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whoretan · 2 years

Text

You | One

masterlist.exe

Summary: Jeongguk was supposed to be like the rest, easily hackable with a selection of dirty little secrets he'd like to keep hidden from the rest of the world: the typical weird kinks, fetishes, scams, evasion of taxes, lying on academic records. However, when you dig deeper it turns out that Jeongguk's secrets run, much, much deeper.

Pairing: Jeongguk x Reader | Slight!Taehyung x reader

Genre: Smut, Psychological, Angst, Romance (Unhealthy and Obsessive on both ends)

Tags and Notes: college setting, psychotic reader, computer science majors, lots of hacking, BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL, read at your own discretion, jk and reader are both fucking nut jobs, reply to be added to taglist

WC: 4.6k

chap1_jk970.txt | chap2_trojan.exe

Three weeks prior to Park Soojin’s death.

Under the bright street lamps of the fraternity housing section on campus, half a dozen cars sat clustered in the road. Knots of teenagers ran in and out of the well-known fraternity, some sat drinking and smoking on the hoods of their cars. Others laughed, argued, and stared at the colossus double-door where two frat brothers played security, awaiting anyone who wanted permission to enter.

The pounding bass beat of rap music from inside thudded into the cold night air from the various open windows. It reverberated in your chest with each step.

You zipped past at least a dozen cars, all on display as a flaunt of their social class; a Mustang GT convertible with twenty-inch chrome rims; Porsche Macan EV with a custom paint-job; Dad’s Ferrari. All indicators of economic class, an invisible glue that bounded socialites like these.

Undoubtedly, the average group of typical scumbags whose parents paid their way into an acceptance letter.

A buzz from the rear pocket of your cargos directed your attention elsewhere. You dug into the pocket and pulled out your pinging phone, scanning the street for an abandoned car until your eyes reached a lonely red McLaren. With another double-take and a clear coast, you plopped on the hood of a car that could very well cover all of your student loans and unlocked your phone.

The Linux shell you’re running through the iSH Project pings the coordinates you decrypted from Jeongguk’s cellphone earlier today.

G77; use coordinate system 1

YGeoCode.getMap {“GeoID” : “J970 CELL”

“GeoPoint” : { “Lat” : 37.56829”

“Lon”:126.9977”

“success” : 1}, 1);

You drop the hand holding the device to the top of your thighs, while your shoulders slump downward, relieving tension you weren’t aware was even building.

It’s a 1:1 ratio— you’ve got him.

“Hey, sweetheart, you sure you didn’t put a dent in my car?” An unfamiliar voice quips from somewhere behind you.

Shit.

Your fingers hurriedly type in the exit command and kill the program. If on the off-chance you did just dent a $300,000 car, the last thing you needed was explaining why you have someone’s coordinates on display.

You look over your shoulder and you’re met with a brown head of curls. The guy, who looks to be no more than your age, quirks a brow and plops onto the empty spot beside you. The car bounces and you look down at the hood of the car where Curly essentially just jumped onto, did he just dent his own car?

“Don’t worry darlin’,” Curls smirks, reaching to the side of his head and pulling out a single cigarette which you can only guess was hidden in the shell of his ear. “Not my car, was just messin’ with you.”

He lights the cigarette and places it between his lips, breathing the smoke in. When his chest stops rising, he takes the stick between his fingers and ushers it toward you, “Want some?”

You shake your head and continue watching as he shrugs and places it in the corner of his mouth, letting it rest there without the need of his fingers for support.

You turn your head away from the stranger and back to the street. The majority of the crowd that was present minutes ago made their way into the fraternity, leaving a barren road and the heavy smoke of burning herbs.

“What’re you doin’ at a party like this anyways?”

You scuff and face Curly once again, mildly offended at the question. Curly’s now moved both of his arms behind him and is using them as support as he leans backward on the car. His lip tugs upwards when he sees whatever expression riddles your face.

“What is that supposed-“

He pushes himself off his hands and raises both hands before his chest, shaking them in defense, “You’re wearing cargos and a hoodie with Doc’s in eighty-degree weather for fucks-sake.” He gestures to your outfit with one hand. “You do know what kind of assholes are in there, don’t you?”

You’re more than aware of what kind of misogynistic animals reside in that house. In fact, you know everything about every single one of them— their home addresses, hospital records, GPAs, transcripts, academic records, bank account numbers, transactions, who they sent their last text message to, to what condom sizes they like to buy at 7-Eleven even though the latex is probably way too big.

Instead of letting curly know you’ve committed about fifty offenses and earned yourself a jail sentence of sixty years in prison, you opt for a simple, “So?”

Curly inches forward, face contorting in confusion as he gestures to the house and then back to you, “So? You think they’re just gonna let you walk right in wearin’ your favorite boot camp outfit?”

Well, you weren’t exactly planning on taking the main entrance. Did you mention you found the blueprints a week ago?

“You got a secret crush or somethin’?” Curly drops his hands and digs his elbow in your rib, wiggling his thick brows.

You use your arm to push him in the opposite direction, denying his allegations. Curly, however, has other plans, continuing to playfully elbow your rib while whispering a symphony of various ‘Ooohs’ and ‘La-la-la’s’.

Your phone ping’s once again and you silently curse, the ping serving as a signal that Jeongguk’s moved over ten feet from the previously registered location. Jeongguk could very well be making his way back into his room all while you still haven’t even made it onto the front lawn.

Curly halts, dropping his elbow and peering down at your phone. You side-eye the stranger and flip your phone so the screen faces the ground. His eyebrows scrunch and his mouth goes agape, a sudden realization dawns on his face.

He recognizes the ping.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Not only has Curly wasted almost fifteen minutes of your time, but the fucker knows how to code. Not any code, though, he recognizes illegal code.

Your phone pings again and you resist the itching urge to chuck the device onto the ground and jump off the car to run home.

Curls scoots closer to you until his thigh is pressed against yours. Your eyes remain locked on the phone, watching your knuckles turn white around the device. You hold your breath till your throat begins to constrict, begging for air. What are you supposed to do? What if he knows Jeongguk?

“Who’re you tracking?” Curly whispers, low enough that you barely pick up on his words.

You can’t rat yourself out. No chance in hell are you telling him you’re tracking Jeon Jeongguk’s fucking cellphone.

You shakily exhale and push yourself off the McLaren, shoving your phone into your pocket, ignoring the several new pings reverberating through the air. “I- listen.” You raise your hand to rub your face, “Can you like, keep this between us?” You use your pointer finger to swing back and forth between the both of you.

Curly groans. He grabs the butt of the cigarette and stands up. He drops the butt onto the floor and uses his boot to crush the remains into the pavement. “Listen sunshine, clearly we’re both up to no good. N’ if it makes you feel better,” he digs into the pocket of his trousers and pulls out his own phone.

The screen lights, illuminating Curly’s face with white. You notice the mole on the tip of his nose, his one mono-lid, and the way he’s using his teeth to scrape at his bottom lip. The white cast turns a darker shade and he faces the screen to you, revealing a nearly identical iSH Project program running.

He’s tracking someone too.

“If you don’t wanna tell me who you’re stalkin’ then, fine by me. But, let’s help each other out, yeah?” He swings his arm around your shoulder, spinning you to face the house. He points to the bushes on the rear of the home, “We get in n’ split. You do your thing n’ I do mine. N’ if we coincidentally happen to meet each other inside, we have a good fuckin’ time. How bout’ that?”

He uses the hand that’s hung around your shoulder to push your face to your left, leaving you only a few inches away from the tip of his nose. Your eyes gaze at his, meeting an eerie black, the complete opposite of the light brown you took notice of earlier.

Curly smirks and leans in, pecking your forehead, leaving a glossy cast of his lips dead center. When he moves his face away, he uses his free hand to poke at the tip of your nose, “That was for good luck, now c’mon we have assholes to screw over.”

About twenty-five minutes and a ridiculous amount of bickering later, you’ve convinced Taehyung— the name Curly told you right after you confessed you had the blueprints of the home, not forgetting to add that you’re “the best little hacker he’s ever met”— to take the emergency ladder instead of scurrying through the bushes and taking the back door.

“I still think this is a shit idea, just wanna let you know,” Taehyung half-whispers, holding onto a piece of your hoodie as you lead the way through the bushes.

“Noted. Still don’t care.” You mumble, picking up the pace to spite the coder.

When your hoodie falls flat onto your back and a groan erupts from behind you, your chest swells with triumph. Smokers aren’t good runners after all.

“Hey,” Taehyung calls from behind you, “don’t be an ass, we’re on the same team here.”

We. Plural.

A tree branch cracks as Taehyung stomps over it, seconds later, your hoodie is being latched to once again and a few colorful words flutter out of the former’s mouth. Lovely.

You continue pathing through the tall shrub, much to your and Taehyung’s luck, the streets were clear as day when you made your big sprint— more of a light jog for Taehyung really— to the side of the frat.

You’d studied the blueprints in and out. Each room, bathroom, kitchen (yes, there’s more than one), and even the home gym locations are perfectly engraved into the crevices of your brain.

