buzzes in her pocket and it was Robby. I walk over to my bed and I lay down. I groan in pain when I moved my hand wrong and Tory hangs up the phone.

"I need to meet Robby. I'll be back to check on you. I can't believe they wanted me to watch you get hurt like that. That was truly inhumane, Ariana. I've gotta go. I'll see y'all later." Tory leaves our house and Xander gets into the bed with me before I go to sleep.