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Elias didn't look behind him. He just watched the video end, the screen fading to a single line of text: “Archive Complete.”

The video froze. On the screen, the suburban street was gone. In its place was Elias’s own apartment building, seen from the exact streetlamp in the video. And there, sitting on his windowsill in the reflection of the glass, was a small, hand-painted wooden bird. 1_5096009036352979558mp4

The notification arrived at 3:14 AM. It was just a file name: . Elias didn't look behind him

He clicked "Download." The progress bar crawled. Outside his window, the city was a blur of neon and rain, but inside, the only sound was the hum of his cooling fans. was a small