"I know this hand," he whispered. "I'd know it anywhere." He looked up, and his eyes were wet. "Forty years ago, there was a builder in this city. No shop would put his name on the door, but every shop sent him their impossible cars—the best I ever saw."
Walter's voice thinned with memory. "I once watched him save a race engine three factories had condemned. He listened to it for an hour, machined a part by hand overnight, and it won that season. They gave the trophy to another man. He just smiled and went back to work." The old engineer shook his head slowly. "I lost track of him decades ago." He closed the notebook gently. "His name was Samuel Carter."
The garage was silent. Theo felt his throat tighten. "That was my father," he said.
Walter turned to face the room, and his quiet voice carried like iron. "Then listen to me carefully. This car—this exact car—Samuel Carter rebuilt it with his own hands. I would stake my entire reputation on it. And if his son says you are resetting it wrong, you would be a fool not to let him prove it."
A murmur rolled through the crowd. The household staff edged closer. Somewhere near the back, three more phones rose into the air, recording.
Boyd's face had gone red. "This is absurd. We are a factory-certified team. We do not hand a $20 million machine to a janitor's kid because some old man recognizes a doodle."
"That doodle," Walter said, "is more accurate than anything your laptops have produced in three days."
A few of the staff could not hide their smiles, and even one of Boyd's own technicians looked at the floor. The mood in the garage had shifted, and Boyd could feel it slipping away from him. The crowd was no longer laughing at the boy; they were starting to wonder.
Harrison Wells had been silent through all of it. Now, every eye turned to him. He was a man who trusted credentials, suits, certificates. Everything in his world told him to side with Boyd. But his car was dead, his gala was tomorrow night, and a builder's son was offering him the only hope he had heard in 72 hours. He thought of the cameras that would be pointed at an empty stage. He thought, strangely, of a name no record book had kept.
He looked at Theo for a long time. "How long do you need?" Wells asked.
The room held its breath.