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Back In The Future

Thursday

October 21

2018

The DeLorean broke the time barrier with a big triple blast. Everything in the street lighter than a box full of bricks got blown away, to find its destiny somewhere else. Doc hit the brakes and finally the car slowed down. After the bright light of the time barrier his eyes were blind, red and blue dots dancing before him. Everything seemed very much dark on the other side of the windshield. Reasonably he didn´t expect to see any lights anyway.

The time circuits were set on the date October 21, 2018. One day after he´d left this time period last time he´d been here. That was now over thirty years ago, from his point of view. It would be interesting to see the same place and the same people again, knowing that nothing had changed for them in all these years since their last meeting. Years that had changed so much for him.

At least he would be able to tell them that he succeeded in his mission. The promise he gave. He had found a way to keep it. It was always an gift in itself to make a gift to someone else. Especially a gift like that. John Connor and his friends would share his view, that was for sure. It would enable them to finally fight their war at the place and the time it belonged. The present. Their present.

Doc was no philosopher but he knew one thing without any doubt. You couldn´t change things by changing the past and you couldn´t win a fight in the past. You could only fight your battle in the here and now. Time traveling was not to change things. It was just to uncover things. To explore. To learn. At least that´s what he´d told Connor last time.

Though, it would be interesting to see them again. Maybe it was not possible to change things in the past, but he obviously had found a way to change things for the future. Just a little cheating but Doc figured it would be all right. It wasn´t the first time he decided a little cheat on time and fate wouldn´t hurt. Though he took this decision with a little help, he took it by his own free will. And it was good that he did. He lived and could go on with his own mission through time. A mission that would be accomplished very soon with a little luck.

It was a shame. After all Doc invented the time machine to discover the future. To find out the future of mankind was as dark as it was, had been a shock. He was able to see the future only to learn it lay in ruins.

Fortunately he knew that there was hope, even in this hell. John Connor and his resistance would beat the machines one day. Doc believed that without any doubt. He believed in the strength of mankind. Humans wouldn´t go down so easily. Just like in H.G. Wells´ War of the Worlds. Doc read it as a kid and still believed it could be true. Though he never believed to see that war with his own eyes.

But he did. Thirty years ago he got a short glance at it and now he returned to exactly that time. He was an old man now. 63 years. What an age to finally experience an adventure like that. But better later than never. Not that he wasn´t used to wait after all. And for what he´d waited.

He waited for the possibilities to start with his work on the time machine. He waited for the day he would meet Marty for the first time. Great Scott, what a day it had been. Seeing Marty as a fourteen year old after he´d known him as a seventeen year old almost grown up, was a real tough thing.

But was that weirder than suddenly seeing his little neighbor, a once five year old girl, as an old woman? The difference between them was much bigger.

At least this time there were no differences to be expected.

Doc´s idea of time travel did never consider things like that. He thought on differences in the environment, the buildings the manners and customs of society. But not about people he knew. He´d never though about that. And then Marty had seriously asked him to look him up after arriving the future. Obviously the kid wondered where he would be in this future T had told them about.

Maybe Doc underestimated him. Maybe he was not too young for the truth. Perhaps he could tell him what he already knew about the future without disturbing him. The kid was tough. He would be able to stand it once when he would tell him.

Thinking that warmed his heart and broke it the same time. But that was something Doc would consider on a later occasion. Now he had to focus.

He reached down to switch off his headlights, just in case. Though J.J. did say, the machines were not very interested in Hill Valley, but you never knew. Safety first. He would have to find his way in this strange area, even though he remembered it to look very irritating. Recognizing familiar streets had been tough back then. When you saw merely ruins and not the buildings you used to know.

But he believed he could find the house again. Jessie´s house. He would use the time portal J.J. constructed and he would go to Los Angeles. To John Connor´s headquarter. Like he´d done it with T 30 years ago. Yesterday. It was funny.

His hand touched the switch to turn off the headlights, and that was the moment he noticed it. There was light outside. Electric light. Lamps. The street wasn´t dark and abandoned like he remembered it. Now that his eyes got adapted, he could see it pretty clear.

There were parked cars in perfect shape and a long line of lamps illuminating the street. Great Scott! How was that possible? The houses were no ruins like they should be in this time period. They were perfect and in some windows there was even light on. People!

Doc was shocked. He checked his time circuits again. Perhaps he made a mistake or perhaps there was a malfunction that brought him to another target than he actually planned. In that case he would have to reload the plutonium reactor and do another trip. That would be very unpleasant. He hated waste of energy. But there was no malfunction. The year was correct. October 21 2018, 04:35 a.m.

But he didn´t even need to see his instruments. He just had to look out. The cars were not the types he knew from his time in the year 1985. The looked completely different, almost like rockets on wheels. Even the street lamps were different. High tech versions from the lamps he was used to see along the streets. There was no doubt. This was the future.

But that was impossible. There should have been a nuclear war years ago. The human race should fight evil machines to survive and hide between ruins. Why were there no ruins? While for every other person this discovery would be a happy one, Doc could only feel dread and the deepest worry. This wasn´t good. This was so not good.

John Connor, T, Jessie … they all had told him that however horrible that future might be, it was absolutely necessary to occur. Every disturbance in that already very unstable and sensitive timeline would cause an unimaginable disaster for both future and past. And since his own life and Marty´s depended on that undisturbed timeline, Doc was very concerned about this new development.

He passed a building that looked like a bank and saw a digital clock outside. It changed from daytime to weather to stock index. Finally it showed the date. October 21, 2018.

So it was true. No mistake. He was at the right time. The only problem was: Nothing else was right.