Part One:

Open on COCK, a bloodied boxer with the head of a rooster, touching fists with another Peculiar. Around them, a crowd is shouting and cheering, with wads of bills clutched in hands.

Monologue: This city ain’t a place for the faint of heart.

Brief shots of COCK fighting, ending in his victory.

Monologue: These dogs catch a whiff of weakness on you, they’ll rip you to pieces.

Shot of COCK being paid by MEDIUM JIM, a short, hairy man with a beer belly.

Monologue: So get hard. Get mean. Hit back. Hit first.

Shot of COCK shopping at a dingy grocery store, still bandaged from the fight.

Monologue: Make ‘em choke on you, and they might just leave you be.

Shot of COCK walking down the street at night with a bag of groceries. A pair of dark figures approaches from behind.

Monologue: Of course, sometimes…

Black and white silhouettes. The figures attack COCK, hitting him with a stun gun and throwing a bag over his head. They quickly throw him into a van and speed off, leaving the spilled grocery bag behind.

Monologue: that just paints a bigger target on your back.

Open on Frank in his small, darkly lit office, looking disgruntled. The narration goes in boxes down the page.

Monologue: Jesus, I need a smoke.

I used to go through a pack a day, before all… this happened.

When I was fourteen, my Ma caught me with a cigarette outside the movies. She grabbed the pack, tore off the filters, made me smoke ‘em all before I threw up. Right in front of my friends.

Nowadays, with my condition? I look back to that day and think: “man, I didn’t know how good I had it.”

Frank toys with his powers over a few frames, turning his hands into origami. Narration continues.

Monologue: See, I caught something fierce and peculiar, something that’s been shaking this city loose the last few years. Some of us got strong, but most of us got weird.

Me? I got a radical case of paper. A deep-tissue massage session in a wood pulper that left me with a natural aversion to firearms, cigarettes, and flames of all kinds.

So I don’t smoke anymore.

another shot of the dim office.

Monologue: But hey, we play the cards we’re dealt. And it turns out there’s a market for a man ready to fold himself into tight corners to find the truth.

And in a city like this, the job never gets boring. When the crooks have powers and the cops are crooked as a bent penny, if Joe Normal or Peculiar Pete wants a scrap of justice, they come knocking at my door, like-

Knocking at office door

Monologue: well, like that.

Janet opens the door

JM: “Frank? We’ve got Medium Jim up front, wants to talk to you.”

FF: “Send him in, Janet.”

Door closes, then opens to reveal MEDIUM JIM. He looks worried.

Monologue: Medium Jim reps a few good boxers in the underground fights around the city. Decent guy, won’t rig a fight if he can help it.

The name? No, he ain’t psychic. Ol’ Jim was late to the game when he got into boxing. There was already a Big Jim and a Little Jim.

FF: “Take a seat, Jim. What can I do you for?”

MJ: sits, wringing his hat “I got a problem, Folds. It’s… it’s Cock.”

FF: stonefaced “didn’t know you bowled that lane, Jim.”

MJ: “Aw, lay off, Folds! I’m serious here!” slaps down picture of a “This is Cock.”

visual montage of Cock in various cage matches, beating up humans and Peculiars

MJ: “My best boy. No fancy powers, you know, but a real mean streak of vinegar. He’s been tearing up half the underground. His last fight, he laid out Bricky Smits in six rounds.”

Monologue: It’s no small feat. Smits is one of the heavyweights, grows rock right out of his skin.

FF: “So what’s the problem?”

MJ: “He’s gone missing. Every win, he takes two days off, then he’s back at the gym, training, like clockwork. Real dedicated. But I ain’t seen him in a week. I go to his place, he ain’t home. I ask around, nobody’s seen him since the fight. He’s got a match in three days and I’m at my wit’s end.”

FF: “So your best fighter’s skipped town and you need me to get him back in time for the fight?”

MJ: “It’s more than that.

He’s a good kid, Folds, and you don’t get that often in the rings. I’m worried about him.”

FF: expression softens “Alright, Jim. I’ll see what I can do. Talk to my secretary. It’ll be usual rate, plus expenses.”

MJ: “Thanks, Folds.”

Monologue: No haggling. He must really be worried.

They shake hands

Monologue: Let’s get to work.

Montage of Frank asking various Peculiars about Cock.

Monologue: Cock lives in the Sink, that melting pot of scum, grit and gristle between 36th and 48th. Meat grinder of a neighborhood takes in the desperate and churns out hardasses and hamburger meat in equal parts. Apparently he grew up there.

No wonder he’s tough as a coffin nail.

Of course no one saw Cock. Chronic blindness is a scourge on these streets. It’s amazing how many murders, muggings, and gunfights nobody sees here.

But I give it a good once-over. Meet a few locals.

