ASW Episode 263
The Case of the Menacing Slash
It was another Monday morning. The sign on the door said Private Investigator.
But the sign below that said closed and I was saying yes to a third cup of coffee.
It was a bitter, heavy roast, like an SEC lawsuit.
My partner was out of town, looking into a band’s kidnapped drummer, but that was like debugging a bad buffer overflow – too many symbols and on the wrong count.
When a file path walked in.
“I have a stalker,” they said, handing me a stack of letters.
Most were ambiguous, but their intent was clear – each one ended with a slash.
“I get these at home,” they continued. “Outside home. They follow me everywhere.”
I looked at more letters. Nothing about them was normal.
“I want you to get to the root of this,” they demanded.
“I can,” I said. “But not for free. Some of them are encoded, but 2e or not 2e, I charge by the hour.”
They dropped some cash on my desk, “Then put a stop to this. Period.”