End of the Future, Part 25

That Sick Feeling

Please Read and Review. I'd like to know what I'm doing right (to keep doing it), and what I am doing wrong (to correct it).

Hill Valley, California, USA
Pohatchee Drive-In Teather
1986

"Three, two, one. Here it comes!" Marty said, chronometer in hand. Over the sand, twin lines of fire appeared as a series of thundering noises and lights appeared from thin air. Next to him, arms crossed, Dr. Egon Spengler watched, holding his own timepiece firmly in his fingers; three timepieces, perfectly synchronized. One with him, one with Marty, and the third one with Ray Stantz, who had volunteered himself for the test. Only one passenger, as the DeLorean was not spacious enough for three adults. Even Marty and Jennifer barely fit.

Sitting down on folding chairs under a foldable tent, Winston Zeddemore, along with Lorraine and George McFly kept their own watch. Behind them, Jennifer and the three former pilots watched.

The DeLorean reappeared, amidst a cloud of condensation. Slowly, it neared the waiting audience. Finally, the doors opened, and Ray Stantz bolted to behind a shrub. To everybody else's consternation, the portly man noisily emptied his stomach.

Asuka grimaced, while Shinji hurried to take a water bottle to the now panting man.

Behind the shrub, Ray swished a mouthful of water, and spat it over the mess he had just done. "Uuugh… That felt really… really… strange…" He wheezed, keeping his head low, his hands on his knees.

"Are you okay, Dr. Stantz?" Shinji asked.

"I'll be fine in a minute." He waved his hand, the timepiece visible in his palm.

The others arrived a moment later. Egon put his stethoscope on, and checked Ray's vitals. "Heart and lungs are working normally, though a bit fast. How do you feel, Ray?"

"A bit weird, Egon, but it's going away. It seems time travel doesn't agree with me." He said, wiping his mouth with a tissue. Egon looked at Ray with a strange look in his eyes, and pulled the PKE Meter from his bag. He waved it in front of Ray, then in front of Doc, Shinji, and Asuka. Then he did the same with George, Lorraine, and Winston.

"Hmm…" he said, taking notes in the small notebook he always carried with him. Then he adjusted a knob in the PKE Meter, and repeated the procedure, jotting down another set of notes.

"What?" Ray asked, a bit alarmed. "Something wrong?"

"There is some residual activity in some of our bodies." Egon explained, pushing his eyeglasses up. "Everybody who has traveled through time has one kind of residue. Winston and I have a different one. Ray, your body has both kinds of energy residue. Unless I'm wrong, our ghost busting activities exposed us to multiple types of ectoplasm for several months, and we are still carrying the residue. That residue should be.. um… eliminated eventually. But for the moment, I think we three are… erm… somewhat incompatible with time travel."

"Really?" Ray's brow wrinkled, with no little alarm. "How incompatible? Is it bad?"

"Well… I think it is enough for some minor… relatively minor symptoms. Upset stomach, maybe some joint pain, headaches, that kind of thing; like a bad case of flu should we insist on repeating the experience." He said, storing the stethoscope. "For now, just get you some Pepto and let's see if you get better."

Doc looked at Egon, grabbing his colleague by the left shoulder, "You think it could be dangerous?"

"I don't think so, but I wouldn't reccomend any of us to go on time-trips in the near future." He grimaced at the accidental pun, "At least not until we understand precisely what are the risks. However, you, Marty, Jennifer, Shinji and Asuka have not shown any adverse symptoms, I think it's the mixing of the two energies what caused Ray's inconvenience. Rei's readings are very strange. She doesn't have the same time travel residue, that could be due to her arrival a month before the others; but her PKE readings are out of the scale." He adjusted his eyeglasses again. "If the regular readings of a human being were a Twinky, Rei's would be a Twinky the size of Jack Burton's truck, including the trailer. But that would be only if she scored right at the top of the scale. She goes beyond it; at the moment, I cannot even speculate on the size of the Twinky." (1)

Winston whistled, "Could be even bigger than Gozer's Twinky."

Rei nodded. "I am an independent avatar of Lilith." She said as if that explained everything. (2) At least for Shinji and Asuka, it did.

Ray sat down on a chair Shinji had brought, along with a small shovel. Once he felt better, he said, "Here, check this." He gave Egon the time piece. Meanwhile, Shinji busied himself burying the vomit.

