Silent Scream - Info

Scotland, February 1971

Located a little off the road in the scottish highlands, an old caste had been reopened and renovated in 1936 as a medical institution, first for imprisoned criminals with mental instabilities or psychosis. It was shut down during World War and now twenty years ago, a group of doctors, psychologists and else opened the castle gates once more - the gates to the Silencium home for the mentally insane. Their goal under the guidance of Professor Allan McVarden was to give a home to severe cases of mental illnesses who have chances for rehabilitation or at least to be reintegrated in society, but are way too complicated, violent or strange for ordinary asylums where not enough time can be spent on their therapy. People come from allover the world, either prisoners again or just people whose illness makes it impossible for them to live a normal life. The mental home is financed by several states and donations so no one has to pay to come here, but only Professor McVarden and some of his fellow doctors decide who will be allowed to come here and who will be denied as unfitting for the project.

In the past three years, the rate of people being cured so they could go to an ordinary asylum or even return home as fully resocialized rose drastically without anyone outside knowing why. The secret is a new invention called the dream therapy - the therapists and many scientists succeeded in creating and controlling lucid dreaming. As soon as the patients are ready for it, they can participate in the program which hooks them up to a machine during the night once or twice in a week, some can even handle three or four nights in a week. The therapists set up a place and a scenery for the patients to be in, mostly ordinary things like being in a café where they can practice normal behavior without any risk for civilians or themselves. They can see, feel, hear and smell normally, for them, it is reality bu even if a patient freaks out and 'kills' someone, it still is just a dream. They will wake up in the morning unharmed from the night's illusion, though lucid dreaming in that way is very tiring and not nearly as nice as real sleep.

Sometimes though, there are also nightmares. In some cases, the machine creates other spheres, where phobic patients are confronted with their fears or really violent cases put in defenseless state, experiencing what they did to their victims trying to teach them empathy. The project is top secret and not without risks, it can help for sure, but who knew what kind of damage it might cause messing with someones psyche and memories ...

The castle:

In here, there is room for 25 patients in the ordinary wing and five in a high security wing where they live and sleep as long as its neccessary. Their cells are medium size and depending on the patient, there is a different style of interior - some don't even have ordinary blankets to prevent them from suicide attempts, others have their own cozy room like a normal person. The staff also has a wing to live in, only few drive off to the next town 25 miles away after work.
The area is surrounded by a very high stone wall, topped with barb wire and secured with cameras, but inside there is much to be found - an athletic ground, tabletennis, even a swimming pool outside for summer ore ice skating during the winter. There are many art courses as well to keep the patients on their toes and to make them keep contact with the others, everyone has his or her own weekly schedule of how many courses (art, physical etc) they have to attend (they can choose a little, if someone wants to do soccer, they can do soccer as no one forces them to do volleyball) and which doctors are to be visited. And some schedules have one or two very late and obligatory courses starting at 10pm - the time when normally everyone has to go to bed and turn off the lights ...

Right now in February 1971, there are 21 patients living here, 15 therapists, 8 doctors with different specialities, 4 scientists, 11 nurses both male and female, 28 guards and 15 other staff members for cleaning and cooking. Pick one.