"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." --Arthur C. Clark
Tap, tap, tap. Marty McFly opened his eyes with a start, his heart already pounding. He blinked a couple times, frowning faintly in confusion as the seconds passed and his pulse began to slow to a more natural pace. Why did I wake up? he wondered fuzzily, propping himself up on his elbows to scan his darkened room. Nothing looked amiss. Silence surrounded him. A glance at his clock told him it was around two thirty in the morning. He fell back on his pillow, trying to recall if he’d been having some sort of nightmare. After a moment he shrugged and closed his eyes again, rolling over on his side. Then Marty heard it: the faint click of something against his window. The sound cut through the silence like a knife. His eyes shot open and he found himself staring right at the closed glass. A dark shadow of someone was outlined by the light of a nearby streetlamp. The shadow was pressed against his window! Marty’s heart started to race anew. Someone’s trying to break in! he realized in horror. As quietly as he could, praying the robber couldn’t see him, Marty eased out from under the blankets and slid to the floor with a faint thud that sounded tremendously loud in the quiet house. Marty didn’t care; if his parents heard him, so much the better. He ducked down low and crawled over to the bag at the foot of his bed that he had packed just hours before, in preparation for camping at the lake with Jennifer the following night. As he zipped it open and started to rummage around inside, the taps came again -- harder and louder this time. What kind of moron knocks on a window in the dead of night? Marty wondered, frowning hard as he finally located what he had been searching for: a powerful mag flashlight. He yanked it out of his pack, spilling the rest of the contents on the floor as he did so. Marty hardly noticed. With the flashlight in hand, he crept on his knees to the window and leaned against the wall beside it. As soon as Marty heard the three sharp taps again, several seconds later, he jumped up, spun around, and clicked the flashlight on. He aimed the beam right at the window, attempting to startle and blind whomever was out there. The person outside gave a very audible gasp of surprise and fell backwards, rustling the bushes loudly. Marty clicked the flashlight off, blinking hard himself from the sudden flood of luminance. He took a few steps away from the window, watching the glass as well as he could around the spots in his vision. The intruder, however, didn't seem at all discouraged by the flashlight assault and only seconds later was back at the window. "Marty," the person hissed, the voice clear even through the glass. "It's me, Doc." "Doc?" Marty said aloud, too surprised to say much else. He hadn't heard anything from Doc Brown in a week, not since he had departed in his new steam time machine with his family for parts unknown. When a day had passed, then two, and there was no word or letter or anything from the scientist, Marty had started to wonder if he would ever hear from his old friend ever again. A few times during the last week he had stopped by the old garage that Doc had called his home for as long as Marty had known him. The place was depressingly empty, though the power still ran and it appeared that Doc had taken few, if any, articles from the house. The building looked like it was waiting for his return, but by Friday Marty had come to the sad conclusion that Doc wasn’t going to return. If he was, Marty reasoned, why hadn’t he contacted him immediately after his last departure? Why would he put his friend through that? But now, nearly a week after he had last seen him, Doc was here at his bedroom window, and in the middle of the night no less. Marty didn’t hesitate in the least to push open his window. "Doc! What are you doing here? Where’ve you been all week? Why are you here now? Jeez, you could’ve waited ‘til morning to call or something -- you scared the shit out of me. I thought you were a prowler!" Doc waited patiently for Marty to run out of breath before he spoke. "Marty, I can’t answer all those questions now," he whispered. "You’ve got to come with me right now. I need your assistance." Marty wasn’t so ready to comply, however. "My assistance? Jeez, Doc, that’s nice. Why didn’t you give me a letter or something in the last week? I thought you’d gone away forever. What, were you going to leave me hanging for weeks?" "Marty, I really think this is neither the time nor the place," Doc said, shifting slightly on his feet. As he did so, Marty noticed for the first time his clothes -- not late nineteenth century duds, like he had assumed, but something decidedly different. The clothes he had on looked like something out of an old Robin Hood movie. "All right," Marty agreed, realizing that he was probably pressing his luck already having a conversation like this with his family so close by. "But I should probably get dressed first...." "That’s fine. Will you meet me at Eastwood Ravine in about ten minutes?" "Eastwood Ravine? Uh, okay." "Good," Doc said, backing away from the window, onto the back patio. "I'll see you soon." Marty dressed quickly, in jeans and a sweatshirt as the night was chilly. He escaped out of his bedroom window, taking his skateboard along. If he took his truck at this hour, his parents would definitely hear the noise and wake up, then fire off a barrage of questions that Marty knew he didn’t want to answer. As far as everyone in Hill Valley, save for Jennifer, was concerned, Doc Brown was off on another one of his extended mini-vacation for parts unknown. While his parents had, over the years, tolerated his older friend’s strange all-hour habits, Marty wasn’t sure if they were still like that....now. His memories prior to changing things in 1955 were still there and he wasn’t quite sure how different this Lorraine and George McFly reacted in many ways. It was one of the strangest sensations he had ever experienced, returning home to a family that was the same but, in many many ways, vastly changed. Frankly, Marty still wasn’t used to it, and wasn’t sure he ever would be. At least Jennifer and Doc were the same as what he remembered from before. Ten minutes later, when Marty reached the ravine where the DeLorean had been destroyed not quite a week before, he found no sign of Doc at all. When several minutes passed and the scientist still wasn’t there, Marty started to wonder if he had heard him correctly. Or, worse yet, if he had somehow dreamed the entire encounter. It wasn’t like Doc to be late. Just as he was debating whether to go to a phone and try Doc’s old phone number, which should’ve still been working for another month, he became aware of a low rumble from above. Not giving it much thought at first, used to such noises from the airport, Marty only looked up when he realized the noise was a lot closer than some airplane. He gasped at the sight of a large, dark object hovering some twenty feet above. It took him only seconds to realize it was Doc’s train time machine he was seeing. Marty quickly backed away from the train tracks and watched as the large, unusual vehicle touched down gently on the tracks. Doc Brown opened the door and hurried outside, but Marty hardly noticed as he tried to take in all the details of the new time machine. There were so many little gadgets and gizmos all over the train, moving and glowing, performing functions Marty was sure were beyond his comprehension. The overall appearance of the train was quaintly Victorian, however. It looked just like something Doc would create, stranded where he was. Whether it was entirely crafted by hand or modified from an existing steam train, Marty couldn’t tell; either way, however, it was a very impressive accomplishment. "I’m sorry if this is rather abrupt for you," Doc said as he joined Marty’s side. "I did plan to inform you of my whereabouts, but I hadn’t yet done so before we left for... well, I’ll get to that. I came to you because I need your help." "Help with what?" Marty looked at Doc’s ancient attire, glanced at the time machine, and started to come up with a theory. "Is another one of my ancestors in danger or something?" "Or something," Doc said. He gestured for Marty to follow him. Marty complied without hesitation, curiosity proving a powerful motivator. "Doc, can’t you tell me what’s going on?" Marty asked as his friend mounted the steps into the train’s cab. "Certainly," Doc agreed from inside the train, perhaps a shade too quickly. He reappeared in the doorway a second later, a bundle of material in his arms. "But first, I’m going to need you to change into these." Marty eyed the bundle rather suspiciously. "So this means were going somewhere, right? Another time?" "And another country as well," Doc confirmed with a quick nod. What?! Marty thought in surprise. Another country? "How can that happen?" he asked immediately, accepting the clothes from Doc. "I thought you couldn’t do that. Or can this time machine go to