CHAPTER 17

Time had passed and things had been surprisingly calm, but only questionable for those who still managed to be involved. Lately, Jacob had been taking advantage of Derby's strange fanbase by putting her in bizarre scenarios in recent productions and promotional material. Like anyone would, Derby hated this, but she had a known talent for smiling and bearing through things, as forementioned like when speaking with somebody she's well aware has done the most egregious things among anybody she's ever known.

On that note, as if it weren't clear enough already, Sammy himself, despite his fanatical ambition to continue being a prodigy in Jacob's eyes, had been developing questions in his mind about the practicality of it all. As much as he loved it so, how much DID he love it? It made him feel ill on so many occasions, if he were to escape, could he do it in one piece? Would he vanish? Would his soul even remain, or had Jacob already sucked it out of him? In a moment, that's what Sammy was soon to discover.

Walking past Jacob's office, Sammy suddenly heard a voice say "Psst!" from behind the door. Just for good measure, Sammy knocked once he approached the door. It opened, and Jacob invited him in.

"What's up Jacob?" Sammy sat down, not knowing what to expect – Never knowing what to expect, for that matter. Jacob to him, such as everybody, was unfathomable at times, most people only catching up with his work to see what he was gonna do next to potentially "restore" his reputation as a company.

Jacob leaned back in his chair, hands clasped together, "You see Sammy, as much as I appreciate your talent, personality, and – well, you, I've come to make a very important decision in terms of the final cut of our future works."

"Huh? And what's that?" Sammy was intrigued.

"Basically, I'm going to be dubbing over your voice lines in order to give a fresh new feel to our company at hand. This means that not only will I be making visual changes, but audible as well! After all, as the main character, people need something they can relate to!"

"Uh, is there something wrong with my voice?"

"Oh, no Sammy! It's just very unique, so unique, that it still reminds me of those days way back when, when everything was dandy, and I was only notorious for a, fun few things." Jacob couldn't focus looking at Sammy, he began to glance around the room. He sighed, "Those were the days."

Sammy started to feel guilty. He didn't know what to do. He sat in silence for a moment, before he came up with something to say that had a chance of saving himself. "Maybe if uh, it's too hard for you, you could maybe, I dunno, lay me off?"

Jacob stood up, "LAY YOU OFF?!"

Sammy was startled, "I mean, heh, it's not that I don't WANT to work here! Heck no! What I'm saying is, I wouldn't mind getting laid off if it made you feel any better! I love you Jacob! I'd do anything to make you happy, remember?"

"Oh that won't be necessary, Sammy." Jacob shook his head whilst giving Sammy a Kubrick-esque glare through the windows into his soul. "I need you. No matter what it takes. I'm doing everything I can to prevent getting rid of you. I don't care if you represent everything people hate about me. I need you to know that every moment you love being yourself, that's me, loving you, and loving being you."

Jacob got up from his seat and hugged Sammy, caressing him on the back slowly and gently. He whispered to him, "The only thing you have to do to keep me happy is to keep being yourself."

To Sammy, he felt a little bit less at ease than the last time Jacob did this. Something was wrong. "I gotta go Jacob," He proceeded to get up, "I don't have time for this right now, I gotta, uh, meet somebody somewhere."

"Oh." Jacob looked at him reluctantly, "Alright then. Take care dear!"

Sammy quickly made his way to the bathroom. All he'd done was sit there and stared at the tiled floor. He noticed some of them were chipped, some had dirt in between them. He analyzed these details as he contemplated how he felt just then. He thought to himself, 'I love him...I need him...I love him." The repeating thoughts were too much in collision with how he felt emotionally. He broke down and started sobbing, as silently as he could amongst the sniffles and wheezes. Did all those people deserve to die because one person tried to kill him? He thought'...Yes, otherwise they would have killed me eventually. I am the statue holding up the temple. The giant chocolate bunny these poor people worship. I am a token...I had to." His eyes were bloodshot, he felt them ache and twitch.

He got up and looked in the mirror. His eyes were pink and wet. His sweater was a faded, sorry brown tinted color. His face was worn and tired. He could only frown at this shell that stared back at him.

Suddenly, he noticed something peculiar about himself, something he thought he'd notice a lot sooner: Instead of four head appendages, he had two, and in place of where the others used to be looked like surgical stitching.

"That...son of a bitch!" He mouthed to himself looking back in the mirror. He figured this was another change he made that went unsaid. Jacob was only progressively shaping Sammy in his image, whether it was to his knowledge or not. Considering this dynamic, it was very clear how Jacob wanted Sammy, and others within and outside the company, to view him: Like a god.

Meanwhile, a face Jacob particularly hadn't seen in a while had shown up in his office.

"Why hello Mr., uh...Nerv's father, how might I assist you this afternoon?" Jacob sported a fishy grin.

"I want to say two things. First off, my son seems very different nowadays, but that's not why I'm here."

Jacob sighed in relief.

Nerv's dad continued, "I'm here because I would like to write a script for my son's show 'Evaporate' in which I have been apart of. I have a very comprehensive history in writing. Here is my resume." he placed a stack of paper seemingly out of nowhere onto Jacob's desk.

Jacob flipped through it quickly. "...Wow!" He stuffed it all into a drawer. "Sensational, sir. It's such a smashing opportunity to have you on board with us, but I'll let you write under the condition it's only a short."

"Ok. Thanks." Nerv's dad left the room and got to work.

Little did Jacob know however, Nerv's dad knew there was something terribly wrong with Nerv now, and that was not the son he once was. In order to deal with this as civilly as possible, now as a writer, he decided to write the episode "New shirt" as an excuse to beat up this shell that was no longer his son, as he certainly couldn't beat up the person he figured had done it. He went the smarter route and used his talents to his advantage.

In order to spread its reach, Jacob only wanted the episode to be short so he could milk the YouTube Shorts feature and reach more people unknowing of his past and only see him for his "talents". You can tell he was doing this with the sudden captions plastered over top the film, something you never see in a regular length Evaporate episode. Dweeb.