Exciti

Chapter 35 (Liam)

Liam smiled despite his nausea as Lucy dragged Adam off the TerraFerry, her momentum overtaking his pace. It was amusing to watch Lucy this excited. "Come on!" she urged.

"Slow down, I'll trip," Adam complained halfheartedly, his face half covered under a baseball hat.

"No, you need to hurry up!" she insisted.

Liam hoped, and not for the first time, that they weren't in trouble for sneaking into the Venetian Bubble without permission. He sped up to walk beside them, which was easy considering his stride was much longer than any of theirs, "We should have told Dr. Little," he signed.

Lucy narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't start with me, you can only visit the Toy warden if you have a card, and the doctor would have asked Lago or Kerman to accompany you two instead of me. Na 'ah, no way, I'm NOT missing my chance. I finally get to see the Toy warden's collection and visit the Venetian Bubble." She was squealing by the end of her rant.

Well, it is too late now anyway, Liam thought and focused on keeping his eyes trained on the exit and ignoring the palpitation-inducing see-through dock. "Well, you won't get to see anything if Adam twisted an ankle," he half-joked.

"If he won't hurry up, I will carry him," Lucy warned.

Adam looked horrified, "You wouldn't dare!" but started running nevertheless.

A wave of disorientated vertigo blanketed Liam when he stepped inside the Bubble, intensifying his nausea. The place looked like the Venice he had seen in pictures and movies: beautiful old buildings with waterways instead of streets and gondolas instead of cars. The only difference was that this particular Venice seemed to think that gravity was pliable, and sometimes, optional.

The buildings and waterways extended to cover the entire inner surface of the spherical bubble, including the part over Liam's head. He looked up to see gondolas, people and Exciti going on their daily lives, only they were upside down.

OR maybe we are the upside-down ones! The thought alone made his dizziness worse. He clung to his backpack, feeling the reassuring weight of his ball.

Most of the waterways clung to the inner surface of the Bubble, climbing up and down its walls. Some, however, seemed to crisscross and zigzag in the middle of the air in crystal clear water streams that appeared to float on their own. The whole city was illuminated in a bright late morning light that Liam couldn't see a source for. He inhaled the warm air and took off his jacket, the December air outside had nothing to do with the summery weather of this Bubble.

Lucy started babbling, "The Venetian Bubble was originally famous for being the one city run completely by Exciti, but now it is famous for being the entertainment center of HQ! Dr. Little and Lago would never let me come here on my own. Lago claims the place is full of hoodlums and cons, but I think he doesn't know what he is talking about. He had never been here! The worrywart," she grinned.

"who says hoodlums?" mouthed Liam.

"Lago," she said before she put her fingers in her mouth and whistled loud enough to make Adam wince. "His theatrical interests tend to spill into dramatic tendencies. Don't ever ask him about his love life, or how he was named Lago instead of Iago," she rolled her eyes, "The drama!"

A gondola sliced down one of the floating streams and glided to a stop in front of them.

"Where to?" said an old, thin gondolier whose head resembled an oar's tip with one eye in the middle.

The Excitus's gaze rested on Adam a second too long before he looked at Lucy who started talking almost before he finished his question, "How much to the Toy Warden's?"

Liam lost interest in their bartering over the price almost immediately. He approached Adam, "How are you holding up?"

It had been a tough trip once they crossed to the Key Maker's entrance. They did expect the news of Adam's Eclipser gift to spread all over HQ, but Liam had never imagined that every Excitus they encountered would flinch, squeak, or scurry away at the sight of Adam. He was pretty sure his friend had heard many more unkind words than he had read on many lips.

"Eclipser...dangerous."

"... monsters like him roam ..."

"...a weapon against us."

"Lucy Ellington ...descend so low!?"

It was like walking down the street with his mother all over again.

The worst of it was Berta's reaction. Adam was looking forward to seeing her, even brought her another piece of Lago's brownies, but she took one look at him and started screaming bloody murder before she ran to hide, trembling and sobbing, under the Key Maker's bench. Liam only read one word in between her screams before she ran, "Fire," and wondered how farfetched the rumors have gotten. Adam took the baseball hat out of his bag and wore it right then and there.

His best friend looked at him with that steeled-against-the-world gaze that he had developed since his hospital stay, "I'm okay... I just want to get this done with."

"I'm sorry about Berta ..."

Adam interrupted with a dismissive shrug, "More brownies for me."

Liam wanted to press on, but Lucy turned back to face them, looking vexed, "He will take us to the toy warden's house, but he won't bring us back." Her gaze rested on Adam when she delivered the punch line, "and we will have to pay double the usual fare."

Adam moved to the gondola, overly animated, "Let's get on to it, then, shall we?"

The gondolier looked at Adam with his heavily hooded eye, "Just so you know, if you Eclipse me, the water here shows no mercy to non gondoliers. You will all go under."

A thick, tense silence prevailed as they boarded.

Liam looked around while the gondola moved up the stream. The city was full of gardens and beautiful buildings. He looked up, a party of some sort was being held on every terrace, rooftop and square they passed by. The party atmosphere even crept over to the crowds that walked along and across the canals. Every corner seemed to hold a festival, and every street felt like a carnival. Everywhere he looked, Liam saw dresses, tuxes, togas, saris, kimonos, and a few other garments he didn't know the name of, all very extravagant. 

The light on Liam face felt soothing and warm. He was happy Lucy got them to take a gondola, the boat allowed them to see everything without the flinching Exciti. The gondola glided as he tried to take in everything from the flashy casinos to the crazy amusement parks and the acrobatic circus posters that performed incredible feats on most bridges. It was too bright for the lights to be on, but every sign around the city had an arrangement of light bulbs framing and threading the words. The more he looked, the more he was convinced that this place looked less like Venice and more like a half-sunken Las Vegas at night.

They passed under a bridge where a few Antiquarians were toasting a drink when Lucy started practically vibrating in place with excitement, making the gondola rock a little. "Wait till you get there, guys. The Warden is the most famous collector of first circles in The Society. It is said that his house is full of high-quality ones that you could never see anywhere else!"

The gondolier huffed, "His house?! A trusted fellow gondolier told me that his friend's wife's grandmother's twice removed cousin used to work as a cook for the restaurant across the street from the toy warden, she said his warehouse is big enough to extend under this entire city."

Lucy breathed, her big eyes round in awe, "Woah!"

Liam caught Adam's eye. They both grinned and carefully looked in opposite directions. A star-struck Lucy was just too funny, not that they would dare laugh to her face.

The trip finally ended when the gondolier glided to stop in front of a Venetian building more elaborate and spacious than any they had sailed by.

The gondolier announced, "Toy warden's house, please tip your gondolier."