by T5, Sonja and I'm Not Mister Mxypltk
As the tunnel started to crumble all around them, Naecken (who had just regained consciousness) yelled, "Here! Take cover beside me!" He took a huge rock out of the ground and raised it as a shield against the falling debris.
Mick Harrison said, "So how long can you hold all that up, Naecken? Please don't drop that on us until we've figured a way out of this."
"Uhh... long enough, but hurry, there seems to be something that is leeching power out of me."
Just when Naecken was about to collapse under the weight of the crumbling tunnel, the big rock that the black demon was using like a shield lifted from his hands and began to float in mid-air, protecting the heroes from the falling debris.
"Who? What?" said the heroes, but only Mick noticed the nearly invisible smile on Sonja Ljzavet's lips, and the fact that the tattoo covering her body from leg to neck had disappeared.
Then Marv Velo saw a small hole in the wall. "Quick, follow me!" he shouted.
The group followed Velo into the hole he had found, but they found that the space inside the hole was smaller than the part of the cave they had just left, so they had to crawl.
"How odd," Velo said to himself. "From this point on, the ground we're crawling on seems different than the one we'd been crawling on earlier. It seems more fragile, almost like ceramic."
"Mick?" Shirley Francis said, visibly uncomfortable because of all the dirt.
"Huh?" said Mick after a couple of seconds. He was distracted because of what he had just seen Sonja do. He turned his head to Shirley, who was right behind him, and said, "Oh, uh... what, babe?"
"Can't you just... you know... get all super and get us the hell out of here?" she said, wiping the dirt from her jacket as she kept crawling.
"Oh, uh..." Mick said nervously. "Actually, I... my powers are too unpredictable, you know. They are too crazy to be used here. That silly... uh, those silly powers."
"Oh," Shirley said.
"And I think they have a crush on you, so I don't want them anywhere near you," Mick muttered to himself.
Tobias Christopher, immediately in front of Mick in the line of crawling heroes, heard Mick's muttering and turned to him. "Man, don't you think that's a little selfish of you? M'xy could help us better than you can in this situation."
"Yeah, I guess you're right. Okay, here I go." Mick stopped and opened his mouth to say, "M--"
Suddenly, the floor under him cracked, and he fell.
"MMMMMMMMMMM!"
"MICK!" Shirley screamed, looking at him as he fell to the ground.
"Mmmm, I should have guessed it," Velo said, rubbing his chin. "We've been crawling above the ceiling of some kind of chamber all this time."
"I don't think this is like a chamber, man!" Mick yelled. "This is way more spacious. It's like a whole, I don't know, a whole football field down here!"
"What do you see down there, Mick?" Sonja asked.
"Well, caves," Mick said, looking around, "lots of caves."
"I say we all jump down there!" Lance Lorenzo suggested. "It seems a lot more comfortable than being here."
"Yes, I don't wanna crawl anymore," Shirley said. "Let's jump."
"Uh, guys?" Mick said, looking at something the others couldn't see. "You might wanna reconsider that idea..."
"Oh? And why is that?" Velo asked.
"Well, believe it or not, a group of, uh... underground angry villagers is approaching," Mick answered. "And they don't look happy."
As soon as she realized Mick was in danger, Shirley tried to reach him with her hand. "Mick! Take my hand, before they reach you!" she yelled.
The pressure she put on the ceiling made it crack even more, and she fell, followed by Naecken and then the rest of the group.
As soon as they hit the ground, they realized they were surrounded by the underground people.
"Fascinating! I think there's an underground civilization down here," Velo said, getting on his feet.
"Well, duh," Mick said.
"Ain't that sumthin'?" one of the underground people said. "Looks like weir on a lucky day, dontcha think?"
The underground people started examining the group, which began preparing to attack, if they must.
"Hmmm... oh... gooood... Razor's gunna luv this one," said one of them, a pale man using a big red hat, as he went over each one of the heroes. Then he reached Naecken, who was still getting on his feet and faced the ground. "An' what do we got here?"
Naecken lifted his head and looked at the underground man.
"Omygob," the man said, eyes wide open.
"Wha, Red? He's got sumthin onniz nose or sumthin?" another underground man said. As he got a closer look at Naecken, he said, "Oh my..."
The other underground men gathered around as Naecken wiped his nose.
"...Gob!" they all said at once.