The emergency ladder, which according to public records was installed three weeks after the Bang Fraternities’ initial move-in, was connected to the balcony and joined the room of Park Jimin. Across the hall, two doors to the right is Jeongguk’s room. That’s your target.

And the sole reason you’d spent twenty minutes trying to convince Taehyung to take the ladder. Easier access meant less of a possibility of running into people and worse of all, Jeongguk himself.

The ladder’s three-fourths of the way to the back of the house. Most likely rolled up to prevent intruders from using it to access the house without permission. Of course, you’d thought of that too and looked into the company that installs emergency ladders in the vicinity.

You ran the password cracker you’d spent all summer coding, found the sudo root password, and boom, access to all of their clientele files. Low and behold, your university had a file and in it was the fraternities. A little Googling later, you found the exact model of the ladder they used and discovered it had a small lever that let it fall down without a key or having to be at the top to press its emergency button.

The end of the shrubs was approaching, your queue to crawl through the bush and into the open space. You halt and point to a small opening through the bushes, large enough for you and Taehyung to crawl through without rustling the shrub more than necessary and garnering any unwarranted attention.

“Once we get through here,” you point to the opening, making sure to turn around and get confirmation from Taehyung that he understood. When he nods, you continue, “I’ll pull a lever and we climb up. I’ll check if Jimin’s in the room, if not, you climb. Also, do not say anything, they probably have all of the windows open.”

You slide through first, looking back and forth to ensure no drunk college students made their way out of the home and to the sides. With the hand on the other side of the brush, you shoot a thumbs up and quickly book it to the ladder.

The ladder is in fact rolled up, and much higher than you expected it to be. You scan the steps trying to pinpoint the step with a tiny lever on the side of it. When your eyes lock onto it, you flip the lever upwards, and the ladder automatically clasps an inch above the soil.

The rusting of bushes gives you the go-to climb upwards. You sprint up the ladder and the ladder dips a little further once you’ve reached the top.

You peer over the stone balcony, and much to your surprise, Park Jimin’s glass doors are wide open. The sway of his white curtains makes an appearance every few seconds.

Without much thought, you grip the ends of the balcony and use all of your forearm strength to hoist yourself over the edge. You land on your heels and peer over the glass door to reveal a dark room. Quickly, you scan the bed, bathroom, and desk— all empty. What idiot leaves his balcony door wide open during a party? Jimin, apparently.

“Jesus fuckin’ christ,” Taehyung moans as he reaches the top of the ladder. “Lil help here, please.”

You turn to him and he extends his hand to you. Lazy shit. You groan and grab his one hand with both of yours, steady your weight onto your heels and drive backward, pushing him forward until he falls over and lands flat on the ground.

“Very graceful,” you comment, and Taehyung releases a huff in response.

After what appeared to be shame-riddling his face, Taehyung stands up straight and arches his back backward, cracking his spine in the process, “Holy hell that hurt.”

“My bad.”

Taehyung grins and raises a brow, “Worried bout’ me darling?”

You roll your eyes and turn toward the bedroom, inviting yourself in. You rush toward Jimin’s bed and dishevel the perfectly made bedsheets that a maid undoubtedly made this morning. You then turn back to Taehyung who stands with furrowed brows and run your fingers through his curls, loosening them.

He tilts his head and you sigh, “We need to make it look like we just made out.”

Taehyung opens his mouth and nods his head, “Gotcha.”

You and Taehyung stare at one another. Spit builds in your mouth and you awkwardly swallow the build-up. After a few seconds, you nod and turn your head toward the door.

“Well we should-“

“Who’re you tracking?” Taehyung asks.

“I thought we agreed-“

“I’m here for Min Yoongi. He owes me six grand in narcotics. Stole my shit and sold it somewhere on the market, gonna get into his laptop and get my money back.”

You blink at him and question the sincerity in his words. Does he have any reason to lie to you? What kind of benefit would he get from lying to you? Is Taehyung even his real name?

You lift your hand and rub the back of your neck. Hesitatingly you bite at your lip and nod slowly. He’s either confident as hell or an incredible liar. Fuck it, what wrong could it do?

“Jeon Jeongguk. I’m about ninety percent sure his girlfriend runs a Red Room on the dark web, and before you laugh at me I want to let you know the fucker completely encrypted a section of his computer. I can’t access any of her information without whatever the hell Jeongguk has listed in a ‘RR Soo’ folder on his computer.”

As much as you expected Taehyung to laugh in your face, his eyebrows lightly rise and he nods understandingly as if he’s totally cool with whatever the fuck you have planned, “Cool shit detective, good luck.”

You swallow, “You’re not gonna?”

“Laugh? Nah. We’re both bout’ to commit an offense, I have my reasons and so do you. What’s laughin’ gonna do?”

Taehyung doesn’t wait for your response, instead, he digs into his trousers and pulls out a cigarette box. His slender fingers flip the green top, revealing an array of sticks, he pulls one out and tilts the box to you, much like he did before with the single cigarette.

You shake your head at the request and he shrugs, shoving the box back into his pocket.

Taehyung lights the cigarette and lifts his head, averting his gaze to you. He winks and walks directly past you, leaving only the click of the door as a reminder of his presence.

Holy hell.

You rub at your palms, feeling the moistness that accumulated. When did it get so fucking hot? With a deep sigh, you shake your hands and rub them against the roughness of your cargos.

It was now or never. Your phone hadn’t pinged in about ten minutes meaning Jeongguk had to still be somewhere downstairs.

You turn toward the door and walk to it, pressing your hand on the knob and rotating it. When it clicks, you swing the door open and make your exit.

The smell of burning weed intoxicates you, filling the air with a cloud of thick smoke. With a quick glance in both directions, you notice the upstairs is relatively empty. In fact, there was no one in the hallway. Not even a trace of Taehyung, who left moments ago.

The boom of the speakers that were planted through the house and the screams of excited men and even more excited girls vibrated everywhere. There must be at least a hundred people downstairs.

You tug your hood over your head and avoid contact.

Across the hall and two to the right.

Jeongguk’s door was hard to miss, a large white board nailed to the center of the door with ‘BAD BUNNY JK’ written in purple. Beside it was several much smaller doodles, all drawn on in different colors.

You inched forward and knocked twice.

Nothing.

You reached down, grabbing the knob to twist it, but, it wouldn’t budge. Fucker locks his door, of course, he does.

You groan and bend down to eye level with the knob, you reach into a lower pocket of your cargos and dig out a lock-pin. You jam the metal into the door and twist until the lock clicks, unlocking the door.

You check over your shoulder and rise, bolting through the door and directly into the room, slamming the door behind you.

Jeongguk’s room, much to your surprise, is exactly how you imagined it’d to be. To your left is an unmade bed with black sheets and a matching pillow set, plus a few scattered plushies of various colors. Directly in front of you, a PC set up with two horizontal monitors and one vertical off to the side, the keyboard pulses with rainbow hues. Directly above the PC are several posters, Metallica and ACDC to name a few.

In the corner, an orange electric guitar rests on a stand, several doodles are drawn onto its surface. To the right, is a closet with closed sliding doors and a mirror hanging from the top.

It’s definitely cleaner than you expected.

You glance at the corners of his room, of which all are empty. Okay, good, he has no cameras. At least, none that you can see.

With a deep breath and a hammering chest, you take a step toward the desk. Roughly, you dig out the single USB flash drive you’ve placed in the bottom pocket of your cargos and slide out its metal component.

When you’ve reached Jeongguk’s desk, you tap on the space bar of his keyboard and watch the desktop come to life. A photograph of Jeongguk and his girlfriend, Soojin, appears in front of you, in the photo, Soojin smiles as Jeongguk kisses her cheek. How romantic.

You resist an urge to roll your eyes.

In the center of the desktop Jeongguk’s ‘BB BUNNY JK’ username is displayed in bold letters and under it is an empty white text box awaiting the correct password input to allow access to the PC.

You hacked Jeongguk two weeks ago.

His password, ‘soosoo970’ is a play-on-words of the nickname he uses for his girlfriend. Which is tremendously more idiotic than you could’ve ever imagined. Seriously, what kind of software engineering student uses the nickname he gives his girlfriend alongside the year he was born as his password?

You type in the password, press enter and the page unlocks itself. Without wasting any more time—thank you, Taehyung— you open the terminal and shove your USB drive into the computer.

You open the batch file you saved on the drive and run the script. After the script successfully runs, it allows you to automate tasks and export Jeongguk’s data into text files, granting you complete access to all of his desktop passwords while not having to be on it directly.

Using your Apple Watch’s clock, you count ten seconds until the script finishes running and lets you download the batch file. After opening the file, you see everything.

And no, Soojin doesn’t run a Red Room. From what you understand, the girl can’t even fucking run the ‘Hello World’ command if her life depended on it. And yes, you did lie to Taehyung.

Initially, you’d taken a certain interest in Park Jimin. He was in nearly all of your classes: confident, outspoken, and eerily kind. The kind that bugs you because for some odd reason it just doesn’t feel right.