He compared with the others. "Plus three hours difference."

Doc nodded, "Thirty years trip into the future, we stayed three hours in Dead Valley. Though Dr. Stantz didn't show any adverse symptoms in the future, I must say." Doc looked worried.

Winston noted, "Well… maybe it is accumulative, Boss." He looked at Doc, "I mean, if Ray was fine in the future and got sick on the return trip, it might be that he could handle the first dose, but two were too much."

Doc paced around a few steps, his right hand on his forehead, as if checking his own temperature. "That could be it, yes! Though I agree with Dr. Spengler. No more time travel for you three."

Ray stood up, swaying a bit. He sat down again. "Uuhh… add light head to the list, Egon." He drank more water. "Ugh… let's not do that again, I vote for cancelling the paradox test."

"We were not doing any paradox test." Egon shook his head.

"Good, because I don't want to do that."

"What paradox test?" George and Doc asked almost at the same time.

"On the way, Ray posited that the incontrovertible proof for time travel would be to repeat your experience with your past selves. You know, when Miss Parker met you at the Mall right after Marty came back from 1955."

"That one was carefully planned, to increase our available plutonium." Doc grumbled. "Which will stay right where it is now, thanks to Mr. Fusion."

"We were going to ask you about doing something similar. But decided against it, just in case."

"Right." Doc shook his head. "Let's take a moment to breathe, then, if Dr. Stantz feels fine, we can go back to HQ, and discuss the recording he made in Dead Valley, and the samples he collected."

Later

The group went back to Brown Enterprises, to watch the tape, and include Lisa in the meeting.

The image was a bit shaky, but very clear.

"I'm Dr. Raymond Stantz, recording audiovisual evidence of the abandoned city of Hill Valley." From the image, it was obvious he was holding the camera, pointing at himself. "With me, is Dr. Emmet Brown." He turned the camera towards Doc, who waved at the camera with a grave expression on his face. "At the moment, we have just arrived to the Pohatchee Drive-in Theatre site, in 2017, according to the time circuits in the DeLorean. The place looks even more dilapidated than in 1986." The camera panned around showing the overgrown desert plants. The image stopped on a cactus. It clearly showed a couple of faint marks.

Ray noted, pressing the Pause button. "I did those marks surreptitiously while you guys were preparing things. I wanted some kind of thing that would be difficult to fake, unless you knew where it was. I pushed a little stone into the cut." He showed a pebble. "This one. I cut it out to make sure it was not a copy."

George nodded approvingly, "Very ingenious, Ray. No 'Mission: Impossible' (3) trick."

Ray smiled and nodded awkwardly at the compliment.

Shinji asked, "What's that?"

George squeezed the boy's shoulder, "An old TV show, a group of spies used a lot of tricks and gadgets to fool the bad guys. Several times, they tricked the bad guy into believing they were in other city, in other country, or even that they had been in a coma for several years. Maybe we can catch a rerun in syndication."

Shinji nodded, "I'd like that." He smiled.

"Shall we continue?" Doc asked, impatiently.

"Oh, sure." Ray pressed the button, and the tape continued. The rest of the recording basically consisted of a repeat of Doc's, though the locales varied. Ray put a backpack on the table, "I brought back a few clothes and orange flakes, for analysis."

"Well done, Ray. I'll begin immediately." Egon took one of the plastic bags, and looked at the orange flakes inside. He shook the bag to get a better view of the content.

Asuka huffed, "That's somebody! Can't you show some respect to a dead guy, or…" she interrupted herself.

Ray quipped, "Well… after you deal with a lot of unquiet spirits, dead bodies are much less… um… respectable? And this doesnt even look like bodily remains."

Winston shook his head. "Ray, Egon, knock it off. Miss Soryu, I apologize. Occupational thing, I guess. One gets a bit detached."

She nodded emphatically, "At least try to not shake the bag as if it was a maraca."

Slowly, Egon put the bag down, and rested his hands on the table, one over the other. He looked like a kicked puppy for a moment. Asuka pinched the bridge of her nose, while Shinji and Rei exchanged a look.

"Okay, okay." She exhaled. "Spengler, you need somebody to kick some sense into your head. You just got yourself a lab assistant."

