Chapter Three

Saturday, October 25th, 1985

11:20 PM

All was well along the quiet suburbs of Riverside Drive. The Burger King had just closed down for the night and after the lights faded, the street fell as silent as it was dark. The moon seemed to be the only light shining besides the harsh glare of street lamps the adorned either side of the road. It was quiet, peaceful.

For about three seconds.

BANG! BANG! BANG! If anyone was asleep, they were awake now. And if anyone was awake, they probably wondered what that obscene noise was. But the folks of Riverside Drive had learned that living next door to wacky, wild-eyed neighbor like Doc Brown meant enduring his scientific experiments to their fullest extent.

But for Marty and Doc, that noise was a relief that once again, a flawless jump through the space-time continuum had been completed. Were it not for the dark street, some poor soul would've have called the police or fainted at the sight of a Delorean appearing out of nowhere in the night sky and landing on the pavement outside Doc's lab.

But it was clear that after the Delorean's wheels returned to their normal position and flux capacitor cooled down that something was amiss. It wasn't the time; Marty looked at the display and saw the correct date. It was only moments after he dusted Needles' truck. Only now, Needles' truck was no where to be found.

Yeah, Marty thought, If I saw a Delorean disappear I'd probably high-tail it out of here too. I should probably lock up my truck.

Only Marty's truck was not in the driveway. In fact, like the red Ford, it was no where to be found.

"Doc?" Marty asked, "Where's my truck?" Actually, it was a dumb question. How should Doc know where the heck Marty's truck was?

The teenager looked up at the lab as the Delorean's gull-wing doors opened. He half expected Doc to go into a fit of rage when he saw what had happened to the lab's roof, but the Doc never made a sound. He simply muttered to himself about how he could fashion a power relay system for the train's hover circuits so they couldn't be fried so easily. But the reason Doc didn't blow up was simple.

Nothing was wrong with the lab's roof. Not a scratch or a missing shingle or nothing. It was like Marty's run-in with Needles had never happened.

Had never happened.

Something had changed. Big time. Marty didn't know what, but that last time he tried to make a better future, his greed got the best of him and turned Hill Valley into an alternate universe. More like Hell Valley. Marty shuddered at the memory.

"Doc," Marty said, "I got this funny feeling…"

"Me too," Doc said, "The flight circuits aren't where I left them. Clara's right, I am getting scatter-brained." Doc waded around a few more piles of odds and ends before he grasped a ream of papers that rested just outside the door.

"Well, at least the newspaper is where is should be." The scientist said as he set it down on an already cluttered work bench and continued his search. Marty grabbed the paper and stepped out into the light so he could read.

The first thing that caught his eye was headline. It was in big block letters that a blind man could read. From about three-hundred yards away. The words jumped out at Marty and slapped him in the face.

LOCAL SCIENTIST FOUND DEAD

Early this morning, Police discovered the remains of local resident Emmett L. Brown, shot to death, in the parking lot of the Lone Pine Mall complex. The body was discovered at 6:00 am when a security guard noticed Brown's van parked next to the burning remains of minivan.

Along with an automatic rifle police believe to be the weapon that killed brown, the missing vials of plutonium from the nuclear plant in Arizona were also uncovered, but it is unknown what Brown's intentions of using the plutonium were.

Marty never screamed so hard in his life.

"DOOOOOOOOOOOCCCCCCCCC!" Whoever hadn't been awakened by the Delorean was certainly awake after that scream. Doc bolted straight up from underneath a cabinet and bounded over the piles of junk to Marty's location.

"What is it, Marty?" Doc said, noticing the chalk-white look on the teenager's face. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Doc, Look at this!" Marty plastered the paper in Doc's face. The old scientist gasped almost as loud as Marty had screamed.

"Holy Socrates! Where did you get this?"

"It's the paper, Doc! Look at the date! It's today's paper!"

"Great Scott! Why am I dead! Again!" Doc had to find out. He tore through the paper for any sign of it being a hoax. Instead, all he found was another disturbing story on page eight. Now it was Doc's turn to give Marty bad news.

HILL VALLEY TEEN MISSING

Police have started a city-wide manhunt today to ascertain the fate of Hill Valley High student Martin Seamus McFly. Martin was reported missing by his parents at 7 o'clock this morning. So far, there have been no leads as to the young man's whereabouts.

Marty was solemn and shared a grim expression with Doc.

"Doc, this is heavy!" the teenager was stunned with disbelief.

"It doesn't make sense!" Doc said over and over as he paced back and forth frantically on the driveway. Doc always paced rapidly when he was nervous or disturbed. Right now, the situation warranted pacing.

"What got reversed? Nothing changed in 1941! Marty?"

"It wasn't me, Doc. I didn't do anything! I swear!"

"As much as I want to believe you, you must tell in perfect detail the events of your trip." Marty recounted the facts carefully.

"I got to 1941 and I hid the Delorean, then I went and found you! There's no chance I did anything!"

An idea popped in Doc's mind like a light bulb going off. His eyes suddenly got wide as the idea turned into a thought.

"The Court House!"

"What?"

"If we want to find out what happened in 1941, we'll go to the Court House and look at the archives!"

"Great idea, Doc, but the Court House is closed."

"Marty…" Doc said, giving him the look again, "I'm a man of many means."

- - - - -

It was now raining in Hill Valley 1985. The weather only complimented what was turning out to be another nightmare for Doc and Marty. The Delorean's wipers were cranked at full blast as the car trudged on through the downpour. It took a good fifteen minutes to get there, so Marty thought it was a good time to talk.

"Doc," Marty said, "I just gotta know one thing; what the heck happened to the other Delorean."

"The other Delorean? Oh no, no. This is the very same Delorean you remember. Piece for piece."

"How?"

"Remember this?" Doc said, holding up a black electronic object, "It's the sleep inducing Alpha Rhythm generator. After I built the train, I went back to the moment you came back from 1885 and switched cars. I knocked you out with this."

"Really?"

"Yes. I'm sorry though; I gave you a little too much and you barely got out of the way of that train."

"Why Doc? What about that stuff you said about changing history?"

"I couldn't leave working components of the time circuits or the flux capacitor out in the open for anyone to see. If that knowledge got into the wrong hands, the results could be…"

"…Disastrous." Marty said, completing Doc's sentence. He decided not to press the issue further. What ever Doc's reasons for preserving the Delorean, he must have thought it was important or he wouldn't have done it.

Marty glanced up at a street sign through the rain-streaked passenger window. 34th Street. They were just in front of…

Well, they should have been right in front of the Hill Valley Court House. Except that, through the downpour, neither Marty nor Doc could catch a glimpse of the building.

Another simple explanation; there was no Court House.