The floor didn’t just crack.
It gave up.
Stone groaned once—low, deep—then folded inward as the chamber collapsed into itself. The ground beneath them broke into slabs and falling debris, the entire space tearing downward toward the abyss below.
Don moved before thought finished forming.
The world fractured into trajectories and failure points. Falling stone. Spreading vines. The ruined tunnel ahead—half-buried already, its mouth choking shut as more debris slid into it.
No clean exit. No safe drop.
’Only the way we ca,’ he thought.
"TRY AND MAKE A WAY OUT!" he shouted.
Then leapt.
Stone vanished under his boots as he bounded from one breaking slab to the next, montum carrying him forward as gravity clawed for purchase.
His hand snapped out—telekinesis flaring—and a falling mass reversed direction mid-drop, blasting upward hard enough to hurl Starboy back into the air instead of down.
Another chunk followed. Then another.
Don didn’t slow.
Starboy watched him in that split second—really watched him. Not the chaos. Not the falling ceiling. Don.
And then Starboy moved.
He followed without question, body angling toward the tunnel, hands already lifting as energy rolled forward in tight, controlled surges. If Don thought the path was forward, then forward it was.
Behind them—
Pyro never turned.
His motion didn’t break. Didn’t hesitate. Fire surged hotter around him as he drove straight toward Elliot’s ruined form, closing the last stretch of distance in less than a blink.
"Pyro—!" Don started.
Too late.
VOOOOSH!!~
Pyro burned straight through Elliot.
Not an explosion. Just force.
Fire carved a path through flesh and vine alike, lting growth away as Pyro passed clean through his torso. The mass split—hearts torn loose, so destroyed, others still beating as they tumbled away trailing vine strands.
Elliot scread.
The sound inhuman.
Rage and pain tangled together as his body thrashed, limbs flailing as collapsing stone slamd into him from all sides.
He smashed into one wall, then another, dragging vines with him as the chamber continued to cave.
Don risked a glance back as he launched for the tunnel’s edge.
Starboy surged ahead of him, palms glowing brighter as he prepared to clear what remained. The tunnel mouth was already half-buried. Broken stone jamd the entrance at ugly angles. Whatever waited inside was likely worse.
Behind them—
Pyro’s montum finally bled off.
He slamd into the far wall chest-first—groaning as his fire dimd by a fraction. He dragged himself upright, breathing hard, already turning—
Expecting a corpse.
He didn’t get one.
Vines were already crawling.
They wrapped the burned cavity where Elliot’s chest had been torn open, stitching over scorched flesh, threading deeper with frantic speed. So pushed inward, anchoring themselves where lungs should have been.
Pyro stared. "What the—"
The vines swelled.
They fused. Thickened. Reshaped.
Lung-like structures blood outward, pale and wet, inflating until they obscured what remained of Elliot’s chest. Then—
They contracted.
FOOOSH~.
Dark green gas erupted outward in a violent burst, flooding the collapsing chamber in a rolling cloud.
Pyro’s eyes went wide.
"—shit."
BOOOOM!!~
An explosion tore through the space like a hamr.
Pressure slamd into Don from behind, hurling him forward as fire and force ripped through falling stone. He crashed shoulder-first into a slab, rolled, and barely caught himself on the tunnel’s edge.
Starboy wasn’t as lucky.
The blast clipped his flight path mid-adjustnt, throwing him sideways—BAM~—into the wall. He tried to recover, pushing off—
Too slow.
A massive chunk of ceiling dropped and crushed into him—followed by more debris piling on top, burying his glow beneath stone and dust.
"STARBOY!" Don shouted.
Another slab fell toward him.
Don punched upward.
His fist t stone and shattered it—BOOOOM~—rock exploding outward in fragnts. The recoil snapped through his arm and chest, the counterforce slamming into him harder than the debris ever could.
His footing vanished.
The edge gave way.
Don fell.
