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Eli had always hated Robby Keene.
Stupid reasons at first: he was the enemy in a tournament, he stole Miguel’s girl, he was part of Miyagi-Do. Learning the guy was Sensei’s son should have complicated things, but it didn’t. After Hawk and Miguel confronted him, Sensei never mentioned Robby again. It was like Keene wasn’t his son at all. He was loyal to his students.
And Hawk went right back to hating Robby for every petty thing. Like, shit, that kick at the mall hurt. Plus Keene kept him from getting his revenge on Demetri twice.
And then the big reason.
Hawk watched them load Miguel into the ambulance that day, furious—and terrified, which only made him more furious. He found out Keene ran while they weren’t sure if Miguel would even survive the night. Then they weren’t sure if he’d ever wake up, and Keene was still running. Then they weren’t sure if he’d ever walk again and Keene put him there.
Eli had an active fantasy life ever since he was a kid, and that hadn’t gone away even as some of the fantasies became reality. In the months after the school fight, there were two he kept going back to.
The one where he kicked Demetri’s ass in front of the whole school was fun. Everyone would cheer him on, and then they’d laugh and wonder how they could have ever thought Hawk was the weak one. Demetri would snivel on the ground and prove he was a pussy, and Hawk would tell him he should have stuck with Cobra Kai, and then...
And then...
He never really got to the “and then.”
(When he had Demetri on the ground at the arcade, sweating bullets as his friends cheered him on, and the snap of his once best friend’s arm felt nothing like winning—Hawk finally started to figure why he could never script the fantasy any longer.)
But the one where he beat the shit out of Robby Keene? That one never soured.
And Hawk wanted to beat the shit out of him. It wasn’t about public spectacle, or even recognition. It didn’t go away when Miguel laid into him for hurting Demetri. Sensei Kreese said sometimes you had to do things for your loved ones when they weren’t strong enough to do it themselves. Miguel wasn’t strong enough anymore. Hawk was.
It was about justice. It was about striking back. Hawk wanted to put Robby Keene in the same pin Miguel had—only he wouldn’t pussy out. He wouldn’t stop at a broken arm either.
But it had to stay a fantasy until Keene was out of juvie. And then it had to stay a fantasy until the coward showed his face. And then it had to stay a fantasy until Kreese realized how fucking insane it was to recruit the guy—
Or, Eli found out, until he realized how fucking insane it all was instead.
He stopped fantasizing about beating the shit out of people after that. Maybe he still wanted to beat Keene, but...in a better way. Hawk wouldn’t cross the line, and he wouldn’t start a fight. He was just prepared to finish it.
The fantasy vanished entirely after he lost his hair. It wasn’t that his hate had gone away. Eli just couldn’t imagine himself winning anymore.
It was funny: in all that change, somehow Robby Keene became one of the most consistent people in his life.
Demetri and Miguel and even Sensei Lawrence went from friends to foes to friends again. Miyagi-Do was once the enemy and now his home. He was on a team with Sam LaRusso of all people. Her dad wasn’t half bad either. The new allies Hawk once derided as traitors turned out to be onto something. And Cobra Kai, once a mark of pride, became his biggest shame. Even his love life couldn't stay stable.
But Robby Keene? Day or night, spring or fall, Robby Keene remained the fucking worst.
Easy.
Miguel didn’t come back to the mat for their match.
The knot in Eli’s chest that had loosened upon hearing it was just a pulled muscled seized up again. He tugged anxious at his belt. Fuck. He might actually be the guy who was going to win this whole fucking thing. Just one match left.
Robby stood across the mat, face inscrutable.
In his new burst of confidence, Hawk had started thinking about the tattoo shop again. It wasn’t so hard now that he realized he hadn’t lost everything. The hair would grow back. He didn’t need it anyway. He could be whoever the fuck he wanted it to be.
And the person he was, Eli and Hawk, could say without fear that the Cobras were still assholes for cutting it off.
Eli didn’t want to beat the shit out of people anymore, and he was still trying to figure out what justice meant. But he understood satisfaction.
There had been five of them who came after him. Destroying Kyler in the quarterfinals without breaking a sweat had crossed off one. Two others had been eliminated in the preliminaries. Eli had only gotten the chance to fight one of them (an easy win), but he’d promised himself not to start fights anymore, so that would have to be enough. They were nobodies anyway, obviously not the ringleaders.
He wouldn’t get a chance to fight Tory here either, but he was willing to vicariously enjoy Sam’s oncoming victory in the girl’s final instead. Turned out the princess wasn’t so bad when she took the stick out of her ass.
Four out of five. That just left Robby. A perfect, public match, where Eli wouldn’t be doing anything wrong by fighting. He could get his vengeance the right way. This was his chance.
He told Sensei LaRusso as much.
“This fight is not about him,” Sensei LaRusso said. “The biggest battle is always the one within.”
Eli didn’t get it immediately, though he pretended to. He already had his confidence back. He wasn’t fighting himself; he was fighting Keene. This was his change for justice. His chance to finally prove—
Okay. So here’s the thing.
