CHAPTER FIVE
Suspended Animation
Saturday, November 5, 1955
9:22 PM
Marty continued dragging Emma down the street until they were out of sight of and still another block past the Baines' house. Emma demanded to know if he had a good reason for hauling her out of there before she even got to grab a roll for the road, and after Marty's curt explanation of his mother's not-so-motherly touch, she backed off.
"Damn! I meant to ask them where Riverside Drive was."
"Riverside?"
"Yeah, look." He took out the phonebook page from that morning and shared it with Emma, pointing to Doc's listed address. Emma laughed, handing the page back to him almost immediately.
"That's the mansion's address. Riverside was renamed for Kennedy not long after the place burned down and Dad sold the land."
"So we're looking for a mansion."
"Ding ding ding."
Marty slowed his speed walk to that of a leisurely stroll lest Emma collapse against another tree. He wasn't exactly sure how she had made it through the day without her shoulder bleeding through his jacket, but he was also glad that wasn't the case. She plodded along beside him expressionlessly, maybe on the verge of a stumble here or there. Her posture was normal, but Marty could see the weight of everything settling on her that much more.
"How are you holding up, Em?"
"I'll be fine until we get to my dad's. The rest and food really helped."
It was dumb to ask if she was in a lot of pain. He could see her hiding it ever since the parking lot, and she was doing a hell of a job. She was right to call him a big sissy sometimes; she handled pain way better than he did, but he'd never tell her that.
But as they turned a corner under the soft rustle of an overhead oak tree, the street lamps gave away her grimace.
"I'm sorry about, you know," – he jerked his head over his shoulder – "back there."
"For what?"
"Well, they are my family. I just feel like I should apologize for them for anything."
Emma smiled. "Your family was fine. If you're going to apologize for anything, apologize for jumping in front of a car and scaring me half to death."
It was Marty's turn to smile. "I scared you?"
"You jumped in front of a moving vehicle," Emma chided. "Then proceeded to remain unconscious, essentially leaving me by myself in 1955."
"I had good reason."
"Yeah, and it might have killed you. I was going to kill you if you had woken up with no memory. Do I need to get you a leash?"
"Chill out, Em. Everything's fine."
She gave him a look that made him recoil slightly.
"Okay, so everything will be fine. Once we see your dad."
Once we see your dad.
God, what was that going to be like? Granted, it hadn't completely sunk in that the last eighteen hours had been reality, least of all losing Doc in such a violent way. He was battling to process everything, let alone what Emma must be trying to talk herself through.
It was going to be the biggest relief to reach Doc. They were in the clear once they had him. Maybe it would feel like nothing had happened at all when they knocked on his door. It will have all been a nightmare.
Why can't it all just be a nightmare?
"Marty."
He stopped. Emma had crossed the street, the sign above her head embossed with gold letters that read RIVERSIDE.
"Look both ways, stupid," she called as he jogged over to her. He matched her slow pace, pushing his hands into his pockets. He clutched the lining up in his fists absentmindedly, his right forefinger grazing a penny.
"Em, has it hit you yet?"
"What? About my dad?"
"…Everything."
She sighed, not looking up. Pieces of her long bangs freed themselves from her ponytail in the light wind, brushing across her face. "No. And to be honest, I don't think the feeling will pass anytime soon."
"Did you maybe want to wait while I talked to him?"
Emma shook her head. She appreciated what he was saying, but part of her had to see her father, even if he wasn't her father yet, and even if it was just to look at him.
"He's not my dad yet," she repeated aloud to herself.
Marty raised an eyebrow. "I guess not yet."
"He can't know I'm his daughter then."
"What?"
"Marty, it's 1955. Whether he buys this time travel thing or not, announcing I'm his daughter isn't going to be a good idea."
"Oh, come on," Marty said. "He'll work ten times harder to get us home by morning if you told him."
"He could also not like me and decide not to have kids."
"Really?"
"I do have my mother's attitude. And if memory serves, she is his least favorite person right now." She groaned in frustration. "I know I don't sound like I'm making any sense. It's complicated, Marty. And it's safer if he doesn't know yet."
Marty nodded his understanding. "So, you're just a lackey around the lab like me?"
She blew a raspberry. "No, I'm an assistant. I'm not a lackey."
"Excuuuuse me."
A few minutes later, a glowing box that read 1640 appeared along the sidewalk. Eyes following a grand brick driveway beyond it, the Brown Mansion towered from a small hilltop that dwarfed the garage they both called home in 1985. Lit with lights from an impeccably well-kept expanse of lawn, the rich architecture, warm lighting, and commanding grandeur of the place drew silent awe from its onlookers.
Marty glanced over at Emma's bright curiosity, nudging her until she acknowledged him amidst her captivation. She'd seen pictures from before the fire, yes, but pictures didn't do this place justice.
"Ready?"
"As I can be."
Marty lead the way, mindful of Emma's determination not to baby her arm as they ascended the long, curved pathway. A large stone stoop welcomed them before a heavy wooden and stained glass door. Emma reached out, touching the cool, elaborate moldings. Marty's sharp knocking pulled her out of her trancelike wonder, and she turned around with him to look out over the street.
