As always, Oskar had promised only ten minutes in the closet.
As always, that promise proved meaningless.
Only when Bertha was utterly spent—legs locked around him, arms clinging as if he were the only solid thing left in the world, her mind drifting far from anything resembling reality—and only when Oskar, with one final, hard forward hip motion, finished what he had so enthusiastically begun, did fate finally intervene.
The closet door did not survive.
With a loud crack and a burst of splintered wood, it gave way beneath Oskar's weight, sending the two of them tumbling out in a chaotic heap of limbs, undergarments, dresses, and discarded women's clothes.
Oskar groaned as they hit the floor.
Bertha made a pleased, almost animal sound, laughed faintly, and promptly fell asleep sprawled on top of him, utterly unconcerned with the wreckage around them.
Only then did their meeting truly come to an end.
Once he had disentangled himself, Oskar dressed Bertha properly, lifting her with surprising care and settling her on the sofa beside little Alfried. He crouched in front of the boy, tapped his shoulder, and said quietly:
"Watch over your mother, my man. And make sure she brings those documents for me to sign later."
Alfried had blinked once, solemn and drowsy, before drifting back into his baby dreams.
Oskar straightened, summoned a few trusted maids to deal with the shattered closet and general chaos of the room, and then left the luxurious office without a backward glance.
By the time Oskar was back on the train to Berlin, he looked like a perfectly respectable Acting Crown Prince: uniform neat, expression calm, documents in order. No one seeing him in the carriage corridor would have guessed he'd spent part of the afternoon being blackmailed into national salvation with baby making sex.
Life went on, literally it seemed.
He didn't stay long in Berlin or Potsdam.
A few days later, a call came from Stuttgart.
"Your Highness," said Paul Daimler on the line, voice bright with barely contained excitement, "we need you here. In person."
So Oskar went.
Stuttgart greeted him first with distant coal smoke, then with crowd's of screaming people and factory whistles, and the gleam of new brick—Muscle Motors had changed the city in less than two years. Where Daimler had once been a respectable, ambitious firm, now there was an industrial beast: three shifts, conveyor lines, and a steady stream of motorcycles rolling out like metal cavalry.
"Your Highness, welcome to Stuttgart," Paul Daimler beamed, striding up to meet him at the gate. The man looked a little thinner, a little paler, and a lot richer.
Although the old Daimler company now technically lived as a subsidiary under the Muscle Motors banner—and their share had been squeezed down to a modest five percent—the absolute numbers were absurd. Five percent of a mountain was still a mountain.
"Paul," Oskar said, shaking his hand. "You look like a man who hasn't slept in weeks. I assume that's good news."
"Very," Daimler said. "You have no idea how popular our machines are right now. The factory is at three eight-hour shifts and the lines still can't keep up. We've already broken ground on a second plant—if all goes well, it'll be operational in three months. That might finally let us breathe."
Might.
Muscle Motors' logo—the double "M" under a small crown, all framed inside a shield—had begun as branding.
Now it was a badge.
In Germany, young men and women emptied savings to own that badge. In France, officers bought the bikes "for reconnaissance" and somehow ended up racing each other. In Britain, suffragettes discovered that a fast, reliable motorcycle made an excellent getaway vehicle when the police got too close to their demonstrations.
Oskar had laughed out loud when he read that report.
He'd meant the "lady scooters" as a small rebellion against outdated norms. Britain's women had decided to take him literally, or at least the woman's rights movements called the suffragettes had.
In a few places, the scandalized press complained about the advertisements—especially the one with visibly pregnant Tanya in a summer dress riding, smiling calmly, hair tied back, one hand on the handlebar, one on her belly. "Indecent." "Irresponsible." "Unwomanly."
Women didn't see "indecent."
They saw "freedom."
"You understand," Daimler said as they walked, "that even your donation of fifty million Marks' worth of motorcycles to the army barely dents our profits. Two models alone could feed this company for years."
Oskar nodded. That had always been the plan.
The bikes weren't just fast and beautiful—they were practical. Quieter, thanks to Oskar's insistence on effective mufflers. Easier to maintain. And once people started bolting on improvised panniers and cases, they stopped being toys and became transport.
Streets changed when enough people rode something that didn't shit in them.
"Britain, France, Russia," Daimler went on. "Even in America, we're hearing of demand. And in Russia there's apparently some… Georgian fellow using our motorcycles for bank robberies."
Oskar had seen that report too: a young revolutionary, stocky and grim, racing away on a stolen Muscle Motors bike after an "expropriation."
He'd stared at the name for a long moment.
Stalin.
The universe had a sense of humor.
Oskar didn't bother with the administrative offices. He went straight to the research hall.
"How's the new development coming?" he asked as they crossed the factory floor, workers glancing up, then immediately back to their stations—discipline and pride welded together.
"As you requested, we've started on the second-generation motorcycle," Daimler said. "Maybach is leading the team. Progress has been very good—we expect a finished design sometime next year."
He sounded as if he still thought it a little premature. After all, there wasn't a real competitor in sight.
But no one told Oskar "no" when he asked for a new generation.
Research was expensive—but their current profit streams had turned expense into rounding error.
"And the army donation line?" Oskar asked. "The military bikes?"
