Poison which constantly needs to be treated by antidote to not get killed
Inspired by Frank Herbert's Dune:
Action Joe is kept prisoner in Doctor Evil's prison. Doctor Evil knows that Joe's escape is inevitable. So he decides to introduce poison to Joe's body. Joe gets his antidote in his daily food rations.
Once Joe stops eating antidote he should die, regardless of how much of the antidote he has eaten.
Things to consider:
- The person to be given the poison is a classical action hero (a physically active guy who is well above average in all metrics).
- The antidote should be something considered "not poison" so that Joe has no chance of realising he is being fed antidote.
- The antidote has to be consumed (eaten).
- The quality of food is going to be classic "prison food", so the antidote can be something generally untasty.
- The poison is introduced to Joe'sbody while he is unconcious, so there are almost no limitations except one: introducing poison to a body should make as few body marks as possible (say injection is OK, but general surgery is not).
I know that a similar premise was used in Jurassic Park but there the dinosaurs were genetically modified. I feel that modifying Joe is also beyond plausibility.
And as stated above: the poison and antidote should be something plausible. No hard science is required.
Also, later in the story not only is Joe is going to escape (surprise, surprise), but he should know about his condition. So bonus points for mentioning some cure which cures Joe forever.
EDIT: Dr. Evil's motivation: he is going to offer for Joe to work for him. But the Dr. is not stupid and assumes that Joe will betray him and/or escape at the first possible moment. Also, Dr. Evil is cruel by nature, so he wants to kill Joe once Joe is not needed, without actually being accused of the killing.
This post was sourced from https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/q/37351. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
1 answer
Inject him with a small explosive device near the brain stem. The device is constantly listening for a radio signal that is being transmitted around his cell, like a dead mans switch.
The device could be small enough that it could be put in with a needle, similar to how animals are tagged with RFID chips.
The explosive itself could be very small since it wouldn't need to blow his head off, just mess up the brain stem.
The explosive could also be used to drive a spike or something like a miniature gun, or even break the capsule and release some toxin.
When Joe escapes his cell and goes outside the range of the radio transmitter the explosive triggers, killing him.
You could let him know that it's there by watching another prisoner try to escape, or DE could give him a warning by injecting a dog or some other animal and throwing a ball for it to chase down the hall.
Joe could make a daring escape by hooking the transmitter to a battery pack and taking it with him. This adds to the suspense by needing to make sure that the battery doesn't come unhooked, and also he has to get somewhere safe where the device can be removed before the battery dies
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