"You have got to be pissed that this place burned down," Marty said, taking in the wide yard and flowering trees. "Hell, I'm a little pissed."
Emma shrugged. "What are you gonna do, you know?"
"Suggest he call an electrician and get the wires checked?"
The door flew open suddenly.
Marty and Emma spun around, catching a glimpse of who they assumed to be Doc probing his wild eyes through the crack at them before slamming the door shut again. Intrigued and startled alike, the two of them stepped toward the door in unison. Emma tried to squint through the stained glass pane to make out any kind of shape or shadow beyond it as Marty leaned toward the doorjamb hesitantly.
"Doc?"
The door again flew open, all the way this time, and Marty and Emma drew back in surprise. After she shook the sting from her eyes by the sudden barrage of the indoor lighting, Emma came face-to-face with a middle-aged Emmett Brown, a shockingly large cage-like thing strapped to his head. His eyes were as wide and wild as ever, and before she or Marty even had a chance to draw a breath to speak, Doc grabbed each of them by their jackets and yanked them inside.
"Don't say a word."
Emma dizzily came to a standstill as the door was slammed, trying to get her bearings. Her father was thirty years younger, nearly unrecognizable aside from what little personality they had just experienced. His cottony hair was shorter and light blond, and his hands weren't nearly as calloused or cracked as she'd known them to be. His casual luau shirts and khakis were a thing of the future; he looked so straight-laced with a tie and tucked-in shirt. His cuffs were even buttoned. Outrageous headgear aside, he almost looked alien to her.
Then there was the matter of this silver snakeskin robe.
Yep. Everything was going to be okay.
She stumbled over a thick, red rug carpeting the smoky foyer after Marty and her young father. Dying plants hung amidst glossy wooden panels and crossbeams, intricate stained glass lamps, and a scattered assortment of blueprints, tools, and random odds and ends. Her dad led them over to a crude, haphazardly stacked pillar of knobs, wiring, scrap metal, and dials emitting the foul-smelling electrical burn and frighteningly healthy zaps. Coupled with the nausea from her pain, she felt herself grow pale and lightheaded.
But it was impossible to look away from that contraption on the top her father's head.
"I don't want to know anything about you!"
"Doc!"
"Quiet!"
She glanced at the dog not unlike Einstein as he was unhooked from a smaller, less impressive head unit and jumped into a riveted leather armchair behind them. She redirected herself back to the sprawling thing on her dad's head, standing right next to him as she examined the vacuum tube heavily wrapped in electrical tape that ran down his back and into the misshapen, sizzling tower. She suddenly realized what this Neanderthal of an invention was, narrowing her eyes as Doc silenced Marty's protesting with a blue, wired suction cup to the forehead.
"I'm gonna read your thoughts," Doc announced, pointing at Marty. He reached over to the top of the crackling scrap pile, suddenly jerking his head away from a hollow tapping next to his left ear. He scowled at the girl next to him.
"Don't touch that!"
Emma lowered her hand but continued to examine his helmet. Clearing his throat, Emmett turned his attention back to the kid in the life preserver, rejuvenating his gusto with a deep breath. He flipped a switch, twisted a knob, and planted his foot in front of Marty, straightening the headgear.
"I am going to read your thoughts."
Marty glanced at Emma, expecting to see her tucked into a silent shell of shock off to the side of Doc, revering in the fact that she was seeing her father, in some strange way, back from the dead. Instead of getting caught up in a mind-boggling stupor over that, however, it appeared that his Chem lab partner was occupied with a different upsetting conundrum, continuing to scrutinize the heavy metal unit on Doc's head with a look of disgust.
"You've come from a great dist-"
"Why are you squeezing it into your head like that?"
Emmett cast her an annoyed frown, readjusting. "To concentrate and stabilize the neuropaths of the brain waves! Now, quiet! I need absolute silence!"
She raised her eyebrows. "That –"
"Shhhh!"
Emma bit her tongue, eyes darkening as they smoothly met Marty's. He beseeched her for help, for a silent acknowledgement that yes, of course now was not the time to analyze his brain waves via primitive suction cup in their current predicament. Marty could barely hold onto a single thought himself for the past day, so good luck on that one, he thought at the erratic scientist.
Doc readied himself again, but he felt the girl's hard stare on him and slowly looked over at her, eyeballing her impatiently. She raised her eyebrows again, and he groaned.
"Just say your piece so I can get on with this without any more interruption!"
Emma leapt at the opportunity. "Pushing that thing into your skull is going to short out your nervous system with that many amperes crowding the parietal condenser."
She reached up, plucking a black wire out of place on the helmet and sending Emmett reeling off to the side incredulously.
"What in God's name do you think you're doing?!" he shouted, pressing the helmet to his head with great protectiveness.
"Of course, I don't even know why you have a parietal condenser when the theta and delta waves are most prominently coded in the temporal lobe."
"I'm not trying to read theta and delta waves; I'm trying to read his beta waves," Doc said, smacking the back of one hand into the palm of the other. "His active, in-the-present, nowthoughts!"
