Big Dave snorted.
Rusty pointed at the FXR.
“Your motorcycle, Professor.”
Leo's head snapped up.
“Don't call me that.”
Rusty smiled.
“Now I understand why Dutch did.”
The work began.
Not with Leo touching tools.
With questions.
“What did you already replace?”
Rusty listed components.
Leo listened.
“What did you measure?”
They told him.
“What happened when you tried starting it?”
Tommy described the kickback.
Pete described the drain.
Big Dave explained the compression readings.
Leo walked around the motorcycle twice.
Then pointed.
“Drain the oil before opening the cam side.”
Big Dave looked amused.
“You worried about my boots?”
“Yes.”
That wiped the smirk off his face.
By midmorning the cover was off.
Leo stood on a milk crate.
He leaned forward with the battered flashlight.
Rusty remained close enough to pull him back if he reached anywhere dangerous.
The boy did not.
“Turn it slowly.”
Big Dave rotated the assembly by hand under Rusty's supervision.
“Stop.”
Everyone froze.
Leo pointed.
“There.”
Rusty leaned in.
At first he saw nothing unusual.
Then Tommy handed him another light.
A tiny mark appeared on one component.
Not what the service book showed.
Different stamp.
Older pattern.
Rusty's stomach tightened.
“You were right.”
Leo nodded.
Big Dave leaned in.
“Well, I'll be…”
Pete looked over.
“That's actually from the older setup?”
“Modified.”
Rusty stared at the engine.
The realization was humiliating.
Not because an eight-year-old had known something he did not.
Because Rusty had allowed the motorcycle's model year to become an assumption.
1986 FXR.
Evolution-era engine.
Therefore follow the expected geometry.
Except Dutch and Arthur had altered it decades earlier.
The motorcycle wore one identity outside and another inside.
“How much offset?” Rusty asked.
Leo said, “Dad always said twelve.”
“Could be memory.”
“Yes.”
Rusty smiled faintly.
“You're getting smarter by the minute.”
They did not simply trust the number.
That mattered to Rusty.
They verified.
Measured.
Compared.
Worked backward through the engine's actual mechanical relationship rather than the factory chart.
Slowly, the answer became clear.
Leo had remembered correctly.
The existing setup required an ignition reference different from the standard configuration.
And repeated attempts to start it at the factory setting had created another problem.
Tommy discovered it.
He rolled one pushrod across the steel table.
It did not roll smoothly.
It wobbled.
“Rusty.”
Nobody liked his tone.
He rolled another.
Slight wobble.
Another.
Worse.
Big Dave cursed.
Rusty looked toward Leo.
The boy had gone pale.
“Did we do that?”
Rusty considered lying.
“No.”
Leo looked relieved.
“The kickback over time probably did.”
Tommy looked toward the engine.
“Doesn't matter who did it. We can't reuse these.”