different places now?" Doc waved away the questions as he returned to the ground outside. "Change clothes, then we’ll talk." "Wait a minute, I want to know what’s going on here first!" Marty insisted, not moving. "Where are we going? Why do you need me? What’s so important that you show up in the dead of night?" Doc looked a him for a minute, perhaps weighing the pros and cons of answering Marty’s questions, then resigned himself to the inevitable and sighed. "Very well. Our destination is the year 1385, at a small village in England called Mountain Crest. I need your help with a little problem back there that involves Clara." "Clara? Hey, where’s your family? Did you leave them at home, wherever that is?" "No, not exactly. We went to England for Verne’s birthday -- Verne’s my youngest, he just turned eight. The boys are waiting for us back in Mountain Crest." "What about Clara? Where is she?" Doc was looking increasingly impatient, but continued to answer Marty’s questions, perhaps understanding the need for the answers. "Clara was taken captive by the king of the village. He developed an attraction towards her and when she turned away his various offers, he decided to grab her in the village marketplace and hold her prisoner." "What for? Did she do something wrong?" Doc snorted softly. "Only by telling him the truth -- that she was married and not interested. And I know that when you see him you’ll understand things much better. Anyway, I need your help in getting Clara out of that castle. Jules and Verne are too young for this business right now." Doc gestured to the train cab at his back. "Now hurry, change clothes!" Marty went slowly up the steps into the train, all eyes as he stepped inside. He jumped at the hissing sound of the door closing at his back, folding up neatly. Marty stared at that a minute, amazed at how Doc seemed to take into account everything to the point of building stairs in the lower portion of the door, so when it swung down one would have an easy way to exit the train. He finally tore his eyes away from the door and looked around the rest of the train’s cab, for the first time setting eyes on Doc’s second time machine -- the only one now, Marty realized, a little sadly. The inside was a lot larger than the cramped interior of the DeLorean, and not nearly as high tech upon first glance. There was a bench padded in a velvety, burgundy fabric at the back of the cab, with seat belts dangling down to the floor. A few lamps, possibly gas-operated ones, hung on the walls, which were covered in a green vinyl-looking material. Windows were in all the walls, including a pretty circular one behind the bench that was made from frosted glass. Stained glass was set near the tops of all the windows, in small half-circle panes. There was even a raised skylight of sorts above, set over the back portion of the cab. Across from the bench, taking up nearly the entire front wall of the train, was a mess of tubes, dials, pipes, pressure gauges, and knobs, built around what looked like a boiler. Mounted in the center of it all was what appeared to be keys from some ancient typewriters -- perhaps two typewriters by the look of it. Directly above the keys were three lines of dates, in rotating type. The top line, the destination time, read Nov 02, 1985 at 02:10. The middle line, the present time, was the same date, the only difference the time being 03:08. And the last line -- the last time departed -- was dated Jul 20, 1385 at 22:19. On top of the display of dates and times was what appeared to be a location display, which currently read, "Hill Valley, California." "Wow, this is some time machine!" Marty called out to Doc, his voice carrying through the windows. Doc’s reply was immediate. "You’re supposed to be changing," he called back. "I know, I know, I’ve just never seen this time machine before. When did you put that location display in?" "Not long ago," Doc said. "Now please, change." Marty sighed. "Fine, okay." He looked around the cab one more time, then set down the clothes Doc had given him on the seat at the back. Marty picked up the top article, shook it out, and held it up before him. The clothing looked like nothing he had seen before: a long tube-like sleeve unattached to anything. "What the hell...." he said under his breath. Marty returned to the window and slid it open. "Doc, what is this?" he called, holding up the strange article of clothing. "Is this like a scarf or something?" "No, those are.... Well, I guess I’ll have to show you." Doc opened the door and climbed aboard. He took the article from Marty and held it up against his own body, so the top of the tube thing was around his waist and the bottom around his ankle. "These are called hose and there what a lot of people now think of as tights," he explained. "These particular ones attach to a small belt that goes on like underwear might and there’s one for each leg. You’ll pull them over the underclothing that was used for underwear back then." Marty winced at the description, already disliking what he now knew about the time period he’d be hanging out in. "Oh jeez," he said under his breath. "It’s fairly self-explanatory, once you look at all the pieces of the outfit I’ve given you," Doc said, passing the hose back to Marty and heading for the door. "I’ll be outside if you’ve got any more questions." Marty took a brief moment to ponder the idea of avoiding the medieval garb entirely in favor of his regular clothes, recalled his less than pleasant experience at being seen in the wrong attire back in the Old West, then swallowed his disgust and started to sort through the rest of the pile. Twenty minutes later, having successfully if not reluctantly exchanged wardrobes, Marty frowned as he looked down at what he was wearing. He wondered if he should be glad or not that there wasn’t a mirror. His outfit consisted of dark leather boots; a loose, long sleeved white shirt that went to almost his knees, with one of those little lacing things at the neck that reminded him of Shakespeare outfits; a baggy dark green vest, unbuttoned and loose, was over the shirt. A brown leather belt went around his waist, over the white shirt. But by far the worst part were those hose, uncomfortable and weird fitting. And he’d never hear the end of it if any of his friends saw him wearing those! Marty wasn’t sure how to open the door, so he stepped to the window and looked outside. Doc was standing outside, his back to the time machine. Marty rapped on the window to get his attention. When Doc had turned around, Marty pointed in the direction of the door. "How do you open this thing?" he asked loudly, so his voice would carry through the glass. Doc stepped over to the time machine and the door swung open a second later. Marty didn’t hesitate at all to express his opinion as his friend came aboard. "Do I really have to wear this?" he asked as he gestured to the hose, making a face. "It’s really -- well, in a word, they bite!" "I’m sorry, but most definitely," Doc said, not without sympathy. "Do you realize the commotion your modern clothes would cause?" He flipped a switch next to the door and the door swung closed again with a soft whoosh of air. "Why were you in the Middle Ages, anyway?" Marty asked. "I thought you weren’t going to time travel anymore." Doc smiled a little sheepishly. "Well, this was a special occasion. Verne wanted to go there for his birthday and see the tournaments. He’d recently taken an interest in the period and I thought it would be a nice gift, as well as educational." Doc leaned over to open the boiler door and throw some logs in from the floor beside the boiler. "We intended to stay there for a week before returning to the future, but two days before our intended departure the king took Clara." Marty nodded, but his questions continued. Though, technically, he had seen his friend less than a week earlier, years had passed from Doc’s end. He wanted to know everything that had happened since he’d gone out in a blaze over Eastwood Ravine. "Where do you live now? When you’re not time traveling, I mean." Doc began to type on the keys. The numbers and letters on the destination time line rotated to read to Jul 20, 1385, 22:20, and the location changed to Mountain Crest, England. "Currently, we make our permanent residence in Hill Valley, in the year 1896. It was late October when we left." "Do you ever think you’ll come back here?" Marty asked, holding his breath as he waited for his friend to answer. "It’s really quiet without you here, Doc, and I’ve really missed you. And, I know you probably know more about it than me, but wouldn’t staying in the past mess things up now?" Doc turned around. "You’re right," he said. "That’s been on my mind since September of 1885, especially since I knew Clara was fated to die, I was never supposed to be there, and we now have two children who never existed in the first place. That was partially why I built another time machine, though I still think time travel can be quite dangerous. But it was my life’s work and...." He