"I brought you," Alex replied as he knelt down to examine the exposed shelf more closely. "Because you said you wanted to come along. Something about needing to get away from your paper and not having anything better to do."<br/><br/>Alex dug into the loose earth at the base of the shelf for a moment, then made a noise of surprise. "Hey Dan, come check this out! I think there's a cave or something down here." Alex started digging faster as Dan ambled over. "I don't remember any known cave networks in this particular area... This could be an undiscovered cavern!" His voice rose with excitement. "Or a small hollow in the rock..." He mumbled.<br/><br/>As he approached, Dan could see that it did look like some kind of cave or something. Alex was kneeling at the base of a rather sheer rock shelf that looked like it had been pushed up during the quake or something, and at the base there was a small sliver of darkness that was slowly growing bigger as Alex pulled away more dirt.<br/><br/>Suddenly, the ground near the shelf shifted slightly, and Alex froze. "Uh oh... That wasn't goo~" Before he could even finish the thought, the ground gave way completely, collapsing into the rapidly widening tunnel and taking them both with it!<br/><br/>The chaos of falling dirt and rock seemed to go on for ages, though in reality it only lasted a few seconds. When the two men were able to reorient after their chaotic tumble, they found themselves slightly battered and bruised at the bottom of a dome-shaped cavern. Sunlight streamed in from the hole where they fell in, but it was on the ceiling and a good 15 feet above their heads. From the shape of the cavern, there was pretty much no way they would be able to climb out.