"We've increased production there as well," Daimler said. "It's squeezing capacity, but we'll manage. The generals are very pleased, I'm told."
Good.
The army's affection was worth more than any newspaper article.
Wilhelm Maybach met them at the entrance to the test bay, eyes bright behind his spectacles.
"Your Highness," Maybach said, practically vibrating, "come, come. You have to see this. It's exactly what you described. No—better."
He gestured dramatically, and the curtain of everyday machinery parted to reveal the thing Oskar had been waiting for.
The car.
It wasn't a future luxury sedan. Not yet.
But compared to the boxy, stiff contraptions most European streets had to endure, this looked like it had been dropped from a later decade by accident.
Streamlined body. Large, proper headlamps instead of lanterns nailed to random spots. Real side mirrors. Clear signal lamps. Leather seats that looked like an actual human might enjoy sitting in them for more than twenty minutes.
And, just as important—clean, logical underpinnings: a strong frame, a decent engine and gearbox, brakes that existed as more than a rumor, and a manually retractable soft top that could be folded away without needing six footmen and a prayer.
It wasn't the car of Oskar's old life.
But it was the first one that pointed in that direction.
"My man," Oskar said softly, walking a slow circle around it, "this is… excellent. Truly excellent. Once this hits the streets, the others won't know what hit them."
Maybach preened outright.
"I told them," he said to Daimler, "I told them—if we build this, the old firms will look like toy shops."
Oskar opened the door, ran a hand over the stitched leather, checked the pedal layout, the gear stick. Everything was where it should be—or close enough for 1908.
"Paul," he asked without looking up, "how many of these can you produce?"
"Right now?" Daimler said. "We only just began mass production. Output is limited. In a month, we hope to reach five thousand units per month. That should cover domestic demand, at least for now."
Oskar closed the door gently.
"Five thousand a month isn't enough," he said.
Both men stared.
"Your Highness," Maybach said carefully, "even counting all countries together, I doubt the world has produced six hundred thousand cars in total."
"Exactly," Oskar said. "The market doesn't exist. Yet."
He turned to them fully.
"But it will. Once people trust the machines, once the roads improve, once they see that a car makes their life easier instead of miserable… demand will explode. Our job is to be ready before that happens. Not chase it afterwards."
He raised a hand.
"I don't expect fifty thousand cars a month tomorrow. But within three years? Yes. That's the target."
"Fifty thousand a month…" Daimler repeated faintly. "Six hundred thousand a year."
He looked halfway between horrified and thrilled.
"In three years," Oskar said calmly. "And that's just the beginning. The real revolution is not that the rich drive. It's when the factory worker starts dreaming about owning one."
He nodded toward the car.
"This will be our middle model," he said. "The backbone. Call it the Muscle Motors B‑Class."
"B‑Class?" Maybach echoed.
"Because we're building around it," Oskar said. "Above it, an A‑Class: longer wheelbase, more space, better suspension, upgraded interior. This one is already comfortable. The A‑Class will be the thing the very rich use to show off and pretend they're better than each other."
Maybach tried, and failed, not to smile.
"And below it," Oskar went on, "a C‑Class. Shorter body. Canvas roof. Cloth seats. Slower engine—forty, maybe fifty kilometers an hour top speed. But safe. Reliable. Cheap to build. I want the price under two thousand Marks if we can manage it. Something a diligent worker can afford after some years of saving."
Daimler's eyes widened.
"High, middle, and low," he said. "One brand. One network. Three levels."
"Exactly," Oskar said. "The A‑Class is the dream. The B‑Class is the standard. The C‑Class is the promise."
He folded his arms.
"And every one of them is serviced at our Pump Stations, fuelled at our pumps, and plastered with our logo until people see it in their sleep."
Daimler and Maybach exchanged a look—the kind men shared when they realized they were staring at an insane idea that might actually work.
"Your Highness…" Maybach said slowly, "this is… actually brilliant."
"Of course it is," Oskar said lightly. "I stole it from the future."
Neither man understood the joke, but both laughed anyway.
"What about pricing for this one?" Oskar asked, nodding toward the B‑Class.
"After we reach real mass production," Daimler said, recovering his business tone, "our calculations say the unit cost will be around two thousand Marks. We intend to set the price at four thousand Marks."
Oskar nodded.
"Four thousand is acceptable. Too high for normal workers. Just within reach for a doctor, a lawyer, a prosperous merchant. Fine—for now."
He tapped the roof lightly.
"But don't get attached. When we break through proper conveyor production, the B‑Class will have to slide lower so the C‑Class can sit on top of the workers' dreams instead of just floating above them."
"Yes, Your Highness," Daimler said.
"We'll start development of the A‑ and C‑Class at once," Maybach added, already making mental notes. "Same platform where possible. Shared parts. That will help with cost."
Oskar smiled.
"That's the spirit," he said. "We don't just build engines. We build habits. Once Germany starts moving on wheels, it won't go back."
He looked at the car again, at its lines, at the way it already felt like it belonged to a slightly different century than the one outside.
"Ships for war," he thought. "Cars for peace."
If he did this right, maybe people would spend more time racing down roads than marching into trenches.
It was a foolish hope.
He clung to it anyway.