Part One

The Shapes of Things To Come

Chapter One

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"Tiii-iii-iiime...is on my side...yes it is."

The band crooned the old Rolling Stones song with somewhat more harmony than its original creators. A few resolute couples were revolving on the dance floor, but for the most part, the guests had returned to their tables to nibble at cheese and refill their cups of wine and rum punch. After a day of pageantry and a night of wildness, the party was finally, slowly, winding down.

Marty McFly took off his bowtie and loosened his collar. He sat back in his seat and put an arm around Jennifer. She snuggled up against him and nibbled playfully at his ear, making him laugh. She had to push aside his hair to do that, now. Marty was getting a little shaggy.

Her lover was older than he had been when she first fell in love with him. There were more lines in his face. More care in his eyes. He was kind, and thoughtful, and he treated her like an equal, a friend and confidant- not a subordinate 'wife'. But sometimes she missed the old Marty.

"Pretty crazy stuff, huh?" He said to her. "The whole wedding thing."

She nodded. "Feels like we just graduated."

"You don't regret doing it, do you?"

"Are you kidding?" She sat up in her chair until she was level with his eyes. "Marty, I'm so crazy about you, if you hadn't asked me to marry you, I would have knocked you down and sat on you until you did."

"Oh yeah?" He grinned, and some of the old Marty came through. "You can sit on me anytime you like."

She slapped him on the shoulder. "Dirty."

"That's me."

"Seriously, though. Are you completely okay with this?"

He picked up his glass of champagne and sipped at it. "I think so, yeah. I don't mean I want to settle down, do the whole house-kids-steady job gig, but I want to spend my life with you. Think you can deal with someone as crazy as me for that long?"

"You'd better believe it. And a good thing, too. Do you know you sound like Doctor Brown sometimes?"

"Yeah..." Marty ran a hand through his hair. "I miss him."

"I know."

"...anyway," He shook himself visibly out of the thought. "What do you think about the hair?"

She drew her fingers through it. "Mm. Going to take some getting used to. How long are you going to keep it?"

"I don't know yet. I think I'll just let it grow and go from there." He blinked. "Jennifer, what's wrong?"

She was looking over his shoulder. "Marty, there's a man staring at you."

"You always say...that you want to be free..."

He turned. Behind him, standing still as a statue amid the crowd, was a tall, wiry man in spectacles and tuxedo. His frizzy brown hair flowed every which way, and probably would have fallen to his shoulders, had it been inclined to lay flat, which it wasn't. The man had a sallow complexion and deep, sunken cheeks. He might have been as young as Marty, or as much as ten years older. His features were bony, his nose was large and hawkish.

"Do you know him?"

Marty shook his head. "No. You?"

"No." She looked back at the man, whose eerie, unblinking gaze hadn't wavered from Marty. "What are you going to do?"

"Go talk to him, I guess." He stood up.

"Marty..."

Marty turned, and put his hand in hers. "We're in the middle of a party. If he wants to make trouble he's at least going to wait until we leave. I'll be okay."

He turned away from her, and threaded his way through the party, until he stood in front of the man.

"All right. What?"

Marty decided he was looking at a young man after all, only one weighted down by unknown concerns. There were dark circles under his blue bombardier's eyes.

"Are you Martin McFly?"

"Who wants to know?"

"You are, aren't you?"

Marty stuck his hands in his pockets. "Sure. What do you want?"

"You're a friend of Doctor Emmett Brown, yes?"

"I knew him, yeah. Look, man-"

"Have you seen him recently?"

"Uh, no, not really." He didn't like the way the conversation was going.

"Not really, or not at all?"

"Not at all. I haven't seen him in a couple of years. I heard he got into some trouble with terrorists a while back."

"So I have heard." The man cocked his head. "So you would swear you have neither seen or heard anything from Doctor Brown since 1985?"

"Yeah, sure."

"I don't believe you, Mr. McFly."

"Look, I don't know who you are, but I bet you didn't get invited to this party, so either you can start explaining what you're doing here, and why you're grilling me about some crazy scientist I haven't seen in years, or you can make like a-"

"My name is David Brown," said the man. "My father is Alexander Brown. My uncle is Doctor Emmett Brown."

"Oh..." Marty felt the world tilting around him. "I didn't know the Doc had a brother."

"Had is the appropriate word."

"What?"

"That's why I'm here, Mr. McFly. That's why I want to know about Doctor Brown. I've come here to tell him that his brother is dead."