“Gah!?”
I hastily opened my eyes, looking around in confusion. My vision was blurry, but I could tell I was inside a building. The familiar scent of oil, metal, and rubber filled the air, triggering a wave of nostalgia.
Blinking a few more times, I managed to steady myself and take in my surroundings. I froze, wide-eyed.
“Isn’t this… Dad’s garage?”
The racks of tools, the neatly arranged boxes full of screws in all shapes and sizes—it was unmistakable.
And there it was, taking up most of the space in the garage: the totaled BMW M3. The very car my dad had bought for me for pennies while he was drunk.
Yeah… if you want something from your parents, always ask them when they’re drunk.
I remember that day vividly. Dad had been drinking with my uncle in the countryside when we came across this beautiful wreck—a brand-new but thoroughly totaled BMW M3 destined for the junkyard. At the time, I was head over heels for anything mechanical, and I begged him to buy it. Drunk as he was, he caved, and I got my first car for next to nothing.
The thing is, I’d already fixed that car. It should’ve been fully restored, tuned up, and parked in the garage of my LA mansion by now.
So why the hell was it here?
And… why are my hands so small?
“Oh shit… my voice… why do I sound like a kid!?”
Panic hit me like a freight train. I rushed over to the car’s door, using the side mirror to take a good look at myself.
“Oh god! I’m back to my boy-self? Wait! This doesn’t make any sense!”
My brain scrambled for an explanation, piecing together the last thing I could remember.
The last thing I’d been working on was a sustainable energy source for my house. I’d gotten tired of paying exorbitant electric bills and decided to build a reactor using some experimental data.
“Right… that white burst of energy… I should’ve done that in a proper research lab instead of my garage,” I muttered, trying to recall the events more clearly.
I’d miscalculated the energy output. Apparently, my house couldn’t handle it, and… well, it went boom.
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“But this still doesn’t make sense! That energy should’ve vaporized me. There was no quantum physics involved—unless the sheer amount of energy somehow messed with it…”
My thoughts trailed off as I remembered something else—a figure dressed in white. Who—or what—was that?
Still, if I was really back in my younger body… the possibilities were endless.
I nearly started salivating at the thought of all the things I could do—so many opportunities to invent, to profit, to tinker…
“Marcus! You up? What did I tell you about sleeping in the garage!?”
‘Oh crap. And here comes the downside of being a kid again.’
“Sorry, Mom! I got carried away!” I shouted back, already preparing my secret weapon: the puppy-eyes technique.
Mom walked into the garage, her arms crossed and her gaze scrutinizing me like I was under a microscope.
“I know you’re gifted when it comes to machines, son, but you can’t spend the entire night in the garage! What if you catch a cold?”
“Sorry…” I mumbled, giving her my best apologetic look.
“Go take a shower. You reek of oil!” she ordered, motioning toward the house.
Sheesh… as if she’d never seen a guy working his craft.
But then it hit me.
All my stuff—everything I’d built, all the companies I’d worked with, the patents, the projects—they were gone.
“Marcus, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?” Mom asked, her tone suddenly concerned.
‘Deep breath. It’s only Tesla, Microsoft, Lexus, and all the Italian supercar companies… nothing major! I can always buy them back!’
“Nothing… I think some dust got in my eyes,” I lied, quickly rushing into the house.
Upstairs, I took an icy cold shower, letting the freezing water snap me back to reality. I couldn’t afford to cry like a baby every time I thought about what I’d lost.
----------------------------------------
And so, my trip to the past—or whatever this was—began.
My name is Marcus Goldman, a guy who spent most of his life tinkering in a garage and getting rich off it.
It all started when Dad first took me to his garage. I fell in love with the place instantly, and from that moment on, I practically lived there, building and tinkering until I eventually surpassed his skills.
Working from home turned out to be incredibly lucrative. From wood to metal, and then to high-tech engineering, I climbed the ladder until… well, let’s just say building a self-sustaining reactor in your basement garage is a pretty high level.
Explosions aside.
But now? Things felt… different. I mean, sure, I’d been called a once-in-a-lifetime genius, but even I found it strange how easily everything came to me now. It was like second nature.
After the shower, I went back to the garage and stared at my first car—the BMW M3.
I couldn’t resist. I grabbed my tools and got to work, fixing it up with whatever I could find in the garage.
But as I worked, I started noticing things. I didn’t just remember this car—I knew it inside and out. I even found ways to improve its design beyond anything I’d done before.
That’s when it hit me.
This wasn’t my past. At least, not entirely.
The dates didn’t match. I remember getting this car in 2004, but here I was in 2003.
And some of the companies I’d worked with or invested in didn’t even exist.
An alternate reality, maybe? Like one of those light novels I used to read in my free time?
Regardless, it didn’t change much. After double-checking the tech level of this world…
Well, let’s just say I cried again.
But I wasn’t going to waste this chance. My first priority was to tackle the basics: smartphones, touchscreens, fiber optics, and everything else on my ever-growing list of revolutionary ideas.
This was going to be fun.