Heaven Or Hell?

1: Chapter One

October 21, 2015

05:15 AM PST

"Why, yes, yes of course!" Doc exclaimed. "Because this hoverboard incident has now occurred, Griff now goes to jail. Therefore your son won't go with him tonight and that robbery will never take place. Thus history, future history, has now been altered and this is the proof!" He held up the newspaper article. "Marty, we've succeeded, not exactly as I'd planned but no matter. Let's go get Jennifer and go home!"

Marty smiled, putting the hoverboard in the DeLorean. He was tempted to turn the bag he was dragging with him around, but realised what he was doing and decided against it – if Doc would see the almanac fall out of it, he would get suspicious immediately. The teen really wanted to get rich, and prevent his son from becoming the wimp he was now. The son of the richest man in Hill Valley wouldn't have no need to get bullied by a Tannen. In fact, they wouldn't even dare to get bullied them – because the richest man in town would also get the largest security in town – for himself, and for his family. Marty knew that rich people often got chased by robbers and murderers, who thought that killing him was for the better… or just wanted to get paid their salary as a hired killer.

Glancing up to Doc, Marty stepped in and greeted Einstein again, being careful to do not let Doc see the almanac. "Hi Einie, hi buddy!" he greeted. Doc stepped in as well and closed the door. "We've left Jennifer in the alley" he reported. "If she hasn't woken up, she should still be there now – and I hardly doubt so, 'cause the energy that came free was enough to put her knock-out for more than an hour, and it has hardly been three quarters since I stopped her from asking all those questions about the future." He lifted the DeLorean's wheels up and flied off to the alley.

Down in the alley, Jennifer was still lying knock-out on the ground. Doc jumped out, Marty followed after hiding the almanac behind his seat. If Doc would see it, he'd probably take it away from him. The teenager grabbed Jennifer's feet and while the inventor dragged her shoulders they moved her to the car. As the two time travellers stepped in again, Jennifer just was waking up. "Marty?" she asked. "Marty? Is that you?" She moved her head a little more up. "Where are we?" she asked, just as Doc lifted the time machine off the ground. "Dr. Brown?" she asked surprised, seeing Doc sitting next to Marty. "Where… where are we? I dreamed that we were in the future… we can't be, can we?"

Marty saw no way to hide the truth from his girlfriend – and actually felt no need for it, as Jennifer could be trusted with the knowledge and they were returning back to their own time soon anyway. "Well," he replied, chuckling, "you're safe and sound now, back in good old 2015… a thirty years ahead of your time." The reaction could be expected. Jennifer jerked up and looked out of the window. "2015?" she gasped, staring outside. "I can't believe this! Am I really in the future? Has Doc Brown really invented a time machine?" She looked at all the flying cars that were in the sky. "Whoa, this is so cool!" She turned to Doc. "Where in time are we going, Dr. Brown?"

"Well, actually, we're going home…" Doc said, then to be startled by the sound of a few sirens above them. "Great Scott! Police!" He pulled down the gas. "Come on, guys, we gotta get out of here. They must have gotten a tip that there was a girl lying knock-out up here in the alley, and want to pick you up." He sighed. "Am I glad we got here in time. I would hold myself responsible if they'd take you to your future home. The knowledge that you'd gain there could be disastrous and could really be able to cause a time-paradox."

"A what?" both Jennifer and Marty asked, simultaneously. Marty continued: "You never told me about that. What's a time-paradox for a thing, Doc? It sounds kinda bad… isn't it?" When Doc nodded, he added: "Maybe you could explain it to us, and especially to Jennifer. She knows even less about time travel than I do… and that's not very much."

"Right" Doc nodded. "Practically, a time paradox is something that stops itself from existing. Like Jennifer would encounter her future self, go into shock, and die. Then she never would live to return to 1985 and grow up to be her future self, so she doesn't die. But if she doesn't die she will be able to grow up and become her future self, so she does die… in fact, this makes her both alive and dead at the same time. And that's against all natural laws of physics existing and causes a paradox to occur. A paradox rips apart the space-time continuum and destroys the entire universe." He paused before adding: "Think well, that is the worst-case scenario. The self-destruction could also only occur in our own galaxy."

"Well that's a relief" breathed Marty, as Doc began to speed up some more. "We've got to get out of here" he reported. "I'm sure that, by the time 2015 rolls around, our future selves will have thought of something to solve the problem with the police. Especially with you that could come in handy. Since you look exactly like your future son, the police will – if they see you – mistake you for him and arrest him for kidnapping a girl while he doesn't know about anything. With me, the cops will way more easy mistake me for my future self. That means that the person who comes in trouble on my side, in this case my 2015 counterpart, will remember this accident and will be able to sort the problem with the police himself."

