Alitia: Hellfire and Blizzard

XIV: For Reclamation

Luce couldn't say she was looking forward to having to reclaim Acadia and Sierra. 

Deep down, she knew it was necessary. Of course it was. If the resistance against Brynn wanted to stand a chance of winning this battle, they were going to have to reclaim the schools she had already taken over. Luce knew that started with Sierra, the first school of the two the group was planning on targeting, but she wasn't sure of how to feel about it. Her stomach clenched with anxiety each time she thought about it for longer than a few seconds. What good did any of this do her when she had no idea how to handle the future?

Luce tapped one foot anxiously against the ground, forcing herself to breathe around the tension in her chest. She wouldn't be feeling this way if not for the stark similarities this situation had to the battles against Iago. Even roughly a year later, Luce still felt the sting of having to battle him. She was getting closer to the anniversary of the battles against Iago truly kicking up and hitting a boiling point, and that never did any favors to her rampaging nerves. If anything, it just made Luce feel worse. She struggled enough as it was, and she didn't need Iago to make things spiral out of her control even more. And yet, there she was, still reminded just a bit too much of everything he had done to make her life miserable. Brynn was different from Iago, but the difference between the two of them wasn't anywhere near as great as Luce needed it to be. 

Luce probably would have felt better about the idea of having to fight Brynn if she knew what to expect from the next few stages of the battle. Instead, it felt like she was going in with next to no information at her disposal. Altina decided that they needed to strike as soon as possible with as much force as they could muster. If they lashed out immediately, then they would be able to catch Brynn off guard. Luce wanted to think it would work that way, but she was starting to doubt it. Brynn had enough military prowess to take over two of the Millennium Six schools in one fell swoop, and she was bound to know how to defend herself from outside attacks too. Luce wasn't going to give up entirely on winning the battle yet when she still felt there was a chance, but it was difficult for her to truly feel like she knew what she was doing. 

A lot of that came down to the fact that the group still hadn't managed to get in touch with Leviathan. That wasn't to say they hadn't been trying. In fact, Fromir had been sending him messages or calls at least three times an hour, but Leviathan never picked up. Luce didn't know how to fight back against Brynn when the people who would have had the best information for her were both missing in action. The search for Minerva was still going every bit as poorly as it had been a few hours ago, and Luce was starting to lose hope that they were going to find her at all. Luce knew that patience was a virtue, and she couldn't lose her confidence so soon, but it was hard to keep herself composed in the face of it all. 

Leviathan was another matter entirely. By all logic, he should have been there to help the group. He knew more about Brynn than anyone but Minerva, and he would have been the perfect person to help guide the Millennium Six back to their full reclamation... But he refused to pick up the phone. Fromir was certain something had gone wrong with him, but he didn't know the details beyond that. Any attempts to reach out to Aurore had fallen short too. Apparently, she didn't know where he was either. It didn't matter that Leviathan was technically her coworker and fellow Guardian. She didn't know where to start when it came to finding him, and Luce was starting to get mildly frustrated with Leviathan's desire to keep to himself when the world could least afford for him to do that. 

Luce bit back a heavy sigh as she arrived at the front gates of Alitia. All the students that were free to fight were being stationed in either their home school or the fighting squad that would be moving to reclaim Sierra. Recent messages had revealed that Brynn was in Acadia, and the group was planning on taking Sierra back so they could strike at Acadia with a bit more strength when the moment arrived. Luce didn't think either school was a perfect target at the moment, but she doubted anyone wanted to hear about her anxieties. They needed to focus on seeing all of this through, and to do that, Luce needed to keep her head held high and her shoulders back.