shrugged a little. Marty tried again, wondering if Doc was avoiding his question. "Will you move back to the future, though?" "Clara and I have been discussing it," Doc said, turning around to focus on the time circuits. "It’s quite possible and more than likely, I believe." Marty grinned. "Great! Wow, that’ll be kinda strange to have you around with a family now." His smile faltered a little. "The town will probably have a field day with that, though. Know what you’re gonna tell ‘em?" "I’ve got some idea," Doc said. "But that is a definite concern. People are absolutely going to question their appearance." He looked at Marty again. "We’ve talked about not returning to the future until 1996 because of that issue." Marty blinked, his smile vanishing entirely now. "1996! No, Doc. That’s too long -- God, that’s more than ten years from now! Why then?" "Well, because of the boys’ ages. Verne just turned eight and Jules will be ten in a couple months. How would we explain my returning to Hill Valley with not only a wife but two kids who are obviously genetically mine, as well as a lot older than a couple weeks?" "I’m sure you could think of something," Marty said. "Maybe say you had a wife or something for years, but she lived somewhere else...." "It would be questioned," Doc said. "But I don’t particularly want to move back to ten years from now, either. There are other issues at stake and the Hill Valley of 1996 is not my home." He smiled a little at his friend. "We could return to this time, but some very tight stories must be conceived before we do so and I’m working on that problem." Marty knew Doc was trying to reassure him, but he didn’t feel much better. "I’m sure you can think of something," he said, the words coming out with a kind of desperate confidence. Doc turned his full attention back to the front of the time machine. "I wouldn’t worry," he said as something came to life with a low rumble. Marty could feel the vibrations through the floor. Doc grabbed hold of a bar set in the wall near the boiler. "Marty, you might want to take a seat and prepare for temporal displacement. It’s a little different from the DeLorean." Marty took a couple steps back and sat down on the seat at the back, gripping the wooden arm rest with his hand. The train shuddered once, then lifted into the air slowly. Marty leaned forward and craned his neck towards the windows, trying to see outside. He saw some billows of steam, not much else. The train continued to rise up, then moved forward and turned in a wide arch, until it was facing the ravine. It picked up speed slowly, faster and faster until it hit what felt like eighty eight -- then with a flash of bright light they vanished into the past.
Once the piercingly bright lights of temporal displacement faded, total darkness surrounded the train, making Marty wonder if they had even gone through time. He leaned close to the nearest window and squinted outside, trying to make out anything. But all he saw was his own reflection in the lighted cab. Marty turned to look at Doc. "Where are we?" "You mean, when are we," the scientist corrected without looking at his friend. "Well, yeah, that too." "Currently, we are hovering in the air above the village of Mountain Crest. My family is staying in an abandoned two room cottage about a mile from the village -- not terribly far to travel in these days. And it affords us some privacy." "Where are you hiding the train?" "Right behind the cottage. There’s a large clearing there, and beyond that unsettled woods. It’s safe, trust me." Doc yanked a lever back and the train jerked to a stop in the air. Marty gripped the armrest hard, trying to stay in the seat. He braced his feet against the floor, and after a moment was able to lean back. "There’s our place," Doc said, pointing out the window as the train began to move again, slowly this time. Marty leaned forward again, trying for another look. This time saw a small light waving at them from the ground. "Who’s doing that?" Doc glanced outside for a second before turning his attention back to the controls. "Jules or Verne, I imagine. I asked them for help in signaling where to land when I planned to return, at precisely 10:20. As you can see, it’s quite dark down there, before street lamps and electrical lights. I don’t want to accidentally land on anyone -- or anything." The train stopped dead in the air again, causing Marty to scramble for the armrest once more, then the time machine started a vertical decent, slowly lowering to the ground. When the wheels touched down, Doc opened the door and turned to Marty, still seated. "You can leave your future clothes in here." Marty had almost forgotten about those, which he had set on the seat in a rather untidy heap. While he stood and tried to find a place to stick them that wasn’t going to be in the way -- he settled on the space under the seats -- he heard footsteps clatter up the stairs to the train and a childish voice spoke. "Did you get him?" Marty turned his head in time to see a boy appear in the doorway of the cab -- the owner of the voice, apparently. The kid appeared to be no more than seven or eight, with a head of short blond, wavy hair and bright blue eyes. He saw Marty looking at him and smiled, not appearing shy in the least. "You’re Marty, aren’t you? Dad’s friend from the future?" "Ah, yeah...." Marty said. "And you’re...?" "Verne," the kid answered. "I remember we saw you when Dad finished the time machine. That was a couple of years ago, but I still remember." Marty blinked, taken aback by what Verne had called Doc. It was going to take him a while to get used to the idea of the Doc as a family man. "Really?" he said in response to the boy’s comment. Marty glanced at Doc, surprised with that revelation, but it would make some sense. Verne did look a couple years older than when Marty had first seen him. But that fact made Marty feel rather hurt. Doc had time travel for two years and he didn’t even visit me in that time, except to say good-bye? He sighed to himself, rather disappointed. "Well, it’s nice to meet you again," he said to Doc’s son. The boy nodded once. "Same here." He turned to his father, still shutting things down at the front. "Dad, Jules is in the cabin, lookin’ over the plans and seein’ if there’s anything wrong. You know, the usual." Verne made a face briefly at that, then looked at Marty again. "You haven’t met Jules yet, have you?" "Uh, no, just that one time when I saw you, too. Why?" Verne shrugged, then turned and jumped down the stairs to the ground outside. Marty looked curiously at Doc. "What was that about?" "What was what about?" Doc asked, sounding preoccupied.
"The comment your son -- wow, that’s weird to say! -- the comment your son made about Jules." Doc grunted. "Oh, there’s a fair bit of sibling rivalry between the two," he said. "Genetics are rather strange things; they’re nothing like each other." Marty smiled. "That’s not so strange," he said. "My brother and sister and I aren’t really alike in any way, except that we have the same parents." "I’ve heard similar reports from Clara, who grew up with some siblings. But as I was an only child, I’ve never had experience with it." Doc turned around and looked Marty over once, perhaps to make sure he would blend in all right, then nodded to himself. "Let me show you what we’re going to do tonight." "Tonight?" Marty asked as he followed Doc out of the train. "You mean we’re going to get Clara tonight?" Doc nodded as he closed the train up. "That was the intention. I wouldn’t have brought you here until I was fully prepared. I thought you might want to get home as soon as possible." "Well, yeah, I guess so. But how do you expect to break into a castle? Don’t they have moats around them? And spiked gates?" Doc chuckled softly as he headed for the small cottage, Marty right behind him. "You’ve been watching too many movies. I’ll explain everything to you in a few moments." The first thing Marty noticed when he entered the cottage was that it was falling apart. There were gaping holes in the ceiling, the walls were slowly rotting away, and the door was literally hanging by its hinges. The room was lit by a few oil lamps placed in strategic corners of the room, the wicks turned on high. In the center of the room was a makeshift table, created from a board resting on two sawhorses. Standing at the table, with what looked like a map spread out across the wood, was a brown-haired boy that Marty deduced to be Jules. He was a couple inches taller than Verne, who was hovering at his side, and appeared rather serious at first glance; he was leaning over the paper, a pencil in one hand and a frown on his face. At the sound of additional people entering the room, he looked up and Marty noticed he had brown eyes that bore a remarkable resemblance to Doc’s own. Jules looked right at his father, not even noticing Marty. "Father, I have calculated that if you were to enter the castle at the so-called ‘entrance A-2’ on this map, you would come across a less populated area of the