The chamber dropped out beneath him, darkness swallowing everything as he plunged past writhing vines and falling stone, the abyss opening wide below.
Stone and dust tore past Starboy as he fought the air.
The first impact had knocked him crooked, but he recovered fast—rolling his shoulders, twisting midair as another slab scread past where his head had been a mont earlier.
He kicked off nothing, forcing montum back into his body, light flaring around him as he stabilized.
More debris followed.
He weaved through it on instinct alone—shards, broken parts of ceiling, trailing vines snapping uselessly behind him as gravity dragged everything down toward the sa hungry dark.
Then he saw Don.
Falling hard.
Below them, the abyss had movent. Not visibly—yet—but the sound carried. Wet movent. Dragging mass. A distant churn layered beneath the thunder of collapsing stone.
Starboy hesitated.
Just for a mont.
’Do I go after him—or—’
Don adjusted.
Mid-fall, he twisted his body, eyes narrowing as his gaze locked onto sothing far below. His arm snapped out, fingers curling—
A massive slab of falling stone wrenched sideways toward him, tearing through the air under telekinetic pull—SKREEEE~.
Starboy barely dodged as it tore past his shoulder.
Don didn’t ride it upward.
He drove it down.
The rock slamd into his back and exploded under the force of his push—BOOOM~—shattering into fragnts as Don used the recoil to accelerate deeper, vanishing faster into the abyss.
Starboy sucked in a breath. "You’ve gotta be kidding —"
But then he dove.
Air howled around him as he dropped after Don, dodging debris by feel more than sight now. His vision struggled—too dark, too much motion, too many shadows twisting where they shouldn’t.
He could barely make out Don’s outline ahead.
Vines snapped at him from the walls, so missing by ters, others grazing close enough to tug at his attire. He burned through them with weak bursts, light flickering as his glow thinned the deeper he went.
’Damn it... why is it getting harder to move?’
Gravity felt heavier here. Not stronger—thicker.
Then—
Don hit sothing.
Starboy saw it just as Don did.
A vast lattice of vines stretched across the abyss, spanning from one massive tunnel mouth to another on the opposite side. Thick, layered cords braided together into a moving wall, flexing as it shifted position—closing, opening, feeding.
It wasn’t blocking the abyss.
It was working.
Don’s brow furrowed mid-descent.
"If it’s functional," he muttered, drawing his arm back, "its worth destroying."
He punched.
His fist tore into the vine-mass—CRAAASH~—splintering layers apart like wet timber. The impact sent green fluid spraying in wide arcs, droplets flashing past Starboy as the structure buckled inward.
Then—
A scream echoed.
Not from below.
From above.
Elliot’s voice ripped through the cavern, warped by distance and rage—an ugly sound layered with cursing as the structure convulsed in response.
The vines hardened under Don’s arm, texture changing—less flesh now, more barked resistance—but they still caved under his montum, ripping apart as the abyss shook again.
Don burst through.
On the other side, he saw more.
Dozens.
Similar vine-structures stretched across the expanse at intervals, so pulsing with dull green light, thick cords bulging as sothing was pushed through them toward unseen destinations.
Don clenched his jaw.
He didn’t slow.
He smashed through the next one—BOOM~—then another, green fluid raining down like acid rain. The third resisted harder. His punch tore into it but didn’t fully break through, montum depleting fast as the mass fought back.
But then... Starboy hit it half a second later.
"MOVE!"
He ramd into the damaged section, light flaring as his shoulder and forearm detonated through the weakened vines—finishing the break and blasting them through in a spray of shredded growth.
He matched Don’s pace, flying hard beside him now, breath rough, glow flickering weaker with every ter.
He yelled over the roar of falling debris and distant screaming.
"How deep does this go?!"
Don didn’t look at him. His eyes stayed locked forward, already tracking the end—where the abyss widened, where the air shifted, where the sound changed.
"Not far!" Don shouted back. "We’re coming up on the end—brace yourself!"
The darkness below them opened.
And whatever waited there was close.
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