「. 𖦹˙— 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆. ˖ ࣪. ࿐♡˚. 」
⤿ 𝘍𝘓𝘐𝘗𝘗𝘐𝘕𝘎 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘚𝘊𝘙𝘐𝘗𝘛 🥋 ˖ ࣪. ࿐
𝗰𝗼𝗯𝗿𝗮 𝗸𝗮𝗶 ┆𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘰𝘯 𝘰𝘯𝘦
❪ ﹆ ━ 𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘳 ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ❫

❝this is 𝒅𝒆𝒇𝒊𝒏𝒊𝒕𝒆𝒍𝒚 flipping the script❞

          ❝𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐓𝐍𝐀𝐌 𝐅𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐁𝐀𝐂𝐊𝐒?❞ A smirk is on Laken's face as she stares at Johnny from her position leaned on the opening of his office.

Johnny sends her a playful glare, "Get the hell out there."

Laken laughs, turning around to walk back towards the mats with Johnny following her.

"Why'd I let you talk me into this?" Demetri asked Eli as Laken moves to stand next to them. "This goes against everything I stand for. It's like extra gym class for no reason."

"Let's just give it a chance." Eli tells his best friend, smiling as Laken wraps her arm around his shoulders.

"Yeah, just give it a chance, Metri." Laken smiles warmly, ruffling her cousin's hair as she does so.

"Thank you. You saw the fight." Eli says, "Miguel kicked ass.

"Okay! Today we begin . . . ," Johnny trails off as the dojo full of teens ignore him, "QUIET!"

Laken lets a giggle slip past her lips, slapping a hand over her mouth as Johnny shoots a look over in her direction, "Sorry, it kills me every time you tell that."

"Face front!" Johnny ignores the blonde, though he's fighting a smile off. Everyone turns to face him, and Johnny keeps his eyes on them as he walks around, "Nice shirt."

"Thanks." Demetri smiles happily at the compliment on his shirt.

"I'm joking. It sucks." He walks to the next person, "Word of advice. If you got shit for teeth, don't smile." And to the next person, "God, makes me feel like a virgin, just looking at you. When I look around this dojo I don't see Cobra Kai material. I see losers, I see nerds. I see a fat kid with a funny hat with his tits popping out."

"Johnny!" Laken hisses, wide eyed.

He shrugged at the blonde, "But in my short time as a sensei, I've also seen some miracles. So, maybe there's some hope for you yet." He looks around, "But first, I need to see where you're at. So everybody, fall in! That means line up!"

Laken shakes her head in disappointment as everyone moves to stand in a singular line, "Kill me now."

"No, not . . . not line up in a line." Johnny protest.

Demetri looks over at Johnny from his place behind Eli, "You mean like "rows"?"

Johnny covers his face in disappointment before glancing over at Laken, "Take me out with you."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          ❝𝐅𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒! Jab punch! ❞ Johnny yells, walking around, "Nope, wait till I say go. Hiya! Come on. Stand straight. Plant your feet in there. Are you sure you're right-handed? Hiya! Come on, tits, you can do better than that. Hey, lip!"

Laken tenses up as the words leave Johnny's mouth.

"Yeah, you. The one with the freaky lip. Who do you think I'm talking to?"

"Johnny, stop it." Laken hisses, tightening her fist.

"Excuse me, uh, Mr. Lawrence." Demetri spoke up, eyes glancing over at Laken, knowing how angry she got when people made fun of her cousin.

"Sensei Lawrence!" Aisha corrected him.

"Okay." Demetri chuckled, holding his hands up in defense, "You really shouldn't make fun of someone's physical appearance."

"Oh, is that so?" Johnny asked, "So, I'm not supposed to mention his lip at all?"

"Well, yeah."

"Maybe that's what they teach you in school, but in the real world, you can't expect people to do what they're supposed to do." Johnny tells them, "Alright. You hear that, Lip? If you can't handle someone making fun of you, how are you gonna handle an elbow to the teeth?"

"By calling the police." Demetri states in an obvious tone.

"Dude, knock it off." Miguel looks back at them.

"What? He does realize the Nazis lost the war, right?" Demetri asked his new friend, "Why should I be scared of him? Because he's got a snake on his wall? It's not like he's a teacher who can give us a bad grade. We're paying him. He works for us. It's not like he can actually hurt us."

Johnny makes his way over to him, "Are you done? Hit me. Go ahead, hit me. Strike me right here." He points to his face.

Demetri raises his fists up, moving to punch Johnny in the face but he's hit is blocked.

"Harder."

"Is that all you got, princess?" Johnny asks after blocking another hit.

Demetri goes to hit Johnny again, but once more Johnny manages to block the hit, grabbing the lanky boy by the arm and flipping in onto his back on the matt.