castle and be able to avoid traversing by the king’s bedroom," he said, pointing to something on the paper with the pencil. Doc came over for a look as Marty struggled to scrape his jaw off the floor from the words that had been uttered by a kid who wasn’t even ten years old yet. Wow, he thought, stunned. Even Doc doesn’t talk like that! Doc didn’t notice his old friend’s reaction, his attention focused now on the paper spread across the table. "Yes, that course appears to be the wisest," he agreed. "Nice work, Jules." Doc looked up and gestured for Marty to come in closer. Marty did so, noting the paper appeared to be a very detailed floor plan of a building. "Where did you get something like this?" he asked Doc as he examined the plan. "The castle is still standing in the future," Doc said. "I merely went ahead a few centuries and stopped by the gift shop in there. They sold these maps for only a couple dollars. Very fortunate for us." "I want to come, too," Verne said, looking up at Doc with an obvious expression of begging. "Come on, Dad, it’s our mom stuck in there. We should be able to help ‘er out!" "It’s far too dangerous," Doc said quickly, shaking his head. "You’re both too young to get involved with this situation." "We already are involved," Jules muttered. He looked at Marty for the first time. "You’re Martin McFly, I presume?" "Just Marty," Marty said. "And you’re Jules?" Jules nodded, eyeing the teen for a moment. "I would guess you have to be in your late teens. Is that correct?" "Well, yeah, I’m seventeen -- " Jules turned to Doc, cutting Marty off. "That’s rather young, too." Doc was examining the map again. "Marty has assisted me in matters like this before," he said without looking up. "And he is seven years older then you." "Technically, Verne and I are far older than he is," Jules said, folding his arms across his chest, as if the matter was inarguable. Doc was
n’t going to budge, however. "Perhaps technically. But you both still have yet to reach seventeen physically and are too young to be drawn into this mess. Anyway, you both have your own jobs to take care of here." Doc looked up at Marty, still hanging back a little. "Come here, let me explain to you what we’re going to do." Marty edged close to the table. Doc picked up the pencil that Jules had dropped on the plan and pointed to what looked like a small room with a big red X in it. "This is where Clara is being held, under lock and key, with two guards stationed at her door." "How do you know that?" Marty asked, amazed. "I saw her, briefly," Doc said. "I was walking around the perimeter of the castle yesterday, trying to locate the best way inside, and I saw her at one of the windows. We spoke for just a moment before some guards chased me off the property. Clara was able to tell me how she was being held prisoner, with the blockaded door and the guards, and I was able to pinpoint the precise location of her room with the assistance of this map." Doc tapped it once with the pencil. "Anyway, her room is on the second floor of the castle, in the west wing of the building." Doc moved the pencil to the plans for a different floor, beside the second story. "Here’s where we’ll enter, at the north end of the building and at the back entrance. As Jules mentioned earlier, that entrance has less security, possibly because there are several miles worth of wild wilderness in that direction." "What do you expect to do with the guards, anyway?" Marty asked. "Would they just let us walk by?" "Hardly." Doc looked up from the map. "I plan to use the sleep inducer on them, the same device I used on Jennifer when we were in the future." "Don’t you have to put that right in their face?" Marty asked, remembering very clearly when Doc had used it on his girlfriend. "Will they let you even get close enough to do that?" "It doesn’t take long at all. I just need a clear shot of their eyes." Doc turned his attention back to the map. "After entering the castle, we will go up the back staircase, approximately ten feet away from the A-2 entrance we’ll use. This will lead us to the second floor of the castle." Doc pointed out the locations as he continued to explain. "We will go down this main hall, turn a right here, move five doorways down, then take another right at the next hall we come to. If these maps and my calculations are correct, Clara’s chamber will be the second room on the right. If all goes well, we will incapacitate the guards at her door, then smuggle her out of the room and castle without an alarm being raised." Marty stared at the map and whistled softly. "This is pretty complicated. Why don’t we just throw a rope to Clara in her room and let her climb out or something like that?" "I’ve considered that option," Doc admitted. "And I wish it could be that simple, but that avenue of approach is physically impossible. The window is far too narrow for her to squeeze through." "Have you considered the alternatives if a complication should arise?" Jules asked Doc, studying the map. "There is one." Doc pointed at the map with the pencil again. "If an unexpected problem should come up, such as an alarm being sounded or additional guards than we are expecting, we will split up. I will go down the hall this way, heading towards the south end of the building. Marty, you head to the east, this way. There’s a staircase at the end of this hall, and at the bottom of the stairs is a doorway to the outside. It’s the easiest route out, aside from the way we would arrived." "What would happen to us if we were caught?" Marty asked nervously. "Just out of curiosity...." "You’d get taken to the dungeon!" Verne exclaimed, his eyes wide and the expression on his young face gravely serious. "The king will probably keep you locked up there forever, and feed you only moldy bread and rainwater for the rest of your life!" Doc shot him a sharp look. "Verne, you know that doesn’t happen. Those are just legends." He turned back to Marty. "I wouldn’t worry about that -- it shouldn’t happen. We’ll have future technology to our advantage as well as these plans. I don’t think anyone in the castle believes it would be possible for us to sneak in and locate Clara." "But what if we are caught?" Marty persisted, feeling rather uneasy that Doc was avoiding the question. "Well... ah...." Doc cleared his throat and looked rather uncomfortable. Marty’s disquiet tripled. "Doc, do you know or do you just not want to tell me?" Jules answered the question. "Verne is partially correct," he said. "They would likely take you to a subterranean prison and keep you there. Perhaps they would allow you to go, but this king is rather neanderthal-like and he could possibly kill you in a most painful manner." While Marty attempted to weed through Jules’ technical vocabulary (and wonder if the kid ate dictionaries for breakfast), the boy earned a rebuke from his father, just as his brother had. "Jules, that’s not necessarily true," he said. "Your sources of information are just the same as Verne’s." Jules snorted softly. "I highly doubt Verne even knows what an encyclopedia is, let alone reads one." Doc decided to change the subject, even as Verne sputtered at the insult. "Marty, nothing should go wrong," he said. "Even Clara doesn’t know that we plan to get her out of there tonight. I’ve scouted the area as well and have a very good idea on what to expect. I wouldn’t have brought you here if I thought this would be very dangerous." Marty wasn’t really sure if he believed that. Sure, Doc wouldn’t put him in a dangerous situation, but things could go wrong. They had before. Not everything could be planned out to the nth degree, especially where human behavior was concerned. "I know," he said, though he still wasn’t comfortable as Jules’ words finally sunk in. Dungeons and death -- great. Doc took out a pocket watch and looked at the time. "We should probably start on our way now. I’d like to leave this time period by dawn and that would mean before five AM." Doc started to roll the map up. "Wait a minute!" Marty cried when he realized what was about to happen, holding up his hands. "I’m not ready for this yet! Which way do I go if something happens, again?" "We can discuss this further on the ride to the castle," Doc said, slipping the rolled map into a leather backpack. He looked at his kids. "Jules, Verne, stay here. I’ll contact you with a walkie-talkie transmission with news as soon as I can. Understand?" The boys exchanged a look, then nodded slowly. Doc looked a little skeptical at their nods. "I mean it!" he emphasized. "If I discover you both followed us, you’ll be in big trouble!" The kids looked at each other again and made equally sour faces. "We understand," Jules muttered, not happy. "We’ll stay here and await your call." Doc hesitated for a moment, as if he wanted to press the issue, then seemed to change his mind. He headed for the door, taking a lamp with him on his way. "Let’s go, Marty," he said. "The sooner we get Clara away from that place, the better!"
