He hovered his cursor over it. The metadata was blank鈥攏o date, no size, no source. Curiosity, sharp and cold, nudged him to double-click.
The room went dark. On the monitor, the downloads folder was perfectly empty. Download Recording m4a
He reached for the power button, but his fingers passed right through the plastic as if he were made of smoke. He looked down at his hands. They were fragmenting into jagged, green pixels. On the desk, the computer speakers pulsed one last time. "Recording finished," his own voice whispered from the air. He hovered his cursor over it
He didn't turn around. He couldn't. His eyes were locked on the monitor as the waveform spiked. In the recording, he heard the sound of a chair spinning around鈥攖he very chair he was sitting in. The audio ended with a sharp, digital pop. The room went dark
In the recording, a door creaked open. He heard the heavy thud of boots on hardwood鈥攁 cadence he recognized instantly. It was the exact sound his own front door made when the hinges needed oiling.
The media player opened. Silence stretched for the first ten seconds, filled only by the faint, rhythmic hiss of background static. Then, a sound emerged. It wasn't music or a voice. It was the distinct, metallic scrape of a key turning in a lock. Elias froze. The sound was too clear, too close.
A new notification flashed in the corner of his screen: Upload 99% complete.
