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A side character inDead Spacethat’s encountered mainly through audio logs, Jacob Temple is one of many damned souls aboard the USG Ishimura. It’s a tale we never see, but it’s interesting nonetheless with how it mirrors Isaac’s journey through the corrupted vessel.
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It all culminates in a rather heartbreaking confrontation that cemented one character in particular (Dr. Mercer) as a solid villain for the story. For those that might’ve missed a few logs or anyone looking for cliff notes, here’s everything you need to know about Jacob Temple.
Who Is Jacob Temple?
For those not in the know, Jacob Temple was a crewman on the USG Ishimura. Like Isaac, heheld the position of Engineerand, also like Isaac, he tried his absolute best to keep the Ishimura going and make sure his friends were safe. Though, unlike our protagonist, he wouldn’t be as successful in any of those tasks.
Jacob would meet agrisly end at the hands of Dr. Mercerafter the good doctor betrayed him. Though he would try to defend himself, Jacob would be locked in place with a stasis blast and summarily executed by Mercer. An event Isaac, unfortunately, got to witness.
Warning: Spoilers For The Plot Of Dead Space Below
The USG Ishimura Incident
Jacobs’s story is found in various audio logs scattered throughout theUSG Ishimuraand he’s mentioned briefly in a few others. If you pay attention, you’re able to figure out a rough timeline of the events on the ship as well asJacobs’s attempts to salvage what little he couldwith the people he knew best.
His overall goal was torescue his girlfriend Dr. Elizabeth Cross, who was stuck in Hydroponics, and then launch a distress beacon, even building one if need be. Here’s a brief rundown of what happened to Jacob pieced together with logs found on the ship and from other encounters.
Temple Log One
The first log, found in Chapter Three, states that it has beentwo days since the planet cracking mission startedand the Necromorph outbreak started to kick in. Jacobs describes how he’s now the acting Chief Engineer. The man in charge of a team that was slowly dwindling as stragglers were dragged screaming into the darkness to become new converts for the horde, orfound rendered into bloody chunks.
Morale is at an all-time low and hope is dwindling fast. Fuel is also leaking and thePrimary Engine is starting to give out. Leaving with someone named Danvers, Jacob set off for the ship’s Fuel Depot with hopes of correcting the fault. He was an Engineer after all.
Temple Log Two
The second log, along with the third and fourth are also found in the third chapter. In this part, things seem to have been going a little rough for Jacob. Screaming and delusional muttering is heard throughout as it seems others in Temples' party have not been faring well with exposure to the Marker.
A third member namedHenderson begins pulling his own teeth out. Danvers only stands there and yells in surprise whilst Temple simply berates the man. Neither helps as Henderson hits himself against a doorhard enough to knock himself out.
Temple Log Three
The third log begins with Danvers ranting. Muttering over and over that they (he and Temple) should never have let him (Henderson) live. It’s clearDanvers is now showing the same signs of psychosis, but Temple is still soldering on. Reporting in the log that the Primary Engines fuel lines weren’t leaking, they had been purposefully shut off. Their valves were damaged in such a way that made opening the lines back up difficult.
However, Jacob seemed confident in his ability to repair the valves and he seemed to have hope of getting the fuel supply up and running. Something they would need to do quickly because, with the main engine offline,the ship’s orbit would start to decay. Sending the Ishimura careening into either the colony or somewhere else on the planet. Either way, it would destroy the ship.He estimates they have about ten hoursand the two fervently begin the repairs.
Temple Log Four
By the fourth log, things have gotten worse. Now the ship’s centrifuge is offline, and without its ability to counteract the millions of tons of planetary debris hanging off the ship’s gravity tether,the Ishimura will start to plummet into Aegis VIImuch faster. By this point, it’s clear these are no unfortunate accidents or old degraded parts,it’s sabotage.
Temple is furious. He can’t stand it, he knows someone planned it, and he’s going to set things straight like Watergate.It turns out that it’s another crewmember, Dr. Kyne, that’s behind it all. He’s been running around the Ishimura, breaking everything in an attempt to annihilate the ship, Necromorphs and everyone else still left alive onboard.
It’s Slower In Stasis
After repairing what he could and eventually meeting up with other survivors on the mining decks, Jacob would attempt tosalvage an SOS beaconas a last-ditch attempt to call for help. But unfortunately, this is where Dr. Challus Mercer would enter the scene. After tricking Temple into meeting him at the flight deck so he could join the other survivors, Mercer tries to get Jacob to help him put the Marker back on the colony but he’s rebuked.
In the original game, Jacob is killed by being stabbed in the head, allowing him to be converted into a Necromorph and thenused for Mercer’sexperiments. In the remake, things are a bit more gruesome. Mercer catches Jacob in a Stasis Field and whilst chewing the scenery with his villain role,points his gun at the back of Jacobs’s head and pulls the trigger.
This sends a large iron bolt painfully slowly through his head as his body gently drifts to the floor. With Kyne commenting as Temple collapses, “It’s much slower in Stasis.” A gruesome and unnecessarily slow end for a man who was just trying his best to survive.
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Jacob Temple And Elizabeth Cross
An interesting thing about Jacob Temple is that he continues to impact the story, albeit not strictly in person. In a part of the story we’re not privy to at first, it turns outDr. Elizabeth Cross has been seeing Jacob aliveand well this entire time. For you see, whilst Isaac had been hallucinating Nicole, Cross had seen Jacob and thought she was following his lead throughout the events of the Ishimura.
In reality, every time Cross saw Jacob she was in fact interacting with Isaac, and the same goes for Isaacs’s interactions withNicole Brennan.Both were being influenced by the Markerto restore it to its pedestal where it would be able to activate its true power. Why it’s significant is that after Cross realizes Jacob was a hallucination, she becomes despondent and gives up, seeing no point to continue since the one she cared about the most is no longer here. With her mind already addled bythe Marker,Cross’s last thoughts were of Jacobas Daniels shoots her in the head out of mercy.