After the third week and an itch you couldn’t simply squash, you hacked into Jimin’s computer, then his cellphone, and his entire life. Turns out he wasn’t as irregular as you thought, sure, he watched anal porn more than most dudes his age but, other than that, his record was clean.

Then, you hacked the rest of his fraternity. Call it simple-minded curiosity, or whatever. But, you wanted to know what type of people Jimin was okay with associating himself with.

Sure, nearly all of them were your typically coke-addicted, old-school wealth, types of douchebags. But, they didn’t have any hidden files, encrypted programs, or scripts, nothing that screamed ‘Hey look, I’m totally doing something I shouldn’t!’.

Jeongguk, unlike the rest of his fraternity, took an extra precaution in ensuring his information stays private. Privacy, like complete encryption from all proxies except the root IP typically only happens because of a single reason— Jeongguk’s hiding something.

And once you get home and decrypt all of his passwords and to what programs and sites they belong, you’ll know exactly what it is he’s hiding.

You kill the batch file, copy it onto your drive, and clear the terminal.

After shutting down the PC, you shove the USB drive back into its original pocket and proceed toward the direction of the door.

Whatever Jeongguk hid on that PC will be yours by the end of tonight. Your chest swells with triumph as you lower your hand to twist the knob.

“Soo, chill, wait until we’re inside,” a voice groans from the opposite side of the door.

There’s a sound of keys clanking against one another, “Fucking hell, which one is it again?”

Your blood runs cold and your hand freezes on the knob, unable to move an inch.

Why didn’t your phone ping? You coded it to ping three times in a row if Jeongguk’s elevation level changed, which he very clearly did.

You’re fucked. You’re absolutely fucked. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Panic settles in and you begin to rapidly look around Jeongguk’s room to find somewhere you can hide. His bed had storage containers filling the space underneath it and there’s no way you’d have enough time to move them and make room for yourself. The space underneath his desk is too open, he’d notice you the second he walked in.

C’mon, c’mon.

You continue rapidly looking around until your eyes land on the closet. In a sprint, you rush toward the sliding doors and haul one of the doors to open. Thankfully, the space on the bottom has just enough room for you to squeeze into a ball and pray to who-fucking-ever Jeongguk doesn’t need a change of underwear tonight.

After you’ve nearly collided with every single piece of clothing in his office and settled into a ball on the floor, you usher the closet door closed and hold your breath.

No more than ten seconds later, you hear the door swing open and a pair of footsteps rush in.

“Baby, I’m tired.” You hear the female, who you presume to be Soojin, moan.

Your heart pounds against your chest and you try to exhale as quietly as possible. The sound of footsteps and a thud on a cushion muffles your irregular breathing.

From the corner of your eye, you notice a dim light peeking through a gap where the two closet doors are joined by bolts. You shuffle your way toward the gap, not because you’re a creep, but, because you need to get the fuck out of here.

You catch your breath as Soojin straddles Jeongguk, giggling as she pulls off his oversized black shirt, throwing it somewhere onto the ground. She kisses his neck, and chest, and eventually reaches the border of his joggers.

Jeongguk groans, gripping the back of Soojin’s hair and giving her a light tug, “Get on with it.”

His girlfriend giggles in response and lowers herself off of him and onto her knees on the floor. You try to look away, try to ignore the pulsing in your stomach, and look into the darkness of the closet. But, you can’t.

Your eyes are glued to the couple.

Soojin pulls down Jeongguk’s joggers, along with his underwear. You bite your lip and try to steady your heart, your feet have fallen asleep and the tingling sensation makes both of them go completely numb.

From your position, you’re unable to see Jeongguk’s lower torso, Soojin’s back obscures the view. But, as your eyes trail upwards from Soojin’s waist, you notice Jeongguk’s pecks, his prominent collarbones. The definition in his toned arms as he uses one hand to steady himself and the other to guide his girlfriend’s bobbing head.

“You’ve been naughty, haven’t you?” Jeongguk moans and you can’t resist the urge to look up at his face.

Soojin moans in response, choking in the process of Jeongguk shoving her mouth to the bottom of his cock.

At this point, you’ve unconsciously moved closer to the gap to get a closer look, most of your weight shifting to the tip of your feet. Your eyes settle on Jeongguk’s lip, the smirk that tugs upwards and then to his eyes.

When they meet, your hand flies to cover your mouth to suppress the yelp that’s forming in your throat.

His eyes are completely black, the normal doe shape they carry transformed into that of a feline cat— a predator stalking his prey.

Jeongguk’s staring directly at you.

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rainy-melodies · 2 months

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“Let's keep up the pace!"

⋆˚🐾˖°

The Twisted Prophecy: Code of Fire

. ⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓃠⋆.ೃ࿔:･

The infamous socialite of Roseclan! Hareskip is well known across the forest for his chipper attitude and bright ginger fur. Together with Roseclan's deputy Cloverpatch they act as mediators for disputes with other clans, as well as the rumored infighting happening within the bushes of Roseclan camp.

. ⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓃠⋆.ೃ࿔:･

OK OK, i know i just posted about my au yesterday but i'm really on a roll with these designs. I kinda have an idea on what i'm actually doing so this post is MUCHHH more polished than poor riddle's. I think I might redo his once i get through the other heartslabyulers.

but yeah CATer!! i hit him with the kittyfication beam. He looks like a little cutie pie. I wanted him to look kinda bunny-ish, since in his beta design he had rabbit ears, so bunny!cater for the win i guess!!! Of course i had to put in his little fang in there too, couldn't pass up that opportunity. He's just really cute and i think he deserves a gold star sticker.

i've created Roseclan's little clan icon thing. stiilll not sure how i feel about it so it may or may not change in the upcoming posts. i'll figure it out. shoutout to riddle's coffin icon.

anyways, let's talk a little about Roseclan's territory and clan life! I think it's pretty neat. I imagine Roseclan's territory is pretty comparable to Thunderclan in the original books, except with lots of flower bushes. Not necessarily the typical roses that they have in Heartslabyul (I don't think those grow naturally in the wild??) but maybe like wild roses!

Somewhere on the far-end of territory there's a twoleg neighborhood that grows ACTUAL roses, and patrols will go there from time to time to hunt the critters those roses attract. Think rabbits, mice, and (less conventionally) bugs! Roseclan cats eat the caterpillars they find in roses as a good luck sort of thing, much to the disgust of other clans.

I loved the tidbits of world-building Warriors had so of course i'm gonna jam pack my AU with these little details. Overall I'm really excited to start really getting into this whole thing and sharing it with the rest of y'all!

well thats all i've got folks, have some little doodles of hareskip for the road.

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generic-whumperz · 7 months

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The Aid Masterlist

Cover pics sourced from Pinterest

(18+, MINORS DNI!)

Bad summary (I suck at these): Set in the near future, an ability wielding telepathic-empathic 18-year-old sells himself into high-class slavery to support his family and to escape the wrath of an impeding Regime that has overthrown the US government, as well as avoid the growing numbers of the ravenous blood-thirsty hoards of afflicted. Stripped of his name, The Aid serves under a Southern Californian socialite, Madame Eleanor, the prestigious Sullivan family matriarch, for five years before being given to her Sadistic Son, Wyatt, after her untimely death. He now must fight for survival in a war-torn world and rediscover who he is, and hopefully, he’ll make a friend or two along the way.

What you can expect: A long, slow-burn type story with undertones of family war-time drama, multiple POVs (in the works), multiple parts, and Whumping of all kinds. Too many themes and lots of insane shit. This story is the first of many in my chaotically crafted BBU-inspired original AU (although it is very different). It’s a bit of a mess rn, I’m figuring it out as I go along and it’ll all tie in and make sense eventually. And oops this may turn into a “multiple book” situation. Oh I’m sorry, you wanted a simple whump story? Too bad, take a never-ending series instead!

General vibes: post-apocalypse desert horror meets torture den meets psychedelic 60s and mid-centruy modern aesthetics (plus a lot more other shit that will come in wayyyyy down the road).

General content warnings:

This is a heavier story with little to no comfort and constant levels of hurt (physical and emotional), including NSFW themes, heed any TWs & CWs listed at the beginning of each part! This is not a happy story (at least right now and in the near future, but he will have a happy-ish ending I promise), if you want something nice n’ fluffy, this isn't it!

*Not all of these themes are explored yet, but they will be. I’m trying not to give away spoilers while also being upfront by what to expect here.

20+ year age gap between Whumpee & Whumper

Former (elderly) lady Whumper (dies at 73)

Institutionalized slavery in a post-war/ post-apocalyptic AU

Culty & conspiratorial religious extremism (not the main focus of this story, but it’s there in the background and connected to above bullet point)

Cannibalism (the “afflicted” are basically stand-ins for zombies)

Non-con & dub-con (varying degrees of each, anything explicit will be marked as such!)

