Dutch, the Fence: bible and visual components
- Season record names Dutch as the ally (corpus edit in Press Raven): +5
- Production spec for the 16 pieces, with prompts and anchors: +8
- Dutch's first scene drafted and read cold by Beckett: +7
Open Questions (5): all decided 2026-10-16, as recommended
Recommendation: Yes. He's her way back in after the burn, and 'the Fence is secretly a cop, and you're one of the few who know' is easy for a teenager to follow. A later twist can sit one level up (who he reports to, why he chose a burned agent).
Decision (Sarah, 2026-10-16): agreed as recommended.
Recommendation: Yes. One helper after the burn is easier to follow than two, and 'the only one who still picks up' gives him a reason to be everywhere. The bible's lock keeps him from solving the season: he can steer and encourage, never supply a document's clue.
Decision (Sarah, 2026-10-16): agreed as recommended.
Recommendation: One screen, two doors: his Messages thread on the phone opens the counter, and the Underworld carries a door to the same screen. The phone fits the meeting's plan (unread texts, no notifications); the Underworld fits Standing and Choice §7.
Decision (Sarah, 2026-10-16): agreed as recommended.
Recommendation: A pawnshop. It's the front a teenager recognizes for buying stolen goods. Safecracker's desk safe then moves from the pawnshop to a loan shark's office, so the two never look alike.
Decision (Sarah, 2026-10-16): agreed as recommended.
Recommendation: 'Fence Agent.jpg' (1254 × 1254), the newer and sharper of the two. 'Fence Undercover.jpg' stays as the original casting reference.
Decision (Sarah, 2026-10-16): agreed as recommended.
The portraits that exist
The Fence bible: Dutch
Status: drafted 2026-10-16 by Claude; Sarah approved Q1–Q5 as recommended the same day. Spec v2 §4.3 requires this page before any new Fence copy is written. It supersedes spec v2 §4.3 (the Fence as the department's asset, a handler who kept it from you, and the late Act IV reveal) and the reveal use of the "file opens" portrait in §5.1. The one item still marked (assumed) is Claude's and open to change; the decisions are recorded under Decided.
Who he is
Dutch is the Fence: the man on the street who buys what you steal. Flat rate, no appraisals, no questions. His glasses sit up on his forehead because he never looks at the goods; he watches the person selling them.
He is an undercover police officer. The fencing business is his cover, and has been for years. Every item that crosses his counter goes into a case file. "He logs everything" is literally true.
He is four things to Peregrine, and they are the same man:
- The shop. Coins are spent at his counter (Standing and Choice §7; the Oct 5 meeting's Dutch table, hold slot and back room).
- The jobs. He sets the Safecracker nights: four crooks' safes, his fee for each.
- The connection inside the police department. Peregrine's way back in after the Agency burns her. He's the one who still picks up.
- The ally. After the burn he is the season's ally: his voice carries result screens, hints and routing (Q2). The locks below keep him from solving the case.
The word "fence" is never required. The player meets Dutch by name, and the job is explained once in passing: "Dutch buys what you steal. Don't ask him where it goes." [draft]
The truth table
| Fact | Who knows | What Peregrine knows |
|---|---|---|
| Dutch is a police officer | His lieutenant; a handful of people in the department; Peregrine | Knows from the start (Q1). |
| The shop is a front | The department. The street believes it's real. | Knows. |
| Every item is logged into his case file | The department | Knows. "He logs everything" is a fact she shares with him, not a clue. |
| What the safes hold becomes leads, not evidence | Dutch | Knows. Nothing taken from a safe off the books would stand up in court; it shows him where to look next. |
| His long case targets the rackets that feed Calico's table | Dutch, his lieutenant | Knows there is a long case. Not told its target (assumed). This is where a later twist can live (who he reports to; why he picked a burned agent). |
| Peregrine was burned as compromised | The Agency; Dutch hears it on Day 10 | Knows she's burned. Knows Dutch heard. |
| Whether Peregrine is dirty | Dutch doesn't know at first. He keeps paying her anyway. | Knows he's watching her. It's never said aloud. |
| The Agency's sealed desk, Corrigan's file, SP-14 | Not Dutch. He has no access to the Agency. | — |
What the street sees
- A forgettable man behind a counter who buys anything at one flat rate.
- He never haggles, never appraises, never asks where something came from.
- He calls her Peregrine, never Agent Peregrine (spec v2 §4.1's naming rule: street surfaces drop the title).
- He never uses the words police, officer, badge or case on a street surface. In private, with Peregrine, he can.
Locks
These hold for every surface Dutch appears on.
- He never solves the season. Dutch has no access to the Agency, its sealed desk or its documents. He cannot clear Peregrine, and he never delivers a clue the season's documents must deliver. The proof in Act V stays Peregrine's, Wren's and Falconer's.