There were the stupid things Keene had done that Eli hated him for: the mall, Sam, tournaments, rivalries. And there were the big things: Miguel and the shave. And then there was...
I just don’t need to drink to pretend to be cool.
Robby. Existing.
And Eli fucking hating him for it.
Eli was nobody and he knew it. Everyone knew it. Kids took one look at him and sorted him into the “helpless nerd” box. So he’d tried to fix it.
Hawk bought his reputation with hair dye and karate lessons and hundreds upon hundreds of dollars worth of ink from a bougie tattoo shop. Hawk said yes to every party and every drink, went to extremes trying to hang onto his hot girlfriend, kept his head on a swivel making sure no one would ever believe he’d once liked nerdy shit.
And then there was Robby Keene, with none of that, showing him up anyway.
Maybe it was grabbing the cobra with his bare hands after Hawk pussied out. Maybe it was that he’d been to juvie. Or maybe it was long before that—the rumor from Aisha over the summer that he had to crash with the LaRussos because he was homeless; the confirmation months later of a sleeping bag in the dojo’s back room. Or the cheap clothes, the nonexistent relationship with his dad, the rumor he’d been kicked out of his last school too. Hell, maybe it was none of that, but the Miyagi shit: the way he’d fought last tournament despite a dislocated shoulder and never made any attempt at a dirty strike in return.
Eli couldn’t say. It wasn’t the sort of thing you put your finger on. It was the sort of thing people just sensed: Robby Keene was the real shit. And Hawk didn’t impress him one bit.
The worst part was—Eli didn’t even think Robby had been trying to rub it in. Hawk didn’t impress him one bit, but he didn’t even care. He didn’t say it, I don’t need to drink to pretend to be cool, with a laugh and a gesture for his friends to jeer, like every bully Eli had known. He didn’t shoot secret smirks after he grabbed the snake, reveling in Hawk’s misery. He didn’t even seem to notice Hawk getting nudged out of the attention he stole.
He was just...there. Cool without pretense.
And like practical effects beside a CGI monster, his mere presence illuminated just how much of Hawk was fake.
Robby Keene didn’t need eye-catching hair. He didn’t need a huge fuck-off tattoo, or a motorcycle, or a vocabulary that was half “pussy,” half “fuck.” If Robby Keene liked Doctor Who, he wouldn’t think twice about people finding out, and no one would give a shit if they did. He didn’t front.
So who the fuck was Eli?
One point for Robby. One point for him. A seemingly endless grapple, never quite finding an opening, and then—
Sudden death overtime. The crowd went fucking wild.
They cheered for all of his matches before, but this—this was something else. Eli stared in awe at the entire crowd on their feet. The roar went on and on and on. The announcer was good at making it sound epic, sure, and the arena was kitted out with nice lights, and they’d both gotten this far with the training of their senseis. But that roar was for exactly two people.
For the first time since 1985...
Eli looked across the mat, and there was Robby Keene, looking up in wonder too. For just a moment it was like—like recording those crappy old Youtube videos with Demetri. Two people making a show together. Not like a fight at all.
Robby turned to him, gi hanging open, something small and surprised lingering on his face.
So Eli had been to, like, a million meetings with school guidance councilors back when he was getting picked on. When he was really little, they’d try sending him and his bully-of-the-week in together to “work it out”. He remembers the crappy councilors saying again and again that you shouldn’t have to make people feel worse to make yourself look better.
In a world of the bullies and the bullied, Eli never understood. The people who were strong had to ensure everyone else looked weak if they wanted to stay on top.
He got it now. Kyler, Brucks, so many kids at school, they were all assholes and bullies, so Eli conflated the two.
Robby Keene was an asshole, and just shy of an attempted murderer. But he didn’t smirk after he bagged the cobra. He didn’t start fights just to show off. He was cool, and real, and didn’t need a mohawk, because he didn’t even care about any of that. And he fucking sucked, but he’d never had to be a bully to be a badass.
So Eli—Hawk—both of the above—didn’t have to be either. He could be real too.
He didn’t have the hair, but he didn’t need the hair. Maybe he’d grow it out again to spike up and dye, or maybe he wouldn’t. It didn’t matter. And, yeah, he did have a big, fuck-off tattoo on his back, and he liked it. He liked that he could roll his shoulders to make the wings flap, like he liked karate, like he liked Doctor Who and the extended Star Wars universe. And he...maybe didn’t actually like the motorcycle. So he didn’t have to! He could fucking sell it and drive a regular goddamn car if he wanted. And he could be Miyagi-Do because (don’t tell Sensei Lawrence) he kinda liked that too. He could be cool, badass, and the bigger man.
He could be Hawk without the ‘hawk. He could win the All Valley Tournament. And he could beat Robby Keene, not because Eli was angry and vicious and dreamed of violence, but because he was fuckin’ good at this.
Under the burning lights and the roaring crowd, Eli pressed his hands to his sides and, without anyone asking, he bowed.
And the craziest thing was, Robby Keene bowed back.
Eli fucking won.