Walter sat at the little booth in the diner sipping his coffee. He'd been coming there for four weeks. First week he came back twice after meeting the gorgeous waitress the first time there. The next week he came four times, one time she wasn't there which really irritated him. This week he'd sat in his car on a side street and only gone in knowing she was there, five times in total. She was always friendly and polite with him. He responded with generosity and kindness. He always tipped her very well and made sure none of the other customers gave her a hard time while he was there.
Walter thought back to last week:
One guy had been rather crass with her and Walter's blood boiled when he saw him reach under the skirt she had to wear for the job and grabbed her ass. Even as Paige pulled free and stepped further away Walter was beside her glaring at the man. The man smirked at Walter as he eyed him. The owner rushed over and because Walter had been coming there so much, he sided with Walter and he demanded the man leave.
Walter watched as the man left the diner and read the license plate number of his car as he pulled out, committing it to memory.
"Thank you Walter, but you really have to be careful. We get some pretty rough people in here from time to time." Paige smiled prettily at him.
"I'm not worried about that, I just care about you Paige." Walter told her sincerely.
Paige smiled as she blushed.
"You're sweet." Paige told him as she gave him a small kiss on his cheek and Walter just grinned before sitting back down.
Walter watched as Paige calmed herself and went right back into waitress mode. Being sweet and attentive to her customers. Walter smiled inwardly as he noticed peripherally that she kept looking towards him. One thing Walter couldn't understand, why he was being so slow to act on Paige. He'd never taken this much time to actually get to know a woman. Sometimes he felt like he knew Paige already.
He remembered opening his laptop and connecting to the diner's wifi and then linked up to his server at home. He hacked his way into the city's bureau of motor vehicles and pulled up the license plate and got the name on the car. "Roger Thomas", he nodded. He quickly searched that name on the license database and found a number of them, but only one with the same street address as the car. He pulled up the picture and knew it was the same man.
Walter closed his laptop for a moment as Paige stepped back over to his booth.
"Thanks again Walter. I'll be off the clock before much longer. Is there anything else I can get you?" Paige smiled.
"You don't have to thank me for that Paige. You've always got a friend in me." Walter told her as without hesitation he reached out and took her hand in his. "I wouldn't mind a piece of baked Alaska if you still have some and a refill on coffee."
Paige had blushed as he took her hand but nodded.
"I think we do, and thank you Walter. Sometimes I have really bad days but you helped make today a lot better. I'll be right back." Paige told him and waited for him to release her hand.
Walter winked and gently let go and Paige walked to the kitchen.
Walter opened his laptop and quickly hacked into the three big credit reporting companies and began entering false credit information into them concerning Roger's horrible credit practices.
Walter smiled and closed his laptop again as Paige walked back up and sat the dessert down and then topped off his coffee.
"Paige?" Walter asked as she turned.
"Yes Walter?" Paige smiled as she turned back around.
"I know with what happened this isn't a good time and I'm sure you get hit on all the time. But I had planned to ask you out today. But after that, I just want you to think about it. One of the next times I'm in, just let me know. No pressure." Walter smiled.
"Oh, okay, well thank you. I will think about it." Paige smiled and then turned to leave.
Walter's eyes traveled her form. She was just about as perfect as they came, he thought.
Walter went back to his laptop after taking a bite of his dessert and a sip of coffee. He hacked the man's bank accounts and drained all the money in them. Next he tripled his loans and electronically transferred the money around before he made them all past due by three months. He hacked into Roger's private investments and cashed them all out, sending all of the money to an offshore bank. It along with all of his savings was diverted through a number of bank jumps until it was safely deposited into his private bank account.
Paige walked back out and slipped his order ticket down on the table.
Walter smiled and picked it up. He quickly pulled out his wallet and removed a fifty.
"Darn, I forgot to get some change before I came in today, but after what that creep did and your boss hates breaking big bills. If you got my meal in tips already, keep the change, do a little, something nice, for yourself." Walter told her. "Maybe a movie you've been wanting to see or your nails."
