Eleanor had two sses of red wine that evening. She had wanted to chat with her daughter, but since she wasn''t withn, Eleanor just ran a hand through her hair. "I''m tired, but it''s been very fulfilling. I''ve met a lot of brilliant schrs."


    A sense of irrepressible excitement and joy colored her voice, and she seemed to radiate a dazzling light.


    "Get some rest. Don''t stay up toote," Ian instructed in a low voice.


    "Thanks." Eleanor lowered her gaze, avoiding the deeper emotion in his eyes.


    Silence stretched between them through the screen. Eleanor was standing on the balcony, and a gentle evening breeze brushed against her cheek. In the soft light, her face was tinged with a rosy blush, giving her an unintentionally alluring air.


    On the other end of the call, the man''s gaze grew more intense. After a moment, he said, "Get some rest. I''m hanging up now."


    "Okay." Eleanor ended the call and leaned against the railing, gazing at the distant city lights, her mind momentarily at peace.


    She went back to the desk, opened herptop, and logged back into Dr. Smith''s internal database. There was a Q&A session on blood diseases the next day, and Eleanor was missing a few data sets. She found a public data report and took some notes.


    As she navigated back to the main tform, she scrolled down, searching for another data source.


    Suddenly, her eyesnded on the locked document at the bottom of the page. She stared at it for a few seconds, rubbing her forehead. Ifn was the one who set this password, what kind of key would he have used?


    Eleanor was a bit tipsy from the wine, and her thoughts were drifting. Normally, she was calm and rational, but tonight, her mind was unusually agile.


    She recalled the image of the young man and woman who had bumped into each other, a scene that mirrored her own memory of the day she first metn.


    All at once, an idea struck her slightly inebriated mind like a sh of lightning.


    Eleanor sat up straight, her heart picking up speed at the thought. She reached out and typed a series of numbers on the keyboard.


    Even after so many years, that date was still firmly etched in her memory.


    After entering the numbers, Eleanor firmly pressed the Enter key.


    The screen seemed to freeze for a second. Then, the dialogue box that had repeatedly asked for a


    password vanished. And right before her eyes the tightl sealed


    mysterious document f?ldero


    opened.


    It was unlocked.


    In that instant, Eleanor''s heart stopped.


    The folder didn''t contain a single file but several clearly structured subfolders. The very first one was a video file, named with a date.


    Her heart began to pound uncontrobly. Her fingertips trembled with nervousness as she hovered the cursor over the first video for a few seconds, then double- clicked.


    A yer window popped up. The image was slightly shaky at first, then the background of aboratory came into view.


    Soon, a familiar figure appeared in the frame—it was her father.


    vel


    Eleanor''s eyes instantly welled with tears. It was indeed a daily video from her father''sb. He looked younger back then. He was operating aplex piece of equipment, asionally looking down to record data and scratching his head a habit of his when he was working.


    This video was from two years before his death, the first year after she was married.


    Eleanor''s vision blurred with tears. It had been so long since she had seen her father looking so vibrant and full of life.


    The videosted about twenty minutes, documenting aplete experiment. At the end, Elliot Sutton walked up to the camera, smiled, and said, "That''s all for today This set of data is very useful