Chapter 7

Thursday, February 19th, 1987

Trilogy Hill Valley

7:57 P.M.

Mystie looked over at Clara. "So -- you're Clara," she blurted, unable to think of anything better to say.

Clara nodded, looking from her unconscious husband to Mystie and back. "Who are you?"

"Mysteria Jones Brown. That Emmett's wife." She pointed to the unconscious Doc. "And I'm sure you know Marty." She looked between the two teenagers. "Well, a Marty."

"Do you need a hand?" Marty offered cautiously. He didn't want to upset Clara, knowing how she might react.

"Well, if you can get those two awake again, I'd appreciate it," Clara said. "There's some smelling salts upstairs in our bedroom cupboard."

A sudden groan from Emmett told them the salts wouldn't be necessary. "Great Scott," he mumbled, sitting up.

"You okay?" Marty asked.

"Yes." He looked over at his other self. "No."

"Mama, help?" Verne asked, voice muffled by the gag.

"Oh, coming dear." Clara quickly untied Verne and their Martin. "Emmett, do you have any idea why your other self looks like that?"

"None. Why does he look like that?" Emmett asked Mystie.

"Well -- apparently he was just too tired to return to normal-looking," Mystie non-explained. "My poor baby. . . ."

"You know what I mean. Don't skirt the issue."

Mystie and Marty looked at each other nervously. "Um -- well -- our Doc's a vampire," Marty said. "And so's Mystie. It's a really long story."

Everyone stared at him. "Vampire?" Emmett repeated. "Vampires don't exist."

"Then you explain why he has fangs," Mystie said. "Where we come from, vampires do exist. I don't know about this world."

"But -- but look at the definition of a vampire!"

"Then throw it out the window," Mystie said firmly. "Most of what's commonly 'known' about vampires is utter bull. Including the fact that we're all evil," she added, glancing back at Clara.

"Your Emmett Brown probably just saved our lives," Clara said softly. "I wouldn't think he's evil for that." She looked down at her feet, blushing. "In fact, now I feel really guilty about threatening him with the shotgun."

"Excuse me!"

"I panicked! The only other alternate Emmett Brown I've ever dealt with was trying to kill me! I didn't know what this one could do."

"It's okay. Your Emmett explained it all to us." Mystie used her own fangs to bite her wrist, prompting starts from Emmett and Clara. She held the bloody flesh to Doc's lips. He stirred, took a weak lick, then fainted again. "He's really out," she said, worried. "It must be from all the sunlight."

"Guess we're going to need the smelling salts after all," Clara said. "Would you like any help getting him upstairs?"

"Mystie and I can manage," Marty assured her. "You'd better do something about the Wonder Twins." He made a face. "So Biff had twins in this reality?"

"Unfortunately, yes. Bill's not that bad usually, but Jiff's definitely his father's kid," Martin replied, making his own face. He shook his head. "This is weird. I mean, I've seen myself before, but -- well, not like this. This takes the cake."

"I'm telling you. The only other me I've seen was my 47-year-old self." He looked over at Jiff. "So how do you want to do this?"

Emmett took charge. "We'll pull Jiff upstairs and phone the police. You can put your Dr. Brown in our master bedroom and grab the smelling salts. Just keep him out of the way until we're done."

"Sounds good to me. Where is the master bedroom?"

"We'll show you," Jules offered.

"Good boy, Jules," Emmett said proudly. He and Clara grabbed Jiff and hauled him back upstairs, followed by Martin. Mystie looked over at Marty. "Well, that gave me a bit of a chill. I wonder how Emmett is going to react when he comes round?"

"He'll have to admit it was his own fault we had to blab," Marty shrugged, picking up Doc's feet. "Personally, I'm just glad he's here and all right."

"Me too." She put a hand on Marty's shoulder. "You're not feeling his exhaustion, are you?"

"Not really, but I did get some flashes from him earlier. You were right -- too much time awake in the sun coupled with too much stress."

"What are you talking about?" Verne asked curiously.

Mystie looked at him. "Do you understand about different dimensions?" They shook their heads. "Then I wouldn't worry about it just at the moment. Your mom and dad can explain it better than I can."

The kids were satisfied with this. "Okay. Come on, the bedroom is this way."

Mystie kissed Doc as she lifted him. "My poor baby. I just hope that, once he revives, we can get to the bottom of this whole realities mess."

Thursday, February 19th

8:33 P.M.

Great Scott, how can a smell so awful even exist

Doc opened his eyes to find a great mass of white before him. It took him a moment to realize it was a pillow, and that his face was mashed into it. He frowned. But if my nose is here, how can I be smelling that smell?

"Good, he's up."