Red room whumping (working up to it, this feels like a spoiler)

Addiction & substance abuse + general use & mentions (prescription & illicit drugs, alcohol, gambling, porn), + noncon drugging

Caretaker turned Whumpee (“Caretaker” as in literal caregiver)

Sadistic/creepy/intimate/verbally and mentally abusive Whumper

Death threats, attempted murder, and murder

Discussions of mental health including suicidal ideation

Multiple Whumpers (& eventually multiple Whumpees— wow this also feels like a spoiler)

Long-term captivity, and conditioning— I’m talking 5 + 4ish more years (but this does not mean the MC is completely helpless and always compliant and doesn’t snap back!)

Medical & lab whump (this is probably more medical malpractice and just bad healthcare, but there’s some experimental drugging!)

Starvation & subsequent issues with food

Manipulation/ emotional whump

Defiant & angsty Whumpee(s)

Paranormal encounters

Family trauma & drama

Idk what to call this, but MC has some special abilities but it’s not necessarily magic. I wouldn’t consider this magic or fantasy whump by any means and the story does not revolve exclusively around this, although it plays a personal part for MC.

The lists below will be continuously updated when I have new stuff to add! I know it ain't much yet, but I'm workin' on it! :)

Part 1: Out from Under

Prologue (Meet The Whumper)

Chapter 1: Pump It (Louder!)

Chapter 2: Belligerance

Chapter 3: Say My Name

Chapter 4: One Step Closer

Chapter 5: Part 1, Part 2

Chapter 6: Stranger to Myself

(NSFW)Chapter 7: Sicko Fantasies & Haunting Memories

Polls:

Pick a sleep paralysis entity/being to haunt The Aid!

Art:

Bad Procreate Portrait! +Backstory

Lashings

Basement Dayz

Other:

"Life Before" Backstory ask

OC in 3 (Aid vibe pics, visual references)

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hasufin · 4 days

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Conspiracy in practice

There's this thing I've talked about in the past, but it's kinda been a while. And it should NOT come as a surprise to anyone who knows me.

Some few years ago, I lived in San Francisco. I love the City by the Bay, and I love its history. Some of which is, as I'm sure anyone can predict, Really Fucked Up.

Like most cities, San Francisco has at times had trouble with the dead. Specifically, where to put them. They sort of have a tendency to build up, you see.

Now, when SF was originally established, there were (setting aside the existence of the Ohlone, who are important but not relevant to this specific topic) only two settlements: a crude sort of port on the harbor, roughly-ish where the Ferry Terminal is now; and the Mission somewhat further inland and still extant today.

The Mission of course maintained its own cemetery, but that was only for Catholics attached to the Mission. The rest of the population of the nascent community - who were, by and large, not particularly religious - had to find some other solution.

They opted to site a cemetery in a moderately convenient spot so far out of town that no one would ever have a problem with putting dead bodies there. Today we call that location "Civic Center".'

Rapidly realizing the short-sighted nature of that decision, they moved the municipal cemetery to a place even further from the rapidly-growing settlement. A place of bare dunes and cold wind coming off the Pacific; with no access to fresh water and no conceivable reason anyone would ever want to built there. A place fittingly called Lands End.

Now, Lands End was in fact a terrible place to build anything. And it might have remained an ignored terminus of the peninsula, had it not been for the cemetery.

Going to the cemetery was a challenging proposition at that time - into the 1880s, if memory serves. Except that a wealthy socialite and philanthropist, Alma Spreckels, built a railroad from the city out to the cemetery. These necropolis railways were not uncommon projects in the day: they sold two kinds of tickets, round-trip and one-way, for wildly different clientele. I do not think she could have predicted what that would do.

With a railway built to what was at the time rather cheap land, another wealthy person, one Adolph Sutro, saw an opportunity. He decided to develop the area, with an eye especially to the wealthy of the city. He built a bathhouse - well, by modern standards we'd call it more a waterpark - a luxurious seaside resort, and numerous other amenities. Lands End came to be seen not as an unpleasant place to put bodies, but rather as a location where the wealthy would go to play.

And yet, it was nonetheless also the location of the San Francisco Municipal Cemetery. In fact, it held several cemeteries: some few areas devoted to specific religious organizations, cemeteries for fraternal organizations, one for immigrants, and the aforementioned municipal interment.

Each one was different, of course. I could not give detail about the religious ones (except the Neptune Society, which is a unique exception here). The fraternal ones were interesting in their own right: a major draw to fraternal organizations such as the Oddfellows and the Freemasons was that they provided a sort of life insurance for members: they would bury said membership, and look after widows and underage children. So of course they maintained cemeteries for the former purpose. The immigrant cemetery was largely for Chinese laborers. And interestingly interment there was meant to be temporary, lasting only until the body was nothing but bones, which would then be shipped back to China to be buried in the homeland of the deceased - however, not everyone died with enough money for this, and in no few cases the surviving family was unable or unwilling to pay the costs.

Lastly, there was the Municipal Cemetery. This was a "potter's field" in which the city buried anyone whose body was not otherwise claimed. This was done cheaply, the plots were simply numbered, and often they did not even have a name - SF then as now did have a homeless population.

For a brief while, Lands End had a double life, being both a place of raucous merriment and one of somber mourning. The living, however, crowded out the dead. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many American cities decided they would not continue sharing space with the dead, and determined to move the latter entirely outside of municipal limits; thus freeing up city land for other - and more profitable - uses.

Thus it was with San Francisco, who wanted to expand use of the area, build a central park as was the fashion of the time, and become a truly modern city. And so began a somewhat grisly endeavor: exhuming the many bodies and transferring them to the new necropolis at Colma (still the largest necropolis in the USA; slogan: "It's great to be alive in Colma!").

The living next of kin found themselves on the hook for the costs of respectful treatment of their ancestors. Churches were obliged to handle the reburials when they had believed once was enough. Charitable organizations - where still in existence - were required to shoulder their reburial costs.

But that left the sprawling municipal cemetery. As with any city, they resolved to handle the matter cheaply. They doubtless reasoned that if there was no one alive who would pony up the money for a respectful exhumation and reburial, the dead had no one alive to object to digging up some bones and throwing them in a mass grave at a more convenient location. And they were correct.

In fact...

Well, do you know what would be cheaper than digging up bones and tossing them in a pit?

Not doing that. Simply removing the grave markers, assigning the numbered graves to burial pits, and not bothering with the expensive and unpleasant labor. So that's what they did. Or didn't do, depending on how you look at it. They pulled a poltergeist and merely removed the markers. When the city of San Francisco declared all bodies moved, and no additional burials allowed, many thousands of graves actually remained.

Subsequently, considerable construction occurred there. And this is where we get into something which is awful and yet to be expected. You see, this was not a secret. To a certain point of view, it can be understood that only a handful of people realized that when the exhumations and reburials were called done, they were not - after all, the only people who might have done the accounting and realized nothing of the sort had happened were those who had decided on such a course of inaction. To everyone else, the relocation of the poor and dead was Someone Else's Problem.

However, after that point, it must assuredly have been an open secret at least among workers. Simply put, you could not engage in the construction which happened there without regularly finding bones. And in the 90s when they performed extensive renovations to buildings in the area to make them Earthquake-resistant, they did indeed find extremely large numbers of unmarked graves, up to and well past the areas where they were authorized to dig. And even now, frequently some wealth household in the area will decide to add a garage or the like, and discover yet another grave.

This is where I might rail against the hypocrisy.

But right now I want to draw attention to another important point. The reality that the graves in Lands End were not properly moved was both well-known, and a secret, for most of a century. A great many people know it for a fact, but none of them chose to speak up.

There are times when people reasonably deride the idea that the US Government could conceal evidence of aliens, or whatever other vast and lofty conspiracy. And those arguments are valid.

And yet. We can see that it's perfectly possibly for hundreds - likely thousands - of people in a city to keep a secret. They did so by a combination of disinterest with the secret, and that revealing it would incur considerable personal loss for no hope of reward.

It is possibly to keep a secret... if no one gives a damn.

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fictionadventurer · 3 months

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Fortnight of Books 2023: Day 12

Book you still aren’t sure of your feelings on

I'm not sure how I feel about the ending of Miss Pym Disposes. Does the ending (and the heroine's and author's obsession with face-reading) wreck the story for me?

For all that my love of the characters made The Heir of Redclyffe a highlight of the year, I'm not sure how I feel about some of the more melodramatic and preachy elements of it.

Requiem by Amity Thompson. The beginning was lovely with its meditations on life and death and an intriguing world/magic system, but the turn toward a story about creating a zombie army (and the heroine's odd reactions to it) didn't quite gel, and I'm not sure how I feel about the whole.

Series you gave up on in 2023

As hilarious as some of the stories in The Voluble Topsy were, Topsy's dippy-socialite speech patterns became grating in large doses, and the intricate 1920s British politics became a bit too dull, so I stopped reading partway through the second volume, and doubt I'll pick it up again.

I think I've officially given up trying out the books in Jenni Sauer's Evraft series of science-fantasy fairy tale retellings. I'm annoyed that this series will call itself science fiction while having stories that could be contemporary stories or fantasy save for one mention of a spaceship, and the stories and characters all seem so bland and "therapy talk"-ish.

