Chapter 8
Friday, December 27th
3: 46 P. M.
Doc circled his home carefully before landing and shrugging off Marty. "They're gone. Hope they didn't wreck the place too badly."
"Doc, what if they realized we're living here?" Marty asked fearfully. "I don't want to go back."
"We move, plain and simple." Doc opened the door and sighed at the mess. "Of course, they make it look like it did before I -- what the hell?" He knelt down and picked up a silver bag lying on the floor. "I've never seen this before. 'Blast From The Past'. Sounds like some sort of antique store. But why would this bag be here?"
"Ya got me, Doc," Marty shrugged. "Druggies aren't known for their taste in antiques." He looked around himself and spotted what looked like the top of a cane. "More junk. Nice handle, huh?" He showed Doc the brass ornament on top. It was shaped like a fist. "Wonder who it belongs to."
"Probably an old bum who was staying here before me," Doc said with a dismissive wave. Then his sharp eyes caught a name engraved onto the fingers. "Wait, there's a name on it -- Biff H. Tannen?!?"
Startled, Marty turned the ornament around so he could read the inscription. "Biff? But that's impossible! He may shoot up, but he doesn't have any back problems I know off. He's knelt down over me enough times to convince me of that." He examined the broken top. "Sure looks like something he'd use, though. Maybe it's another Biff Tannen?"
"I doubt that. I looked up Biff Tannen in the phone book once. Only one name." Doc looked back at the silver bag he still clutched, then opened it on a whim. Inside was a piece of opaque blue paper that seemed to be a futuristic receipt. Doc examined it closely. Suddenly he turned deathly pale.
"Doc? Doc, are you all right?" Marty asked worriedly. "What is it?"
"Look at this, Marty," Doc whispered, handing over the paper. "Tell me what you make of it."
Marty accepted the receipt and looked at it. His eyes opened wide. The slip read:
BLAST FROM THE PAST
Your last stop in antiques from the 90s, 80s, and beyond
Purchased: Gray's Sports Almanac, published 2000
Price: $32. 19 American (Thumb Credit)
Customer: Martin Seamus McFly Senior (Credit Rating D)
Date: October 21, 2015
Marty had to sit down. The shock was just too much. "October 21st, 2015," he muttered. "The almanac Biff asked me about. . . . me listed there. . . . Doc, it just doesn't make sense."
Doc shook his head soberly. "I'm afraid it does, Marty. I never thought you might be the cause of all this, but it appears you -- we -- are." He sat down across from the stunned teen, plucking the slip from his fingers. "Now, Marty, what I'm going to tell you is going to sound incredible. But I swear it is all the gospel truth. This slip and the cane handle are proof of what I've suspected all along. This has never been the correct time line for us." He glanced at the date on the receipt. "Well, at least we have 30 years until the universe collapses."
"What? What the hell are you talking about, Doc? I don't understand a word you're saying."
Doc got an idea and grabbed his old, broken-down blackboard. He picked up some chalk and started drawing. "A diagram should help. Look here." He drew a line across the board, in unintentional imitation of what had happened months before. "This is a time line. The past is at this end, 1985 is somewhere along here, and the future is at this end." He labeled the points appropriately. "Of course, this is a mere approximation of time, as it is not truly a line, nor is the past set in this place, and from different year viewpoints, these would appear to be--"
"English, Doc!"
Doc chuckled at that. "All right, I'll leave out the hard theory. Let's just leave it that this is a crude representation of the space-time continuum. Along this time line, we did things completely differently from what we do today. I met you in 1982-1983. We became close friends. Biff Tannen -- did whatever he did. Then, on October 26th, 1985, I built and successfully tested a time machine made from a DeLorean car. Apparently I got the power source necessary to power the machine from Libyan terrorists, and they showed up and killed me. You, attempting to flee them, went into the past. November 5th, 1955, if I remember correctly." Doc added a 1955 to the diagram closer to the past and drew an arc from 1985 to it. "You spent a week in the past attempting to correct a mistake you had made with your parents."
"Wait a minute, wait a minute, this doesn't make sense. None of that ever happened. You said it didn't. I never went back in time and met my parents. They got together 'cause of a kid named Calvin Klein."
