❛ I'm a genius, Diaz. ❜

     After Miguel finished his ice cream, the group of four went to go check on Robby.

Ayane saw him talking to not only Kenny, but a much bigger guy who stood defensively beside Kenny. He took a step toward Robby, towering over the boy momentarily. Then he put an arm around Kenny and walked away.

"Who was that?" Ayane questioned, watching him walk away.

Robby turned, seeing her, Miguel, Sam and Tory all standing there.

"Kenny's brother, Shawn. We met in juvie. He told me to leave Kenny alone."

"You're not gonna listen to him though, right?" Tory interjected.

Ayane knew that Robby wanted to convince Kenny to join Miyagi-Do. She wanted to, too, but Ayane felt like Robby and Kenny had more of a relationship.

"Do whatever you need to do," Sam said with an affirmative nod, looking to the others. "We'll have your back."

Ayane stepped forward just then. "Uh, this doesn't need to end in a fight. If you fight Kenny's brother then that's the last way you're gonna get him back in Miyagi-Do."

Robby sighed, shaking his head a little. "I just need to try and get through to him."

He turned and began to follow after Kenny and Shawn, Ayane clenching her jaw in annoyance. She turned to the other three, giving them looks.

"We're not gonna fight here."

The three all nodded, Ayane tailing behind Robby at once.

They ended up outside, at the batting cages. Robby had found Kenny and Shawn, talking with them in what appeared to be a heated conversation. Ayane walked up to the fence gate, watching with apprehension.

She could see the exchange growing more intense, shaking her head a little.

"Robby!" she called, the boy turning his head. In that split second, Shawn threw a punch at him. Robby ducked and jabbed him in the stomach, Ayane watching as Shawn and Kenny both teamed up on Robby.

The other three caught up with Ayane, seeing what was happening. Sam and Tory both entered the batting cage, jumping in to help stop the fight.

Meanwhile, Ayane and Miguel hung back. She looked over at him, shaking her head with visible disappointment.

"Why does the fighting never end?"

Ayane rolled her eyes, stepping in the cage and getting between Kenny, Sam and Tory.

"Kenny!" she grabbed his fist as it came flying at her face, striking him in the shoulder and flipping his arm around, forcing Kenny to his knees at once.

"Kenny," Ayane breathed out, looking down at the boy who could not move in her hold. He was facing away from her, but she knew he was fuming.

"We just want to help you," Ayane continued, Kenny wrestling in her grip. "I know you're pissed, but you can't hold this anger inside of you."

He yelled, reaching up with a hand he managed to get free and punching Ayane in the side. She took a step back, Kenny coming at her. Ayane grabbed hold of his shoulders, bringing a knee up to his stomach and throwing him into the fence.

He was not on the ground long, springing back to his feet to go at her again. But this time Shawn grabbed him, pulling Kenny away.

"Nah, man, we're done. Security's coming. Let's go."

Shawn dragged Kenny away, who glared back at the others before he left. Ayane pushed her hair out of her face, huffing as the others gathered around her.

"That could've gone better," Robby remarked.

Ayane looked pissed. "I said no fighting, and yet what did we do? Got into a fight."

"Hey, you were the main one kicking ass," Tory replied, Ayane giving her a look. Tory started to laugh, along with Sam and then Robby, then Miguel.

Ayane shook her head, cracking a smile. "Shut up. Let's go home before we get kicked out."

She had noticed that Miguel did not even bother to help out with the altercation, wondering why that could have been. When they arrived at Reseda to drop off Miguel and Robby, Ayane hopped out of the car with them.

"I'll catch a ride back home in a bit," she informed Sam, the girl making a confused face.

"Alright. See you in a bit."

She and Tory left, Ayane turning to face both Miguel and Robby. Throwing up her hands, Ayane smiled.

"Wanna spar?"

Miguel and Robby exchanged a look, wondering what Ayane's game was here. They clearly did not want the other to be there, judging by the looks on their faces.

