Chapter Text
“—and that whole timeline was a mess, Doc,” Marty said with a tired sigh. “Hill Valley was this crazy mass surveillance police state, and they were trying to mind-control everybody with these digital watches. It was freaky.”
“Seems quite Orwellian.”
“Yeah, it was pretty much Bizzaro World there.” At his friend’s look of confusion, Marty repeated himself. “You know Bizzaro World, Doc? Like where the anti-Superman lives?”
“I’m afraid I haven’t read many comics.”
“Okay, it’s like, um—it’s basically this place where everyone was their opposite. Jennifer was this tough punk-rocker chic. Biff was, uh, actually kind of nice. I never met the other me, but it sounded like he was a huge dork. And you, Doc? The other you never invented time travel and became a dictator.”
“I can’t imagine being happy in that life.”
“Yeah, you were pretty miserable—and bald.”
“I was bald?” Doc questioned, the most concerned he had sounded since Marty began telling him about his most recent mission in the past.
“Uh-huh. It’s not a good look on you, Doc. Maybe it was stress or something, I mean, you were married to Edna Strickland. Anyways, you—the other you—helped me fix the DeLorean—ah, well, he did eventually. And we went back to 1931 again to stop you from going out with Edna in the first place.”
“But I started dating Edna in August, after Kid Tannen was arrested. It was months later until you showed up again.”
“That was our original plan, to go back to August, but something went wrong with the time circuits and we ended up in October. That’s why I had to break you guys up right before the expo.” Marty glanced away. “And I’m really sorry about putting you through all that, Doc. I know I apologized to the younger you, but even though you know why I had to do it, I’m still sorry for messing with you like that.”
“It’s alright, Marty. Everything’s all in the past now,” Doc assured. He put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “What happened next?”
“Then, at the expo, I had to help you get your booth open. Edna got it shut down.”
“Ah, yes, I remember that. No one was as petty with a break-up than she was.”
Marty nodded. “I had to discredit her to get your booth re-opened, so I hot mic-ed her admitting to being the speakeasy arsonist. And when Parker tried to arrest her, she escaped and took off in the DeLorean. Then, I had to make sure you—young you—went through with your flying car demonstration. It kind of blew up in your face, but you seemed to take things pretty well. And then, after I gave you the newspaper, you—you-you—showed up from the future, and, uh—well, you know the rest of what happened.”
That was the conclusion of Marty’s story to explain why Doc needed to pick him up in 1931 in the first place. It was jarring to learn that this Doc wasn’t the same Doc who needed Marty to rescue him from jail after months of radio silence. If he tried to think about it too hard, he would get a headache. These Docs were already so different.
Firstly, Marty has never seen his Doc be so involved in Hill Valley’s community. His Doc never managed a scholarship fund set up by his late father. Marty didn’t even know the name of Doc’s father until last week. In his original timeline, Erhardt was never spoken about. Doc’s childhood had never been discussed, and Marty knew not to pry into it. Needless to say, seeing what his friend was like at seventeen was an enlightening experience.
Second, Doc was living in the present the entire time. Doc had been living here with his family for the past seven months. When Marty told him that he disappeared in the time train in October, his friend looked completely stunned.
And that’s when the guilt hit Marty. His latest venture in the past fixed the timeline and saved Doc’s life, but it had also inadvertently destroyed more than half a year’s worth of time that Doc had spent with him. No, that wasn’t with him. Doc spent all that time with a Marty who remembers Doc sticking around. That Marty is gone now. Those memories meant nothing anymore.
“So, yeah, I’m not really the same Marty you knew when I left—not exactly the same, anyways...”
Marty trailed off and the garage fell into silence. He paused for a moment, just to watch the dust particles float in the slants of light coming in from the high windows. There was a pounding rhythm in his ears. Maybe it was from the remainder of Doc’s clock collection ticking in sync. Maybe it was his own heartbeat.
“Doc,” he asked, finding it impossible to look his friend in the eye, “does that…change anything? Me being from another timeline? I know I had this conversation with you before, and you said we were friends, but that was with a different you.” He paused, throat feeling tight. “So, uh, I—I just wanted to make sure…”
Marty was cut off by two hands being firmly placed on his shoulders. When he looked up, Doc’s face was shattered.