Doc smiled sadly. "Marty, when your other self arrived in 1955, he was hit by a car while chasing George. He was taken up to Lorraine's room and partially undressed by her. Back then, kid's names were often sewed into their underwear."
"What does this have to do with anything?"
"What brand underwear do you wear, Marty?"
Marty frowned. "Doc! I like you and all, but a guy's gotta have some privacy! Especially when his pal has only known him for a few days!"
"Just answer my question, kid," Doc said, applying slight hypnotic pressure.
Marty sighed, looking annoyed. "I wear Cal-vi -- oh, holy shit."
Doc moved closer, concerned. Marty had turned so white when he had realized what had happened that the scientist was afraid he would faint. "Marty? I know it's a lot to take in. Are you okay? Do you feel faint?"
"A little," Marty confessed. "Holy shit, Mom dated -- Mom kissed--" His eyes started to roll up. Doc gently bent him over and told him to take deep abdominal breaths to keep his bearings. After a few minutes, the teen felt good enough to sit up again. "Thanks. Jesus."
"I know. Amazing, isn't it? To know that some other version of yourself was responsible for your very existence?"
"Freaky," Marty mumbled. "So what happened with -- other me?"
"He changed the future, preventing my death and turning his parents into confident winners." Doc drew a tangent off the line, made a horizontal, and labeled the new line. "In effect, changing the time line into this new one. The old one was erased from existence." He used his sleeve to wipe away his first line beyond the tangent. "That's why I'm so close to you, Marty. I originally met you in 1955. The other you and the other me were very close. We became close rather quickly back in 1955." His mind drifted back to the night after they had used Marty's radiation suit to scare the pants off George. "So, naturally, when I see you, I think of the relationship we had back then. It's hard for me to remember that you grew up in completely different circumstances."
"It's okay," Marty said softly, amazed. "But what happened to turn that one into this one? I gotta know what other me did."
"I don't know. It's hard to say. Maybe you bought the book in your middle age and lost it. Maybe I convinced you to throw it away. Maybe it wasn't even your older self, but the other you, for some reason in the future. All we know is that you bought it, and somehow Old Biff found the book and contrived to give it to his younger self to gain riches. He got the time machine from us -- I wouldn't be surprised if he had killed us -- and went back to the past." Another, very large arc connecting FUTURE and PAST. "He gave the book--"
"Just a sec, Doc," Marty interrupted, seeing a hole in Doc's theory. "How did Old Biff know about the time machine?"
"Once again, I don't know. He might have built his own, but I have my doubts about that. He doesn't seem the type who would be able to build such a complex machine. So my theory is that he discovered our time machine and wrested it from us. As I was saying, Biff gave the book to young Biff, who amassed a fortune with it. Thus, the current time line was created, wiping the other out of existence." Doc drew a new tangent, labeled it, and erased the old one.
Marty shook his head, trying to process it all. "So -- we're living in a time line that was created by people from a different time line?" Doc nodded. "Whoa, this is heavy."
Doc smiled again at the familiar phrase. "Precisely. And sometime around October 21st, 2015, the universe will collapse. You see, now that Biff is rich and famous and I never invented my time machine, Biff will have no reason to steal the DeLorean when he's old. In fact, I doubt he'll live long enough to see the date he previously did. So the loop created by his actions cannot be perpetuated. The effect of the action negated the cause. Without the continuation of the loop, the universe is negated, effectively destroying everything in existence." He took a breath. "Of course, the damage could be limited to merely our own galaxy."
"And that's better how?" Marty shook his head. "I dunno if I believe ya, Doc. It's all so -- far-out."
"You saw with your own eyes the cane handle, the bag, and the receipt -- although how they got here is beyond me. And if you need further proof of your existence in 1955, here it is." Doc pulled from his pocket the old, yellowed letter and handed it to Marty. "Tell me that isn't your handwriting?"
Marty ran his eyes along the letter, amazed. "It's mine, all right," he whispered. He lowered it and looked at Doc. Suddenly, he completely understood his overprotectiveness, his ability to sense his emotions so well, how he only wanted to keep him happy. He smiled weakly. "Thanks for treating me like the other Marty."
"Marty's Marty, no matter what time line it is," Doc said, taking the letter back. "And I hope that soon we can go back to the one place that has remained consistent throughout all these time lines. I'm working on my own DeLorean time machine." Marty's eyes widened. "I was able to use the time in Southdale to mentally design everything for the circuitry and electronics, so hopefully I'll be able to test it soon, and we can escape to the past."
