At 20 minutes to 9, a dozen sleepy seniors amble in, spreading out among the small, triangular tables. They sit close enough to mumble quiet conversations — but not too close. The one girl and 11 boys comprise just over half the graduating class at the Academy for Technology and the Classics.

Josh Montoya, one of those seniors and a cage fighter, sits front and center, chewing gum, hugging a 1.5-liter bottle of water. He hunches down low, into his black, hooded sweat shirt. He scratches his chin, hidden under several days' stubble. His eyes are on the teacher, who towers over him on a high stool, looking crisp in khaki pants, a pale blue striped shirt, red tie. "This young man is my project child," Mark Paules says, tapping the toe of a polished cowboy boot.

Josh sets the water bottle on his desk, leans back in his chair and grins. He tells the teacher he'll give him a call after graduation so they can catch up, hang out.

"When you turn 21, I'll buy you a beer," Paules says. "We're not going to 'hang out.' "

Josh laughs. He slouches forward and wraps his small, callused hands around the water bottle. His smile is fleeting.

Paules: "I think the military, for you, would be a fine finishing school."

Josh has been considering the military. He wants to go to Iraq. He wants to fight. He's only 5-foot-6, 145 pounds, but he's a fighter by nature. He used to scrap with classmates, but now he fights with purpose. He was 15 when he had his first real fight, a mixed martial arts match at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center. On Feb. 2, just three days after he turned 18, a cage fight victory in Farmington gave him professional status.

"He put the guy to sleep in the first 30 seconds," said his mom, Suzanne. She wasn't there for the takedown, but she watched a video of the fight when her son was back home, uninjured. Although she can't bring herself to sit ringside, Suzanne said, she's OK with the fighting. She believes it has given Josh confidence and discipline.

Josh's dad, Ralph, agrees. Cage fighting has made Josh determined to succeed. "I've always told him that school's like that," like being in a cage.

When class begins, Paules orders the seniors to pull out their copies of James Madison's Federalist No. 10. He peppers them with questions about Madison's prose, about factions at odds, about a young country finding its way.

Friends walk by outside, and Josh rises up, waves at them with both hands.

"Hey, focus on me." Paules barely misses a beat in his talk about liberty and control. How do you keep factions from creating chaos without eliminating freedom?

"You could eliminate the people," Josh jokes, his voice barely audible.

"Hey, sober up."

Josh strokes his chin. He opens his bottle and begins to drink. In 10 minutes, he has gulped a liter of water; in 15, the bottle is empty. He has to drink a lot of water to stay fit for the cage. He has to eat six or seven times a day to keep his weight steady. Sometimes he has to cut weight before a match, eating next to nothing for a day or two and running on a treadmill until he sweats the pounds away. That's the worst part of fighting, he says.

Questions on Madison's essay keep coming. Josh has an answer: Veto means "I forbid." This time, his voice is clear. He knows he's right. Paules nods. Josh beams for just a second.

During the lesson, most of the students' eyes are focused on The Federalist or on their notebooks. Josh has no notebook. He admits he doesn't like to study. But he's going to be at the College of Santa Fe's Greer Garson Theatre today to accept his diploma. His eyes stay focused on Paules.

Paules has known Josh for six years. "We've knocked heads for four," he said a few minutes before the government and economics class began, when students were still milling around on the school's outdoor walkway or down below, in the sparse field overlooking Rancho Viejo's rolling hills. Sometimes, Paules said, Josh's behavior was so bad, the two nearly came to blows.

Then one day a couple of years ago, Josh apologized. "He realized that in fact I was on his side." Since then, Paules said, "Josh has put in a fourth-quarter effort." His graduation is a victory.

"Democracy is a messy business," Paules says as he grills the seniors about factions at odds with one another. "Human beings naturally will fight."

Josh says fighting saved him. "I was a troublemaker. I loved to do wrong." He started drinking and messing around with drugs. "Fighting was like an angel. It's kind of weird to say, but that's how I feel."

He's been training with Tait Fletcher at Undisputed Fitness for his next fight Saturday in Cortez, Colo. After school, he meets Tait and a sparring partner, Isaac Vallie-Flagg, another professional fighter, at Undisputed's new studio in Solana Center. It opened a few days ago, Tait says. They haven't finished installing the lights, but the new black mats are down, and the cage is up.

Josh and Isaac step in, begin warming up. They stretch. They jog a few laps around the black chain-link fence. And then they meet in the middle. They start with a round of takedowns. Josh dives for the knees; Isaac goes down. Isaac rises, grabs Josh around both legs, swings him around and down. Josh gets up, dives for the ankles. Isaac grabs him around the waist, lays him down flat. Josh launches into a dozen takedowns. He lunges for the waist, then the knees, then the ankles.

Isaac is a couple inches taller and much bulkier than Josh. The 30-year-old fights at 175 pounds, but now he's at least 185. He doesn't go down easy. When it's his turn to take down, he works quick.

By the end, both fighters' faces are flushed, sweaty. They're breathing hard and hitting harder.

"To be a good mixed martial artist, you have to be a triathlete," Tait says. Fighters use a variety of techniques: Jiu-Jitsu, boxing, kickboxing. A match is like a chess game, Tait says: You have to feel out where your opponent is weak and where he is strong. You have to know your own strengths.

Josh dreams of becoming a world champion cage fighter, but he knows it will be a battle. "If being a champion were easy," he says, "everybody would be one."

Contact Cynthia Miller at 986-3095 or cmiller@sfnewmexican.com.