- He never sells story. Never standing, story progress, Lines, time or a multiplier (Standing and Choice §7; the Oct 5 meeting).
- He never chases. No iOS notifications. He never mentions time away and never says what was missed. His texts are unread messages, not alerts.
- He never gets a cat name. Cat names are for the Underworld's principals (Calico). Dutch is a street name; he isn't a principal, and he isn't on the Agency's side of the birds.
- He keeps his cover in front of everyone else. A scene with a third person in it is a scene with the Fence, not the officer.
The portraits
The identity masters are Peregrine-Grid-Updated/Squares/Fence Agent.jpg (1254 × 1254, the newer of the two) and Fence Undercover.jpg (600 × 600). Both show shop mode: glasses up, pencil behind the ear, a pen in the breast pocket. The casting is about forty, which overrides spec v2's "late 50s–60s". The look stays deliberately forgettable.
The glasses carry his two sides:
| State | Glasses | Pencil and pen | Used when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shop mode | Up on the forehead | Pencil behind ear, pen in pocket | Every street surface: the counter, his texts, job tickets. |
| Off the record | Down, over his eyes | Gone | Only when he talks to Peregrine as an officer, alone. |
Spec v2 saved "glasses down" for the reveal. With no reveal, it becomes the sign that he has stopped performing for the street. The second state isn't painted yet; the visual components spec commissions it.
Voice
Short, dry and transactional. He sounds bored with crime because he has seen all of it. He's kind only in what he does, never in what he says.
- On the counter: "Three on the table. One on hold if you want it."
[draft] - A job ticket: "Four boxes. Pays more the deeper you go. Walk when you want."
[draft] - Day 10, after the burn: "Heard. Table's still open."
[draft] - Off the record: "I don't care what they say you did. I care what's in the safe."
[draft]
When he appears
| Moment | What happens |
|---|---|
| First week | Dutch's first table opens on the phone: "Dutch — can get you things." Three items at 40 coins and a hold slot (Oct 5 meeting). |
| Before the burn | He's a street contact Peregrine uses in cover. The packet comes by Agency courier. |
| Day 10, the burn | The Agency goes silent. Dutch's text arrives anyway. After this, packets come by his runner (Standing and Choice §10.1). |
| After the burn | Safecracker nights, the shop and the back room. He takes the season's ally role: result screens, hints and routing speak in his voice (Q2). He steers and encourages; he never supplies a document's clue. |
Decided (Sarah, 2026-10-16)
| Question | Decision | |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 | Does Peregrine know he's a cop from the start? | Yes. A later twist can sit one level up. |
| Q2 | Is Dutch the season's unnamed ally? | Yes. Result screens, hints and routing after the burn speak in his voice, within the locks. |
| Q3 | Where does his counter live? | One screen, two doors: his Messages thread opens it, and the Underworld has a door to the same screen. |
| Q4 | What is his front? | A pawnshop. Safecracker's desk safe moves from the pawnshop to a loan shark's office. |
| Q5 | Which portrait is the master? | Fence Agent.jpg (1254 × 1254). Fence Undercover.jpg stays as the original casting reference. |
The season record in the corpus (guides/peregrine/guide.json, season.cast, "The ally": unnamed) still needs to name Dutch; that edit goes through Press Raven.
Dutch: visual components
Status: framed 2026-10-16 by Claude; Sarah approved the open questions as recommended the same day. This is a component frame, not yet a production spec: it lists every visual Dutch needs, what each one does, and how it is made, so the set can be approved before anything is painted. Production detail (prompts, exact sizes, import) follows the Kingpin's Room art spec pattern once the open questions are answered. Character truth: the Fence bible.
Rules for the whole set
- Narrative-world style. ART_DIRECTION applies in full: places inked, people painted (soft painted realism, as the con portraits are). No pendant lamp.
- The app draws every word and number: prices, item names, the hold label, job details, his texts. Tags, tickets and labels are blank paper.
- Nothing locked is ever shown. Items he doesn't offer don't appear as grayed slots (the Oct 5 meeting's absence rules).
- Distinct from Safecracker's places and Kingpin's room. Dutch's front can't look like a safe job or Calico's supper club.
1. Portraits
| Component | What it is | Source | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shop mode | Chest-up, glasses up, pencil behind ear, pen in pocket | Peregrine-Grid-Updated/Squares/Fence Agent.jpg (1254 × 1254) | Exists. The master (Q5). |
| Off the record | The same portrait with glasses down over his eyes, pencil and pen gone | A masked edit of the master: only the glasses, ear and pocket change | To paint. |
| Phone avatar | Circular crop of shop mode for his Messages thread and contact card | Cropped from the master by the importer | Crop only. |
| Counter figure | Dutch behind his counter, shoulders up, in shop mode, registered to the counter plate | Painted into the counter plate's lighting, then extracted to its own layer | To paint. |
The off-the-record edit must keep everything outside the glasses, ear and pocket pixel-identical, so swapping states reads as him taking the glasses down, not a different picture.
