“Yes, lumen gas, but it burns cool, so there’s no fire risk. It’s what powers your so-called ‘sunshine’ in Sparkle city.”
My jaw drops. “Truly?”
“Yep.”
“Wow, I had no idea.”
“Jax probably thought the less secrets you had to carry, the better.”
“Maybe.” I shrug, clutching his jacket tight around my body. It smells nice, sweet and musky and very male. And suddenly my nipples harden. Yikes, my body is responding to his scent in avery primal way. “So, getting back to practicalities, what do you need me to do?”
Otis snorts a laugh. “Pretty self-evident.” He makes a sweeping gesture with one big green hand toward his desk. “Help me to get all this under control.”
“That sure is a big pile of stuff there,” I agree, looking at the teetering mountain of appliances and papers.
“Tell me about it.” He huffs. “I’m running the sheriff’s department with a skeleton staff and trying to work out how to outsmart the Sparkle authorities in my downtime.”
“I guess you’ll have to fill me in on what’s going on, because Jax hasn’t. Though he did admit earlier that he’s working for you guys, like, as a double agent. I’ve suspected that for a while, but it helps to have it confirmed, even though I’ll probably worry even more about him now.”
Otis looks down at his hands. “The human authorities have no idea he’s a spy. They still trust him to supervise the shipment of classified goods from here.”
My scalp prickles. “Classified, in what way?”
He hesitates. “Munitions.”
I feel my eyes bugging. “Seriously?! You make weapons down here and give them to the humans?”
“Not by choice.”
“Then why?”
“Because we’re forced to.” He shrugs. “They want to give us monsters a message. Stay underground or else.”
I stare at him. “And you just go along with that? Even though you’re so big and…”
He smirks. “Were you about to pay me another compliment?”
“I was just going to point out that you’re um,green, maybe.” I smirk back. Now we’re on a better footing, it feels okay to tease him a little.
Otis’s lips curve higher. “My standout feature. Along with the tusks.” His brows furrow. “But back to your question. We—the monsters who reside on all ten levels of the Labyrinth—tried to rebel a hundred years ago. The uprising failed. After that, we were forced to sign a covenant that allowed us freedom to roam the Labyrinth without being chained up, provided we never went above ground again. That’s why you never see any of us—apart from when Arlo escaped. We’re working on a solution, but it’s not easy.”
“And Jax is helping?”
“Yeah, Jax is our eyes on the ground, so to speak.”
I sigh, rubbing my tight forehead. “Oh, it all sounds very complicated.”
“Don’t try and understand everything at once,” he says quickly. “The Labyrinth can be a hard concept for a human brain to take in.”
I nod, but still my curiosity won’t let up. “What are those flat metal things?” I ask, pointing at the thin, book-like contraptions on his desk.
“Computers.”
“What are computers?”
“Devices you humans invented before the apocalypse to share data. There were whole systems that linked information at lightning speed, but it all disappeared after Earth was devastated.”
“Where did you get these ones?”
