Author's Note: Story written in honour of the thirty-third anniversary of Marty McFly inventing time travel. Part one of three (that's what is planned, at least). As you've probably guessed, this story takes place in the SmartMarty universe.

Disclaimer: Hello? Hello? Anybody home? Think, readers, think. You know what would happen if I submitted this fic, and claimed the characters as mine? I could get sued. You wouldn't want that to happen, would you? Of course you wouldn't. So, I don't own BTTF.

Inventing Time Travel

March 7, 1978
04:00 PM PDT
Hill Valley California

Looking at the chemic reaction he had just created, young Marty McFly couldn't help but grin. Here he was, Martin Seamus McFly, not even ten years old, and his work was already on the scale of what an adolescent would produce. In fact, most of them wouldn't even think of producing something like this. Of course, that was because most people that age didn't work on science all day, like Marty did.

The boy shook his head. He'd never understand why other people didn't share his fascination with science. After all, what was more fascinating than inventing new technologies, exploring new substances? What would help one understand more about how the world around him worked than exploring outer space, and studying the flora and fauna of the world?

Of course, even Marty had to admit that sometimes his ideas went a little too far. He'd attempted almost all of the inventions in Jules Verne's works, and failed every time. Always, there would be a little thing he'd overseen when building his smaller sized model of the ideas from the books. The worst had been the explosion he had caused when trying to build the rockets from 'From the Earth to the Moon'. Now that had been a blast. He had escaped intact, but only because he had managed to run away at the last minute. And even then, he had suffered some bruises. And weeks of work had been ruined.

He'd been lucky that event had been out of the house, at an abandoned field outside of Hill Valley. When he had burned the living room floor, his parents had been mad. Granted, he would have expected them to give him harsher punishment, and he didn't quite get why they had been smiling at each other, as if there was some secret he didn't know, but he didn't care much about not getting his allowance for a week, or having to stay in his room until dinner. What had mattered to him was the fact that he wasn't allowed to experiment in or around the house anymore.

Marty smiled, as he remembered the event, and how he had met his friend, Emmett. Though their initial encounter had been an accident, they had soon befriended each other and while Marty got to use Emmett's garage for his experiments, he also did Emmett favors by assisting in the legal and financial part of his horse ranch business, and assisting with ideas his friend had about expanding it. There were also times, though, when Marty simply came over to talk with Emmett, because even he sometimes longed for company.

Today, however, he longed for something else. Over the past few weeks, he'd been working on chemistry, but that was only because he didn't know what to do for physics. Ever since he had started inventing, he had worked on ambitious projects, and they had all failed. While his chemistry projects were going well, Marty had no clue why he just didn't get to make any breakthroughs in physics. He knew the field just as well, after all…

Perhaps his projects were too ambitious. After all, trying to duplicate Jules Verne's work was no easy task. Marty pondered that thought for a moment. Perhaps he should work on something not from Jules Verne, or from some other writer. Like H.G. Wells' work, 'The Time Machine'.

Marty smiled wistfully. Had he known how to do it, he would have started building a time machine as soon as he could. But there were problems even he couldn't solve. Like the energy required for time travel. He had calculated that it would need immense amounts of energy, or at least one or two gigawatts released with enormous force. And even then, some speed would be required. And Marty had no clue how to achieve it all.

The boy shook his head. No use dwelling over silly ideas. It would be better to go back to his chemistry works. As he looked back, he noticed that as he'd been thinking, the nice color effect he'd achieved had faded. He needed some fresh ingredients to achieve a lasting effect. A quick look at his kit told him it wasn't there. He'd have to go outside and fetch some from where he had stored all his liquids and other substances, in Emmett's basement.

However, as he was thinking about time travel and what potions he would need, Marty wasn't looking where he had going. And that was his mistake. That afternoon, Emmett had cleaned his garage because of the mess Marty's experiments usually caused, and some soap had remained behind. Normally, it wouldn't have been a problem, but now it was, because Marty stepped right on it.

The nine-year-old barely had a second's thought to think about what he might have stepped upon. He slipped, fell backwards and hit his head against the hard concrete of the workbench. As he lost consciousness, a final thought lingered in his mind, a thought of time travel.

Oooooooo

"Marty?"

Y.

"Marty? It's me, Emmett."

Glowing Y. Big glowing Y. With energy. Flowing through it.

"Marty? Can you hear me?"

Y. Y. Y.

Marty groaned, as he slowly began to come to. He vaguely remembered why he was knocked out, but he didn't care right now. Another thought was dominant in his mind. A glowing Y. And connected to it, the words 'time travel'. A glowing Y with a great energy burst being released from it at a certain speed…

"Marty? Are you awa-"

"OF COURSE!"

Marty jumped up and to his feet, ignored Emmett, and headed straight for his notebook. This was the answer he had been looking for! This was the clue to the mystery! This was the clue to time travel!

For a moment, Emmett remained baffled with shock, as Marty began scribbling his thoughts down on paper. After a short while, though, he recovered. "Marty!" he called out. "You scared me! You – are you hurt? Are you feeling all right?"

While somewhere, Marty heard Emmett, he chose to ignore it. He couldn't answer him. Not now. He was writing down thoughts which, if they were true, might change the world for good. He did a few quick calculations, typing the numbers so fast on his calculator that even he couldn't keep up with it.

Emmett, however, wasn't about to leave him alone. He knew that he couldn't do much to persuade Marty right now, so he simply looked over his friend's shoulder, at the calculations that probably didn't make any sense to him. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Writing" Marty said, as he finished his calculations. To his astonishment, they were all correct. It could work! He knew it! An actual time machine was within his reach!

"I can see you're writing" Emmett sputtered. "But about what?"

"An idea" Marty replied, vaguely. "Listen, Emmett, I'll tell you about everything when it's ready. Right now, I just need some time alone with my thoughts. Okay?"

"But isn't your head hurt?" Emmett said, pointing at the spot where Marty had hurt himself. As the boy touched it, he could see small hints of blood on his finger.

"It's not that bad" he said. "I'll take care of it. I just need some time alone."

Emmett nodded, reluctant to leave him but knowing better than to enter an argument. He left the garage, leaving Marty alone with his thoughts.

It could work. He knew that, now. It would take months, probably years to build, and there were many secrets to unravel along the way. But the base principle was sound, and Marty knew that he would not abandon this project if there was an error. It was way too important for that, and he'd never had such a great starting idea to work with. This plan would work. There would be some issues along the road to the finished time machine, but he would conquer them. He knew he would.

Because if he put his mind to it, he could accomplish anything.