Shot of Frank facing down a group of would-be muggers

Monologue: Get to practice my culinary skills.

Shot of an apartment door. A flat hand and arm slides through the crack of the door and turns the handle

Monologue: I let myself in to Cock’s apartment.

Frank moves through the apartment.

No sign of a struggle, but it doesn’t look like he was expecting to leave. Radio’s on and the milk’s out, starting to turn a real nice green.

I just need something personal of his. A favorite shirt. A signed letter. A toothbrush.

Does he even use a toothbrush?

Lifts the pillow of the bed, pulls out a single feather.

Perfect.

Full-page spread. Evening hours. Frank moves through a street chock-full of people, normal and abnormal. The street is lined with hastily-erected shops and stalls, all selling their various bizarre goods.

Monologue: When good old-fashioned detective work fails, it’s time to try a different tack. Which brings me to Little Avalon.

Half of them are quacks, hooking in the tourists too dumb to know the real thing. Three quarters of them can’t do a location spell to save their life. A third of them completely misunderstand my request for “information about Cock” and direct me to the red light district on 5th street.

But I keep trying.

Enters a dark tent filled with arcane tchotchke. A wizened old lady sits at a fold-out table with an array of magical instruments before her.

WL: “Come in, Frank Folds.”

FF: begrudging “...Alright. I’m impressed.”

WL: “I saw it in my tea leaves this morning. Green tea gives the most accurate reading, you know, but Lipton is so much less pretentious about it.”

FF: “Did it tell you why I’m here?”

WL: sighs “No, it’s finicky like that. But in my experience, a private detective is always looking to find someone. Do you have an anchor?”

Folds holds up the feather

WL: “It’ll do.”

takes the feather, sets up a brazier on the table, and ignites it in a burst of blue flame and sparks.

FF: recoiling “Hey, easy with that!”

Witch drops the feather into the flame, where it blackens and curls. She breathes in the smoke.

Monologue: I can’t help but feel jealous.

WL: eyes rolling back “He is… north, of here. Out of the city, but still close. He is in danger, terrible danger, worse than he has ever faced, but he is not afraid.”

FF: “Sounds like him. Can you tell who has him?”

WL: grips the table “They… they are old, cruel power. They watch death and smile. They dress in white to hide the black rot within. They are secondhand killers.”

FF: “Anything more specific? Names, addresses, something I can use?”

WL: eyes return to normal “I’m sorry, Frank Folds. Something like that… I don’t have the strength for it.”

FF: disappointed “Alright. I guess it’s something to go on.” gives her the money, gets up to leave

WL: “Frank Folds?” Folds pauses “… it is a good thing, this work you do. To save the good from the evil is a noble cause.”

FF: “It’s a living.”

Nighttime. Shot of Folds, walking down a dark street.

Monologue: I walk back to the office with more questions than answers.

This, this is the worst part of the job. It’s like putting a jigsaw puzzle together in the dark, and some bastard’s tossed half the pieces under the couch.

And I’m so caught up trying to fit the facts together-

Shadowy figures rush Folds and grab him

-I forget to watch my back.

Folds is slammed against an alley wall. His assailants are revealed to be two police officers, one angry and one nonchalant.

OR: “Careful, he’s a real slippery freak. Ain’t ye, Frankie?”

FF: “Rooke.”

OP: slams him “That’s Officer Rooke, strange!”

OR: “Easy, Pallson. We’re just having a friendly chat.”

FF: “I’d hate to see an argument.”

OR: “That’s right. You would, Frankie boy, you really would. See, we been hearing about you barking up all the trees, asking about Cock. And that gets us interested.”

FF: “I’m flattered Rooke, but you’re not my type.”

OP: punches FF in the gut “The bird, smartass! Jeezus, you ever stop running your mouth?”

Monologue: He couldn’t have stopped me for ten thousand dollars and Cock’s current address.

OR: leans in “Here’s the deal, Frankie. You stop looking, stop asking around. You’re gonna forget that chicken ever existed. You do that, and maybe we keep our eyes off that two-bit shithole you call an office. And that doll working the phone, dig?”

FF: unruffled “Yeah? The pair of you coming at me now, playing hardball, you know what that tells me? Tells me whatever Cock’s mixed up in, it goes high up. The chief send you?”

officers look at each other

FF: “Yeah, I just bet he did.”

OP: “You know what, fuck this.” pulls out a zippo lighter, flicks it on right underneath Frank’s arm “You lay the fuck off, you got that, freak? Or you burn!”

FF: “Ease up there, kid. Chief Shefford doesn’t need your screw-up to take care of, he’s got enough of his own.”

Monologue: Oh.

Officer Pallson screams in rage and ignites Folds’s arm

OR: “Jeez, Pallson!”

Monologue: That may have been too far.

End Part 1