2. His counter (where the shop lives)
The screen where Dutch deals his three items and the hold slot.
| Component | What it is | Notes |
|---|---|---|
dutch_counter plate | His pawnshop's counter (Q4) seen from the customer's side: a worn glass-topped pawn counter, shelves of other people's things behind him, a curtain to the back room | Portrait 2:3, opaque. The countertop is the work band where the app lays the three items. Reached from his Messages thread and from a door in the Underworld (Q3). |
| Three item spots | Where the app lays the three offered items | Not painted. Positions in an anchors file. |
| Hold slot | A spike or a hook at the counter's end, where a held item waits under a claim ticket | Painted as part of the plate, empty. The app places the held item's tag on it. |
| Back-room curtain | The way into the back room | Part of the plate; the app makes it a button. |
3. Items on the table
Every item is a painted object with a blank paper tag tied to it; the app writes the name and price on the tag. Proposed objects (Sarah's call on each):
| Item (Oct 5 meeting) | What it does | Proposed object |
|---|---|---|
| Cushion | "My first wrong answer next game doesn't count." | A small velvet jeweler's pad |
| Swap | Swaps an item out to My Misses, marked SKIPPED | Two claim tickets pinned together |
| Freeze | Odd One Out tool | A stopwatch with its crown pulled |
| Alibi | Odd One Out tool | A matchbook from a bar, closed |
| Survey | Coordinate Drop tool | A brass surveyor's compass |
| Mirror Line | Coordinate Drop tool | A folding pocket mirror |
| Buy-back | A card he passed on, bought back | The card itself, face down, clipped to a tag |
| A look | One back-room look | A folded swatch of cloth or paper, depending on the look |
Each object is a transparent layer, front-on with a soft contact shadow, sized to sit on the counter at phone size and read at about 90 pt. New items join the set as they are designed.
4. The back room
| Component | What it is | Notes |
|---|---|---|
dutch_backroom plate | Behind the curtain: shelves and racks of unclaimed things, a work table, a caged wall lamp (no hanging lamp: ART_DIRECTION reserves it) | Portrait 2:3, opaque. A calm band where the app lists looks. |
| Look preview | The chosen look shown on the player's own Desk | No new art. The app composites the look onto the Desk screen (the Oct 5 meeting: "previewable on his own desk"). |
Looks themselves (desk objects, wallpapers, sheets) are their own art pipeline and aren't part of this set.
5. His paper
| Component | What it is | Used for |
|---|---|---|
dutch_claim_ticket | His trademark: a numbered-style claim ticket with a punched hole and a string loop, blank | The hold slot's tag, item tags, and the Safecracker job ticket. One object everywhere he touches. Replaces safecracker_paper_ticket in the Safecracker spec. |
dutch_envelope | A kraft envelope tied with string, a claim ticket on the knot; sealed and open states | The post-burn packet by his runner (Standing and Choice §10.1). Distinct from the Agency courier's envelope, so the burn shows in the mail. |
dutch_ledger_page | A ledger page texture with one coffee ring (docs/mockups/_assets.md row "Fence's ledger") | The Fence's Book section on the Case Board. |
6. Off-the-record props
| Component | What it is | Used for |
|---|---|---|
dutch_badge_wallet | A worn leather wallet half open on a counter, a police shield inside, no lettering or numbers | The one document or scene where Peregrine is reminded what he is. Never on a street surface. |
7. What's deliberately left out
- A phone app icon or storefront. He's a contact in Messages, not an app.
- Animation states for the counter figure. He stays still; his texts carry him.
- A second location. One counter, one back room.
- Any cat motif. He isn't a principal (the bible's locks).
8. Count
Paint: off-the-record portrait edit, counter figure, counter plate, back-room plate, eight item objects, claim ticket, envelope (two states), ledger page, badge wallet. That is 16 painted pieces plus the avatar crop. The shop-mode portrait exists.
Decisions
Q3, Q4 and Q5 are decided (the bible's Decided table): one counter screen reached from his Messages thread and the Underworld, a pawnshop front, and Fence Agent.jpg as the master. The item objects in section 3 are still proposals Sarah can change one by one. The production spec is dutch-art-spec.md (2026-10-16).
- Season record names Dutch as the ally (corpus edit in Press Raven): +5
- Production spec for the 16 pieces, with prompts and anchors: +8
- Dutch's first scene drafted and read cold by Beckett: +7