Chapter Four
Sunday, October 26th, 1985
1:43 AM
"It's not here, Doc!" Marty shouted over the incessant pounding of the rain. The two were standing in the very place where the Hill Valley Clock Tower should have been, but wasn't.
The fountain was there, along with the graffiti-covered park benches and gravel walkways. But a huge gap filled the stormy sky. All that remained was the concrete foundations, broken down and cracked due to years of neglect. Several rusted playground toys and swing sets glinted in the moonlight on the very place where there should have been steps leading up to the grand entrance as the wind slowly spun a vacant merry-go-round.
"I can't believe it either, Marty!" Doc shouted back. His flashlight had just caught a sign in its glare. It read "Hill Valley Memorial Park".
"Where'd the Court House go? It was just here yesterday!"
"Yesterday to you and I, perhaps." Doc corrected, "But as far as I can see, she's been gone for a long, long time."
Now Marty's flashlight caught another shiny object in its glare that wasn't supposed to be there. It was like a pedestal or something. As Marty got closer, he could see that it was a plaque. It was dedicated to the site and read:
The Hill Valley Memorial Park was erected in 1948 to commemorate the fallen heroes of the Second World War. This site was formerly the location of the Hill Valley Court House, erected in 1885, but was never completed.
"Why wouldn't they complete it?" Marty asked after Doc read the plaque?
"I don't know!" Doc said as he spun around and marched back to the Delorean, "But I intend to find out!"
"Where are we going?" Marty called through the rain as ran to catch up to the scientist.
"There's at least got to be a library around here somewhere if they haven't torn that down too!"
Marty smiled. Doc was always thinking on the bright side.
They were just nearing the Delorean when a police officer approached them. Marty recognized him right away. It was officer Warrick. The guy was a real jerk. He had given Marty hid first ticket for going only five over in a thirty-five zone. Marty knew he had singled him out because all the other cars were flying by him like he was standing still. This time, though, it didn't look like Officer Warrick was going to give Marty any trouble.
He was wrong.
"Hey!" The officer shouted, "You're the McFly kid! We've been looking all over Hill Valley for your sorry butt! You really got the nerve to try to disappear like that!"
Marty smacked himself in the head. Of Course! Everyone thought he was missing. But why? That didn't make any sense.
"Come on, Marty!" Doc shouted, "We don't have time, officer."
"Says who?" Warrick asked, readying his gun.
"Doctor Emmett L. Brown!" Doc said indignantly.
"Nice try, pops, but old man Brown was shot dead this morning."
"Come on, Marty! Get in the Delorean now!" Marty ran for the Delorean as Doc pushed him inside. Doc jumped at the officer and punched him in the face.
POW! Officer Warrick fell down like a sac of potatoes.
"We'd better get outta here, Doc!" As Doc shifted the Delorean into first, Officer Warrick came around. He shook his eyes as he watched the Delorean peel out of sight. He ran across the park and into his patrol car. The radio was the first thing he grabbed.
"All units! All units! I have a location on the McFly kid. He's being kidnapped by an old coot claiming to be Doc Brown! He's fleeing west on 35th street!" Officer Warrick's patrol car's light rack flickered to life.
"Unit twelve, what is the make and color of the suspect vehicle?"
"It's a grey Delorean; modified!"
"That is confirmed; sending units en route."
The chase of Doc and Marty's life was on!
- - - - -
The Delorean bounded along 35th Street as Marty unfolded a map that was in the glove compartment.
"Doc, we gotta turn left up here at this light and then go straight until we hit the library!"
"Okay," Doc said, "Hang on!"
Up ahead, through the rain, Marty and Doc saw two patrol cars converge on an intersection. The officers parked and got out of their vehicles, guns drawn on the Delorean.
"Doesn't look like they're gonna just lets us go willingly." Doc flipped a few switches and the Delorean started to lift up. Marty heard the cracking noises of guns being fired.
"They're shooting at us, Doc!" Doc didn't respond, but kept the Delorean in a tight upward spin as he turned of the headlights. Marty could see the officers below scrambling to see where the flying car had gone.
Hmph! Doc thought indignantly, They act like they've never seen a flying Delorean before. Then chuckled as he thought; They've probably just wet themselves!
"Doc! The library's over there!" Marty pointed.
"They'll never suspect we went to the library, much less landed on the roof!"
Doc cranked the wheel again and the Delorean swung in a wide arc for the roof of the library. He set down upon the roof with a dull thud and secretly hoped no one was still inside. But it was Saturday, and the Hill Valley State Library was always closed on Saturdays.
"Let's go, Marty!" Doc said, "I don't want to spend another second in this alternate timeline!"
"You don't have to tell me twice." Marty said. The two time travelers walked over to a skylight and Doc and Marty gingerly lifted the cover as quietly as they could while the drone of police sirens echoed in the background.
