To start off, the facility is created to take the cases of people who have been in treatment for wanting to take their own life for a long time, or in and out of places for such treatment, such that they’re considered to be unlikely to want to live from any amount of traditional help.
The theory presented for the treatment comes from the fact that many people who attempt and fail to jump to their death report that on the way down, they changed their mind. The treatment is supposed to create the same effect with a similarly extreme situation to push the patients to change their mind and decide that they want to live.
A healthy goop is engineered to have all the nutrients a person might need. It’s not designed to taste good, but to be healthy as food, eliminating the need for any other food. A diet consisting entirely of this new food will be healthier than most patients’ diets were prior to the program.
As a secondary part of the theory, regarding chemical imbalance, is that a healthier body will help lead to a healthier mind. This is why the healthy goop is engineered. Also present are plenty of exercise machines, mostly for cardio.
The patients must consent to participating, signing the appropriate forms themselves. It is explained to them that this treatment can last for months, but not more than half a year, and that everyone who has left this facility has walked away wanting to live.
Both the primary and secondary theories are explained to them, as well as pointing out that the treatment is rather extreme, stripping them of some of their basic humanity, like having a name, wearing clothing, or being able to contact the outside world, to simulate death.
The facility has a long hallway. On the end closest to the lobby, is the trial room where people can try the first stage of the treatment for up to a week. They can keep their names and keep their clothes on. There’s a green button on the wall that dispenses the goop to eat. There are beds, treadmills, ellipticals, weights, televisions, video games systems, books, high quality condoms, lube, etc… and the lighting is done with those lightbulbs that simulate sunlight. There are no commercials, no internet, no contact at all with the outside world.
After the first week in this section they choose whether or not to join the program. If they join, they have a “death ceremony” that involves their clothing being put into a locker and designating them a number. (The first person through this system gets the number 0. The next gets 1. Etc…) Their key hangs from their left ear (attached by piercing) and a tag with their number on it hangs from their right ear (also attached by piercing.)
They’re put in the next room over, which is pretty much the same as the first. They’re forbidden from using their name. If they do, they’re reminded not to. In subsequent rooms, this gets harsher. They’re told sternly not to use their name if it’s used, then they receive a slap if they do so, eventually it’s any mention of the outside world receives punishment, and by the end anything intelligible as language results in a poke with an electric cattle prod. This shift is very slow from one room to the next.
This is not the only change as they go. The selection of media gets smaller. I do ensure that for the rooms with books, movies, and video games, that sequels are in subsequent rooms, but the available selection shrinks with each move until these things disappear completely. Eventually the only entertainment is television, which gets more repetitive and boring, until it’s something wacky in an obscure language that repeats after a very short time. The room after that has only a laser pointer set to move around randomly, as would be entertaining for a cat.
The available exercise equipment decreases as well. It’s always present, but by the end is just a big hamster wheel. In the first room is a nice toilet, while the last has a hole in the floor. Beds decrease in number and vanish. Condoms decrease in both quality and quantity, with lube eventually no longer being in that box. The lighting also gradually gets darker, with the final room having no light at all. The hallway has light settings for each room and when someone is moved, the hallway is only as lit as their next room. For the last few, I use a flashlight when transferring them.
There are no windows, clocks, or outside contact, so there’s no real concept of the passage of time. Those that come together wind up split apart as one moves through treatment faster than the other. Those who are less healthy will also move slower through treatment, to give them more time with the healthier diet and the exercise machines.
The button for the food stays the same throughout, and glows green. This glow is obviously more interesting for the later rooms than the earlier ones.
At any time, any of them can choose to leave. They have to tell me that they’re certain that they want to live now. Those that take this path become more likely to say how much the facility helped them. Such an extreme treatment was what they needed to appreciate being alive.
For most, however, the changes are too subtle. They start off with a very good and positive introduction, and after the second room, each one is almost the same, so they become unlikely to realize the point at which they stop liking it. They do lose their humanity as well, dropping reason in exchange for instinct, at which point there’s no real chance of them deciding anything. They will just continue to move forward through the program.
Occasionally I will come take the person who’s been in the final room the longest. They are strapped to a reclining operating chair with a button identical to the food button under one hand. They are told that pressing that button will end their life and are given one final chance to decide that they want to live. By this point, it is VERY unlikely that they will decide to leave. They’re not thinking and this button is how they’ve gotten food for a long time now. They’ve been trained to press this button and probably don’t understand what I’m telling them.
Pressing it causes a spike to be pressed into their brain. At this point, I quickly work to extract their organs, starting with their heart, then their lungs. These are sold on the black market, the funds from which support the facility. After extraction, I remove the corpse, taking it home to butcher for meat. I make leather BDSM toys from the skin as well. Eventually, I start to sell some of the toys as a side business, as I just wind up with more leather than I can use for my own toys.
Each time I get low on meat, I come back to call the next number. If the person does manage to retain enough humanity to want to live, that’s great for them. I’ll simply call another number after helping them get their clothes on, giving them a gift basket, etc… I make it a very celebratory and joyous thing on their way out to help them look back fondly on the “treatment center”.
Each wall dividing these rooms is a one-way mirror, allowing them to see what’s coming up next, and probably a couple rooms after that, but not allowing them to see where they already were. The final room, with the chair that kills them, lights up as brightly as the first room when in use, but is in total darkness when not in use. This also adds to the confusion of the livestock as it’s brought in there.
They will invariably see others processed before them. They’re likely to see this from several rooms away. The first few rooms probably won’t get good enough visibility to this last room. You can really only see so far ahead.
The entire system is designed to keep my freezer full with human meat. The livestock undergo the process to ensure maximum healthiness of their meat. If a sow happens to get pregnant, this fact does not get reported anywhere. Pregnancy is simply nature’s version of the turducken.