Outside of the cottage, Doc untied two horses from a tree nearby, both fully saddled up and ready to go. "Where did you get them?" Marty asked, rather surprised they weren’t going in on foot. "From a nearby farm," Doc said, handing Marty the reins to the white horse. "I’ll take them back where they came from before we leave." Marty pulled himself up on the horse with little trouble, having only had a week pass since he had last used the creatures as a common mode of transportation, back in 1885. He waited until Doc was safely on his own horse before he started another barrage of questions. "So, where is this castle, exactly? How long do you think this rescue will take? What if I get lost if we have to make that emergency escape?" Doc started his horse forward, in the direction of a path in the trees that was faintly visible in the light of the lantern he carried on horseback. Marty followed close behind. "The castle is approximately two miles from here," Doc said. "About a half hour, 45 minutes ride on horseback. I hope to be in and out of the building in under half an hour at the absolute most. Fifteen minutes is my goal. As for the emergency escape route, it’ll be pretty easy for you to get to your exit. It’s just at the end of the hall. Mine is a little more complex, but I’ve memorized the map and I’m confident that I won’t have any problems with getting out. You shouldn’t either." Marty frowned, still a little worried. "Are we going to have a meeting place in case that happens, since we’ll be separated?" "I thought back at the horses would be good," Doc said. "That should be easy for you to remember. We’ll tie them to some trees at the edge of the forest near the castle." A few moments of silence passed before Marty spoke up again. "Your kids are sure....interesting. They seem to be opposites of one another." "Oh, they are," Doc said, chuckling softly. "You should see the bedroom they share! Half of it -- Verne’s half -- looks like it was hit by a tornado. But Jules’ half is incredibly neat. Though I don’t know where that boy gets it from. You’ve seen the way my place looks." "Yeah.... Does Jules always talk like that? Using all those big words?" "Oh, yes, he’s been speaking like that since he was a small child." Doc paused, thinking. "I must admit, I’m a bit concerned about it. Jules is extremely intelligent, perhaps more so than I was at his age, but he can be rather antisocial. He has very few friends at home and though he hasn’t said anything, I believe he’s teased by his peers." Marty winced a little hearing Doc refer to the past as "home," feeling a sick sort of disappointment mingled with a little jealousy turn his stomach. I’m happy Doc has a family and all now, he thought. But if they could just come back to ‘85.... "Kids can be jerks sometimes," he said. "Doesn’t matter the time or the place." "That’s true, unfortunately," Doc said. "But I do think Jules might be partially to blame. I’ve heard from Verne that the other children think he’s rather stuck up." "No offense, but I can see why they might think that," Marty said honestly. Doc chuckled, once. "I understand. But he isn’t like you might think, not really. Once you get to know him, you realize most of that is a facade. Certainly, he’s very intelligent, but Clara and I believe most of his behavior -- such as his extensive vocabulary -- is his way of concealing an insecurity, or perhaps rebelling against the other children." "Huh. I didn’t know you took up psychology, Doc." "I didn’t. But once you have kids, you might understand better. They grow up right before you and you’re apt to notice a lot about their behavior and the reasons behind it." "Oh, okay.... Hey, is Einstein still around?" "Oh, yes. But I thought it’d be best to leave him back in 1896 instead of bringing him with us. Taking along a pet on a trip like this can be an added challenge, one we didn’t really need. And he would be more comfortable at home for the five minutes we’d be gone." "Yeah, that makes sense. Hey, what’s been going on in your life since I left 1885? When did you and Clara get hitched? When were your kids born? Why was Clayton Ravine named after me?" To his credit, Doc didn’t seemed overwhelmed by the relentless stream of questions Marty was throwing his way. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly, then started to answer them. "Well, shortly after you left 1885 and the locomotive was wrecked, Clara and I returned to town, where we found the train’s engineer speaking with the marshall about the locomotive being hijacked by two masked men. I corroborated his story, explaining that they had taken Clara hostage further down the line and that Clint Eastwood and I were able to get her away -- but although I escaped, Clint wasn’t so lucky. The train crashed, with the two hijackers and Eastwood on board. They were all killed." Marty couldn’t believe what he was hearing. "And they bought this?" Doc nodded. "Despite some of the sticky, illogical flaws -- such as a lack of any concrete human remains in the wreckage -- yes. It’s good that this happened in a time and place before advanced forensic science.... Anyway, a few days later, they held a funeral and memorial service for you, burying a coffin filled with ashes from the train wreck, believing it was your remains. Attending your funeral wasn’t the best day of my life -- at the time, I genuinely wasn’t sure I would ever see you again. I figured that something had to have happened to the DeLorean when you didn’t return for me within a day." "Something did, Doc," Marty said, surprised he hadn’t yet told his friend. "A train hit it as soon as I came in. I made it out of there just in time!" Doc didn’t look terribly surprised. "I thought as much," he said. "And I knew you well enough to know that if the DeLorean was still working, you would’ve returned for me, despite my wishes to the contrary. But, anyway, not long after your funeral, a town meeting was held and it was decided to name the ravine after Clint Eastwood for his heroic capture of Buford Tannen and his rescue of Clara." "When did you and Clara get married?" "We were engaged in early November of 1885, and were married on December fifteenth that same year," Doc said. "We lived in her cabin near the school house and she continued to teach after we were wed, as I continued my smithing work. Before Jules was born, in early 1887, Clara resigned her position and stayed home to be a mother. Verne arrived at the end of October in 1888 and shortly thereafter we moved out of the cabin next to the schoolhouse and into a farmhouse with more room. I acquired a steam locomotive a year later when one was being retired from the rail company and began to modify it into a time machine that could run on steam power. Five years later, in 1894, it was finished." "Think you’ll ever do another DeLorean?" Marty asked. Doc was silent for a minute, thoughtful. "Perhaps," he mused. "If we move back to the future, that is. I still have the blueprints and the notes from that creation in a safe, back at my lab in 1985. If we came back, I could easily reconstruct another DeLorean time machine. Might be a little expensive, but it would certainly be easier to use then the train and much easier to conceal in other times." "Yeah," Marty agreed. "And DeLoreans have a lot more style than trains -- no offense, Doc." Before Doc could say anything in response to that, something let out a long, loud howl, sounding close by. The horses started a little, whinnying uneasily. Marty turned to Doc, shivers running down his spine as the sound came again, from a different direction. "What was that?" "Wolves, I suspect," Doc answered calmly. "But I think we might be safe." "Wait a minute." Marty stopped his horse. "Might be safe?" Doc’s horse continued to move forward. "Don’t worry, Marty," he said over his shoulder. "We’ll be at the castle soon." * * * It was nearly half an hour later before they reached the castle grounds. Doc had them dismount the horses a couple minutes before Marty could actually see the structure and before they had gotten into any clearing. "From this point onward, silence is of the utmost importance," Doc said softly as they walked. "When we’re in the castle you must speak in a whisper, preferably not at all. The stone hallways and rooms can amplify sound quite well." "Okay," Marty murmured back. "How much further?" "Not much," Doc promised, blowing out the lantern. Marty was rather disoriented at first, then as his eyes adjusted he realized he could see quite well. The moon and the stars gave off quite a bit of light, enough to cast shadows. He was rather surprised by that, then remembered noticing something similar back in 1885. When he had remarked about it to Doc back then, the scientist had mentioned something about it being due to a lack of air and light pollution, which dimmed the skies considerably in the future. The woods started to thin out a minute later and, in another minute, Marty saw the castle rise up through the trees. "Whoa," he breathed, amazed. The moon gave off more than enough light for him to see the building