"Great," came Marty's strangled voice. Doc turned his head to see Mysteria and Marty standing beside him. Marty was holding a bottle of smelling salts under his nose. "That's cheating," he blurted, stunned.

"It worked, didn't it?" Marty said, gratefully capping the bottle. "It's good to see ya, Doc."

Doc's face lit up as he realized that they were indeed really there. He sat up and grabbed the both of them in a hug. "Oh, it's good to see you too! Maybe I just dreamed that whole adventure. It was the craziest thing, Mysteria. I somehow ended up in another world where I was married to an Old West schoolteacher named Clara Clayton."

"Sorry, Doc, it's real," Marty told him, wiping his eyes. "This world's Dr. Brown managed to find a way back here so we could help you, that's all."

"That's all! Great Scott, that means we can get home!"

"Well, not right away," Mystie said with an embarrassed look. "We had to tell this other version of you what you were. He's rather insistent on learning the details now."

Doc sighed. "I see. I'm sorry about that. What with all that was going on, in such a short amount of time. . . . I honestly tried to resume normal form, but I was just too tired."

"I know, sweetie." Mystie glanced toward the door. "Want to hypnotize it out of them?"

"I don't know. I'm still feeling pretty out of it. And I do need to talk to my other self anyway. Let's play it by ear for now." He rubbed his eyes. "Where are they? Where are we, for that matter?"

"Their bedroom. They're waiting for us in the living room."

"What happened with Jiff and Bill?"

"They've been arrested. We waited for the police to leave before we woke you up."

"Good idea." Doc slowly got to his feet, yawning. "I was frightened that I was going to have to seriously hurt Jiff by the end of that fight. He's much crueler here than he is in our reality."

"Maybe because he has a twin brother to beat up here," Marty shrugged, helping Doc steady himself. "Is there anything we can get you?"

"Honestly, a drink would be nice. Probably clear my head a little more."

"Got one right here," Mystie said, putting his mouth against her neck. Doc gratefully extended his fangs and sucked for a few minutes. "Thanks," he said, feeling much more refreshed. "Lead on."

Clara, Emmett, and Martin were waiting on the couch for them in the living room. "Glad to see you awake and upright," Emmett said. "No ill effects I hope?"

"None that'll last. Where's your sons?"

"I sent them upstairs to play," Clara said. "We promised them that we'd explain as soon as we could. I didn't want them to be frightened any more than they already were."

Martin couldn't stop staring at his alternate self. "I can't get over this. You guys are from another reality."

"I saw it myself, Marty," Emmett said. "You really shouldn't look so stunned. It's not like we haven't see alternate realities before."

"Yeah, but nothing like this."

"I imagine it would be pretty hard to see yourselves when one of you's been committed and the other is stuck in Switzerland," Doc interjected.

Emmett blinked. "How'd you know about that?"

"I've been reading your journals," Doc confessed. "I was hoping they'd help me understand what was going on with this dimension."

"Did they?"

"Yes, sort of. It looks like the split in our time-lines was caused by one decision -- what date we went to the future. I visited 2015 on the 21st, you visited it on the 26th."

Emmett frowned. "Why the 21st?"

"Well, why the 26th? I just picked a random date."

"I wanted to make it an even 30 years, honestly. So, you were there to see Marty Junior with Griff! Why didn't you do anything?"

Doc suddenly blushed. "I -- uh -- did. I didn't realize what was going on at the time, of course, all I saw was Marty's son being bullied. I snapped and--" his voiced dropped "-- kicked him in the nads."

Emmett and Martin burst into laughter. "Oh man, that's exactly what I did!" Martin snickered. "The guy doesn't seem to listen to anything else."

Doc couldn't help but smile. "That's probably true. I've read about your adventures in 2015, I'm glad you were able to keep your son from going to jail. I also, ironically enough, ended up in a similar position to your Jennifer -- although in my case it was voluntary."

"You voluntarily got yourself stuck in my future house?"

"Curiosity killed the cat," Doc shrugged. "I was able to escape without incident, luckily."

"Good." Emmett leaned forward, looking curious. "So how much do you know of my life? I've been keeping a diary ever since 1950, although I lost the earliest volumes in the fire."

"All of your adventures, up until the Eastwood dedication."

Emmett looked suddenly uncomfortable. "I see. I must have looked like an over-emotional fool."

Marty frowned. "Eastwood dedication?"

"It's a really long story," Martin said. "When I was in the Old West with my Doc, I went under the name Clint Eastwood. So when I went back to the future, everyone though I had crashed with the train we'd hijacked, so they named the ravine after 'me.' I guess you're talking about some sort of formal ceremony?"

Doc nodded. "I sort of know how you felt," he told Emmett. "My Marty was nearly strangled by another vampire, a soulless one."