"Wait, what?" He said, "We will be working with things Science doesn't even know exist!"

From the computer screen, Lisa noted, "Hey, Egon! Red he/he/here happ/pens to be a certified/fied genius! Co/co/college graduate at t/t/twelve. Electrical enginee/nee/neering and AST/t/trophysics! T/t/trained for EVA p/p/pilot from the age of/f/f four! Sp/p/speaks English, Ge/German, Japa/panese and is learning K/K/Klingon!"

Egon looked at Asuka, who looked back defiantly.

"She got you there, Egon." Winston snickered.

He pushed his glasses up. "I speak Swedish instead of Klingon."

"I Can work with that," Asuka said. "You guys need to learn Klingon anyway."

After the meeting, Doc excused himself from the analysis. That left Egon, Ray, Lisa, Asuka and Rei in the lab.

"Are you sure they are not violent?" Egon asked Rei.

"Very sure. None of the selected souls was of a violent nature, though almost all of them had basic training as career soldiers. Major Katsuragi and Inspector Kaji had supplemental training and saw action in combat. But I must stress that all the souls are currently in Instrumentality. Therefore, they are happy and for external purposes, passive."

"And you know which one is which." Egon said.

"Yes."

"Don't doubt the First, Dr. Spengler. She knows, period."

Egon nodded. "Fine, but I want to label each container."

Minutes later, each container had a clear label on its side.

From the screen, Lisa recorded everything that was said, for the records, freeing the scientists.

"Would you like some m/m/music?" She asked.

"Why not?" Asuka nodded.

"Something in particular? Or do I try the radio?"

Egon turned half the way, to his friend at the microscope, "Ray? Any song you'd like?"

Without taking his eyes from the microscope, he answered, "How about some Sinatra, Lisa?"

"Sure, Ole Blue Eyes coming up!"

The speakers on the walls soon began to belt out a song. At first, there was no reaction at all. The music filled the workshop with a sad melody, full of longing, yet dignified.

All or nothin' at all
Half a love never appealed to me
If your heart, it never could yield to me
Then i'd rather, rather have nothin' at all

I said all, nothin' at all
If it's love, there ain't no in-between
Why begin then cry for somethin' that might have been
No i'd rather, rather have nothin' at all

At this point, there were two reactions. One of the soul containers began to bubble softly (4). Excited, Egon began to take readings, relaying the results to Lisa.

The second was more subdued.

Ray hurried to the table, and asked, "Asuka? Are you okay?"

The red headed pilot sobbed silently, a tear shone on her right eye, almost dropping. Trembling at the edge, but keeping stubbornly there.

Author's Notes:

To Halo: Only if he changes things a lot! Otherwise, SEELE might get suspicious about the sequel. Still, can be done, but only after preventing the Impact. Hmm, maybe it's time for George to try his hand in a different genre, just like Stephen King did with the Dark Tower. Translating both BTTF and NGE to fantasy would be the perfect way to do it!

(1) Partly in joke, the Ghostbusters have stuck to the metaphor Egon used in Ghostbusters to compare the normal psycho kinetic activity, with the level of spectral activity during the time period previous to Gozer's appearance. So, ghostly/soul activity will be measured in TUs (Twinky Units).

(2) What's with Rei's readings? As she says, she is an Avatar of Lilith. She is in a way, much bigger that she looks, the time travel energy residue is diluted, while her soul presence is loosely connected to the souls in Instrumentality, even though they are in the future. And actually, her Twinky would be bigger than Central Park. Egon's readings top at the equivalent of a small city.

(3) The Mission: Impossible series began in 1966 and lasted seven seasons, until 1973. It was later revived in 1988; so for the time being, only reruns will be available to the group. As George said, the M.O. if the group of operatives relied heavily in deception, including the ocassional mind-games he describes.

(4) Just like the mood slime in Ghostbusters 2, the souls are sensitive to music, especially if there is an overwhelming emotional connection. The main difference with the mood slime is that it is made from emotions, without much personality by itself; while LCL gel contains a complete soul, that keeps the original personality, though it is wrapped in the false paradise provided by Instrumentality. In Asuka's case, she had not heard Sinatra's All Or Nothing At All (1939), but the lyrics are almost the way she described her feelings towards Shinji during their stay in Instrumentality.