“I feel exactly the same way my counterpart did, and I’m certain any version of myself who knows you would say the same,” he quickly assured, pulling the boy into a hug. “Marty, you are my friend, undoubtedly, no matter what timeline you come from.”
“Thanks, Doc,” Marty croaked.
After a heavy minute passed, their hug broke.
Immediately, Doc went to write down the phone number and address of his home on a scrap of paper to give to Marty. He explained that the garage was kept for storage, extra lab space, and as a secondary shelter. His newer residence was on a small farm on the edge of town. It was a secluded and peaceful area, a place where his family had much-needed privacy and distance from the encroachments of modern life. There, they had built a barn as Doc’s new lab. It was also the only place where they could discreetly store the time train. Doc made it very clear that there was already a guest room set up at the farm house for Marty, and that he was always welcome to come over for dinner and stay the night any time he wanted.
“You could stay over tonight,” he offered.
“Thanks, Doc, but I think I’m gonna go back to my place,” Marty said, tucking the note into his jacket pocket. “Gotta make sure nothing’s changed at home, either.”
Doc nodded in understanding.
After a quick glance at his watch, his friend announced, “It’s getting late. Once we’re finished tidying up the garage, I can drive you home. Marty, can you pack up any books left out?”
“You got it, Doc.”
Taking a look around, the garage looked more empty than Marty ever remembered it being. If he closed his eyes, he could still picture the old armchair nested in the corner and the rickety end table that was always covered with Burger King wrappers and half-finished schematics. But standing in the same nook, where those pieces of furniture used to be, there’s nothing in that spot anymore. In the empty and dusty corner, he could see the vestige of scuff marks in the floor, from where the legs used to stand.
Marty knew Doc didn’t sell off most of his furniture. He was told many of his belongings were moved out. Things like the jukebox, portraits of scientific figures, and many ornamental clocks were safe in his other home. But it was still discomforting to see the garage, a sanctuary during his high school years, become a shell of itself. It was like any connection he had to his old life was slowly being taken away, piece by piece.
“Hey, Doc,” he said, randomly playing with some left out junk, “do you ever think about the other you’s out there?”
“You’ll have to be more specific, Marty.”
“Like, do the other versions of ourselves even exist anymore? If they’re erased from existence when the timeline changes, are they gone forever?”
“Perhaps not entirely. Those alternate timelines may not be reality here, but they may exist elsewhere. There could be a universe, existing parallel to ours, where I fell in love with Edna Strickland and turned Hill Valley into a totalitarian state from causes that weren’t from your intervention in the past. Perhaps, in this hypothetical timeline, a butterfly in 1931 flapped its wings in a different direction, leading to a chain of events that fated our paths to cross when they originally didn’t in this timeline. Then, those alternate versions of you and I would exist there. Granted, it wouldn’t be completely identical to the timeline you encountered, given the slight discrepancies, but I’d imagine the differences would be negligible.”
“So, you’re saying it’s possible that those other me’s are alive somewhere else?”
“If you believe there are infinitely many universes, anything is possible.”
“Hm,” Marty considered. “Then there’s a chance that some version of me out there still has to live in a world where an evil Biff is his stepfather, or a me who lives in a town where you’re bald and we aren’t friends.” He then huffed, sympathetic. “Their lives are probably shit.”
From where he was packing up boxes on the other side of the garage, Doc said, “It’s entirely plausible—both in their other-world existence and in their lives being shit.”
“Do you think I could ever say ‘hi’ to them or something?”
“Marty!” the scientist exclaimed, shooting up from his work, “you aren’t genuinely considering using the DeLorean to satisfy your curiosity?”
“Jesus, hell no,” he swore, “I’ve had enough time travel for one life. But, I’m just saying, hypothetically…it’d be nice to know that they’re okay.”
Doc briefly pondered this thoughtfully, but didn’t discuss it further. When he was finished cleaning up, he went over to Marty, car keys in hand.
“Are you ready?”
Marty spared one last glance to an old home that he didn’t recognize any longer.
“Yeah,” he said quietly, “let’s go, Doc.”