Leo stared at it on his screen. Outside his flat, the real world was rain-smeared and indifferent. Inside, it was 2012. Or rather, a perfect, stolen slice of 2012.
The screen filled not with the washed-out, ad-riddled broadcast he remembered, but with a clarity that felt almost voyeuristic. The 720p resolution caught the fine lines around Alan Fletcher’s eyes that standard definition had smoothed into obscurity. The AAC 2.0 audio didn't rumble with cinema hype, but it separated the sounds: the hiss of a coffee machine at Harold’s, the specific clack of high heels on the Ramsay Street pavement, the subtle tremble in a voice just before a secret was spilled.
He hit play.