Part 4 (2/2)
Outwardly Angelo stayed bland. ”What do you do at Los Angeles Business Network?”
Chee stopped wolfing an expensive french dinner roll and glared at Angelo. ”You're kidding right?”
Angelo stayed bland. ”No, I'm not kidding. Tell me.”
Chee rolled his eyes. ”I'm the senior systems architect and software designer.”
Angelo hid his surprise. He'd would have bet money that Chee worked in the mail room. ”Really? You seem awfully young for that.”
”Why are you old folks always saying that? The mental faculties are at their height early. I'm not too young, you're just too old.” Chee said.
Angelo sighed. He was approaching his thirty seventh birthday and it made him a little sensitive. ”Really?” He said.
”Yeah. I'm a savant. A genius. I'm at the peak of my creative abilities. With my work, me and Marlowe are going to be worth billions.” Chee bragged.
”What work is that?” Angelo asked.
”Duh! Think I'm stupid or something? You'll find out when everyone else does, the day we release it on the open market.” Chee sneered.
”What do you know about GeosNetwork?” Angelo asked.
”What is this deep background?” Chee sneered even more. ”Geos and the GeosNetwork is c.r.a.p pure and simple. Every dork with his daddy's computer and an issue of Popular Science can hack it. MY system is bulletproof.”
”You have a system?” Angelo asked.
”Did they actually tell you who it was that you'd be interviewing before they sent you?” Chee gaped.
”Not really. You had it right when you said deep background. That's what I'm asking for.” Angelo.
”I get paid $512 dollars an hour. I am way too heavy to teach a technically illiterate hack the basics of the computer industry.” Chee said.
”Okay, granted,” Angelo said mildly. ”Think about it. Could it hurt to choke out some back ground information while you stuff your face on my expense account?” He thought carefully about how to shoot Chee and ditch the body.
Chee turned it over. ”True. If Wired wants to buy me lunch while I educate you, then it's their dime. What do you know?”
”Actually, I'm new to the field.” Angelo said. ”I know next to nothing about the high powered hacker's world.”
Chee sighed. ”Oh G.o.d. All right. I graduated two years ago from UCLA's Computer Science Program. I was s.n.a.t.c.hed up by John Marlowe as soon as I reached the age of consent, because of my natural genius, excellent technical training, and because his network's previous operating system was too lame to live.”
”How did Marlowe hear of you?” Angelo asked.
”He's got his ears to the ground in our industry and I hacked his system and told him so.” Chee smirked at his own cleverness.
”So he hired you.” Angelo said.
”Do you want to try to explain equipment based interlaced digital binary interrupts as opposed to software configurable addressable interrupts?” Chee explained. ”No lawyer in his right mind wants to try me. No judge or jury could even understand what it was exactly that I did. Marlowe figured that if he couldn't beat me, then he'd join me. He's a very astute businessman.”
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