stretch out before them, built on a slight hill. It was about three stories tall, constructed from smooth gray stones that were beginning to grow moss and ivy in places. The castle had a couple towers, all with very narrow windows set into them. Three dark archways were set into the back portion of the castle that they could see and all three entrances were flanked by guards. A few smaller, plainer buildings were scattered around the castle and a low wall, crumbling completely in places, encircled the entire property. "Wait," Doc whispered, grabbing Marty’s arm as he took a step forward. "Let’s tie the horses here." Marty continued to stare at the castle as he tied his horse to the tree, his attention so sidetracked from his task that he misknotted the reins twice. "That place looks huge!" he said softly. "Are you sure we won’t get lost?" "Don’t worry," Doc said, slipping his backpack off his shoulders. "We’ll be fine." He reached into the pack and pulled out the device Marty recognized as the sleep inducer from the future. "Stay behind me, and don’t look directly at this device when I use it," Doc told him as he closed his pack again and slipped it back on. "I don’t want accidentally catch you with this. I fully charged this thing using some of the train’s power and as long as we don’t run into any unexpected problems, I think I’ll be able to have each of the guards unconscious for at least half an hour -- as long as we don’t run into more than eight of ‘em." Doc paused, looking his friend. "Are you ready?" Marty nodded. "Ready," he whispered. Doc moved forward, the brush crackling softly as he moved. In the silence, the sound seemed incredibly loud, like they were announcing their arrival with the proverbial guns blazing. Marty followed close behind, trying his best to make the least amount of noise possible and not succeeding very well. He winced with every step he took, every snap of fallen branches underfoot. Once they were at the treeline, and had climbed safely over the walls, Doc walked without hesitation across the open space at the back of the royal property, heading straight for the castle archway on the far left. Marty hung back for a moment, caught off guard from the bold, open approach Doc was taking. Wasn’t the whole idea supposed to be sneaking in? he wondered, confused. When Doc glanced over his shoulder to see if Marty was with him, the teen hurried to catch up and kept his questions to himself. The two guards at the far left entrance watched them suspiciously as they approached. Doc hid his hands behind his back, the sleep inducer blocked from their view. "Good evening," he said pleasantly to the guards. "Thou art trespassing on royal land," one of the guards said, his words coming out coated in a thick English accent. "Begone at once." Doc continued his advance towards the men. "Of course," he said in the same pleasant tone of voice. He waited until he was close to the guards, who looked as if they were about to reach for the swords girt around their waists, then whipped the sleep inducer out and thrust it in the first guard’s face. The man’s hand immediately gripped his sword’s hilt but, before he could pull it out, the device flashed a pulsing light into his eyes. The first guard slumped to the ground. Doc whirled around and did the same thing to the other guard, who was frozen in shock at what the stranger had done to his friend, then lowered the sleep inducer and switched it off. "Let’s go," he whispered to Marty, who was standing a respectable distance away. Without waiting for Marty to answer, Doc stepped up to the large, heavy door just behind the guards, and eased it open with a soft squeak of hinges. Marty glanced at the two guards on the ground, then looked in the direction of the other four watching the other doorways at the back. None of them appeared to have noticed what had just happened to their friends. He hurried after Doc before they could see him. The castle was dark inside, a startling contrast from the moonlight-flooded outdoors. The only light inside came from torches hanging on the walls in metallic holders. Dark colored tapestries hung on the surrounding walls, creating a cave-like feeling. Doc made sure Marty was safely inside, then shut the door and started to walk down the hall toward some stairs at the end of the hallway. Before ascending the stairs, Doc paused and waited for Marty to catch up with him. "Keep close to the wall as you climb these stairs," Doc murmured. "Just in case someone is coming down them. And be careful when you climb them. There’re no hand rails for you to catch yourself on if you trip." Marty nodded without a word. Doc took the stone steps slowly. Marty waited a moment, then followed his example, keeping his back pressed close to the wall as he climbed up. The stairs curved in a tight circle, making it impossible to see what lay ahead and what lay behind. A few minutes later they reached the second floor. It was empty and silent, with even fewer torches lighting the space. Doc took a right at the first hallway they came to, his steps echoing slightly in the cavernous hall. Marty followed close behind, not wanting to get lost or separated in a place like this. He always thought that a medieval castle would’ve been really neat to be in, but this place was giving him the creeps. Doc stopped when they reached another hallway, peering around the corner cautiously. He looked at Marty and nodded once, taking another right. The next hallway was also empty, the flickering torches causing eerie shadows to leap across the walls and floors. Doc stopped at the second doorway on the right. A large, primitive lock was securing it shut, along with a heavy wooden beam. "That’s odd," Doc murmured, the unexpected sound of his voice causing Marty to jump. "This should be Clara’s room, but where are the guards?" "Maybe they moved her," Marty whispered. Doc frowned. He slipped his backpack off and reached inside, rummaging around. A moment later he pulled out what looked like a pocket knife. "I’m going to break the lock and see; it should only take a moment. Make sure that no one is coming." Marty nodded. Doc bent over the padlock and started to work on it with the blade of the knife, moving it around inside the keyhole. Marty looked around nervously, his bad feelings about the place increasing. Doc was still focused on the lock when, without warning, four guards came walking around the corner. Marty shook Doc’s shoulder hard. "Doc!" he hissed. "Wait, I’ve almost got this thing undone," Doc muttered. "But we’ve got company!" Doc looked up and saw the guards heading for them. "Halt!" one of them yelled as he noticed them. "Halt, in the name of the king!" Doc straightened up and reached for the sleep inducer in his pocket. As the first guard reached them, Doc held it up to his face and pushed the appropriate switch. But nothing happened. Doc tried once more. Nothing. Panic appeared on his face as the guard drew his sword. "Something’s wrong," he said. "Run!" Marty didn’t need any urging for that! He had only gone a few steps when one of the guards grabbed his arm. "Come with me!" the guard said, pulling him none too softly. No way! Marty thought, trying to jerk his arm away. But the guard had a pretty good grip on him. Marty changed his tactic and twisted around, using his free arm to hit the guy, hard, on the hand he was using to hold on. The guard let out a gasp of surprise and pain, letting go. Marty took off down the hall, skidding a little from the smooth bottoms of his boots. He threw a look over his shoulder, seeing two guards hot on his tail. Which way was I supposed to go? he thought frantically, unable to remember Doc’s exact instructions. Marty turned down a new hall then made another immediate turn, his immediate goal to try and lose the guards after him. At the end of the new hall he saw a staircase and knew that the best thing he could do was to go down it. He remembered that much, that a staircase was involved in his route out. Marty started to run down the curving stairs, sometimes skipping a step in his haste. Between his speed and his panic, he failed to notice the puddle of water on one of the steps. As his foot came down on the dampness, his new boots slipped forward into empty air and he fell backwards, sliding down the stairs the rest of the way on his back. His head hit the stone steps hard, pain exploding inside his skull. Even in pain, he struggled to stop the rapid trip down the stairs, but his legs and hands were useless against his momentum. Only when he reached the bottom did he stop the painful slide. When he realized he wasn’t moving anymore, Marty struggled to lift his head up. He groaned without thinking about it, the pain at the back of his head almost more then he could bear. His vision wavered and tilted, fuzzing in and out of focus. This isn’t good, he realized faintly, trying to tell his body to get up and get out of the castle. But his body wasn’t listening to the plea from his aching mind. Marty heard someone step next to him. "Guards!" the