Touched - Order of Odium: Book One

Daniel - 9

In the next few months, Daniel was busy doing experiments with Steven to hone his skills with the artifact. One of the first issues that arose was that while he could teleport places, he had no way of teleporting back. Each time he touched the artifact he had to find a way back to the room the artifact was contained in. Eventually, they learned that as long as Daniel wasn't physically touching the artifact, he would move it to a pocket. After some thought, they decided on placing the artifact in a pouch that Daniel would place in his pocket. When it was time to teleport, he would reach into his pocket and touch the artifact, or "quarter" as he saw it.

Although the pairing of Steven and Daniel was contentious at first, they eventually grew to tolerate each other, which was fine as far as Daniel was concerned. He had no plans on making friends with him. Daniel knew he was the biggest cause of the problems that had started between them, but he decided early on that he didn't want to be the "bigger man" and apologize. These people didn't care about him, so why bother getting to know them? He could work with Steven, exchange the occasional snide remark to each other, and go on with their day. No big deal.

The experiments began with Daniel thinking of teleporting to a location inside of the Warehouse that Steven had predetermined, and then Daniel finding his way back through the labyrinthine building with the help of a guard. The idea for using a pouch to hold the artifact was Daniel's idea after having to walk for what seemed like miles throughout the warehouse. Daniel simply called it a "bag" for the artifact, but Steven liked to refer to it as Daniel's coin-purse and ask if he had remembered to bring his purse or if he had left it in his room with the pantyhose he kept forgetting to wear.

Although Daniel would never admit it to Steven, he was actually starting to somewhat like the guy. The two had such similar personalities, he thought in other circumstances they might have even been friends. In these circumstances though, there was no way in hell Daniel was going to even attempt to become friends with someone who worked for the Order. As much as Aleksander seemed to be happy all the time and acted like he cared about him, he knew it was either for Aleksander's benefit or the Orders. A well-mannered prisoner is easier to deal with than a disorderly one, after all.

Eventually, Steven would have a guard go farther and farther away from the room that held the artifact and have Daniel transport to where that guard was located. Soon they had Daniel teleporting outside of the Warehouse. First to the shader camp underneath the Warehouse, and then to other states and countries. Once Daniel had been successful in a number of long term teleportation experiments, Steven had Daniel try bringing other items with him. First a small ball, and working their way up to bigger items. Months later they started having him teleport someone with him.

Between experiments, Daniel received weapons training as well as survival and hand-to-hand combat training, although no one would ever explain why he was receiving this training. He was assured though, multiple times, that if he tried anything that they didn't like, they would shoot him without blinking. He had apparently earned a reputation for himself for being difficult in his first year as a "ward" of the Order. He hadn't given anyone any trouble for a long time, but his reputation combined with the guards' general unease around people who didn't sign up or get recruited to work for the order made it hard for anyone to trust him.

As time passed he was allowed more freedom and was moved into a suite of rooms on C-level. His new place was so much more than he had ever imagined having that at first, he didn't know what to do except marvel. He soon grew comfortable with the lifestyle though, surprising himself. He was still a ward of the Order and continued to dislike being used as a guinea pig for the experiments, but he had to admit that the treatment he was getting here was better than anything he likely would have received below. He would occasionally remember telling Steven and Aleksander to send him to prison rather than keep him working for the order, and he would wonder what the hell he was thinking.

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