Inside the case was the disc and a small, yellowed card. On it, handwritten in her grandmother’s neat cursive, was an activation code: .

Over the next three hours, Mira watched her life unfold from a perspective she’d never had—not as a participant, but as a witness. She saw the moments she’d forgotten: the afternoon rain on a summer camp tent, the smell of her grandmother’s sourdough, the exact shade of blue of her childhood bedroom walls.

A video player opened. Grainy, handheld footage. Her grandmother, younger, standing in a garden Mira didn’t recognize. Elara was holding a video camera, pointing it at herself.

She smiled. For the first time in years, she smiled like her six-year-old self blowing out candles.