Paige blushed.
"I do, but I really shouldn't Walter, this is too much." Paige hesitated.
"No, seriously Paige. You didn't deserve what he did. Try to relax and not let it get to you. You have a lot of loyal customers who count on you." Walter smiled.
Those eyes and the way his cheeks tucked in just a little as he smiled, not to mention those cute curls in his hair. Paige blushed and looked down as she realized how hard she was staring at him.
"Okay, if you really insist. Thank you Walter." Paige said as she gently reached out and took the bill and order slip back. "Have a great weekend."
"Thanks Paige, I appreciate that. You have a great weekend too." Walter told her gently.
Walter watched her walk away before he turned back to his laptop. He had a couple of other things left to do to Roger before he left. Roger's day was about to get a lot worse. Especially if he broke even a small traffic law and got pulled over. Three bench warrants now had his name on them along with a host of violent charges against him.
He nodded as he closed up his laptop and left the diner. He thought of Paige as he climbed into his car. He knew everything about Paige. He wasn't crazy that she had a kid, but that didn't really bother him too much. Her employer on the other hand was a cheapskate. Walter had done a business analysis of the diner and by his genius calculations the diner's business had more than doubled since Paige began working there. Vastly all of the extra income came from her shifts. The reported tips showed that the other wait staff wasn't bringing in the extra money but her tips were phenomenal and so he hacked the payroll system and quadrupled her pay. The diner was also now paying her insurance fully including her son's coverage. Noting it as compensation for increasing sales for the diner. After all, what was an extra measly eight dollars an hour and an extra five hundred a month in insurance when your bottom line went up over twenty thousand a month because of one person.
Present day, Sep 2, 2014:
Walter smiled as Paige walked down the rows of tables and booths to where Walter sat. Her smile was undeniable. She was happy, happier than he had seen her yet.
"Well, Ms Dineen, I must say that is a beautiful smile you have today." Walter grinned.
"Well thank you Mr O'Brien. Here is your BLT." Paige smiled as she sat it down in front of him.
"Did you win the lotto or something?" Walter marveled at how much more beautiful she appeared.
"Something." Paige laughed. "My stingy boss." Paige said quietly as she glanced around. "He grew a heart. When I got my pay last Friday I had a huge raise on it. I mean, huge for this kind of work. And he's even completely paying for my son and I's insurance. Talk about relief."
Walter grinned and nodded.
"I'm glad to hear that. You've got a lot of loyal customers. Since I've been coming I've seen your tables filling up long before the other's. You really make people feel better, about themselves, about their day. And so the diner's good fortune should be reflected on you for causing it." Walter grinned.
Paige blushed.
"Thanks Walter. Is there anything else you'd like right now?" Paige asked as she noticed another regular walk in.
"Well I see you have another fan so I will let you go for now." Walter smiled as Paige nodded and turned.
"Oh, there is one thing Paige." Walter asked.
Paige turned as she reflexively looked at his coffee cup but saw it nearly full.
"Yes Walter?" Paige asked sweetly.
"Have you considered my request for a date?" Walter grinned with great affect as it showed off those indents in his cheeks.
"Yes." Paige hesitated for a second and then she plunged ahead. "I'd love to go out with you sometime."
"Oh Paige, that really makes my week. Go ahead and help your fans and when you get a moment stop by and let me know when is best for you." Walter told her as his eyes seemed to sparkle.
Paige blushed at him calling them her fans but she nodded and walked off to make her rounds.
"Damn it!" Marked complained bitterly as his experiment failed, again. His hand swept across the table his research was on and flung all the various components across the room in the Loft.
Mark closed his eyes as he tried to get his anger under control. And then she was there. The sweet scent of her perfume wafted across him. He felt the tension ease and flow out of him.
"Mark, my love. What's wrong?" Megan asked as she wrapped her arms around his chest as she pressed in tightly to his back.