#fortnight of books 2023 #books #i had to mention that last point because she's got a maid maleen retelling out #and i have to remind myself not to put myself through this again #no matter how cool i think the idea of a sci-fantasy maid maleen involving cryostasis could be

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orbleglorb · 9 months

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@polkadotpatterson hi. using this as an excuse to talk about my shit sport.

banesball is a game similar to blaseball in the sense that the game wants you dead. however, everything is very meticulous and odd and that is because i asked myself "how could i make the worst sport ever?" and then made a spreadsheet about it

banesball does a lot of things in 3s. 3 teams play at once. there are 27 teams total (multiple of 3). there are three conferences (lawful, neutral, chaotic) and three divisions (good, neutral, evil). the fields themselves are triangles. this is because most sports do things in 2s, and in order to make it the worst sport ever i had to get rid of that

so, the full list of teams is: jacksonville librarians (location may change), jaipur crickets, portland brewers, buenos aires architects, katmai volcanoes, sapporo cranes, point nemo socialites, cedar rapids bakers, underworld gemstones, tampa gardeners, galway revelers, eureka redwoods, chicago beans, death valley omens, london watchers, seattle baristas, perth polycule, paris performers (based out of paris, TX), salem sorcerers, atlanta artists, austin musicians (location may change), new york city pigeons, nova scotia lookouts, memphis showboats, alberta rats, geneva mad scientists, and reno clowns.

the lookouts were originally the lighthouse keepers, but it was a lengthy name and calling them the "lookouts" allowed for more variation in what they do. i.e., one could be a life guard. i chose lighthouses because i was going down a wikipedia rabbit hole and apparently nova scotia has a shit ton of light houses.

The Person Pit is a pit that people come out of. these are typically missing people from all over the world (although most of the time they're from canada and the northern USA), but sometimes ppl who do not exist just kinda appear and everyone goes ok 👍. whoever shows up in the pit has been Claimed and must Play Ball. that is a much more recent development, though. The Pit has existed longer than Banesball. it also just decided it would be fun to start a Banesball team. when tulio came out of The Pit, he was injured, which was the first time that had happened in a while. those who come from the pit typically have no memory of their experiences inside of it, but tulio does. and tulio isn't saying jack shit out of fear.

i have lored some players from around the league, although i haven't really claimed a team since i am The Creator. however, i've done the most lore with the lookouts because The Person Pit is so important to me (it correlates with my OC universe). here are my thoughts on the players:

barbie nebuchadnezzar: no pronouns. prefers to go by barb. barb has lived in nova scotia barb's entire life. nobody knows how long barb has been alive, not even barb. barb is a seasoned sailor that became a lighthouse keeper, as well as the Keeper Of The Pit. barb is the only player on the lookouts that has not come from The Pit.

evelyn hassan: nothing yet </3

kit walsh: he/she. butch lesbian. pink hair and pronouns. he's the captain of the lookouts, despite being the third recruit. she's in some sort of trade profession (maybe welding or carpentry). she's the biggest supporter of everyone on his team. will hold your hand at the dentist if you asked

zaynab campbell: she/her. middle-aged(ish) ex-housewife from a lavender marriage. motherly in a sense, but grandma might be more apt. avid baker and, after her divorce, worked as an OSHA inspector up until coming out of The Pit. dating lola

lola sharp: nothing much yet :( late twenties, early 30s. peppy

tulio tailor: any pronouns, primarily uses he. cursed. he Knows. nobody knows why. likes making things out of clay and pottery

dhia bronwyn: nothing much yet. muslim & hijabi (maybe niqabi)

me and some friends have a discord server where we've made some lore for these guys! if u wanna join lmk :3 usually i go in and just add a bunch of players at once, & it's pretty silent the rest of the time. not much to do yet. there's no sim, and likely never will be, but we're having fun yes and-ing each other. i made a perchance generator for generating names and stats, as well as a name generator for teams based in areas with vastly different names than north america. both work much better on a computer.

ok infodump over 👍

#banesball #nova scotia lookouts #banesball info #i also made a rulebook (it's still a WIP tho)

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bbltheque · 2 years

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#bbltheque #socialite ish #black girls in luxury #spoiled girlfriend #spoiled heaux #femininity #level up #that girl #the feminine urge #black woman femininity #black women in luxury #hypergamyblr #hypergamy #level up journey

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mariacallous · 3 months

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FIRST SOCIALITE (HUSBAND): “I can’t read this thing!” (Tossing aside Truman Capote’s magazine excerpt from his forthcoming novel Answered Prayers.)

SECOND SOCIALITE (WIFE): “But darling, you must read all of it. If you don’t, we won’t have anything to talk to anybody about.”

The above exchange actually occurred, but as often happens with popular hot controversies, the principals prefer not to be identified, even after telling the tale on themselves. The social stakes are too high. Being on the wrong side in one of these tempests in a teabag could be fatal. What if Kitty Miller never invites you again … or “Swifty” Lazar hangs up on you … or the Bill Paleys hear you didn’t step over the line at what has now become the Smart Set’s own Alamo? Or what if Truman Capote prevails and comes out on top? What if he writes a sequel that tells even more?

Staying alive and well in society means never zigging when you should zag.

“Whoever gossips to you will gossip of you,” goes the old Spanish proverb, and this one came home to roost for the International Set’s crème de la crème with the publication in the November Esquire of Capote’s “La Côte Basque 1965” — the “tail” of the long-awaited “kite” called Answered Prayers that is the writer’s next major work of fiction.

Society’s sacred monsters at the top have been in a state of shock ever since. Never have you heard such gnashing of teeth, such cries for revenge, such shouts of betrayal and screams of outrage. Well, anyway, not since Marcel Proust flattered his way into the salons of the Faubourg St. Germain and then retired to a cork-lined room to create a masterpiece, recalling the details of the Baron de Montesquiou’s “preciosities” and rendering him into the “Baron de Charlus,” setting down the vivid details of a world of le gratin where the rich see only one another.

What did Capote write that so enraged so many? Oh, just everything he ever heard whispered, shouted, or bruited about — the same kind of stories that have been wafting among the fine French furniture crowd since Maury Paul first saw the Blue Book dining out on Thursday and coined the phrase “Cafe Society.”

“La Côte Basque 1965” is a 13,000-word story about a luncheon between “Lady Ina Coolbirth,” a 40-ish multiple divorcée on the rebound from an affair with a Rothschild, and the innocent narrator, “Jonesy,” at Henri Soule’s exclusive Manhattan restaurant. While drinking Champagne and eating a soufflé Furstenberg, “Lady Ina” gossips about the International Set, telling one “no-no” after another on one and all, including herself. Capote has peopled his story with real persons, using their real names as well as with a number of other real persons, using fake names. The most shocking of “Lady Ina’s” send-ups are the stories about Cole Porter putting the make on an Italian waiter called “Dixie,” the one about “the governor’s wife” and her sordid sexual put-down of the climbing Jewish tycoon “Sidney Dillon,” and the histoire of trashy “Ann Hopkins,” who tricked a blue blood into marriage, then murdered him after he got the goods on her and threatened divorce.

Other naughty things in the story are the opening dirty joke … the bad breath of Arturo (Lopez Wilshaw) … the duchess of Windsor never picking up a check … Maureen Stapleton’s nervous collapse … Carol Matthau’s dirty mouth … Princess Margaret’s dislike of “poufs” … Gloria Vanderbilt’s failure to recognize her first husband … Oona O’Neill fluffing off the boyish J.D. Salinger … Joe Kennedy having his way with an 18-year-old school chum of his daughter’s … “Sidney Dillon” and his womanizing and social climbing .. . “Cleo Dillon” loving only herself .. how the famous TV comic “Bobby Baxter” goes off with a hooker and his pushy wife, “Jane,” has the last laugh … the weird young movie cutie who marries the son, then the father, only to find herself divorced because of a German shepherd … Lee Radziwill coming off better looking than Jackie Kennedy, who resembles “a female impersonator” … the love affairs of “Lady Ina,” how much she needs a man, and her envy of the domestic bliss of two attractive lesbians who reside in Santa Fe, “the dyke capital of the United States.”

Capote insists that the gossipmongering central character, “Lady Ina Coolbirth,” is strictly an invention — but friends of Lady (“Slim”) Keith, Pamela Harriman, Carol Portago, and Fleur Cowles are all nevertheless incensed. “Well,” sniffs Truman, “let them all martyr and identify themselves if they like … let them hang from the cross claiming they’re hurt … those who want to say they are models, that’s up to them!”

Other characters in “LCB ’65” are so thinly disguised as to be seen through tissue paper clearly — among them “Ann Hopkins,” undoubtedly representing Mrs. William Woodward Jr., who killed herself on October 10, seven days before Esquire hit the stands, and “the governor’s wife,” said to be the late Marie Harriman.

