Alyssa's Sins

12. Initiative vs Reinforcements

The time had come—30th November 2009. This attack was not like any other attack—this was widespread, akin to the Hundreds' Day Offensive, versus the concentrated attacks in salients like the Spring Offensive. While Alyssa and Lucas Jones had correctly predicted they would attack in some places, they had never realised the huge scale of this attack. It's almost as if it were an entirely new offensive. They attacked everything, from Alyssa's vices to the hardliners. This was designed so Alyssa and her supporters couldn't concentrate on a particular point.

Seeing as though Alyssa was relatively stagnating in academics, Michael decided to pick up his academic pace. He announced to the school that he would apply for UW Academy in 10th grade, or even the Transition School in 8th grade. If he managed to be accepted into the Transition School, he would be skipping three years in total, accounting for the year spent in the Transition School. Then he picked up the pace with extraordinary speed, finishing twice the curriculum for a day in a few hours.

With the academic gap closing, Alyssa began working harder to study, and Lucas Jones began giving more executive functioning tips to Alyssa to help her organisation. It was the least he could do—ultimately, she needed a wide executive functioning base for her goals. Lucas Jones was contemplating hiring tutors for Alyssa, but then Michael could have ammunition against his daughter, claiming that not only is she sinful for smoking and drinking, but also her grades were not "real" due to a lot of help from tutors.  Alyssa told the liberals and moderates to make a defense in depth, in terms of academics, their debating points, etc. so if one point got defeated, they could fall back.

While Alyssa's attention was drawn towards preventing Michael from exceeding her, some Pluh Cult members launched attacks against the liberal and moderate wings of her supporters. The sophistication was marvellous—like the Hundreds Day Offensive, attacking at various points simultaneously to overload the lines. Hardliners of the Pluh Cult attacked some liberals on points like "conceding" their ideology and their lack of academic success. Olivia, one of the hardliners, even had a physical fight with one of the liberals, leading to the Pluh Cult member being suspended for 3 days.

With their backs to the wall, the liberal and moderate wings clung on for dear life to avoid being swamped by all the Pluh Cult's points. Despite their gallant effort, one by one the points fell—another friend of Alexey surrendered on 4th December. The Pluh Cult had occupied 10 of the 20 honour roll spots for the first time in years. Alyssa's supporters occupied 4, with Alyssa the champion but just barely. 

The defense in depth was incomplete but gave Alyssa barely enough time to save her friend Matthew from falling off the honour rolls. Regardless, the Pluh Cult had accomplished their aim—to fully seperate Alyssa and her hardliners from the moderates and liberals.

It was at a surprisingly heavy cost - Alyssa's jaw struck the floor when she heard a disillusioned Pluh Cult member, a Brit called Liam, surrender to her. He had his badge and other Pluh Cult materials with him—useful for reconnaissance. He claimed the Pluh Cult had various morale issues—one of his friends, Levi, took a 3-day leave of absence for mental burnout. A few others either protested silently against the First Pluh or took smaller leaves for mental burnout. He even gave evidence for this, with a copy of Levi's medical leave certificate.

Alyssa and Lucas Jones rallied on 5th December 2009 to stop the liberal and moderate wings from collapsing. They rallied about how the Pluh Cult was becoming exhausted and that this was their final throw. The Pluh Cult attacked this rally, showing examples of Alyssa's supporters surrendering to the Pluh cult. After that, Alyssa worked hard on her academics and pleasured herself with long cigarettes.

At least Alyssa's rally slowed down the Pluh Cult, even though Alyssa was hanging on for dear life for her valedictorian award, and the liberals were forced to renounce most of their points by 10th December 2009. It was a slow, controlled retreat, with the Pluh Cult seeming to suffer more than the liberals and moderates.