His expression surprised me. I turned my head to look behind me, but there was no one there.

I couldn't help but think of a ghost story I'd recently read.

Surely, he wasn't possessed by some malevolent spirit?

My confused expression seemed to be making him more afraid.

Could it be that his overindulgences had twisted his mind and now he had his eyes set on me?

Why else would he stand there staring silently for so long?

Maybe I should run now, I thought, just in case.

Just as we were staring at each other, a snow-white cat appeared, as if from nowhere.

It walked towards us, gracefully.

Upon seeing the cat, Brook knelt down.

I wasn't sure what was going on.

For some reason, I knelt down too.

Brook picked up the cat and started crying.

I didn't know what to say.

I figured he hadn't spoken because his voice was so hoarse from crying.

But when he finally did speak, it made me want to tear up our agreement.

After all this trouble, thinking he was going to throw himself off the roof, he was just upset because his cat had gotten out and he couldn't find it.

He asked me, his voice faint and raspy, "What are you doing here?"

I scratched my head. "I live in this building. We must be neighbors."

Seeing that he was in no danger of doing anything stupid, I decided to leave. It would have been awkward to stay when he was like this.

So, I said my goodbyes and left.

...

My mom's decorators had worked their magic quickly. In a little over a week, they'd managed to soundproof the entire house.

I worked in the gaming department of the animation studio. My main role was writing the dialog and plot for one of our more popular characters.

Now that Brook Sierra was on board, we sent out our first wave of promos for this character.

But the feedback wasn't as positive as we'd hoped.

The biggest story that everyone was talking about was claims that the character represented by my scripts was plagiarized.

I sat in my house, feeling a little dizzy from the redecorating fumes.

I didn't understand how anyone could accuse me of plagiarism.

There was a knock at the door.

I opened it to find Brook standing there, holding his cat.

I figured he'd seen the news already, too.

I invited him in.

As expected, the first words out of his mouth were: "Have you seen the rumors about your scripts?"

"I have. I promise you there's no truth to them. I didn't plagiarize anything."

"I believe you. Have you tried calling the studio to find out what's happening?"

I had tried, but no one was picking up the phones.

It was bad enough that they hadn't called me first, but the fact they weren't even answering my calls ...

I waved my hands, helplessly.

In this industry, being suspected of plagiarism was hardly rare.

But considering how much these rumors were blowing up, the fact that the company hadn't done anything about it yet was unusual.

Brook's cat was looking around my living room, lackadaisically.

Suddenly, it stretched out its legs and struggled free.

Free to roam as it pleased, the cat wandered the floorboards, gracefully.

Brook was still looking at me, a serious look on his face.

I discovered that here, in my own sanctuary, I was the most nervous one present.

"What do you plan to do?"

I wasn't sure how to respond. There was no way for me to prove my innocence. After all, by this stage, nothing anyone could produce was entirely new anyway.

I could be sure that I hadn't copied anyone else's work, but if there happened to be coincidental similarities ...

Well, there wasn't much that I could do about it.

I shook my head, helplessly.

Brook's voice was hoarse. "You're new to this industry, am I right?"

"You are. I've only recently started."

He went on, seemingly not holding out much hope.

"Do you have a record of your edits?"

"Of course."

I fetched my laptop and handed it to him. He opened my scripts and started checking through my editing history.

"Did you send this to anyone else?"

"I sent some of this to a company I interviewed for before."

"They probably used it without your permission. I'll get in touch with PR for you."

I was suddenly filled with admiration for him.

I was so relieved that I didn't even mind that his cat had knocked all of the fragile collectibles from my desk onto the floor.

I looked from the broken pieces lying on the floor to the cat, feigning innocence, among the carnage, and finally to the mortified expression on its owner's face.

My heart went out to my shattered collectibles, but if losing them was the price I had to pay for restoring my reputation, then it was more than worth it.

I located the résumé I'd sent when applying to the other company and checked the materials I'd attached.

Sure enough, the offending character designs were in there.

At the time, the company had said my proposed outlines weren't good enough, yet they'd clearly gone on to use them without changing a thing.

...

Not only did Brook insist on compensating me for the broken collectibles, but he also contacted my manager and provided him with irrefutable proof that I hadn't plagiarized a thing.

Perhaps spurred into action by fear of being accused of having done nothing, my studio's PR department finally refuted the rumors and filed suit against the other company for using my work without permission.

Trevor seemed less than happy to see me exonerated, announcing in our office group chat, "We're about to launch an open beta for our new character. Anyone who used their connections to get here and isn't up to the task, you may as well leave now."

Remarkably, this comment seemed to be directed at me.

When the character that everyone had been working on for so long ran into difficulties, he did nothing to resolve the situation.

Instead, I found a resolution and now he's ignoring reality and living in his own little fantasy world.

Who decided to make this useless prick a manager?

I could only inwardly grumble. After all, I was still at the center of this whole controversy.

But it was a little rich that he'd assigned his lackey—the only one who had actually used his connections to get this job—to work with me.

When I arrived at the recording booth with Brook, a shy-looking man wearing lensless glasses was waiting for us. This was Eugene, Trevor's little pet.

He immediately fetched a glass of water for Brook and offered to take his coat.

For a shameless suck-up, he seemed really quite attentive.

Brook was suffering from a cold and his performance wasn't meeting our needs.

I asked him if he'd like to end the session early and come back when he was feeling a little better.

But Eugene interjected and insisted that Brook keep re-recording each line.

There was plenty of time left in the schedule; we were in no rush, but for some reason, he kept pushing to get it done.

It was as though he was actively trying to prevent Brook from leaving the recording booth.

It was clear to me that something fishy was going on, so I said I had to go to the toilet and slipped out to investigate.

When I looked out of the studio window, I noticed far more cars were parked outside than usual.

There was a crowd of people milling around the doors.

I returned to the recording booth and gestured for Brook to check his phone.

He looked down at the screen and then sat there in silence. I was surprised that he remained seated.

Trevor was obviously planning to reveal Brook Sierra's true appearance as a means to whip up interest in our game.

If Brook didn't sneak out soon, then the media would soon have this place surrounded.

Even though our studio would be the ones to benefit most from all of the attention, springing something like this on anyone showed a real dearth of moral character.

"All those journalists outside, are they your doing?" I barked at Eugene.

Eugene stopped what he was doing and leaned in close to my ear to whisper, "Brook Sierra is a celebrity. Surely, I don't need to tell you how much attention we'll get from this."

"Did you ask his permission?"

"This is a studio matter."

I poured out a glass of water, saying to Eugene, "Understood. I'll just get him some water."

Businesses only care about their profits, but I'm just a lowly cog in the machine, why should I care if some fat cat loses their bonus?"

I gestured for Brook to step out of the recording booth and handed him the glass of water.

At the same time, I told him, quietly, "If you want to get out of here, I can help you get out unseen."

He took the water and gave me a thoughtful look.

"What about you? Your boss won't be happy about this.

"Your corporate overlords aren't likely to forgive you for ruining their PR scoop."

While I knew that the studio could outwardly do little more than deny me a performance bonus or two, I could certainly wave goodbye to that promotion.

Once I'd burned my bridges there was little room for development; I'd probably have to leave. But Brook had helped me in my hour of need, I wasn't going to sell him out now.

I just so happened to have a copy of the building plan on my phone, so I sent it to him.

He told Eugene he was going to the toilet and slipped out of a side entrance where a taxi I called was waiting to pick him up.

Once he was safely on his way, he sent me a text.

By now, Eugene was pacing up and down by the door, impatiently. He even went so far as to go outside to check the toilets. At that point, I called him back.