"Oh my sweet Megan. I've failed yet again. I was so sure I had found a way for your body to replace the myelin, properly, when the MS attacks you. But once again my intellect isn't enough." Mark sobbed even as Megan motioned for him to turn and they hugged each other tightly.
"Mark, you are doing everything you can and I can't ask for more than that. All I really want is a happy life with whatever time I have left with you and Anthony." Megan told him.
Mark at first smiled thinking of their son. He was barely four and much too young to lose his Mother already.
"Well I'm not giving up yet. I will find a solution and you will live to see our great grandkids get married." Mark swore.
Megan grinned at that thought.
"I'd be really happy at this point to see Anthony graduate high school, or maybe seeing him fall in love for the first time. That would really be what I'd want." Megan grinned. "Cabe called. He's on his way over." Megan kissed Mark for a moment.
"I better get started cleaning this mess then." Mark sighed as he nodded.
"Centipede!" Cabe called out as he walked into the Garage with his new partner.
Happy looked up from welding and turned her welder off and began removing the various pieces of safety gear
Toby looked up from the couch he lounged on and sighed as he closed his book.
Sylvester looked over from his white board and sat the marker down and began walking towards the briefing table.
"What's up Cabe?" Mark asked as he moved down the stairs from the Loft.
"We have a security issue." Cabe announced as they all gathered together. Cabe pointed to the monitor tree and hit a button on a remote. They saw a banner of "Homeland Security Briefing" pop up. Katherine Cooper appeared next.
"Good morning Centipede. Meet Roger Thomas." Katherine said instead of diving into too many pleasantries as she knew they typically irritated the geniuses. "Someone did a hatchet job on him a week ago." Katherine told them.
"Please don't say Walter O'Brien." Toby almost cried with dread.
"Big baby." Happy slapped his arm.
"The man is a psychopath. He probably eats babies for breakfast." Toby bit back.
"That is my baby brother you are talking about there Toby and it better stop." Megan yelled as she moved carefully down the ramp with the help of her mobility scooter. Her four year old son grinning as they came down the ramp.
"We don't know if it was him or not. But Thomas is a good friend of the Governor of California and he's asking for our help in at least clearing the record." Katherine told them.
"At the risk of offending my wife, my brother in law is certainly more than capable of making mincemeat of someone's digital life. You have my word, we'll do everything to fix what was done and see if we can find any evidence of who did it. Even if it was Walter." Mark promised.
"That's all we can ask Mark, good luck." Katherine told them and then Cabe clicked the remote and the monitors went back to normal operations.
Mark took the folder Cabe handed him and he opened it. His eyes flew over the data contained in the papers and then closed it and handed it to Sylvester.
"Sly, take the credit reporting companies, see what you can find out and fix. Make sure this time you demonstrate each step as you go so we don't have another case thrown out." Mark warned him. "Toby, I want you to take a look at the man's life. Analyze it, see if you can find something that might link it to whoever did this."
"Oh, like you are just going to ignore that it is Walter who did this?" Toby snarked.
Mark's fist slammed into the top of the table.
"I've warned you all that I am going to warn you, Toby. Stop with the snide comments. We approach this with an open mind with no set agenda. We are only interested in the truth." Mark told him.
"I'll dig into the legal system and see what I can find out first. After that I'll move to the banks. Sly you'll go after the retirement plan when you are done." Mark told him.
Megan pulled against Mark's hand and he leaned over and she kissed him.
"Thank you. I know more than likely it was Walter, but I really appreciate you always trying to approach it like it could be someone else." Megan told him with misty eyes.
"You are the love of my life and he is my brother in law. Besides, truth is truth and that is what we should be looking for. What's our motto, gang?" Mark asked as he stood back up.
"Ever in the light of truth." The other three geniuses said out loud before they turned to work on their assignments.
Cabe jerked his head and Mark stepped over.
"How's the experiment going?" Cabe asked quietly.
Mark sighed.
"Another failure." Mark told him.
Greetings! I hope this finds you well! Welcome to Dark Walter...we hope you enjoy your stay...
To the Adventure! -Tim