"Well, you're the Doc, Doc" Marty responded, causing a smile on the scientist's face. "Right!" he called out. "And let's now get the hell out of here." The inventor switched the time circuits on. "Let's see… we left 1985 at seven minutes past eleven on October 26, so we should return to… nine PM in the evening. October 26, 1985, 09:00 PM." He tapped the date and time into the panel.

"Why so late, Doc?" Marty asked, curiously. "I mean… you didn't exactly type in the easiest time. We're supposed to leave for our date at the lake at around 5PM. You're not making it very easy for us to reach our booking. And we've been looking forward to today… I mean to October 26 for a couple of weeks. It would be dramatically if we'd have to cancel it, and it would raise many questions by the family."

"Maybe you're right" Doc considered. "But still, I'm doing this for a good reason. If someone would see the time machine, it could be disastrous… I've been worrying sick about what effect my showing up in daylight when we left could have had on the space-time continuum. That's why we can't go at day, and if we go to the night before you'd have to wait a couple of hours before returning home because your younger selves will be there." He sighed. "So I'm still for the current Destination Time."

"Like it isn't daylight right now," Marty sneered, "and if you haven't paid much attention to yourself while appearing out of nowhere at 4:30 PM." He relaxed. "Really Doc, if we arrive out of town, we'll be fine with a quarter or half past eleven. Nobody will see us, and we will come in time at the lake… hell, Doc, like the entire time travel inventing isn't dangerous at all! You're worrying way too much about the effect little things can have, Doc."

"Maybe I am" Doc considered. "Still, I think we should get used to the idea of returning at night. That would be a better time to do so. However, in this case, I guess I can see your point…" He sighed. "You know, I'm not even sure if I want to go through with this, after all. Who knows what would happen if we got hit by your older self's car and all die so you can't grow up to hit us… I'm thinking hard about destroying the time machine after returning home."

"Destroy it?" Marty asked, stunned. "You can't just destroy it? What about all those thirty years you've spent on it! What about all the possibilities you have with this thing? Hell, you could even visit your parents as little children! The possibilities with this thing are practically endless!"

"And the problems and paradoxes you could cause are endless, too" Doc replied. "I'm sorry Marty, but my conclusion is not going to be changed. I'm going to destroy the time machine… no matter how much pain it will do to me to destruct the only invention I made that really did, indeed, work."

His voice softened. "Maybe, after this, I'll never have success again. But the thing has brought nothing but disaster."

"Aww, that's not true" Marty said, trying to be gentle to his scientific friend. "There came good of it, too. Hell – look at my parents! Mom is healthy and not a fat alcoholic who disapproves my relation! Dad is a successful writer! Dave's working at an office! Linda has so many boyfriends that she can't hold the count of all of them! And I own the truck I've always wanted to own!"

"That's quite true, Marty" Doc responded. "But still, I'm sure that I really should destroy the time machine. I could maybe keep the flux capacitor intact in case of emergencies, but that's all. And I'm not gonna change my mind about this, Marty." He tapped in the new Destination Time: October 26, 1985, 11:30 AM, and glanced at the police. "Let's go" he muttered. "Let's go."

The time machine began to accelerate and move faster and faster. Both Marty and Jennifer watched as the speedometer began to reach higher and higher numbers. 65…70…75…80…82…

"Brace yourselves for temporal displacement, Marty, Einie and Jennifer" Doc warned. "This is going to be a rather bumpy ride."

"We will, Doc" Marty said, smiling, however he didn't exactly understand the details in what Doc was saying. That, however, wasn't strange because he almost never completely understood his best friend. Doc always talked in scientific language – which was not precisely easy to understand for a seventeen-year-old teenager who dreamed to be a musician one day. "We will."

"Right." The time machine began to move faster again. 83…84… Marty grabbed the almanac from behind his seat and held it close to him, making sure that neither Doc or Jennifer could see it. 85… Jennifer grabbed his hand, as the teenager quickly put the almanac away behind his back. 86…87…88… the flux capacitor began to… flux, and to the surprise of the police agents behind them, the vehicle began to light up with blue lights, and then it disappeared in a brilliant flash of light with twin streaks of fire left behind, as it broke the time barrier.