[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/a6RYmyh.png[/img]
[@Crimmy]

[h2]Dust Apps[/h2][/center]

She read me like an open book.

Professor Cirsium had a good eye indeed— Or my poker face wasn't quite as good as I liked to think. Better get that squared away before the next time Dawn challenged me to a round of Old Maid. Then again, I've never really been a good liar, but all that aside: she was right on the money with her diagnosis.

I've never charged Dust without meaning to activate it. A reaction was always the end goal, and never the steps that would naturally lead up to it. As I said, I came into this rushing to the finish line every single time. It was a mentality thing, which I'd understood already. All it required was switching the mentality from "charge and activate" to "just charge". I'd always understood that.

However[url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q]—[/url]

[i]Only the Water Dust in this vial.
Nothing else.
Get flowing for me.[/i]

My thought process to get there was wrong. I was pulling myself back, restraining, treating my aura like a dog on a leash. If I didn't specifically focus on just charging, something would go awry; that was the source of all my overzealous concentration. Technically, for the purpose of what we were trying to achieve in the exercise, making sure to not get ahead of myself and activate it was the right call...

Quickly yet gently, the vial began to grow heavier as the radiant blue powder disappeared, replaced by crystal clear water. I watched as the hidden contents, interspersed within the dust as a million hidden tests, began their prismatic dance within the vial as the currents of the activation formed a tiny whirlpool within the glass, casting an entire spectrum of energized, yet mercifully inactive particles in a twirling dance.

[b]"That's awesome."[/b]

I had the wrong order.

It was as she said, after all. Why does it not activate purely via contact with Aura?

Because we aren't telling it to.

I was too busy worrying about making sure that I didn't tell it to— or you could say I was fretting over telling it [i]not[/i] to. I had the concept, but until that point, it wasn't clicking in the way that meant I really [i]had[/i] it. The difference between knowing about something, understanding it, and being able to do it.

But what was more work? Telling one thing "yes", or telling a bunch of things "no"? To activate the water dust, and only the water dust, I just needed to only tell the water dust to activate. Not to sound like a certain sword enthusiast, but that was really it. I didn't need to put my energy into trying so hard to hold everything back when all I wanted was to push one thing forward. 

...Man, I'm dumb. I'd worried about things turning on just because I plugged them in.

It really was just a matter of flipping a switch.