At once, Miguel replied, "Uh, I think I'll leave you guys to it. I'm kinda tired."

Ayane's face fell, frowning at Miguel. He looked at her with a weak smile. "Goodnight, Ayane."

With that, Miguel turned and walked to his apartment. Robby turned back to the girl, placing his hands in his pockets.

"Are you and Miguel... okay?" he asked.

"We're fine," Ayane replied, staring at the Diaz's apartment door. "Or so I thought."

Robby felt a little bad, but he was more so excited that he finally had a moment alone with Ayane. They had not really talked since her incident.

"How are you doing?" he then questioned, Ayane looking over to meet his eyes. "You've been avoiding my texts again."

Ayane rubbed her arm, giving a little shrug. "Yeah, sorry about that. I-I'm doing better. A lot better."

Robby eyed her momentarily, then smiled softly. "You really scared me, by the way. I'd appreciate it if you never did that again."

Cracking a smile, Ayane rolled her eyes. She held out a pinky to Robby.

"Never again."

He continued to smile, interlinking his pinky finger with Ayane's.

She yanked Robby forward a second later, taking him by the shoulder and kicking at his shin. Robby quickly defended, turning and throwing a punch at her which Ayane blocked.

"Alright, don't be a pussy. Let's spar."

Robby laughed, raising his fists.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The next day, at practice, Ayane was shocked to see none other than Kenny Payne enter the dojo.

She stopped stretching, approaching him in disbelief. Robby was behind her, both of them standing in front of the boy.

"Kenny," Ayane smiled, then hesitating. "Wait, you're not here for round two, are you?"

Kenny laughed, shaking his head. "Nah, nah. I... I wanna join Miyagi-Do."

Ayane looked over at Robby, who returned her smile. Robby held his fist out, bumping Kenny's. He looked over at Ayane, who went in and hugged him.

"Sorry for throwing you into a fence yesterday," she apologized as she pulled back.

Kenny grinned. "It did me some good."

Ayane and Robby showed Kenny around the place, introducing him to the senseis. Miguel watched the two of them the entire time, trying to ignore the feeling he got watching them. It damn near felt like rage.

Miguel finally broke away from sparring with Eli, walking over to Ayane at once. She was stretching on her own, Miguel fighting the urge to check her out as she leaned down to the side and grabbed her foot.

"Hey," Miguel greeted, Ayane standing up straight.

"Hey, Mig. What's up?" she replied with a smile.

His irritation seemed to immediately disappear when talking to her. Miguel tried to think of an excuse for coming over to talk to her, realizing he did not have a particular reason for approaching her.

"Ah, nothing. Uh– do you– did you wanna– um, maybe get together later and study for Calculus? I can already tell it's gonna kick my ass."

Ayane laughed a bit, wondering if this was just Miguel's way of asking her to do something.

"I can't make any promises that I'll be much help, but I can try," she replied, placing her hands on her hips. "Your place or mine? Well– the LaRusso's?"

Miguel chuckled softly. "Uh, it doesn't matter. We can go to the LaRusso's since it's right here."

Ayane nodded. "Yeah, sure. After practice?"

Miguel nodded back, more than happy to agree.

"Whatever works best for you, babe– uh, oh God, sorry, I-I didn't mean to–"

He scratched the back of his neck, his face burning as Ayane raised her eyebrows. She cleared her throat, finally laughing him off.

"It's okay. There's bound to be a slip up every now and then," she shrugged, Miguel mentally smacking himself.

"Sorry," he apologized again, Ayane waving him off.

Just then, Johnny called all the students to attention. Ayane and Miguel walked over, seeing all three senseis on the platform. And, Ayane noticed, they were all wearing white gis.

She furrowed her eyebrows with confusion.

"After lots of consideration between myself and the other senseis, we've come to an agreement," Johnny spoke, looking to Daniel and Chozen.

"From here on out, we're going to be Miyagi-Do."