Many other names were dropped, some in passing, some to devastating effect. John Hersey has said that “the final test of a work of art is not whether it has beauty, but whether it has power.” But try telling that to the friends of the late Cole Porter, or Maureen Stapleton, Elsie Woodward, Josh and Nedda Logan, Johnny Carson, “Babe” Paley and her powerful husband, Bill. (I remarked to Truman that I didn’t know that his now ex-friend Mr. Paley had ever been an “adviser to presidents,” as “Sidney Dillon” is described in the piece. Truman just grinned and said, “I didn’t either.”)

Everybody written about in “LCB ‘65” has been guessed and second-guessed at with little or no concession to Capote’s own thesis — that this is a fictionalized version of a world he knows very well.

For years Capote has been society’s adored and adorable resident intellect and court jester. In a world where parties are still often “given against someone” … where bitchery, snobbery, and hauteur are still prized right along with poise, manners, and money … where the merits of plastic surgeons are argued in the same way the religious used to argue theology — gossip has always been the great staple, the glue holding beleaguered life-styles and sinking social values together. But it’s one thing to tell the nastiest story in the world to all your 50 best friends; it’s another to see it set down in cold Century Expanded type.

Capote has always been the gossip’s gossip nonpareil. He has been leaving them laughing and quaffing blanc de blanc with the best of them, ever since he came of age as an enfant terrible pet of the rich after Other Voices, Other Rooms catapulted him to fame in 1948. He has sailed on their yachts, masterminded their love affairs, and been such a focal insider that his Black and White Ball for publisher Kay Graham is still remembered as one of society’s best parties.

When the gorgeous women of the world’s tycoons and power brokers sat down to spoon up soufflé with Capote, or when Truman tickled the risibilities of the powerful tycoons themselves with his outrageous tidbits and fascinating possibilities, he was always the brightest, most entertaining little imp imaginable. Oh yes, of course, he was — well, everyone knew, “queer.” But in such an amusing classy way — in the manner of the great Italian count who remonstrated with an English lord for snobbery, saying, “My dear fellow, when your ancestors were still painting themselves blue, mine were already homosexual!” You know, that sort of thing. And then, of course, didn’t that more or less make dear “Tru” all the more manageable and “safe”?

Society always thought it had something on Capote, in the same way the French le gratin had Proust’s desperate desire to belong, his suspected inversion, and his Jewishness on him. What’s more, society believed Truman to be a lightweight climber who aspired to stay in its good graces. (Snorts Truman, “Yes, they have always made that mistake about me! Why, if anybody was ever at the center of that world, it was me, so who is rejecting whom in this?” Summoning up an echo of Beau Brummell’s “In society stay for just as long as it takes to make an impression. After that — go!,” Truman continues: “I mean I can create any kind of social world I want, anywhere I want!”)

It seems simply never to have occurred to many people that the writer’s goddess might turn out to be not “Babe” Paley, but Truman’s own muse. He was, after all, so seductive, so naughty, so charming. He knew everything about everybody and — what’s more — had total recall. But now, the same people who listened so delightedly and told tales out of school find themselves hoist by their own windiness. There they are, splashed through the pages of Esquire like hollandaise that has missed the asparagus. God! And that ain’t all — there’s more to come. It is all going to be bound between hard covers into a book. A book!

Capote, meanwhile, is also a literary name. The almost universal acclaim for In Cold Blood lifted his reputation from that of a poetic mannerist into the pantheon of American belles lettres. So the Establishment world that reads and writes has also joined the hue and cry. The question whether Capote has indeed ruined his reputation by stooping to writing gossip, as opposed to whether he is only doing the same kind of work attempted by ether famous writers in the past, will be argued for a long time. There seems to be no such thing as an indifferent opinion of “LCB ’65.”

Feuds and furors flash and die in these media-mad days, but the roar over Capote’s roman á clef vignettes, observed and recorded in explicit detail, rages on. “LCB ’65” was a one-shot last November, but its reverberating ripples still lash both coasts.

(Capote yelps: “When I was in New York a few weeks ago everybody was falling all over themselves being nice to me. The machinations going on behind the back of the people who are in the book you wouldn’t believe. Most of the attackers are just pilot fish, trying to outdo one another in being vicious in their sycophancy. They all want to stay in my favor but maintain a great front of animosity.”)

Capote rushed back to California from New York to finish up another 30,000-word installment for May publication. The reaction to “LCB ‘65” inspired him to crank that up to 40,000 words, and now, he says the literary Establishment can sit around waiting for their turn. They are “on” next, and then there’ll be four more magazine assaults before Answered Prayers appears in hardcover.

Dissenters to what one social Don Quixote calls “Capote’s character assassination in the guise of art” have been pellucidly vocal: “Disgusting! It’s disgusting!” says society’s favorite extra man, real-estate investor Jerome Zipkin, shooting his immaculate French cuffs. “Truman is ruined. He will no longer be received socially anywhere. What’s more — those who receive him will no longer be received.”

Patrick O’Higgins, a writer and pal of Elsie Woodward — the mother-in-law of the late suicide, Ann Woodward — is himself one of the more exquisite tale-tellers of this same world, but he says: “Truman’s gone downhill. People think, ‘What a shame that a great talent should be reduced to writing gossip.’ Some people are really hurt because they’ve been kind to him. The Paleys were always so fond of him. But Elsie hasn’t been hurt. She didn’t even read the piece. She couldn’t care less. All she’ll say is ‘Je ne le connais pas!’ — isn’t that perfect?”

Columnist Jack O’Brian: “He knows what will sell in this market … he’s Jackie Susann with an education.”

Writer Wyatt Cooper, husband of Gloria Vanderbilt: “I hate talking when my feelings are negative. It isn’t constructive. I’m very fond of Truman. We used to have lunch, gossip, and it was fun. But lately it wasn’t. His viciousness ceased to make it fun. I even talked to him about it two years ago and he thanked me later for caring. I think this destroys all the things he has built up. He can’t really pretend to sneer at these people in the Jet Set. He worked too hard to be ‘in’ himself. Of course Gloria is offended! He made Carol Matthau come out tough and bright, but has Gloria looking vapid and dumb, in a very unfair way.”

Wyatt, who collaborated with Truman on a television project and has known him for years, continues in his “more in sorrow than in anger” vein: “I had always wanted Truman to write a truthful, non-idealized version of his painful and strange childhood as an outsider. It could have been great. But, you know, he has always had a love-hate for all these beautiful women he has been close to. His mother was an alcoholic and killed herself, and children of alcoholic mothers often end up attacking women. Truman would like to be glamorous and beautiful. He has often acted out fantasies of his own by telling his women friends how to act, who to have love affairs with, by manipulating them. Now he has his ultimate revenge, by making them ridiculous in print.”

Gloria Vanderbilt: “I have never seen it and have heard enough about it to know I don’t want to.”

Director Peter Glenville: “Ignoble, utterly ignoble!”

Esquire’s own media critic, Nora Ephron, who didn’t even like the mild version of reminiscence and revelation dished out by Brendan Gill in Here at The New Yorker: “There has always been a disparity between Capote’s fiction and the public personality, and now finally the two have come together and the public personality has won.”

William and “Babe” Paley are said to have now instructed their distinguished relatives to the effect that longtime pal Capote is persona non grata. And society’s favorite current story is of how Truman phoned Paley to ask what he thought of “LCB ’65.” Paley reportedly said, “Well, I started it and dropped off to sleep and when I woke up, they’d thrown it out.” (Zing!) When Capote protested that it was important that Paley read it, his old friend said wearily, “Truman, my wife [get that — “my wife,” not “your friend Babe”] is ill. I really haven’t time for it.” (Zowie!)

Truman found Wyatt Cooper unable to lunch with him when he was in New York over the holidays. (Cooper: “How could I — out of loyalty to Gloria. She says she’ll spit at him if she sees him.”) And Capote tells of being “cut” in Quo-Vadis by “a pitiful old society woman I often took about in Paris because I felt so sorry for her. No, don’t mention her name — it’s too sad.”

Mrs. Josh Logan was said to be so incensed she rushed across a crowded room to call Dotson Rader a “traitor” just because he also writes for Esquire. Nedda Logan informed Dotson that “that dirty little toad is never coming to my parties again.” (Some dialogue in “LCB ’65” refers to a Logan soirée: “‘How was it?’ — ‘Marvelous. If you have never been to a party before.’”)

Then there are the artful diplomats, like those two brilliants who’ve won fame straddling the fine line between practicing journalism and personal social acceptance among the Upper Crust — yes, fashion’s elegant Diana Vreeland, as well as that friend-of-the-“400” (sometimes now referred to derisively as “the 4,000”) Aileen (“Suzy”) Mehle. Told that Truman wanted to know why she had never written so much as a word in her syndicated society column about the only subject consuming “her crowd” since November, Suzy says: “Why? Why, there’s nothing for me to write. Truman’s done it all himself!”

And Mrs. Vreeland (rising high above the smoke of controversy just as a perfect hostess ignores a cigarette in the butter) dismisses the gaudy gossip, the sex scandals, the barely concealed identities, the homosexual revelations, the obscenity, the accusations of murder, and the matter of whether or not Capote has been “antisemitic,” “anti-gay,” and/or “disloyal” to friends and playmates, by putting one unerring finger on just what she considers important. “Yes — yes! The paragraph on the fresh vegetables and their size is really unique in the article. It’s a ravishing statement on the rich!”

