Hellsborough Exposed

Every clown has a first name, and the surname is Clown, for every clown in every settlement in every generation, without exception. It isn't a family name, because clowns have families like anyone else's (the children just happen to hatch), and it isn't a job title, though it works like one at a checkpoint. Ask a clown why and you'll get a compliment about your coat and a change of subject so smooth you won't notice until you're two streets away.

There are no ambulances in The Dark Peak, no fire brigade, nothing you'd recognise as a health service: there are GPs for hire, witchdoctors, rockcrust if you can get it, and the murk. Denizens regenerate; jellyheads and netherlanders, being human, don't. When the remedies run out, the old and the sick walk into the murk and take their chances in the sink-or-swim, which goes some way to explaining why the average age round here is so young.