Broke and Alone

His Thoughts

Disclaimer: The geniuses at Columbia Pictures own the Karate Kid film trilogy. I own the fanfics I cook up from time to time.

Former Cobra Kai sensei John Kreese sighed.

Back then, before that goshdarn Daniel LaRusso and Mr. Miyagi, his so-called "teacher" (which was putting it mildly), showed up and ruined his life (at least from his perspective), he had everything going for him (or so it seemed at the time). 

Students flocked to his dojo like bees to honey, or similar to how the proverbial moth would be drawn to a flame. And he made a good living with all the money that flowed in from their parents, just so he could help keep it going. Keep the rent and the bills paid and such.

But that was before all the not-so-good-stuff (as Kreese mentally preferred to call it) had happened. 

Before that fateful night in December of 1984. The world as Kreese knew it changed in a not-so-good way when Daniel won the All-Valley Under 18 Karate Tournament against Johnny Lawrence, Kreese's so-called 'best' student (which was an understatement). Before Johnny won second place, and not only showed he was fine with the second-place trophy, but even proved he had good sportsmanship skills by personally giving the first-place trophy to Daniel as he felt Daniel had played a good match (and even showed he knew when things were going too far as soon as he gave Kreese the look telling him it was illegal and dirty to use the "sweep the leg" move in a karate tournament).

Before Mr. Miyagi simultaneously defeated Kreese and saved Johnny's life by getting him out of Kreese's chokehold in the parking lot. Before Kreese was looked at with contempt by his now former students — which, besides Johnny, also included Tommy, Dutch, Jimmy and even Bobby Brown, who was shown to have a conscience, standards and morals, of all things — as they tore off their Cobra Kai gis. They'd taken a solemn vow to never step or come across the threshold of the Cobra Kai dojo ever again, as they were done with Cobra Kai for good. Unfortunately for Kreese, they were determined to stick with it, as it'd been nine months since a student walked through his doors.

Now? For Kreese, everything had changed — and not for the better, either. 

The money to pay the rent was less than enough. His assorted creditors were sending him letters, informing him the Cobra Kai dojo would be repossessed unless he managed to find another line of work and got himself back on his feet in the financial sense, as well as harassing him for payment of bills long past their due dates. Also, the organizers of the All-Valley Karate Tournament — which happened to be the same one Daniel had won — had decided to drop Cobra Kai from their membership rolls, because of Kreese not having enough money to pay the membership dues.

Basically, Kreese knew he was in deep trouble... way deep at that. He was bankrupt, and he was alone — with not a single student left.

He had lost everything.