"Were you the cause?" Emmett asked darkly.

"He might have been," Mysteria spoke up, blushing. "Sorry honey, but we did toss around the idea that Sucker was doing it to get back into Biff's good graces after accidentally changing you."

"Fair enough," Doc admitted. "But I certainly never meant for him to get hurt."

"There's that vampire business again," Clara said, looking puzzled. "I still don't understand how you three can claim to be vampires."

Doc allowed his fangs to extend. Clara turned pale and scooted closer to her husband. Emmett stared. "Great Scott. But really, how can that be? Even to develop the fangs, you'd have to go through some serious genetic changes."

"Exactly. Vampirism is a sort of disease. From what I've discovered about it, it does rewrite your DNA to make room for various 'improvements.'"

"Incredible."

Clara glanced at Mysteria. "And you're a vampire too."

"Born in Puritian times," Mysteria nodded, obligingly flashing her fangs again. "I had the bad luck to be vampirized around the time of the Salem witch trials."

"You poor dear. My maternal great-great-grandmother was around during that time. Her sister was imprisoned in Andover for a short while, before her friend managed to buy her way out." Clara smiled a little. "The story was passed down from mother to daughter in my family, apparently to discourage witchcraft."

"Huh. Maybe I knew her. What was your great-great-grandmother's name?"

Clara thought hard for a few moments. "I'm almost certain it was Constance. Constance Vanity Jones."

Mysteria turned dead white. "Oh my God. That's my sister."

There was a period of silence as everyone digested that. Finally Doc coughed. "Maybe we have a weakness for girls from the same bloodline."

"Possibly. We'd have to see a third related wife to make it official, though, and I don't feel like going to find her."

"Do you really think it's possible you'd marry three different women?" Martin frowned.

"If in my own reality, I can be a vampire, I think anything's possible," Doc said.

Martin cast a glance at Marty. "You aren't -- ah--"

"Not until I'm 45," Marty said, holding up a hand. "Jennifer and I are sorta in-between right now."

"Yes, if you drink vampire blood, you gain some vampire abilities," Doc nodded. "Heal some minor injuries quickly, increased strength and stamina, and have a special bond with the vampire who's blood you drank. The bond itself is called a blood-link."

"So that's how you knew he was here," Emmett said to Marty. "I suppose that means you two are unusually close, right?"

"Well, closer than most people," Marty shrugged. "I mean, I am feeling his heartbeat constantly."

Emmett sighed. "Incredible. Simply incredible."

"I don't think it's really that more incredible than anything you've gone through. Besides which, we've actually shared a number of time travel experiences. We've both seen Biff-ruled worlds--"

"How bad was yours?" Martin interrupted, curious. "Biff was my stepfather in the world we saw."

"How does Biff as a vampire strike you?" Marty replied.

Everyone shuddered. "And we've both had to deal with Buford Tannen in the Old West."

"That lout," Clara muttered.

"Tell me about it," Mysteria scowled. "Filly. Bastard."

Emmett decided it was time to get down to brass tacks. "What I want to know is how we ended up traversing dimensions in the first place. I certainly didn't set out with that as my goal."

"Me either. My only goal was to test my newest invention, the--"

"Temporal Displacement Locator," everyone chorused, causing both Doc and Emmett to blush. "We know."

"I suspect the TDL could be the cause," Emmett said. "Maybe its addition altered enough of the electronics in the car to change it from a mere time machine to a dimensional travel machine."

"If that's the case, every time we used the TDL, we'd end up dimension hopping," Doc said reasonably. "I was able to travel back to Hill Valley with it and not end up in another dimension yet again."

"Good point," Emmett admitted. "We also traveled to Seattle with no problems. So that theory is non-viable."

"Maybe not -- how did you get back to this dimension with Mysteria and Marty?"

"Well, upon traveling back to Seattle, we discovered this strange 'ripple' floating in the air. When we passed through that, we found ourselves in this dimension. I suppose you could call it a 'dimensional door.'"

"I see." Doc frowned, deep in thought. "When did you test your time machine?"

"Today at 5:57 P.M."

"Same here. I wonder if that had anything to do with it."

"Could, Doc," Marty said. "I mean, you were both at the same place, at the same time, testing the same invention, and when you actually time traveled. . . ."

"We did it at the same time," Emmett finished. "That could be it. Simultaneous time travel. Maybe it put too much of a stress on the space-time continuum, and that caused a rip between dimensions, which we passed through."

Doc chewed his lower lip. "But that means any time either of us makes a time trip, were' in danger of heading into a different dimension."

"That's true, but the odds must be very slim. My family, Marty, and I have probably made -- over 20 trips through time and nothing like this has happened until now. What about you?"