"I can read his thoughts just by the look on his face!"
Emmett narrowed his eyes on her. "Do you know what this is?" he hissed, pointing at the machine. "It's an electroencephalograph."
"I know what an EEG is."
"State-of-the-art electrical brain wave mapping system."
"With a very high temporal resolution –"
"And I am about to have a breakthrough in neurolinguistics by translating those impulses –!"
"Hey!"
Emma and Doc looked over at Marty. He had no idea what had just been said, but it was time to bring their conversation back from the far reaches of space. Thirty years apart and they could still argue fluidly in the foreign language of science. Though Emma probably had the upper hand now.
He pulled the suction cup from his forehead, settling his wide eyes on Emma. She relaxed her defensive stance, suddenly feeling a painful rush of lightheadedness from the heated exchange. She nodded to Marty rather weakly, sitting in the now-empty riveted armchair. Marty took a deep breath as she sat, meeting Doc's eye anxiously.
"Doc, we're from the future. We came here in a time machine that you invented. Now, we need your help to get back to the year 1985."
Doc looked between the two of them, anger touching his skeptical tone.
"Time machine? I haven't invented any time machine."
Emma looked around the side of the chair, back at Doc. "You will. Everything I just said about condensers and delta waves and coding? I learned it all from you."
After another moment, Emmett chuckled and motioned to Emma. "Impressive, my dear, but not convincing."
He promptly removed the small cage from the top of his head, striding past Emma's indignant scowl to the octagonal table in the rear of the foyer. Marty hurried to join him, pleading as the irritated scientist picked up a set of calipers.
"Come on, Doc! You've gotta help us! You're the only one who knows how your time machine works!"
"Honestly," Emmett chided, "tell whoever sent you here that they have sufficiently ridiculed the crackpot for one evening, won't you? I have work to do."
Emma's tired chuckle pricked his ears. "You sent us here."
Doc pointed the calipers at her warningly, but Marty then took out the contents of his wallet, desperately trying to convince Doc of the validity of their plight. A bout of vertigo took Emma as she watched her not-yet father frown at the items skeptically, and she rested her head against the side of the armchair and shut her eyes.
She held her breath as the pain made her stomach churn, trying not to let a groan or hiss pass her lips. But in doing so, her lightheadedness increased, and the distressed assertions of Marty and haughty mockery of her father floated higher and higher up until she was straining to hear them. Her head throbbed once, like a shockwave rippling over her brain, and her father's voice was suddenly breaking over her and Marty angrily as he snatched up several rolls of blueprints.
"Who's vice president? Jerry Lewis?"
A fresh breath of autumn air touched Emma's face, and she inhaled its pleasant chill as the voices around her began to fall away again. Emma squinted over at the table, ready to just chuck something at this thickheaded imbecile of a scientist her future father was being when she saw that he and Marty had vanished.
Emma sat up in the chair, eyes darting over to the opened back door. Their shouts reverberated outside, and she was half-afraid her father's patience had run its course and that Marty stood a good chance of getting zapped with something. With one more inhale of the refreshing breeze, Emma forced herself out of the chair and out the door, cradling her left elbow.
Marty had chased Doc down the manicured lawn to the garage. She hurried to catch up as Doc locked himself inside, her body quite opposed to the jostle of the light jog towards Marty's frantic run-on sentence.
"You were standing on your toilet, and you were hanging a clock, and you fell, and you hit your head on the sink! And that's when you came up with the idea for the flux capacitor," he said, slowly turning to look back as Emma approached, "which is… what… makes time travel possible."
Emma panted, she and Marty briefly stewing in the fear of defeat before Doc threw the door open again, stricken and wide-eyed. He glanced over at the girl – this girl that had spouted all this brainwave stuff at him without hesitation – and his eyebrows deepened in confusion.
She had paled within seconds, beads of perspiration dotted along her hairline. Then, her vacant eyes rolled back into her head, and she crumpled to the brick driveway.
"Emma!" Marty fell to her side, horrified that he hadn't caught her. "Shit!"
Emmett blinked as if he had missed something. "What's wrong with her?"
"She has a bullet in her shoulder."
"A bullet?" He huffed. "How did I get mixed up in this kind of riffraff?"
"No, Doc, it was an accident, ju- Doc, please." Marty looked up at him, a whole different plea in his eyes now. "You have got to help us. You're our only hope. Please."
The hardened disposition Emmett had fronted from so many practical jokes waned with the flux capacitor story, and it did so further at the helplessness in this young man's voice.
And he wasn't about to let some girl die in his front yard.
Attitude shifting across his face, Emmett quickly knelt, helping Marty gather her up. "Why didn't you seek medical attention?"
"She refused to go to the hospital," Marty said, standing with Emma in his arms. "We just wanted to find you and get home."
Emmett pressed his lips together, watching the dead weight of the girl's head loll into Marty's orange vest. "She may not have to go. After we remove the bullet, I'll make a call."
"You sure you can get it out?"
"Let's get her inside."