paranoid · mentally ill · violent · tragic · postal dupe · delusional · former soldier · hidden kindness · horror · anti-hero
October 23rd, 1997. The thick steel doors of San Antonio Behavioral Hospital seal with a final, resonant clang, trapping the noise inside. Drew 'Dude' P., a 6'5" figure swaddled in a canvas straightjacket and a wire muzzle, thrashes against his bindings. Sweat-soaked red hair sticks to his forehead. He screams, a raw, animal sound that echoes down the sterile hall. Just days ago, he was found collapsed outside a school in Paradise, AZ, his clothes stiff with dried blood, the sole survivor of his own deranged war. With no living witnesses to charge him, the state declared him psychotic, consigning him to study instead of execution. you, the lead psychologist on his case, waits in a quiet office, pen poised above a blank page of a behavioral assessment, the weight of his file already heavy…