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

     After practice, Ayane and Miguel went back to the LaRusso's.

Miguel had his backpack with him, following Ayane up to her room. They were both a bit sweaty and gross from training, but Ayane supposed she could wait until after studying to shower.

She flopped down on her bed, taking a breather as Miguel sat down on the side of it.

"You tired?" he asked as she lay there, sprawled out in a starfish position.

Ayane let out a puff of air through her cheeks. "Tired isn't even the word, dude. I haven't been putting in the work for the past couple months, since the All-Valley ended. I'm letting myself go."

Miguel laughed as Ayane sat up, reaching down to where her backpack lay on the floor. She unzipped it and brought out her Calculus notebook and a calculator, tossing them on the bed.

"You're far from letting yourself go, believe me," Miguel replied, Ayane quirking a brow for a moment as she wondered what exactly that meant.

Sitting crisscrossed and facing Miguel, Ayane opened her Calculus notebook.

"We already have a shitload of homework for this class," she muttered, flipping through pages and then reaching in her backpack again for her laptop.

Miguel nodded with a sigh, turning so that he was facing her completely. He pulled his shoes off, making himself comfortable. Miguel didn't really need any help with Calculus; it was honestly his best class.

"Yeah, which is why I wanted to go ahead and get started on trying to understand it," Miguel replied, tapping his pencil on his own notebook.

Ayane looked over the homework sheet they had been given, making a face of utter confusion.

"There are way too many letters here," she shook her head, placing her pencil in her mouth as she studied her notes.

Miguel watched her, finding what she was doing kind of hot, but he knew he couldn't say that out loud.

"What the hell is a derivative?" she blurted out, Miguel laughing softly.

"It represents the slope of the tangent line to the function's graph up to that point. It tells you how fast a function is changing with respect to its input variable at any given moment."

Ayane glanced up at Miguel, arching an eyebrow. "Uh huh... are you sure that you really needed help with Calculus, Mig?"

His mouth fell open, trying to think of a defense. But he finally began to laugh, unable to even cover for himself.

Ayane shook her head with a smile, rolling her eyes.

"So maybe I just wanted an excuse to hang out," Miguel said, raising his hands. "Sue me."

The girl gave him a look. "If you wanted to hang out just say so, dummy. I'd rather be doing literally anything else with you than Calculus."

Miguel grinned, then shook his head. "Oh no, Miss Cain. We're gonna finish this Calculus homework while we're here. It sounds like you need my help anyway," he teased.

Ayane scoffed, moving her pencil between her fingers. She looked down at her homework sheet, working out the problem on the paper. After a moment, she raised her head and handed the paper to Miguel.

"I'm a genius, Diaz. And I have proof."

Miguel tilted his head as he looked the problem, then meeting Ayane's eyes.

"Um... that's wrong, Ayane."

She narrowed her eyes, looking back at the homework sheet with sheer confusion. Ayane thought she had been on the right track.

"Here," Miguel leaned in, looking down at the piece of paper as he corrected her mistake. "You were close, but you defined the derivative wrong. Just made a mistake with the formulas, is all."

Ayane looked up, noting the closeness between her and Miguel. His hand rested on the homework sheet, only an inch away from hers. She had the sudden urge to reach forward and kiss him, her eyes darting to Miguel's lips for a fraction of a second.

Finally, she broke eye contact and sat back, crossing her arms. "Well, I hate to break it to you Miguel, but you might be here for a while explaining this shit to me."

Miguel was still shaking off the moment of tension between them, giving Ayane a chuckle. He looked up at her with a soft smile, tapping his pencil on his leg.

"I don't have any complaints about that."

Notes.
me screaming at ayane and miguel's slightest interactions now

i have yet to even crack episode 2 of season 6 y'all, this is gonna be a LONGGG act with hella chapters (i don't think y'all will complain though)

i love robby, i adore him and everything he represents, but in this fic he needs his ass beat and that is personally my fault

anyway... any interactions you want to see with ayane?