AllFreeNovel
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Rachel had once said that Gunnar reminded her of the Dude from The Big Lebowski, mostly because of his beard. Now, he looked the part even more because of his weight. His clothes added to the effect: zip-up cardigan, dirty t-shirt, and pajama bottoms. Plus his beard had gone wild.
“Lars!” he cried out cheerfully. “Good to see you, my brother!”
“Hey, Gunnar,” I said, slapping his back as I hugged him. “Good to see you, too.”
“Any other luggage?”
“This is it.”
“Alright, then – let’s go!”
We caught a taxi and headed for his place. During the drive, I kept our discussion confined to our former unit and how the guys were all doing. Anytime Gunnar asked how I’d gotten out early, I promised I’d tell him later. I wasn’t about to discuss it in front of a taxi driver.
The cab dropped us off in front of Gunnar’s apartment building, an old stone building near the red-light district.
As soon as he opened the door to his apartment, the stench of marijuana slammed into me. It permeated the entire room.
The place was a disaster, with bongs, plastic baggies full of pot, and greasy fast food wrappers littering every surface. The furniture included a faux leather recliner, a threadbare couch, a couple of end tables with lamps, a rickety wooden table with two chairs, and an overstuffed bean bag.
One part of the room, though, looked unlike everything else: a computer workstation.
Five monitors sat in a semi-circle atop a desk. On the floor was a computer tower with cables spilling out of it. An expensive-looking computer gaming chair sat in front of it all.
“Throw your bags anywhere, bro!” Gunnar said as he cracked open a beer and held it out. After I took it, he grabbed the nearest bong and lighter. “You want some? They have the best shit in the world here in Amsterdam!”
“No, I’m good. Could we have a quick discussion before you start smoking out?”
“Sure – what’s up?”
“You mentioned you got a job working for a defense contractor. How’s that going?”
“It’s going great, bro! They let me work from home, and they don’t care about my ‘extracurricular activities.’”
He chortled as he gestured to the bong.
“What do you do for them?” I asked.
“Forensic hacking.”
“…what?”
“I try to hack their systems and find weaknesses and shit. Wanna see my rig?” he asked as he waddled over to the computer. “It’s super sweet.”
“Do you only hack the company you work for, or – ”
“Naah, my employer works with a bunch of other defense companies, so I’m usually trying to hack them, too.”
Gunnar typed in a password that seemed to be a hundred characters long. Suddenly, the monitors flickered to life with a stream of numbers and letters straight out of THE MATRIX. I stared at them, completely unable to comprehend what I was seeing.
“So… you’re pretty good at this, then?”
“Dude, I’m one of the best. When I’m really baked, I’m a freakin’ genius.”
“Could you hack anybody? Like… MI6?”
Gunnar swiveled around slowly in his chair. “Um… why would you want me to hack MI6, exactly?”
“I’m going to tell you something, but I need you to swear that it never leaves this room.”