"I'd say about 20 too, maybe a few less," Doc nodded. "Although that seems to disprove the theory that we 'ripped' a hole between dimensions through simultaneous time travel."

"Ah, but that takes us back to the addition of the TDL. The addition--"

Emmett paused as he realized the Martys, Clara, and Mystie were starting to snigger. "What's so funny?"

"Just -- hearing you debate yourself," Clara said, trying to keep a straight face. "It's just -- what's the word? Surreal?"

"Exactly," Mystie agreed. "I mean, you do mutter to yourself, but this--" she broke down giggling again.

Doc and Emmett looked at each other, then had to laugh too. "I see what you mean. This is rather odd. Anyway, The addition of something designed to help us transverse space as well as time would probably make it more likely for us to be able to transverse dimensions. We're traveling across more of the space-time continuum now."

"You've got a point," Doc admitted. "Maybe I should remove the TDL."

"Oh, honey, you've been working on that all summer," Mystie said. "I don't think you should just give it up."

"Yeah, Doc, just because this happened once doesn't mean it'll always happen," Marty agreed. "I think it's a cool addition to the time machine."

"Yeah, me too," Martin said with a slight grin.

Doc looked thoughtful. "But what if I do this switching with another time traveler? If you take into account a theory of infinite universes, I could switch dimensions with any time traveler if we happened to activate our machines at the same moment."

"Like I said, the odds are against it," Emmett reminded him. "I'd call this scenario a million-to-one shot."

"And anyway, anyone smart enough to invent time travel would be pretty sympathetic to your cause," Clara said. "Now that we know what could happen, it should be easier to fix if it ever happens again."

Doc nodded. "You're right. I can't worry constantly about what might happen. Otherwise I'll turn into a nervous wreck."

"You think you would have learned that from your first date with Mystie," Marty gently ragged. "I'm telling you, he was worse than my dad with Lorraine."

"I was not," Doc blushed.

"Honey, we all know you were a wreck," Mystie said, stroking his hair.

"If he had two girlfriends named Lucy Childs and Jill Wooster, I think he deserves to be nervous around women," Emmett said, scowling. "Even I felt rather nervous around Clara -- probably more so since she occupied a special role in the space-time continuum."

Clara kissed his cheek. "It all worked out, right? We're married and have two wonderful boys."

"And we just got married, and I'm eager to get back for my honeymoon," Mysteria said.

"Yeah, our Jennifer's going to be worried sick about us," Marty admitted. "So, do we just take our Doc in our DeLorean back through that ripple again?"

"That would be the easiest option, yes, but I'm a little concerned about leaving that doorway open," Emmett said.

"Me too," Doc agreed. "It's probably in commercial airspace -- what happens if a plane flies through?"

"I don't really want to know. However, I have a plan. If we recreate the conditions that opened the door in the first place, that should reverse the effect and send us back to our proper dimensions."

"What if it doesn't work?"

"Then hopefully the doorway will remain open and we can just switch back the 'easy' way. Then we'll see if we can do anything about it in the correct dimensions."

Doc looked at Mystie. "It's worth a try. The thought of a permanent doorway between our dimensions is just too frightening to me. Too much risk of an accident."

"So I'll go back with you, we'll both return to Seattle, and make another simultaneous time trip in the exact same spot. A minute's jump into the future from 8:54 should be fine. If all goes well, we should pass through again and close the passage."

"One caveat," Doc said, lifting a finger. "You aim slightly to the right, I'll aim slightly to the left. I don't want to see what would happen if we managed to crash into each other."

Emmett shuddered. "Good point. Well, then, I'll see you in a few minutes, Clara."

"Oh, Emmett, be careful," Clara said, kissing him. "I don't want to lose you."

"You'd better come back safe," Mystie almost threatened Doc. "I still need to punish you for getting us into this stupid mess." She abruptly threw her arms around him. "Please be safe, sweetie. Losing you by any other means would be tragic, but losing you in a temporal accident would be just too much."

"I promise, I'll do everything I can to come out of this in one piece," Doc said gently. He kissed her nose. "And I'll let you do anything you want to me, I promise."

Emmett turned to Martin. "I'll be back, Futureboy," he said, warmly embracing him.

"I'll be waiting. I know you'll come back safe. You're the Doc."

Marty squeezed Doc in a mirror image of their counterparts. "Yeah. You've escaped this sort of shit enough times. I think you can pull it off again."

Doc rolled his eyes. "I certainly hope so. I'll see you in a little bit."

Emmett pulled himself free of Martin's arms. "So, are you ready to go?"

"Well -- there is one thing I wanted to see before I left."

"Oh?"

"You mentioned in your journals that you were building a second time machine with materials from the late 1880s. I'd kind of like to see it."

Emmett smiled strangely. "You would?"