Johnny stands up, pointing around him, "Let that be a lesson to all of you."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          𝐑𝐎𝐁𝐁𝐘 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐒 back inside the dealer ship, clipboard in his hand as he came back from putting stickers on all of the car windows, pausing as a familiar laugh filled his ears.

Leaning over the counter and talking to one of the women working was Laken, her blonde hair falling down her back in loose curls, light blue jeans on her legs and a black tank top covering her upper half, his old blue jean jacket covering her arms, and white converse on her feet.

The same flutters in his stomach that he felt whenever the Callahan girl was around him came back as she turned her head and locked eyes with him, a frown replacing the bright smile on her face.

"What are you doing here?" Robby walks up to the blonde, grabbing her elbow and pulling her away from the desk.

"I'm having a tea party." The sarcastic remark rolls off her tounge as she rolls her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest as she pulled the jacket closer to her body. "I'm in a dealership, I'm getting my oil changed, dumbass. What the hell are you doing here?"

"I work here."

Laken glances down at the black shirt, 'LaRusso' printed across one side of the shirt, a scoff leaving her lips, "Of course you would pull some stupid shit like this."

"I'm not pulling anything, Lake."

"Okay, then please tell me what you are doing here." She raised an eyebrow.

Robby doesn't say anything, choosing to look down at his feet instead, a guilty expression on his face.

"Seriously? What? Daddy doesn't appreciate you so you run into the arms of his enemy? That's low, even for you, Robby."

"Why do you care? Huh? You won't pick up my phone calls. You won't answer my text."

"Because you said that you needed some space! Because you told me that I was clingy! Because I was around too much!" Laken's voice raises with each word, a few heads turning in their direction before she lowered her voice, "All I was doing was making sure that you were okay. That you had a place to sleep when you needed, making sure that you had something to eat when your mom was on her benders!"

"You chose my dad over me!"

"I didn't choose anybody! And even if I did, I would've chosen you!" Laken points to the green-eyed boy, "I would have picked you, but instead of talking to me about it, you said that you needed space, that I was too clingy. You found new friends and you left me all on my own. So, I am so sorry that I'm just doing what you wanted."

"Laken?" Daniel's voice cut in the conversation between the two best friends, the male walking over with a pair of keys in his hand, "You know my new employee?"

"Family friend." Laken swallows the lump in the back of her throat as she turns to the LaRusso man with a smile on her face, "Thank you so much for getting me in at the last minutes. If my dad came home and found out that I still hadn't had my oil changed, he'd kill me."

Daniel smiled at the short blonde, "It was no problem. Your father is a loyal customer here, so your oil change is on the house."

"Oh, no, you don't have to do that Mr. La-,"

"It's no problem, kid."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          ❝𝐎𝐊𝐀𝐘, 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘𝐁𝐎𝐃𝐘, fall in!❞ Johnny tells his student before looking around, "Where is everyone? Crater face? Nose ring? Slingshot?

"They quit, Sensei." Miguel tells him, looking down at the floor.

Johnny looks between him and Laken, "Are you serious? I mean, good. That was a test. I wanted to see who the quitters are. Not you guys."

"Oh, brother." Laken sighs, hanging her head in shame.

"You could be home playing your iComputers, playing your video games, eating candy. Instead, you're here, doing push-ups, learning how to fight." Johnny looks around before spotting Eli and pointing at him, "Lip! Look. Even Lip's tougher than those guys. He's no quitter."

"Could you please not call me that?" Eli asks him quietly.

"Excuse me, what?" Johnny hears him and walks towards him.

"I'll kill him." Laken glared at her dad's best friend.

"Could you please not call me that?" Eli repeated.

"Um, I'll warm 'em up, Sensei." Miguel speaks up, not wanting anything to happen to Eli but also not wanting to see what Laken would do if Johnny didn't stop talking about her cousin.

"No, Lip has something he wants to say." Johnny protested.

"I will stab you in the neck." Laken's words make Johnny look at her in disbelief.

"Sorry, speak up, Lip. Or is your tongue messed up too? Are you one of those challenged kids?"

"Um, the doctor said I could be on the spectrum." Eli says, making Laken sigh and hang her head.

"I don't know what that is but get off it pronto. Alright?" Johnny says. "If you don't want me to call you "lip", don't have a weird lip."

"Seriously? Knock it off." Laken moves to stand beside her cousin, arms crossed over her chest with a glare on her face.

Johnny ignores her, "Can't you get surgery?"

"I was born with a cleft lip. This is the scare from the surgery." Eli does everything he can to avoid eye contact with the man standing in front of him, shifting on his feet so that he was standing a little closer to his cousin.