person yelled, the volume of the voice making Marty’s head feel as if it would split in two. Marty tried to focus his eyes on the imposing form above him. It was... a man. A very tall man from his perspective. Wearing what looked like a long golden robe. He scowled down at Marty, and Marty wondered if he was hallucinating. The man looked just like Biff Tannen! "Biff," he mumbled aloud, blinking and trying to keep the image before him from blurring and distorting. Guards ran onto scene, swords brandished. "Our humblest apologies, Your Majesty," one of them said. "This shalt not happen again." Your Majesty? Marty thought, dizzy. Does that mean he’s the king? "King Tannen?" he whispered in disbelief. It was then the shock from the discovery, combined with the bump on his head, caused Marty to do the last thing he wanted to do, lying at the feet of an angry Tannen. He passed out. * * * Doc Brown ran through the halls of the castle, trying to both find his way out of the maze and get away from the guards chasing him. Something had gone wrong with the sleep inducer, some minor malfunction. And it had to happened at the worst time! Inwardly, Doc cursed himself as he ran for not coming up with a better back-up plan. He had relied far too heavily on future technology! He should’ve known better than to do such a thing, especially after all the experiences he’d been through! Doc took a left at the next hall, then another left at the corridor after that. At the end of that hallway was a staircase, and after that would be an exit, if his memory of the map was accurate. I suppose it’s possible they‘ve sealed off the exits, Doc realized, already thinking ahead to what he could do if that was indeed the case. If his memory of the map was correct, there wasn’t much he could do; that was the only exit outside at this point and if it was blocked by guards or a gate, he would be trapped in the castle. Doc highly doubted the guards behind him were going to allow him to escape if he was cornered. Doc hurried down the stairs, careful not to lose his footing. With no hand rails available, it might be a fatal mistake if he slipped. Luck was with him when, as he reached the bottom, he saw the doorway was clear. With the pounding footsteps of the guards in hot pursuit at his back, Doc made a beeline for the door, shoving it open as hard as he could -- who knew if there was someone standing outside it, blocking it. His luck held when he saw no guards -- no one, in fact -- outside. Doc ran towards the trees, deciding that the dark forest would provide plenty of camouflage to hide in. He crashed through the brush, making far too much noise but unable to avoid it. Doc finally ducked behind the trunk of a large fallen tree and waited. A few tense moments passed, the sound of his heart like thunder in his ears, then Doc heard the guards retreat back to the castle, giving up the chase. He waited until the night had fallen completely silent again before moving, heading cautiously for the horses in a deliberately confusing zig-zag manner, just in case someone was still watching for him. If Marty isn’t waiting there for me, Doc thought as he made his way to the site, I’m going to be extremely concerned. Marty wasn’t there. In fact, Doc saw no sign of him anywhere. He waited a few minutes, pacing around and straining his eyes to see if his friend was crouched in the shadows, hiding, perhaps. When he remained alone and saw nothing more threatening than a couple nocturnal animals, his anxiety grew. Finally, he took out the walkie-talkie from his backpack and decided to contact his sons. "Jules, Verne," he said softly into the speaker. "Is anyone there?" A few seconds later his transmission was returned. "This is Jules," Doc heard his elder son say. "Did everything go well?" Doc glanced around before he answered, double checking that no one was around. He remained alone. "Unfortunately, no. Your mother’s chamber was unguarded when Marty and I arrived and while I was breaking the lock, four guards happened by. The sleep inducer decided to malfunction so we had to resort to the back-up plan and emergency routes. I got out fine, but I haven’t seen Marty since." "Are you going to come back, then?" Jules asked. "I can’t just leave without knowing what happened to Marty," Doc said, aghast at his son’s suggestion that he abandon his friend. But it wasn’t very surprising, considering the way Jules had reacted when Doc had decided to go to his old friend for help with Clara’s escape. While Verne had immediately warmed up to the idea of spending some time with this friend from the future that Doc had had since before they were born, Jules was considerably cooler to the idea. Doc suspected that because he had always spoken fondly of Marty, Jules was nervous that once Doc spent some time with him again, he would forget about his family -- or perhaps his oldest child. It was a ridiculous idea, Doc thought, but Jules hadn’t been very polite to Marty since his arrival. He’d have to talk to the boy about that, once he had the chance. In the meantime, however, he had other things to worry about. Wondering how long Marty had been missing, Doc pulled out his pocket watch and placed the watch face in a patch of moonlight. He was shocked to see that less then half an hour had gone by since they had entered the castle. "It’s only been about fifteen minutes or so since I last saw him," he said into the radio. "I don’t feel that it would be appropriate to leave quite yet." "It’s your decision," Jules said, something in his tone indicating he thought his father was being foolish. "But I believe if he was to return you would have seen him by this point." A pause. "Face it, Father, he was probably caught or taken to the castle prison." Doc didn’t even want to consider that. "That’s enough, Jules Brown," he said, his voice a little louder than he would’ve liked. Doc lowered it to a more acceptable level. "Let me speak with your brother." There was a rustling as the walkie-talkie was passed from one boy to another. "Yeah, Dad?" Verne asked a moment later. "I’m going to wait here until -- " There was another rustling from the other end, then Jules came back on. "Father, I don’t think that would be wise," he said immediately. "Aren’t there guards still around?" Doc closed his mouth, the question surprising him. "I suppose there are," he said. "But they’ve all gone back inside and -- " "It doesn’t matter," Jules interrupted. "It’s still probably dangerous for you out there. I really think you should return here." There was a pause. Doc opened his mouth to speak, then Jules cut him off before he could start. "Your friend seems as if he could take care of himself, but it might be dangerous if you leave Verne and I alone all night." Doc immediately picked up on what his son was doing. "Jules," he said, "that’s a very inappropriate statement." "I speak nothing but the truth," Jules said, sounding completely unruffled. "You could have chosen to allow us to come with you, but you didn’t and now there is another choice you have to make. Which one will it be, Father? From what you’ve said over the years, I think that Martin McFly can take care of himself." Doc knew he had two options at this point, neither of them good. He would like to stay right where he was; there was always the chance, though a faint one, that he could go back in the castle and search for Marty if he still didn’t show up in an hour or so. Doc knew that was a rather foolish idea, however. After tonight’s botched rescue, security was likely to be much more alert and perhaps more plentiful. Even if he just stayed put, however, it would be better than waiting and worrying back at the cottage. Except for one thing. If he stayed where he was, Jules would never forgive him. He would use it as a confirmation of some kind, Doc was sure, that Marty was more important to him than his children. Doc ground his teeth for a moment, frustrated with his son’s petty challenge, Marty’s failure to show up, and ultimately the king for putting him in this damned position in the first place by kidnapping his wife. Doc took a deep breath, paced several feet, then gave his very reluctant answer. "I suppose you’re right," he said, nearly feeling the smile of triumph that Jules was likely showing at the other end. "I’ll be back there in an hour." He cut the transmission before there could be any protest to that. Doc turned back to the castle, his eyes waiting for any movement outside. When the landscape remained still and silent, a feeling of dread settled in Doc’s stomach. He knew something had to have happened. Of course, I’m jumping to conclusions, he realized. Marty could have simply become lost in the castle, or really is hiding out somewhere until things settle down. Just because he hasn’t shown up yet doesn’t mean that something has happened to him. When twenty minutes passed with no sign of his friend, Doc took the backpack off his shoulder and secured it on the white horse that Marty had ridden, making sure that the walkie-talkie was at the top of the contents in the bag. Marty would know what to do when he got there. Then, with continuous glances at the castle, Doc untied his horse and began his trip back to his kids.
