The Turning Point

Turner Twins

Nick Lightbearer. Oh, Nick Lightbearer. Blissfully unaware that one of his closest childhood friends had just been unfairly murdered, he sat back, taking two Joy pills at once. The world turned bright and cheery, colourful and mellow. The music in the background was nothing but an incoherent melody, shifting slightly between notes - a strange cacophony of pitch changes filled the room. But Nick was too happy to care about the soon demonic noise. He wrote those songs, and those songs were good. Everyone loved them!

"This shit is hurting my ears.."

"Your ears? My eyes are burning. His neck is so long."

"That's your syndrome playing up, Harold."

"Oh. Yeah.. right. Sorry. Forgot."

"How can you forget a thing like that.. you haven't been on Joy, have you?"

"Course not. It just fucked up my memory and everything for the long run, you know, when we used to drug ourselves silly on it. Stop worrying."

Helena and Harold Turner. As pale as could be, as green-eyed as cats, the two were standing in the corner of Lightbearer's room, lanky and quiet. The two had been taken in by him on a whim, when they had nowhere else to go, Verloc scouring the streets for them. Everytime a Bobby came past, the two would bait their breath. If they saw them.. things would get messy. Quickly. Surprisingly, Nick hadn't given their presence away.

And neither had Harold, with that dreaded Alice in Wonderland syndrome. It distorted the world - things often looked too big, too small, too long, too short..

Helena sighed.

"We need to go," she declared, just about loud enough, so Nick could hear her, bleary-eyed and all. "We're going to do some.. shopping."

"Right on. Just be back before.. before dark.."

And with that, the musician promptly fell asleep. Quickly, Harold turned to his sister, somewhat angered. His face was confused, his eyes, wondering behind his glasses. Helena only stared back. Nick's snoring and even more haphazard noise filled the somewhat now daunting room. The orange walls suddenly seemed all too bright..

"What are we doing? You know the Bobbies will just come for us, Helena.." Harold started, frowning, and crossing his arms. His sister abruptly cut across him, her words gliding from her mouth like scissors snipping smoothly through paper. The music jolted violently in his ears.

"Do you want to work on the Blocker, or no? Those chemicals have been brewing way too long.. they're probably burnt out by now, thanks to this idiot."
With a somewhat irritated gesture toward Nick, Helena raised her eyebrows, trying to make a point.

"Mr. Lightbearer was nice to us, Helena."

"He was a spenger."

Harold couldn't argue with that, in all honesty. And before he could, anyway, Helena had dragged him out onto the street, handing him his jet black and bright white mask - which seemed all too tiny - to help him 'smile'. Sighing, he removed his heart-shaped glasses, put it on, and shuffled down the road, mumbling crap to himself. Helena followed quickly in her own silicon mask, not wanting to seem too suspicious. The two used to be the district's celebrities.. now they were on the run, fleeing from this Joy-fuelled society.. It wouldn't have mattered to anyone in particular anyway. Of course, apart from Anton Verloc.

Suddenly, white-gloved hands smothered them from behind. For a moment, Harold feared it was the dreaded Alabaster Bobby - but he didn't have much time to react. The hands only clamped down further. As Harold heard his sister slump, he couldn't help but do so too.

What just happened..?