Ted had always known that he was different. It didn't matter to him. The way he was different empowered him. Ted hadn't bothered to seek answers to how or why he was different, he simply revelled in the fact that he didn't give a single shit about how other people felt. When he accidentally came across a paragraph in a book, or a scene in a movie or TV show that hinted at what might make him different, curiosity would force him to wonder if he were a sociopath, psychopath or borderline personality, but for the most part he didn't think about it much.
Happily immersed in the predicable world of computers, Ted had a job in I.T. for an oil and gas company that supplied parts to pipelines. It was a sales office with a group of lunkheads who knew nothing about how PCs worked. For the most part, Ted merely had to keep the dummy's out-of-date, heavily abused computers running, update security and keep servers running. In any given day Ted had around two hours of work to do in an eight hour day thanks to multiple automated programs he'd installed to make his job much simpler than his bosses knew it was.
In the end, a person like Ted having all that free time was unfortunate for Ted's bully, a coworker named Arthur.
For some reason Ted didn't care about at all, Arthur had targeted Ted as soon as they met. Arthur was a huge, middle-aged failure of a former football player. Once he'd been a bodybuilder, but when Ted met him, Arthur tended toward fat. Desperately trying to keep the weight off, but too enamoured of baking to succeed, the big man may have been jealous of how fit Ted was. Ted was an averaged sized guy, but fairly skinny due to being a bike rider for transportation. Covering just under twenty kilometres a day on his commute, the computer tech in his late twenties was half the weight of the bigger, older man. Non-confrontational by nature, Ted however didn't cower when the big man loomed near.
The initial encounter came the first time Ted dared enter the open office space Arthur lorded over as his personal fiefdom.
As a neurally divergent person, Ted constantly scanned nearby faces for clues to each social situation. None of the half dozen other salesmen present seemed anxious when Arthur tried intimidating Ted. Tight grins showed they would tacitly go along with Arthur, but they took no great pleasure in his bullying. None of their eyes showed fear of violence, however. More like thinly veiled weariness of Arthur's nonsense.
Gambling on a fraction-of-moment's-intuition, Ted allowed his cold, reptilian stare to meet the increasingly fuming older man's gaze. Using his superpower of disinterest in how other people felt, Ted simply waited for Arthur to lose steam, or for Ted's supervisor who was giving him a tour of the building to carry on.
As he'd suspected, Arthur wasn't going to risk losing his job by touching Ted, but that first challenge had put a target on Ted that Arthur was drawn to like a bull to a waving cape.
For months, Arthur took every opportunity to belittle Ted as much as possible. Precisely because Ted hardly ever reacted, Arthur continually sought a nerve he could press. Eventually, Arthur found it by making Ted work on his computer in the office where everyone could listen as he badgered Ted, who couldn't simply walk away.
Somehow, Arthur sensed Ted's anger, but not its intensity. Smelling blood, Arthur took every opportunity to demean Ted as the tech was crawling under Arthur's desk.
"Hey, while your down there don't be looking at my junk, faggot."
Or.
"You spend so much time on your back, you remind me of your mom."
Arthur would get mud on his shoes before calling Ted so the tech had to lay down on the filthy floor under his desk to work. Normally Ted was very tidy and disliked getting dirty, Arthur saw that, and exploited that vulnerability.
During these episodes, externally Ted appeared unfazed, but internally he raged with a hot enough anger that, if Arthur had seen, would have frightening the bigger with its intensity. Ted's nights filled with dreams of ruining Arthur's life. Before long, Ted actually proceeded to enact his fantasies of vengeance in reality.
With his computer access, Ted could hack into every aspect of Arthur's professional life, but before long Ted was creeping around in Arthur's personal life as well, scouring his financial, medical, school records and social media. As his planned formed, Ted didn't smile, gloat or feel anything at all. It was just another task that gave him a modicum of pleasure because it was a way to occupy himself while at work.
But he was as thorough as an obsessive, as cold as a knife.
Uncertain which avenue of revenge to take first, Ted observed Arthur's pathetic life, making small invasions, setting long term goals, waiting for an opportunity to set in motion what had become his favourite pastime. Destroying Arthur's world.
The epiphany happened when Arthur's daughter Jayna came into the office to see her father.
Arthur had gotten divorced not long before Ted started for the company and Jayna had gone to live with her mother. The girl hadn't visited the office the whole time Ted had worked there and he wasn't the only one who noticed how grown up she was. The teen had an athletic body, slender, firm, and graceful as she followed her father to his cubicle. Dressed like a skater girl in an unzipped, black hoodie, band-tee, shorts and sneakers, she stood under five foot five, her pale face heavily made up. Thick, chestnut-brown hair fell in silken waves almost to her narrow waist. Bare-legged, her knees had old scars on them, but no new scabs, her coltish legs shapely with defined muscles. The beat-up long-board she held confidently looked well-used, her sneakers scraped and scuffed.
Not looking at anyone else, she went with her father, ignoring the lingering gazes ogling her femininity. When Arthur glanced around all eyes dropped to abandoned work, except Ted who openly stared at the sexy girl who had just infiltrated their entirely masculine workspace.
"You see something interesting nerd?" Arthur challenged.
Relishing the opportunity to engage with Arthur in front of the girl he had been studying online, Ted spoke to Jayna, knowing it would bother her father.
"Is that a Landyachtz board?"
"Oh, I wish!" she laughed.
"Shut-up dweeb. Go scurry back to your hidey hole" the papa-bear growled as expected.
"Dad. Please! Relax. He's just asking about my skateboard."
The meekness and awkwardness she showed told Ted she rarely stood up to her father, but that she hated his bullying and felt compelled to say something.