"You mean it was worse before that? Or did the doctor just screw up?" Johnny asked, ignoring the remark being made by his childhood best friends' daughter, "Because if this is the after photo that sucks, man. You should sue."

"Can we just please change the topic?" Eli asked.

"You don't think I want to? It's right in front of me." Johnny tells him, "If you wanna be something other than a nerd with a scar on his lip, then you gotta flip the script. Okay? Get a face tattoo or gouge your eye out. We'll call you "patch," alright? No, don't do that one. You'll still look like a freak."

"Seriously?" Laken throws her hands up as Eli makes his way to the back and out of the room, "God, you are such a freaking asshole! Now I understand why nobody wants to be around you."

"What? Laken, come on. Laken!" Johnny calls after the blonde as she races off in the direction that her cousin went to.

"Sensei." Miguel sighs, shaking his head, "That was Laken's cousin. She's crazy protective of him."

"Ah, shit." Johnny sighs, throwing his head back as he thought of all the ways that he was going to have to apologize to the girl.

"Eli! Eli, hey!" Laken grabs her cousin by the arm, stopping him from moving. "Come on, don't quit yet."

"Did you not hear what he was saying to me?! I just wanna go home." Eli cried, trying to pull his arm out of Laken's hold.

"No! No, we're gonna do what he said."

"Get a face tattoo? Gouge my eye out?" Eli looks at her in confusion.

"No." Laken smirked, pulling him towards where her car was parked, "We're gonna flip the script. And . . . possibly get a tattoo."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          ❝𝐆𝐎 𝐀𝐖𝐀𝐘.❞ Johnny calls out as Miguel taps on his office door, "No more lessons today."

"Do you have to be so hard on them?" Miguel asked, hands thrown out to the side.

"Oh, come on, Diaz. They're a bunch of losers."

"Yeah? Well, some of those losers are my friends." Miguel told him, "Some of Laken's friends."

"Yeah, that tracks." Johnny sits down.

"And they're your students. You wanted a full dojo, you got one." Miguel says to him.

"Not full like that."

"Yeah. I get it, alright? They're losers. Maybe I'm a loser, too. Maybe that makes Laken a loser.

"Are you kidding me? Are you gonna cry now too?" Johnny asked the boy.

"No, it . . . never mind, it's just . . . You don't know what it's like to be us." Miguel tells him, "I'll see you tomorrow."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          𝐋𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐍 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐒 a step away from Eli, a smirk on her face as she looked over her handy work, "Oh, yeah. This is definitely flipping the script."

Eli stands up from his place on the toilet seat in Laken's bathroom, moving to look at his now blue hair, styled up into a Mohawk by his now pink haired cousin.

"Now you just need to play the part."

The two smirk at each other.

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

          ❝𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐄 absence, Sensei.❞ Miguel sighed as Johnny walked out of his office. "Laken being one of them."

"Bunch of pussies." Aisha comments.

"No, it's my fault." Johnny sighed, "Since you joined Cobra Kai, I have been hard on you. I've called you names. I've humiliated you. Some of you I've hit. And for that, I don't apologize. Cobra Kai is about strength. If you're not strong on the inside, you can't be strong on the outside. And right now, you're all weak. And I know that because I was you."

The door comes open and Laken comes inside, sitting her bag down as she moves to her spot behind Miguel and Aisha.

"Where were you at?" Miguel turns his head to look at her, eyes instantly going to her hair, "Nice hair."

"You'll see." Laken smirked.

"I used to have no friends. Used to be the weirdo kid." He points to Bert, "Not that weird. I hooked up with babes and all, but . . . the point is, I wasn't always the badass sensei I am today. Just like a cobra, I had to shed my loser skin to find my true power. And you guys will too."

Laken's smirk grows on her face as she hears the bell above the door go off.

"Welcome to Cobra Kai." Johnny greeted Eli as everyone turns to look at him.

Miguel looks at his friend in disbelief, "Eli, what happened?"

"I'm flipping the script." Eli has a smirk on his face.

"Wait, are you the kid with the lip?" Johnny asked, walking over to him. "Nice cut, bro. You see that?" He points at Eli, "Doesn't matter if you're a loser or a nerd or a freak. All that matters is that you become badass. Hawk, fall in."

Eli kicks his shoes off of his feet, moving to stand next to his cousin, the two of them doing their signature handshake.

"Fear does not exist in this dojo, does it?"

"No, sensei!"

"Pain does not exist in this dojo, does it?"

"No, sensei!"

"Defeat does not exist in this dojo, does it?"

"No, Sensei!"

"Class, are you ready to learn the way of the fist?"

"Yes, Sensei!"