Perl doesn't really distinguish between text and binary data heres a kind of way to do what you want (untested).

# create socket $sock with IO::Socket or similar

my @headers;
while (<$sock>) {
  last unless /\S/;  # end on a blank 'line' ("\n\n"), like in HTTP
  chomp;
  push @headers, $_;
}

while (defined($_ = getc($sock))) {
  my $dec = ord($_);
  # process eithier $_, the ascii equivilent or $dec, the decimal valu
+e
}
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