Marty sighed. “We got closer. That’s all I can say. Except that I had a little run-in with Biff Tannen and four of his goons. I came within an inch or two of being squashed to death.”
“Is that all?” Doc smiled. “So what was the final outcome of the run-in?”
“The four guys ended up in a pile of shit. I have to admit, I handled myself and them pretty well.”
“Of course, you have thirty years of advanced technology to draw from,” Doc Brown rejoined.
Marty snorted.
“Just pulling your leg,” Doc smiled. “Step over here and take a look at this.”
“Sure. What the hell is it?”
“It’s my own clever-as-hell method of getting you back to 1985.”
“Good. Tell me about it.”
Doc Brown explained the nomenclature of the setup and then launched into a description of how it was supposed to work. “You see, we put a lightning rod on the courthouse clock tower,” he said. ‘Then we run some industrial strength electrical cable from the lightning rod, across the street…Meanwhile, we’ve outfitted your car with a big hook directly connected with the flux capacitor…”
He took the toy car and wound it up.
“You’ll be in this,” he said. “Now, on a signal, you’ll take off down the street toward the cable, accelerating until you hit eighty-eight miles an hour…”
He released the toy car from one end of the model. It raced toward the strung wire. Picking up a stripped wire that was plugged into an AC outlet, he brought it toward the “lightning rod” nail.
“Then,” he continued, “lightning strikes, electrifying the cable, just in time to…”
With that, he touched the live wire to the nail. As the toy car’s antenna snagged the cable, sparks flew, the car caught fire and sailed off the table top. Striking the drapes nearby, it rolled down them, spreading flames as it went. In a split second, the cheap curtains were a mass of fire and smoke.
Doc Brown rushed to the far end of the room, grabbed a fire extinguisher and had the blaze under control in less than a minute.
“Well,” Marty said when it was all over, “I’m glad to know you figured it all out. Why don’t we just set fire to me now instead of going to all that trouble?”
“This is theoretical,” Doc Brown shrugged. “It’ll be different with a car you can control and a flux capacitor that directs the lightning into energy instead of letting it go loose, as this did. At least I hope that’s the way it turns out.”
“You’re instilling me with a lot of confidence, Doc,” Marty smiled grimly.
“Believe me, it should work.”
“The operative word there is ‘should.’”
“Well, how can I guarantee you this will work? It’s a scientific experiment, my boy—something that’s being tried for the first time. Nothing is one hundred percent foolproof. Take the simplest part of the plan here—your driving eighty-eight miles an hour through Town Square at just the right moment. Even that’s not guaranteed. Suppose an old lady steps off the curb at the wrong moment? Suppose there’s a cop car that decides to cut you o
ff? Suppose that beautifully engineered car breaks down during the run? Suppose you miss the hook or the lightning strikes early or late? Suppose the newspapers got the time wrong? Suppose—”
“O.K., Doc,” Marty interrupted. “I get the point. It’s a big gamble, no matter what.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of the lightning. You just take care of your old man.”
Marty sighed. Once again he took out the family snapshot and looked at it. His brother Dave was completely gone and Linda’s head was partially obscured.
“Jeez,” he gulped. “I’m next.”
There was a knock at the door. Doc Brown and Marty exchanged anxious glances.
“Biff,” Marty said. “Somehow he got out of the shit and followed me.”
He looked around for a crowbar or some other heavy object as Doc Brown raced to the window and peered outside. Marty heard him grunt.