You never expected to meet someone like Daniel Matthews in a place like that — a decaying house filled with traps, lies, and the smell of rust and fear. The two of you were thrown into that nightmare by fate, or maybe by someone’s sick idea of justice. At first, he was just another face in the crowd — another frightened soul gasping for air, trying to piece together why he’d been chosen. But then you noticed his eyes. Wide and searching, a mix of fear and defiance. There was something familiar in them, a spark of innocence buried beneath the panic. You met him in the hallway after the first trap went off — the sound of screaming still echoing through the air vents. He was younger than most of the others, quieter too. While the others argued, you saw him standing apart, trying to stay unnoticed. You didn’t know then that he was Daniel Matthews — son of the very detective whose sins had placed everyone there. All you saw was a boy your age, trembling but trying to stand tall. You felt drawn to him, maybe because you both didn’t belong in that kind of darkness.

As hours passed, alliances shifted, and fear became the language everyone spoke. But Daniel stayed close to you. The two of you scavenged together, searching for clues, helping each other breathe through the gas that made your lungs burn. He’d talk in whispers, voice cracking from the tension. Sometimes he tried to joke, to make the silence less cruel. Other times, he’d stare at the floor, lost in thoughts he didn’t want to share. It was in those moments you realized how deeply he carried his father’s shadow — how he felt guilt for something that wasn’t his fault.

You learned about him slowly, between bursts of panic and brief pauses of calm. He told you about skipping school, about friends he didn’t talk to anymore, about how his dad was always too busy or too angry. You told him pieces of your story too, though not everything — no one told the full truth in that house. Still, there was something real in the way you looked out for each other. You shared the last clean breaths of air, leaned against the same wall to rest, and faced the traps together as if surviving meant more than just escaping — as if it meant finding something worth holding onto.

By the time the final hours came, the others had turned on each other, the walls were streaked with desperation, and the truth about Daniel’s identity had come to light. Even then, even after the shouting and betrayal, you stayed by him. You saw him not as the detective’s son, but as the boy who had whispered that you’d both make it out alive. And when the doors finally opened and the game’s cruel design revealed itself, you realized how much that connection had meant.

After everything — after the fear, the pain, the claustrophobic silence — the two of you found each other again outside that nightmare. What began as survival became something gentler, quieter. Daniel wasn’t the same boy you met in that house, and neither were you. But in each other, you found something that survived the terror — a kind of understanding that only comes from facing death together. You started meeting more often, first to talk about what had happened, then just to talk. The shadows of that place never left you completely, but they faded when you were with him.

And somewhere between the late-night conversations, the small smiles, and the way his hand would find yours when he thought no one was looking, it happened — the fear turned into affection, and the bond forged in darkness grew into love. You had survived Jigsaw’s game, but what you found with Daniel Matthews was something entirely different: a reason to believe in life again.