Now for Matt's second test. How will he do?

Chapter 6

The next room was small. About two metres by two metres at the very most. On one side there were two metal clips protruding from the wall with a visible wire that ran from some kind of equipment in the wall to the exit door. On the other side of the room was a short table with a knife placed neatly on top next to a micro cassette player. Matt cautiously approached the table and picked up the cassette player. A tape was already loaded in and ready to be played. Matt tried to make sense of what the things in the room were going to used for but he couldn't come up with any reasonable answer. He pressed play.

"So, you survived the first test. Well done, Matt. But there is yet more to come. You have made people feel as though they've lost a part of themselves. For them it was metaphorical , but now you will experience a literal meaning of the expression. On the wall before you you'll see two conductive clips. To open the door and escape from this room, something must be placed in the space between those clips to cut off the electric current going into the door and deactivate the electronic lock. But what is there to use?"

Matt looked around and all he could see in the room was the cassette player and the knife. The cassette player was too small and wouldn't work anyway and the knife was made of metal so it too was useless. What did he want him to use in the circuit?

"You have a knife for a reason. It is a lesser known fact that human skin is a good insulator of electricity. Even a thin sheet will suffice. Good luck."

Matt's body suddenly went numb. He let the cassette player fall from his hand and onto the table. The only way out was to cut his own skin off and use it to cut off the current going through the machine on the wall and unlock the door.

"Oh... Fuck."

Matt reluctantly picked up the knife with both hands then kept it one as the other hand lifted up his shirt to reveal the skin and flesh on his torso. No timer this time. Only Matt's own timing that dictated how long he took.

"Well. Here goes nothing."

Matt plunged the knife into his flesh on his left side and began to cut towards the right.

"Agh!"

The quicker he got this over and done with the sooner the pain would pass. Matt pressed on and soon had half of a vaguely rectangular cut on his skin.

"Shit!"

Matt was nearly done when he dropped the knife out of pain and clutched his abdomen with both hands. His blood dripped and splattered onto the hard stone floor, washing away some old dust and cobwebs. Matt knew he had to get the job done so he reclaimed the knife in his right hand and, after a moment of pausing, resumed cutting out a sheet of flesh from his own stomach.

Eventually he got a piece that was big enough to fit between the clips on the wall. He got up and put it into place as fast as he could in his state and waited in anticipation for the door to go clunk.

A few moments later it did just that and even opened slightly by itself, letting in a crack of dim light from the next room. Matt let his shirt drop back down over his injuries and hobbled his way over to the open door. He steeped through and looked around, ignoring the sound of the door slamming shut behind him. The most notable thing about the room was the person sat down, no, tied down to a chair in the centre. He was unconscious and wearing a metal...

PUNCH!

Matt was knocked unconscious from behind.

Wonder who could have done that. And what was the other captive man wearing on his head? Something familiar perhaps? Next chapter up soon.