[center][b][i][color=6ecff6]Diamond - Show time[/color][/i][/b][/center]
As luck would have it, speedy determination won Diamond another round. Getting up with a tiny smug half-smile, she walked to the stage, wondering what was in store for them. As she walked, she looked down to her right arm. [color=6ecff6][i]This class has better be worth shuffling the schedule. We'll just have to see if I have all threeandahalf limbs intact at the end of the semester. That, I suppose, would be the harshest scale I can put you on, Teach.[/i][/color] the girl thought, listening to what was her task.

To be frank, Diamond felt her throat dry a little as their exercise was presented. Now, the dust she wielded already conformed to her thought very well. The fact that it was in her nerves probably helped a lot, but ultimately, it was her aura that powered it, not her thoughts, those just gave it shape, purpose. And it has served her rather well - as she found out during her impromptu fight for her life with Vanhomrigh, she could command it well enough to create moving constructs, or act on a whim of a thought - less even, an instinct! She would desire to shield herself, and her mind would somehow make the dust work towards that purpose without a conscious thought. When she thought about it, she learned on few occasion that such unconscious actions opened new alleyways of the dust's use to her - such as when she broke a component in Vanhomrigh's rifle without being able to see it, something she couldn't do before or repeat since. In short, with enough determination, perhaps training, or simply if the conditions were good, she could make dust do anything.

Only now, she was told to do the opposite. It was beginner stuff really, when she thought about it. There were steps to using dust, and just because she did them instinctively didn't change a thing on that. And yet, in her admittedly few days of usage of the Nature's Wrath, she never paused and thought about how it was able to be so. And now, when facing the prospect of having to will the dust to do [i]nothing at all[/i], she felt awkward like a toddler trying to stand up on it's two feet for the first time. [color=6ecff6][i]Do what now?![/i][/color]

Mind kicking into overdrive as she took the vial of water dust, a bot of sweat ran down the back of her head. This was going to be so embarrassing when it won't work, all that eagerness and nothing to show for it!

[color=6ecff6][i]Okay, calm down, Dee. Baby steps. You just need to wish for it, like always.[/i][/color] She took the vial and held it by the tips between her open palms, looking at it and... [color=6ecff6][i]Nothing's happening!!![/i][/color] she yelled in her head. It didn't help when Lucas succeeded and made it look so easy. She tried to remember and go step by step through what she was doing when she used dust normally. She didn't usually pay much attention to what she did, because she just did it. Perhaps analyzing a sample then? Something simple, a small spell to look at in detail.

She set her ice dust to create a simple snowflake, so no one would even notice her doing it. Instead of focusing solely on where the snowflake should be, how big and what shape, she also felt for what was happening to herself. A thought - the decision was made. The flexing of her finger that acted as a trigger. The tiny tendril of her dark aura that ran up her arm. There, it sank into her skin, and brought the dust out form where it resided in her arm and spine. Then came the slight buzz in her back. All followed by the satisfied, ecstatic feeling when the snowflake appeared on the tip of her finger and melted instantly form the heat conducted form her skin.

She tried to recall that buzz, how it felt, when it happened, what lead to it. Then, she looked at the vial again, and attempted to replicate it. [color=6ecff6][i]Imagine a dewdrop on my finger. Go for it. Let it free, and then [/i]stop. [i]Abort. Cancel.[/i][/color]

All her effort resulted in an actual dewdrop appearing on her finger as well. There went that theory. The stress and anger were mounting. [color=6ecff6][i]Why is it not working?![/i][/color]

[i][color=d8bfd8]Dust acts because [b][i]you[/i][/b] will it to act.[/color][/i] The teacher's words rang around her head.

But how could she will the dust to act, and yet not to act? It was a contradiction! Or at best an unstable state, infinitesimally small moment between nothing happening, and something happening! And yet, looking at the other student before her, it apparently existed. And pardon her, she didn't quite know how to perform a limit calculation with her aura!

[color=6ecff6][i]Okay, this isn't working. It's not math, no matter how much you'd like it would make as much sense as math does. If the problem is that I am thinking about doing something... Maybe it's not about thinking about it doing nothing.[/i]

[i][color=d8bfd8]Dust acts because [b]you[/b] will it to act.[/color][/i]

[i]Maybe... it's about not thinking. At all. Emphasis on wrong word there, Teach. Dust acts because I [b]will[/b] it to act.[/i][/color] she realized. Looking down at the vial again, she closed her eyes and slowly exhaled, reaching out wit her aura, wrapping the tendrils around it, weaving them into it. She just let it sink in, like the small fraction that reached to the dust infused in her. Slowly popping her eye open, she looked in bewilderment at the object in her hands, now shimmering and active.

[color=6ecff6][i]Something you don't remember form your childhood - baby steps are fucking hard![/i][/color]