Then there are the happy cynics like Emlyn Williams, distinguished Welsh actor-writer: “It was terrible, just awful, but it was so funny-riveting. I couldn’t help laughing.”

Then there are the defenders of Art. Rust Hills, a former fiction editor: “Fascinating stuff. Yes, of course, it’s okay he published it all. I think the artist does have a supreme right to use any material. Remember, life is short but art is long” … Painter David Gibbs: “Oh, don’t be absurd — all art is revolution! Why can’t people get that through their heads? This is brilliant stuff!” … Dotson Rader: “Marvelous, beautiful writing. It’s unimportant whether it’s true or not, since it is presented as fiction. Truman was always treated by these people as a kind of curiosity, expected to do his act. That was humiliation coming from people who had no qualifications other than being rich and social. Everybody in the world has been telling Truman their deepest confidences for years and he never said he wouldn’t use them.” … Geraldine Stutz, a woman of fastidious opinions: “It’s only a scandal to a small insular world; most people won’t know, and couldn’t care less about who might be who. What counts is that it is a wonderful piece of writing and an extraordinary re-creation of the tone and texture of those days in that world” … C. Z. Guest: “Everyone knows the man’s a professional and they told him those things anyway. He’s a dear friend of mine, but I wouldn’t discuss very private matters with him. I don’t even know who those fictional people are.”

Screenwriter Joel Schumacher, himself one of the Beautiful People: “If Truman had written a glittering vision of society, he’d have been termed an ass-kisser and his work a piece of crap by these same people. They always want some candy-ass lie written about themselves. This same world thinks it supports art and artists, but never understands that all a writer has is his experience. These people feel a good press is owed them. Why? In the fame-and-fortune game, whether it’s society, show business, big business, or politics, everybody lives on a plane of incomparable elitism, more money, more privilege than others. So why are they so shocked when somebody tells even a slightly unattractive truth about them?”

So, speaking of Beautiful People, the night before flying to Los Angeles to interview Capote I’m at Pearl’s with seven of them (or what I call semi-B.P.s, in that most of these work hard yet are still “social” enough to be written about and invited everywhere). After the lemon chicken has been served and Pearl has stopped clucking over us, the question goes: “What’s the one thing each of you would like to know from Capote?” They told me.

In this gathering, these youthful realists were amused and entertained by Capote’s daring. Most of them thought the writing was important. Only one of the seven Beauties completely disapproved of the piece. This Frito-colored hair and the women with was the most “social” — by whatever terms — person there; also the richest: a person who found “LCB ’65” “disgusting, unnecessary, mean, bitchy, Truman, like some Napoleon on spiteful, disloyal, and not even very well written.”

General laughter and the retort: “We’re sorry you can’t express yourself more definitely.” But such dissenting opinions were in the majority in the weeks to come. And always, the final clincher by Capote’s detractors was that this hideous, disloyal, tasteless thing the writer had done was bad enough in all its aspects, but its chief minuses were that it was “boring” and “wasn’t even well written.”

A society that habitually enfolds ennui and stinging cultural criticism around its shoulders like a familiar sable wrap could make such pronouncements and still not talk about anything else for two solid months.

Beverly Hills: La Côte Basque 1965 may have been a place, as Esquire noted, “where the plat du jour is seated somewhere in sight,” but La Scala, late 1975, is a place where Henri Soule probably wouldn’t have sent his enemy Harry Cohn. La Scala’s food is indifferent and its service based on benign neglect, yet it offers a carelessly cultivated charm and ambience of New York–in–California. Once inside, out of the relentless 73-degree sunshine, away from the gas-fed fire burning in the Beverly Hills Hotel lobby, away from the denim-tailored suntanned men with Frito-colored hair and the women with smart-looking Mark Cross–type bags that read “Bullshit,” a person can almost imagine being in New York.

Truman, like some Napoleon on Elba yearning for the East (I fancy), suggests we meet here. He has a day off from his acting role as the portly eccentric who lures facsimiles of the world’s most famous detectives to his mansion for sinister purposes in Neil Simon’s movie Murder by Death.

Enter reporter, tape recorder cocked, to find Truman talking with the departing screenwriter Peter Viertel. We slide into a booth and Truman, looking more and more like a diabolical version of the character actor Victor Moore, says nix to the recorder. “I’ll have more to say if you don’t use it.” I protest that I haven’t his fabled total recall. “Oh, you’ll do all right. You’ll see, you’ll get a better story this way.”

Already the interview is out of my hands into the subtle control of Capote. Only around Truman do I ever feel a real kinship with those glamorous women like C-Z, Jackie, Lee, Gloria, Carol, Slim, Babe, Kay, Fleur, Pamela, etc. He inspires a compelling intimacy. I begin to tell him everything. I spurt confidences, betray my instincts, and allow myself to be drawn out. For each question I ask, Truman asks two. “Seductive” is how one longtime friend described Capote, and she is right. I cling to the edge of the table to keep it from turning completely.

Then he orders a double Russian vodka with no ice and a tall orange juice on the side. Oh well, that makes me feel better. If he’s going to drink like that, I’ll be okay. (When the interview ends, two double vodkas, a half-bottle of red wine, and four J&Bs on the rocks later, Truman is as fit as ever and I am still in his power.)

Truman answers the questions put by Pearl’s diners. He punctuates his softly drawled, easily imitated, and widely recognized vocal mannerism with bursts of irrepressible laughter. And some amazed and genuine outrage. He begins most of his sentences with a drawn-out “W-e-e-e-l-l-l…”

WHY DID HE DO IT? WHY GO QUITE SO FAR? asked the retailer.

“Why did I do it? Why? I have lived a life of observation. I’ve been working on this book for years, collecting. Anybody who mixes with a certain kind of writer ought to realize they’re in danger. [Chuckle.] I don’t feel I betrayed anybody. This is a mere nothing, a drop in the bucket. To think what I could have done in that chapter. My whole point was to prove gossip can be literature. I’ve been seriously writing this for three and a half years. I told everybody what I was doing. I discussed it on TV. Why has it come as such a great big surprise?”

IS THERE REALLY MORE COMING, OR IS THIS ALL? THEY SAY YOU CAN’T FINISH THE BOOK, asked the fashion arbiter.

“This thing was only a chapter. My God, what will happen when ‘Unspoiled Monsters’ comes out? [Don’t you like that title?] I’ve never before heard it suggested that this wasn’t part of a whole book. Even my ‘Mojave,’ published in Esquire before this, was part of Answered Prayers, though we didn’t publicize it as such. ‘La Côte Basque 1965’ is certainly no short story. Of course it’s a book! [Exasperation.] Lord, I have a lot to say, baby! I haven’t even begun to say it, though the book is 80 percent written.”

IS IT TRUE YOU ARE DYING OF CANCER? asked the art dealer.

“Irving Mansfield likes to go around telling everybody I’m dying of cancer, but I’m well now. Oh, that reminds me of a story.”

Truman cocks his platinum head so I get a good view of his flat baby-pink ears, which seem to have come in a child’s size and never grown.

“When Jackie Susann died, the Times called me for a quote. I was reminded of a judge who once ruled against Father Divine in some property dispute. Later the judge dropped dead of a heart attack and when they asked Father Divine to comment, he said, ‘I hated to do it, but …’ “

Capote explodes with roars of laughter that rumble up out of his ample belly into a series of hah-hah-hahs. “So I just told the Times, ‘I hated to do it, but …’”

DID YOU WRITE THIS JUST TO MAKE MONEY AND TO SOCK AWAY SOMETHING FOR A LOVER, AS THEY SAY? asked the producer’s wife.

“I have never in my life done anything just for money. I’ve never had any reason to. Why would I need money? My God, I made over $3 million from In Cold Blood and I haven’t spent it. I sure haven’t made any money out of ‘La Côte Basque 1965.’ That’s absolutely cracky! You know you don’t make money from magazines.

“As for my personal life, I don’t care what anyone says or writes about me personally. I have been a public exhibit all my life. So let them go ahead and make me a monster. I was a beautiful little boy, you know, and everybody had me — men, women, dogs, and fire hydrants. I did it with everybody. I didn’t slow down until I was 19, and then I became very circumspect. But everybody knows where everybody else is sexually. There are no secrets, and that’s why I don’t understand the shocked response to ‘La Côte Basque 1965.’ What is all this business? Are these people living in some other medieval century? I’d never sue anyone for anything, but I’ve been lied about my whole life. I’m just surprised they don’t hire a hit man.”

We stop to order. Truman has steak sliced thin as prosciutto, special mayonnaise, fettuccine Alfredo, and Brie. He is emphatic that he won’t be driven out of New York or sell his U.N. Plaza apartment. (“No, no. that’s not so.”) Nor has he bought a house in Topanga Canyon. (“I guess they think that because that’s where the Manson family lived and I’m a monster, too.”) I notice a slight tremor to Truman’s tiny hands as he lifts his glass and feel a pang for his strain.