Once the lid was off, Marty was the first one to jump through the opening. He landed on the library's tacky red carpet and immediately made his way to the directory. It hadn't changed since Marty and the Doc of 1955 came here to find out information about the real Doc's whereabouts in 1885.
Shortly, Doc also came bounding down the skylight and walked over to where Marty was standing. He disappeared and then shortly reappeared with a large book in his hand.
"I think this is what you're looking for." Doc said proudly as he set the book down and flipped through the pages. The old leather cover read "History of Hill Valley: 1850-1950".
"Hey there it is!" Marty said, "I remember that!" The picture he was pointing to framed the Hill Valley Court House as it was when construction started in 1885. If Marty wasn't mistaken, it was taken the day after Buford "Mad Dog" Tannen tried to hang Marty aka Clint Eastwood.
"What does it say, Marty? I forgot my reading glasses."
Marty recited the ancient book's text aloud:
"In 1885, work began on what was to become the Hill Valley Court House. Hopes were high for the new building, which was to be the first permanent construction in Hill Valley. However, in 1941, only days after the tragic attack on Pearl Harbor, the government cut funding to the 56-year project in favor of supplying troops with more automatic rifles to sway the tide of World War II. The citizens of Hill Valley sent many letters in protest, but not enough of the letters were collected to save the Court House. The site was demolished in favor of the Hill Valley Memorial Park in 1948."
"What?" Doc said, "There were plenty of letters! My own father sent one!"
Marty slowly realized his mistake. The truck. The letters.
"Doc, that's it!" Marty exclaimed, "The mail truck?"
"Mail truck? What mail truck?"
"The one I almost creamed on Riverside! The one that left all those…letters!"
"Marty how could you?"
"I'm sorry Doc, I was in such a hurry to find you and I…"
"Marty, Marty. You did a very noble thing coming to my rescue. Again. But this event must be reversed!"
"So they don't build the Court House," Marty said, "I feel bad and all, but who cares about a Court House?"
"Marty! Don't you understand the consequences? If those letters never reach the government, the Court House will never be finished. If it is demolished in 1948, lightning will never strike it…" Marty could see where Doc was going and he didn't like it.
"Lightning can't strike something that isn't there. If lightning never strikes the Court House, you will never be sent back to 1985 during the Hill Valley lightning storm! That event on the night of November 12th 1955 is pivotal our existence in the future!"
"So we go back to 1955 and tell the other you and the other me how to get the Delorean back to the future."
"Marty! You're not listening! Meeting our other selves could create a time paradox which could destroy the space time continuum!"
"Oh, right," Marty said quietly, "I forgot about that."
"We have to cut this snake off at the head. We must go back to 1941, shortly after your encounter with the mail truck. Then we have to get those letters delivered back to government by any and all means possible."
That was the plan, and quite frankly, it was the best one. Probably the only one that had a chance of working.
"Doc, why do have to cut these things so dang close?" Marty asked as they climbed back out of the library skylight. Of course, nothing was really convenient about not existing or being dead. But when Marty and Doc saw what had happened to the Delorean, death didn't sound so menacing.
The Delorean was, for the most part, okay. It had suffered no damage whatsoever in their little run-in with the police. It was something further back in the car that disturbed them.
Ah yes, the little white appliance from the future. The one that was necessary for fusion to happen. You guessed it; Mr. Fusion.
Only now, Mr. Fusion was no longer attached to the Delorean. It seemed that Hill Valley's finest were better shots then Marty or Doc thought.
Yes indeed. They were stuck in a time line where they didn't belong. Again.
"Great Scott! They got Mr. Fusion!" Doc yelled as if own of his own children had been kidnapped.
"You mean we're stuck here?" Marty said, "Again?" This was all a little too familiar than either Marty or Doc cared to remember. Being stuck in a time period were they didn't belong in the first place was one thing, but being the right time period, but with the wrong past behind them was another.
It was at that time that Marty noticed something wrong with the Doc. He was a little paler than usual. Much paler.
"Doc, are you feeling alright?" Marty asked. Doc Brown was now hunched over and grabbing his side.
"No, Marty! I feel terrible!" Doc said, falling to the ground.
"What's wrong?"
"Oh my god! My hand! Look at my hand!"
"It's fading!" Marty exclaimed. He was right; Doc's hand was becoming almost transparent. The Doc was ceasing to exist!
"What do I do, Doc?" Marty screamed.
"The station…" Doc gasped, "Get to the police station."
"The police? Why?"
"They probably still have…the plutonium cores!" Doc was fading fast now.
"How do I get them?"
"However…you can!" Doc said with his last breath, "Hurry!" With that, he completely faded from existence. Marty grabbed his forehead. This was worse than when he had watch Doc get shot by those Libyans.
Marty glanced at the Delorean. He had never learned to fly, much less pilot a flying car, something was never meant to fly in the first place.
He would have to learn fast.