Chapter Text
‘Don’t think I’ll ever go home’ the tune from the song 'Home' played in my earbuds as I snuck out the loosely bared window of my childhood home. The stench of air freshener and bleach transitioning to the nights petrichor.
The sole bag I hold bouncing against my back as I break into a sprint, not looking back as I cross down the main road. My black backpack carries my shoe box of savings, my laptop, and a new burner phone. Two-years worth of work, hidden from watchful eyes. Seven years since the words of kin turned into cuts with glass.
Abuse as a guidance counselor worded it once, not that she actually did anything about it. A home call last year, turned away be placid smiles and hand shakes. Only for me to be found, by a set of flies, in the basement later that evening.
Alas just over 4 months after my 18th birthday, I’m going. Finally running away, or legally moving out. Maybe it was sentimentality that let me stay through the bruises. Or fear. Perhaps both with guilt.
I turn onto the overpass above the highway, mimicking my old school route. Looking out at the car lights lining the highway, I take a momentary pause to breathe.
A poor decision apparently.
Semi-truck high beams cloud my vision, as I turn around to the sound of it speed behind me.
The truck hits the overpass, the top ripping away. Luckily not hitting me.
Words spoken too soon when the crumbling of concrete occurs underneath my feet. A useless scream escaping my throat as I can’t help but fall, shutting my eyes. A final gasp leaving my lips as the rusty pipe above crushes my chest.
Air fills my lungs just as instantaneous as they seem to collapse.
A dream?
My first thought, though the bright sun shadowing... palm trees, removes that train of thought entirely. Well that, and the fading linger of pains, new and old.
Paired with the honk of a horn, causing me to instinctively tumble onto the side walk.
Discomfort settles on my hip, metal pressing against jean and bone. I stand up, pulling a money clip out of my pocket. Attached is a California state ID, same name yet different birth-year? And two-hundred dollars in 20’s.
I hitch a courtesy ride on the coming bus, using it to get out the boiling heat and think.
Thankfully two stops later I note the public library, and get off the bus, being sure to thank the driver.
Entering the building which reads ‘West Valley Library Branch’. I pass the reception, noting a calendar behind the desk which causes me to pause.
“Pardon.” I state, getting the librarian’s attention. “Could you tell me todays date?” My gaze passing between the 2017 event calendar behind her desk, the 2016/17 school year calendar taped to the wood reception desk, and the kind-eyed woman behind said desk.
“January 3rd, 2017, dear.”
“2017!?” I mumble, going unhear by her. “Thank you,” sparing a smile before turning towards the free use computers.
Settling on a cushioned wood seat, I open a browser on the desktop, seeing the same date she mentioned in the corner. Precisely the day of my escape, just a different year.
For a second I don’t know what to search, eventually choosing who the heck I am. Well, when.
The calming click of keys under my finger tips, animates my search for the county clerks site. Selecting a public record search, and typing in my last name. Z-I-M-M-E-R
The search was both fruitful and useless. Apparently in this... world, my parents are dead. I have a closed emancipation file. And am enrolled in online school. Following that I look for any socials of mine, finding zilch. A blank slate.
Putting in a online request for various identification documents, since I have not a clue where mine would be, I soon after leave the library. Making a mental note to pick up the documents from the library, to in which they’ll be delivered, I set for the bus.
Getting off in front of a cheap motel, conveniently across a mini mart, I snag a room for a few nights using half my acquired funds. Shower, sleep, clothes, and a job are the main tasks on my mind.
After a chilled shower, I fall asleep on the old mattress, wearing the same clothes as prior.
Two weeks pass from my arrival in this world.
I managed to thrift clothes and comforter, all washed at the local laundry mat. Then bought a pre-paid phone, which burnt through the last of my funds.
Able to get a job at a nice tipping restaurant in Encino. The place having a job opening for a waitress. Working daily lunch and dinner shifts, I’m afforded mornings to sleep in. Though really spent awake and thinking.
Which there wasn’t much to think about, until three nights ago when I served the LaRusso family.
Said family looking eerily similar to the actors in 'Cobra Kai'. Impossible, so I hoped.
Hopes promptly crushed as Amanda called her husband Daniel and the family shared banter revealing their names to be precisely the same. Done in such a way that my mind was faced with the reality that I’d truly died.
That I was reborn in a television show.
That I was isekai’d into my fifteen year old self.Seriously.
That I was not in a dream.
And begrudgingly I was in Cobra Kai.
Which was better than being in the original early karate kid timeline. Far luckier than being placed in a fantasy world like twilight. Miles kinder than being born in any other show, goodness forbid a medical drama.
Being in cobra kai gave me the choice to stay out of karate business or move along the plot. And what a bore it would be to stay away from the front row of a karate war.
That in mind I made way to the West Valley library, picked up my transcripts and legal documents, and hoped back on the bus. I dropped off at West Valley High School and promptly enrolled in the 2nd semester of 9th grade, having been placed in the spring before canon.
New life, here I come.