Exciti

Chapter 33 (Adam)

Adam threw the stick and hoop to the wooden floor. "This is impossible," he huffed.

The man opposite him huffed back at him, infuriating Adam even more. "You just have to try harder." He insisted in a nasal voice.

Waking up at the crack of dawn on a Saturday to train on an empty stomach was making Adam crankier than usual. "I have been trying hard... for weeks! I just can't do it! Look, why don't you give me something more serious, like an actual weapon? What is it with Antiquarians and toys?!"

The small, bald Antiquarian, who looked so much like a genie, twirled his coiled mustache and returned Adam's stare with his squinty and patient kohl-lined eyes, "Adam, we have been through this. Weapon Exciti are unpredictable and evil because they have absorbed large quantities of negative and dangerous emotions. Hate and fear will sooner make an Excitus turn against you than protect you. Exciti Toys, on the other hand, store a lot of imagination, eagerness and childhood energy. That makes them perfect tools to channel your gift through."

"Lucy has a sword!" Adam winced internally when he heard the whining in his voice.

Monsieur Kerman shook his head. "That sword is not an Excitus, her doll is."

"Maybe I don't need a toy?" Adam suggested.

Kerman sighed and shook his head, again. "Connecting to a toy is the only efficient way to learn to channel your gift. Think of them as your training wheels, or a swimming board. Without connecting to your gift, you cannot control it, then you'd be eclipsing Exciti left and right."

Adam couldn't help feeling frustrated, though more at his own failure than Monsieur Kerman's patient instructions. He took a deep breath, reminding himself that the sooner he controlled his gift, the less dangerous he'd feel around the Exciti in his life, and the sooner he could focus on his search to find Tam. "What am I doing wrong? How is this different from a Tail? Because I can always call Barb out just fine."

"That you have a cooperative Tail is a wonder on its own. Never heard of one before. Still, a coin is a second-to-third circle Excitus. It moves of its own volition. To move a toy, a first circle Excitus, you can't just request it to move. You have to allow your Essence, your Rouh, your Anima, to connect to their life force and let it channel your will."

"Yes, but why am I not connecting?" Like, is there a router somewhere in my head that needs to be turned off and on again?

Monsieur Kerman pursed his lips and rocked back and forth on his bright, curvy yellow shoes. "It is probably a matter of finding an Excitus that fits you, one that clicks. You are older and more powerful than any of my pupils, which makes it very challenging, but it is doable. Look, your friend found it hard at first, too. He is making excellent progress now that we found the perfect toy for him!"

"Yay! one of us is staying out of the Cell," Adam grumbled under his breath. He wrestled with his jealousy as he watched Liam command a brown leather ball to bounce and zoom in the air with mere glances and gestures.

He looked away, reminding himself that Liam had earned his success when he quit basketball to focus on training. He picked up the hoop and stick and gave them to Monsieur Kerman. "I guess I can't use these either. I'm going out. I need a break away of this lame dollhouse."

He knew he was sulking. The dollhouse was actually the coolest thing about this entire fiasco. It looked like an unassuming, handbag sized, doll house with a clock above its front door, but once the door was touched, Monsieur Kerman and his trainees could enter a training hall where time and space could be stretched or shrunk as needed. The two hours they spent at Mercury every day after school or on weekend mornings stretched into four or even eight hours of gruesome training in a gymnasium-sized hall or a small classroom, depending on the lesson.

Monsieur Kerman took the hoop from Adam and gave him a small smile. "I would advise you to be patient, young man. You are making progress. You are excellent in studying Exciti theory, and you have finally stopped breaking every Excitus you try to use." His expression then turned suspicious, and he held up the hoop to examine it, "At least, I think you have!"

Adam made a face, he didn't want to know if he had broken this Excitus, too. He wished he could wipe from his mind the memory of a beautiful porcelain doll that was given to him on the first day. The poor thing disintegrated into dust in his hands the moment he got frustrated with his inability to control it. Most of all, he wished he could forget the look on Lucy's pale face as she watched the dust seep from the folds of the doll's dress. She had stayed out of the dollhouse ever since.

He started moving to the house's door when Monsieur Kerman told him to , "Adam, wait a second." He then walked to a large box at the corner of the room and started to search deeper and deeper within it until his feet stuck up in the air. When he finally re-emerged, he had a smudge of grime on his forehead and a battered card in his hand, "I knew this was here."

He gave the card to Adam, "This is the address of the toy-warden, a friend of mine who has a vast collection of Exciti with a particular focus on Exciti toys. He lives in the Venetian Bubble, so you shouldn't go without Lago or Dr. Little. I have told him about your need for a new toy, and he might be able to help."

Adam said nothing as he took the card. He already felt ashamed of his outburst.

Monsieur Kerman smiled, as if he knew what Adam was thinking, "You only need to stop being afraid of what you are and start embracing it. Look at your friend," he pointed at Liam, "He employs his Visus to see the connection that ties the ball to himself. It doesn't take much from there to flex and extend them like an arm or a leg." He nodded sagely, "Although I must say, he needs to slow down or he will get a very bad headache!"

Liam was smiling as the ball zoomed to him in answer to a long, low whistle. The pure joy in his friend's expression annoyed Adam even more. 

He stomped to the exit. Embrace it, are you kidding me? I could still taste the doll's dust.

Just as he reached the door, the entire house rattled with a deafening boom, boom, boom. Adam and Liam struggled to stay upright. Monsieur Kerman, however, went to the window in a graceful trot, pulled the curtain and looked out, "Who is it?"

The ginormous eye of Lucy occupied the whole window as her speech reached them at one fourth its usual speed. "Hi, are you guys finished? I have breakfast from Lago here, and I'm starving."

Monsieur Kerman hesitated a second before he replied, "Yeah," he glanced at Adam, "I think we are done here for today.