WERE YOU TAKING REVENGE FOR ALL THOSE YEARS IN SOCIETY, LIKE A PET DWARF KICKING THE ROYALS IN THE SHIN AT LAST? asked the WWD biggie.

“I didn’t mean anything vengeful, not even remotely. And I’m disappointed in these people, with all their pretensions for reading, art, theater, and culture that they’re so stupid and can’t see it as a work of art. This book is a serious work of art — if you don’t see it as that, then you don’t see it as anything. I’ve always done good things. Would I actually sit down and write about something like that as a joke, as revenge?”

I ask, “But didn’t it really occur to you that you’d be called a traitor and disloyal for publishing this specific kind of work, using people’s names?”

Truman sighs: “Well, it is true nobody likes what you write about them. Even those I was sympathetic to in In Cold Blood didn’t like themselves in print. Loyalty wasn’t the question, but on the other hand, I don’t care. I really don’t. If that’s the mentality — tant pis … I haven’t lost a single friend I’d want to keep in any event. These people saying these things weren’t friends of mine to begin with. Nedda Logan has always hated me, ever since I published that Brando piece in The New Yorker. What do the Logans have to do with anything, just because they once gave a party for Princess Margaret, who everyone knows is a terrible bore!”

IS IT TRUE ESQUIRE LAWYERS SHOWED THE “ANN HOPKINS” PART TO ANN WOODWARD FOR LEGAL CLEARANCE AND, RECOGNIZING HERSELF, SHE KILLED HERSELF? asked the designer.

“The most vicious thing about all this is that story! It’s absolutely untrue that Esquire showed her the copy. That’s ridiculous. Of course nobody showed it to her, as it would have been tantamount to admitting it was about her. I never let anybody read it in toto, and that’s why it was impossible for her to have seen or heard of it. The manuscript was kept in a bank vault. I was very careful with it; sometimes I let a few people read part of it with me sitting there. The new portion, ‘Unspoiled Monsters,’ I’ve never shown to anybody. This book wanders in all directions. It’s not just about the ‘Côte Basque’ people, and my God, of course I’m not taking out after Babe Paley in the next part. She isn’t even mentioned. How do these things get started? The book is really about ‘Kate McCloud.’ And nobody but me knows who she is, and nobody is going to know.”

I tell Truman that Elsie Woodward herself does not feel Ann committed suicide for any reason having to do with him. He says, “You see …. “

DON’T YOU CARE THAT ALL THESE PEOPLE ARE GOING TO CLOSE THEIR DOORS TO YOU? asked the play producer.

“Well, in the first place, I don’t think all these people will. I maintain the people who are really mad are the ones left out. Jean vanden Heuvel said, ‘I hope it isn’t true I’m not going to be in by name. “La Côte Basque” was delicious and I hereby propose myself for another section.’

“Look, I’m not using Proust as a model because what I’m doing is in the latter half of the 20th century as an American. But if someone like Proust were here now and an American, he’d be writing about this world. People say the language is filthy. I think that’s the way people talk and think now — exactly. I think it’s beautifully written. This thing about me never being invited again just shows such an ignorance of human nature that I can’t believe it. People don’t understand how their own minds work. No matter what happens, you have to respect somebody because he is an artist, if you have any pretensions to culture. There’s a fantastic ingratitude in America toward its artists. I mean, you do marvelous things and they just …

“Well, France is loyal to its artists, England to its artists, even Russia to its artists [chuckle], when they are dead. No other country treats its creative people like we do. Here they wait for you to fail. They love it. If people think I’m just a bitch, then I surely am 100 percent misunderstood. I consider myself a fine artist. I drove down here from working in British Columbia to start work on the movie and found the world had exploded. This place has been in the same uproar as New York.”

I say that maybe people in Hollywood are afraid they’ll be next.

Truman laughs. “Oh, they’ll get theirs!”

He turns serious: “Look, my life has been dominated by my own levels of taste in art, especially the art of narrative prose writing, wherein my particular art lies. I have never compromised that. I may have compromised other things in my life, personally, emotionally, or whatnot, but never that. This book, this whole thing, has been the ultimate of my art. You have to be true to your work. I’ve always said there’s no such thing as writing down. Writers always do the best they can.”

We go out into the sunshine. I take a good look at Truman and am infected perhaps by his own line describing Henri Soulé as “pink and glazed as a marzipan pig.” We walk toward the Beverly Wilshire while I think only in food clichés. I note Truman’s new butter-colored moccasins … his apricot-yogurt sweater … his Champagne lick of hair … the strawberry-colored heels of his tiny French carroty hands … his pale raspberry-tinted sunglasses … his soft Cardin hat with its gingerbread texture. l’m relieved to see that he is wearing an ordinary unappetizing pair of trousers that make him look as if he has been hit in the ass with a shovel.

Truman carries his current overweight bulge before him like some defrocked Santa Claus. He gives several autographs en route. He tries to buy a denim vest covered with pockets, discovers that an expensive camera comes with it, and shrugs, “They should give it to me.” At the hotel we fall into the El Padrino bar and Truman asks for a telephone. Disturbed by reports of Diana Vreeland’s displeasure, he dials her direct.

He calls her “darling,” “angel,” “precious one,” and tells her twice that he loves her. He hangs up triumphant and exclaims: “She says it’s the only important and interesting thing she has ever read about the rich!”

Burbank, Stage 15: I am watching Truman “act.” He stands on a step ladder reading Murder by Death lines in a singularly hideous dining-room set. Peter Sellers, Elsa Lanchester, and Timmy Coco play the scene with him. As far as one can see, Capote makes no effort to “act” but simply plays himself. When the heavy chandelier falls, smashing the table and almost causing serious injuries, Capote quips: “The ghosts of Gore Vidal and of Jackie Susann, no doubt.”

In his mobile dressing room, I ask about this acting bit: “Oh, I just thought it would be fun to do something different and I really liked the script. It’s going to be a good movie. I probably won’t act again. It was just for a change from working on the book, and I knew I didn’t have time to take a vacation. How am I as an actor? [Chuckles.] Let’s see, just say, ‘What Billie Holiday is to jazz … what Mae West is to tits … what Gucci is to loafers … what Schlumberger is to enamel bracelets … what Cartier is to tank watches … what Guerlain is to perfume … what Roederer is to Champagne … what Chekhov is to the short story … what Seconal is to sleeping pills … what King Kong is to penises, Truman Capote is to the great god Thespis!”

Truman is suddenly struck by an idea. “My agent Mr. Irving Lazar has given several parties of late and didn’t invite me. So maybe you’re right. Maybe I am a social outcast. Tell you what — call him up and ask about it!”

I’m reluctant, but Truman pays no attention to me. He gets Lazar’s phone number, he dials, and hands me the telephone. I give my message to the secretary, who says “Swifty” will call back. When I hang up, Truman is exasperated. “No, that’s not what I want you to say.” He re-coaches me in my lines. Before Lazar can return the call, Truman is called to the set. When the call comes through I tell Lazar that his client is now a social outcast and ask if this applies in Hollywood, since Truman has not been invited to Lazar’s parties.

Lazar says, grimly, “I wouldn’t have any comment about that.”

Floundering, I say, “You wouldn’t have any comment?”

Lazar: “No.”

I stumble, “Okay, well, I’ll tell Mr. Capote what you said.”

Lazar’s voice rises. “I didn’t tell you to tell Mr. Capote anything.”

“Yes, I know,” I reply, weakly, “and I will tell him that you say you have no comment.”

Lazar screams: “I don’t want you to tell Mr. Capote I said anything. Dammit, I knew I shouldn’t have taken this call!” (Slam.)

Truman loves it. He roars over having discomfited the agent of Richard M. Nixon. Two weeks later he calls New York to ask what people are saying now. I sense that he is anxious. He speaks bitterly of what he calls “the ‘walkers’ … my vociferous critics … what do they have to do with me … with my work?”

Soon it comes out that now the Paleys, the Whitneys, Gloria Vanderbilt, Mike and Jan Cowles, others who were indeed real friends, have drawn the line against Truman. Unlike the Baron de Montesquiou writing to Proust for reassurance that he is not the model for “Baron de Charlus,” Lady Keith does not get in touch with Capote at all. No, she has gone on a trip to the South Pacific with — the Irving Lazars.

Where does all this leave our hero? “Well, I won’t retire to my cork-lined room yet,” says Truman. “I’m just going to a Palm Springs spa to take off 20 pounds before a college lecture tour. Then I’ll drop the other shoe.”

I remind him that nobody can really judge a literary work for 50 years. “This won’t even be dated in 50 years!” says Truman with a bulldog tenacity.

Then I tell him the story of how Gertrude Stein, with all her artistic pretensions, didn’t like the portrait Picasso painted of her and made the classic hick comment: “But it doesn’t look like me!”

Picasso then said, “But it will!”

Truman applauds. He says, “You know. I’m beginning to think what’s happening now is better than the book!”

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