"I'll help any way I can, Doc, I promise," Marty said eagerly. "Can we go back to the past and undo what Biff did? Restore your time line thing?"
"I would, but it carries too much risk," Doc said sadly. "First of all, we have no idea how Young Biff received the Almanac from Old Biff. We'd have no idea of where to go. Also, we'd most likely erase ourselves from existence. If Young Biff never used the Almanac, the time line would be completely different. George would be alive, I most likely would have never met Josie, we'd be friends since -- since whenever. . . . We couldn't live in that sort of world. There would already be us-es populating it. We wouldn't fit in."
"We could hide and stuff. Nobody would have to know we were around, right?"
"That's not quite what I meant, Marty. Let me use an example from other Marty's life. He pushed George out of the way of a car. The car was supposed to hit George. That's how his parents originally met. If his parents never met, they couldn't fall in love, get married, or have kids. The ripple effect was slowly erasing him and his brother and sister from the time line."
"Ripple effect?"
"My name for the force that makes sure that paradoxes cannot occur, or that foreign time line objects remain in the time line. If he hadn't succeeded in getting George and Lorraine together, eventually he would have been completely erased from existence."
Marty looked lost. "But if I -- he -- was never born, he couldn't go back and stop them from meeting."
"You've got it, Marty. The situation has the other Marty existing and not existing at the same time. That violates all natural laws. So a paradox is created, and you know what happens next."
"How does that apply to getting the almanac away from Biff?" Marty wondered.
"We're changing the time line, just as other Marty did. We would exist as we do now. So we would be erased from existence, replaced by our other selves. And if worst came to worst, create a paradox in the process."
"But how?" Marty asked, then caught on. "Hey, but our other selves wouldn't have a reason to go back and get the almanac from Biff. So he keeps it, we come back. . . ."
"Precisely," Doc sighed. "Nothing would make me feel better than to get revenge on that bastard, but it would have to be in the here and now. And judging from the current state of affairs, that would be a very dangerous move. I don't want to jeopardize either of our existences by revealing myself. Especially if Biff suspects I'm alive."
Marty looked rather disappointed. "I really want to get back at him. Do to him what he did to me. Are you sure it wouldn't work to just take it away from him?"
"I can't be positive, but I can base my theory on what I knew in 1955. Sorry. Maybe someday, when it's safer, we'll have our revenge." Doc came closer to him. "But right now, I don't want to lose the only family I have. Marty, back in 1955, I felt exactly like your father. I would do anything for you. Let me be your father again."
Marty looked at him. His need was genuine, it was easy to see. And, to tell the truth, Marty wanted the same thing. Of course, it had only been 4 days. But he had never felt so at ease around anyone. His only memories of his real father were blurry and dull. He had wanted a family so badly too. . . . Sure, he had loved George McFly.
But after hearing all this, about how Doc had been waiting to be with him for over 30 years, he felt he could love Doc too, no problem. He smiled and held out his arms. "Sure thing, Doc -- Dad?"
Doc stared at him a moment, then pulled him close. "Dad. I've always wanted to hear that word connected with me." He patted Marty's back tenderly. "Do you mean that? Do you really want to call me Dad? Or are you just going along with me?"
"It feels a little weird," Marty admitted. "I mean, you've been feeling that way for -- what? 30 years? I've been feeling like that for 10 minutes."
"You don't have to call me that if you don't want to. I won't mind."
Marty shrugged. "I think I need a while to get used to the idea." Then he smiled. "But you can call me your kid, no problem."
Doc gave Marty a gentle squeeze. "Ich liebe Dich, mien Sohn," he murmured, recalling that nice night.
"What's that mean, Doc?" Marty asked, shifting around in his new father's embrace.
"It's German. It means, 'I love you, my son'."
"Oh. Then -- what's 'father'?"
"Vater." Doc said, puzzled.
Marty snuggled into him, feeling warm and safe. "Ich liebe Dich, Vater," he whispered, ignoring the weirdness for the moment. "I mean it too."
Doc smiled and pulled Marty closer. Okay, Biff, much as I hate to admit it -- I owe you one. Marty is definitely worth your life.
