tampered | Log;;Ongoing

When; October 10
Rating; PG-13 At least for Matt's mouth
Characters; Matt

gogglegeek and Near

n473_r1v3r
Summary; Sick and twisted
Log;

Near awoke, his back and neck sore. He slowly opened his eyes and realized something was wrong...

He could not focus his attention. He was on the ground looking up at an unfamiliar ceiling but...for some reason, he could not think of the reasons why this might be so. He felt as though his mind were overly tired. He could not think straight.

Groggily, he rolled over onto his stomach but realized that a piece of paper fell off of his stomach onto the floor. He reached for it and sat himself up sluggishly. He then began to read:

Poison.

Some take days to release their effects while others take only seconds.

One hour is the time you have to retrieve the antidote.

The antidote is the panacea.

Near's eyes widened slightly at this. He was poisoned...? He could not remember any details before he fell asleep.

He stood up unsteadily, making his way towards the door. Attempting to turn the knob, Near realized that it was locked...from the outside.

Surprised, he turned back towards the room, the note clutched in his right hand. He then began to wander around. Whose apartment was this...? Yet again, he could not focus his mind. He was beginning to get frustrated.

His wanderings led him into the back lounging area. He saw a small safe in the middle of the floor. It was the perfect size for a small bottle of antidote. Near's eyes then scanned the room until they widened in shock at what he saw in the corner of the room.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The first thing Matt noticed when he woke up was that he couldn't move. He seemed to be strapped into a chair or something - his hands and legs were both firmly bound, and his neck was in a collar attached to the chair.

The second thing he noticed was that his vision had been replaced by a wall of text. It looked like one of those stupid logic puzzles that Near and L liked so much, relating to keys or something along those lines.

The next thing he noticed was the high whine of drills or something similar, inches away from his head.

He began to struggle against the bonds almost instantly upon noticing this, pulling tightly against the shackles on his arms, legs, and neck. However, it seemed to do nothing. "Mello!" he called, as loudly as he could, hoping against hope that the man was there to help him.

Utterly shocked by this scene, Near approached the chair.

"Matt...?" The other Wammy's kid strapped in with drills approaching his head from either side sent a shockwave through his system.

He clenched the note even tighter in his hand. One hour...They had one hour to negate the effects of the poison. But how long for Matt...?

"Who has done this?" Near asked Matt steadily, his voice not betraying emotion at the current situation. It took him great effort to string thoughts together.

"N-Near?" Matt was panicked, but he tried not to let it show. "I don't know who did this. I-is... does Kira have the resources to pull something like this off?" He had to keep his calm, he decided. It would do no good to break down now. "What d-does the situation look like, Near? I'm kind of blinded..." He tried to read through the text more carefully, but it remained just a logic puzzle, and Matt found it difficult to focus.

"All I know is that I am poisoned, and I have an hour to find the key to the antidote. I do not know how long you have," he said evenly. No, panicking and frustration never helped situations such as these. As to the question about Kira, he honestly had no answer.

"There is a note I found when I awoke," he added, reading the note loud enough for Matt to hear over the whirring of the drills. Near, contradictory to what he believed would and wouldn't help the situation, began to get frustrated. Why couldn't he think straight? Was it the poison? Was it something that happened before he fell asleep or was knocked out?

He awaited Matt's reaction.

Matt listened to the note in silence, then sighed at the end. "Panacea... cure-all. Maybe it'll somehow get me out of this shit too. Okay. Our goal is to find your key first." He tried to not consider the possibility that the antidote would only save Near. The thought of drills digging into his flesh, piercing his bone, did not appeal to him in any way, and he tried to block out any thought of it, with partial success.

"There's a logic puzzle attached to the inside of my goggles. Should I read it aloud? You're better at that shit."

"Read it, but I can not guarantee that it will help us in this situation if you can not interpret its meaning...The poison seems to be affecting my reasoning skills."

The note on the inside of Matt's goggles would be crucial to their situation. Near only hoped that he would be capable of deciphering its meaning when his logic was so impaired.

"...Fuck." Matt tried to avoid breaking down. If Near's reasoning was impaired... he had been assuming the boy would solve the puzzle quickly and get this done with. Now his chances of survival seemed to be declining.

He began to recite the puzzle aloud - it referred mostly to keys and locations around the apartment, giving it clear relevance to the situation at hand. The drills seemed louder and louder, and he was almost screaming by the end, due to panic and frustration.

"...Do your best to avoid panicking. It will not do anything to alleviate your situation. I will attempt to find the key," he replied monotonously, although he too was beginning to feel anxious.

From the way the puzzle was worded, he could at least deduce that there were at least 2 keys in every hiding place, and so they would have to figure out a way to determine which of the several keys in the correct hiding spot was the correct key to stop Matt's death trap and give Near his antidote. Death by poison was not as gruesome as death by holes drilled into one's head, and so it was Near's priority to set Matt free first and as quickly as possible. He began to search the apartment.

Matt just slumped as much as he could given the restraints. Despite himself, he found he was whimpering very quietly. He could deal with a lot and keep his cool, but that whirring wouldn't stop and it was too easy to think about the sharp pain, the agony that would come as they slowly, slowly, dug their way in -

He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, wishing that he had a cigarette or something to keep him from screaming.

Near moved in and out of the rooms. He checked every nook and cranny of the bathroom without success, but he wasn't expecting a result from the bathroom. The clue behind Matt's goggles did not suggest that anything was in the bathroom.

His heart was not beating at the moment, unbeknownst to Matt, but if it was, it would have been racing. Luckily for him it wasn't beating because if it had been, all of the moving around he was doing would have made his blood pump faster, causing the poison to spread even faster throughout his body.

He went back into the room with Matt inside and approached him.

"Please repeat what is printed on the inside of your goggles," he said rather loudly, so that he could be heard. He noticed Matt's display of discomfort.

Matt would've glared at Near if he could see. As it was, his expression just darkened. "Couldn't you fucking listen the first time?! I figured you would've solved the fucking puzzle by now!" The stress was getting worse as the whine of the drills drew steadily closer and closer, and the last thing he needed was to have Near fail him.

Near did not need to hear this.

"I have already told you. The poison is affecting my logical reasoning skills. Repeat the puzzle for me," he said calmly, but with a cold stare in Matt's direction, even though he could not see it.

"I have searched most of the apartment. I need to hear it again. I will narrow my search even further if I hear it once more. Yelling will not cause the drills to stop working. If you would like to be productive and contribute ideas as to where you think the keys are, then by all means, please do."

"..." Matt recited the puzzle again, voice monotone. He was on the verge of tears now, although he'd never show it to Near. He just wanted out before the drills came down and ended everything and even if it were just 24 hours of nothing after they did the pain would be unbearable.

"...did you get it that time?"

Log;;Ongoing

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