Population Zero: Book 3: A Post-Apocalyptic Cyber Thriller (The Population Zero Trilogy) by Ryan Schow

Author:Ryan Schow [Schow, Ryan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: River City Publishing
Published: 2021-10-20T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

Slater Corrigan

Slater was looking at his ex-wife, mesmerized by her appearance and grateful for her intervention. But he was too wound up, and there was not much she could do to calm him down other than get him away from those people.

“Back in L.A., what did you do when you were gone?” he asked, channeling his aggression into another outlet.

Triana let go of his face, stepped back, crossed her arms. “I lost myself, and then I found myself.”

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“It means maybe I pushed away things that I should not have pushed away. I shouldn’t have pushed you away.”

Whatever explosions were happening in his chest stopped.

“Really?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Sometimes, to appreciate the light, you need to fall into the darkest corners. Life got pretty dark, Slater.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said.

“At the beginning of our relationship, we found each other and we made this beautiful child. But we never learned how to be a family. I think I want to try that.”

He looked at her, unable to hide the desperation in his eyes. “Would you feel this way if things were normal?”

She seemed to think about it, almost like she didn’t expect to see normal again, but then she nodded. “Yes, I think so,” she said.

He felt himself re-centering, some of the insanity burning off. He said, “Population Zero said the power would stay on until we got to Schwein and that Lilitu lady, but what if we never go? Will the power stay on if we don’t kill them?”

“At this point, I don’t think we should trust anything PZ says,” Triana said.

“Slater!” Scout called.

He glanced up at the road, where the others had gathered. His brother was holding up a cell phone. Did Slater have a call?

“You handle that, and I’ll repack our things,” Triana said.

Before Slater took off to see what the fuss was all about, Triana took his face in both of her hands and kissed him on the mouth. He felt himself soften, felt the old pull toward her return, and then he grinned at her like a big dumb idiot.

“Come help me when you’re done,” she said.

He nodded, then jogged up the driveway and returned to Scout. “What is this?” he asked, staring at the phone.

Scout handed it to him. “It’s the guy’s phone. There was an open line. So, whoever he was talking to when Scout chased him back into his car was listening to all of this. And they were listening to us.”

“They hung up?” Slater asked.

“Yeah.”

“Can you find out who was on the line?”

“It’s password protected.”

Tatyana said, “Let me see it.” Scout handed her the phone. She worked on it a few times, then handed it back to Scout. Somehow, she managed to unlock the security screen.

“How’d you do that?” Errol asked.

“I’m smarter than all of you,” she said, deadpan. “That’s all you need to know.”

Scout opened the call log, found several calls to a guy named Wyatt, and then one to a contact named J-Pig.

“J-Pig?” Scout asked aloud.

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