Marty woke slowly, his head aching in time with his heartbeat. Before opening his eyes, he wondered if he was getting sick, coming down with a kind of flu or something. Maybe that’s where the wicked headache was coming from. But when he managed to crack his eyes open at the strange sound of metal scraping against stone, he noticed immediate that he was not in his bedroom at home -- or even in his home at all. With his head still throbbing, the pain mostly focused at the back, Marty blinked once, trying to figure out where, in fact, he was. Around him, shadows leaped and flickered -- it took almost a full minute for his aching mind to realize that they were caused by torches hung on walls. Marty raised his head, the move eliciting a groan immediately as the pain increased. He tried to reach up to his head, intending to make sure that it was just a lump on the back of his skull and nothing worse. His hands couldn’t seem to do what they were told and, with a look down, Marty saw why: His wrists had been bound together with rope. Heavy footsteps approached him from behind. Marty managed to roll over and saw two guards heading his way, their faces without any telling expression. "The king wishes to speak with thee," one of them said in a thick English accident. Marty sat up with effort, feeling woozy. He remembered things now -- sort of. Doc Brown had taken him back to the Middle Ages, they’d gone to rescue Clara from a castle....and then what? Try as he might, he couldn’t remember. As he looked around, Marty realized that perhaps something had gone wrong in the rescue attempt. The torches gave off enough light so that he could see most of the room around him, and it looked like some kind of dungeon. There were four stone walls, one of which had a rusted iron barred door built into it. The stone floor was covered with a green, slimy substance that gleamed slightly in the torchlight. The cell was completely empty except for a small, rotting pile of hay on which he had been lying. "The king?" he muttered aloud, his voice sounding dry and raspy to his ears. Marty cleared his throat and raised his voice so the guards could hear him. "Why does he want to see me?" The guards didn’t answer immediately, grabbing his arms and yanking him to his feet. Marty’s surroundings wavered for a moment, dimmed, then things steadied. His headache was just as bad, if not worse, now that he was on his feet. The guards dragged him stumbling to the hallway outside the cell. "The king has not spoken of his reasons," the second guard said as they took him down a long, dark hall, then up a twisting flight of stone stairs. After fighting the two men with what little energy he had in him, Marty gave in and allowed himself to be pushed and pulled wherever they wanted. Anything, after all, had to be better than the dungeon. After the stairs ended, the guards pulled him through a maze of what seemed to be endless hallways until they reached a large, cavernous room with a high, arching ceiling. The room was decorated with lots of tapestries that looked like they were made out of silk, all trimmed in gold thread. A stained glass window was set at the far end of the room; the sun behind it at the moment cast warm pools of red, green, blue, and gold on the floor. A long red carpet was laid out across the floor, wide enough for perhaps two people to walk down, side-by-side. The red carpet led to a carved wooden throne and, in the throne, sat the same man that Marty realized he had seen the night before, dressed in a red velvet robe trimmed with white fur. And he was a Tannen. No doubt. Marty felt chilled as he stared at the man’s face, though his strong resemblance to Biff Tannen wasn’t so obvious in the light of day, when one wasn’t about to pass out from a good whack on the head. The man seated before him looked younger than the Biff Marty knew from 1985 -- this one appeared to be somewhere in his twenties or thirties. It was difficult to tell. His hair was darker in color, a little longer, and there was a small, jagged white scar on his cheek, under his right eye. Most notably, the man wore a full beard. Yet his face, the bored scowl twisting his features -- it was the same despite being generations removed. When the guards reached the end of the red carpet, they bowed to the man -- the king, Marty realized, feeling slightly sick. "You may release him," the king said after a moment of silence. The guards nodded and stepped back, letting Marty go. The king glared at him, his eyes narrowed into tiny blue slits. "Who art thou?" "Who art thou?" Marty repeated, caught off balance by the question. He had no idea what to say in response to that, only that his real name was probably not the best idea. "Who are you?" he said instead, already having some suspicions of his own with that answer. The king stared at him with a mixture of surprise and disgust. "Who am I? Thou foolish boy, I am Midas Tannen, the king of Mountain Crest!" "Why am I not surprised?" Marty muttered under his breath, rolling his eyes. The king looked at him suspiciously, having perhaps caught a word or two. "Hath the foolish boy aught to say?" Marty shook his head, the move causing him to wince as it briefly worsened his headache. King Tannen resumed his questions. "Who art thou?" "Ahhhh..." Marty said slowly, stalling for time. "My name. Let’s see...." He thought frantically, trying to figure out something that sounded medievalish and wouldn’t create massive suspicion in a time period so far removed and foreign from his own. Weren’t there any movies that he had seen before that took place now, anything that might sound right or-- Marty grinned suddenly, the perfect name coming to him. "My name is Robin Hood!" he finished, tremendously pleased with his choice. The king’s scowl deepened. "Robin Hood," he repeated, as if the name was new to him -- and Marty certainly hoped it was. That character wasn’t based on someone real, was he? Well, it was too late now. "What land is thy home?" "Ah... a really far off place," Marty said vaguely, not wanting to go into any details. The king leaned forward on his throne, suddenly angry. Marty took a step back without thinking, not liking the dark expression on the royal Tannen’s face. "What wert thou doing in my castle? Wast thou trying to steal my wealth?" Marty’s headache grew worse as he tried to understand all the Shakespearean talk. Jeez, it’s like another language, he thought. Maybe I should have paid more attention in class when we were reading those old plays. "I came here because you have one of my friends," Marty said honestly. "Clara." "Clara..." King Tannen said slowly. "Ah yes, her. She is but a beautiful creature. I plan to wed her soon." "Wed her?" Marty said with a gasp. "But she’s already married! She has two kids, even!" "It matters not. Her husband may have an... accident. Or --" King Tannen stopped speaking abruptly, looking at Marty with a strange expression on his face. If Marty hadn’t known better, he would’ve thought the guy was actually thinking. "Doth her husband desire her back?" "Uh yeah, you could say that." "Art thou well aquatinted with him?" "Yes." The king leaned back, his dark expression of earlier all but gone now. A smile spread across his face, the looks of which Marty did not like. He began to feel really nervous with that smile. "Then, Robin Hood, I give thee a choice. Thou shalt remain here, in my dungeon and I shalt keep the fair maidan here. Or thou may depart under the condition that the day after the morrow, upon the noon hour, thou wilt do battle in tournament against me for the fate of the fair Clara." While Marty stared at King Tannen in shock, having expected the king to order him beheaded before letting him go, the older man concluded his terms. "If I am victorious, she will have my hand in marriage and reign over my village as queen. If not, then I shall allow the maiden the freedom she so desires to return to her family." Marty looked at the king doubtfully, wondering if he had whacked his head harder than he thought and that this was some weird hallucination. "Let me get this straight," he said slowly. "You’ll let me and Clara go if I beat you in a tournament in a couple days?" King Tannen nodded, the smile still on his face. "Thou hast my word," he promised. Marty was still rather skeptical, though. There had to be some strings attached -- it was against the very nature of Tannens to be so surprisingly logical and rational. But as much as Marty tried seeing those strings and loopholes to the bargain, he was coming up blind. He sighed softly, wishing that Doc Brown was around -- the scientist would know what to say. But as returning to the dungeon was way down on Marty’s list of pleasurable activities and that Clara would be trapped here anyway if they did nothing, it seemed that there was only one clear choice. Even if it did involve a deal with the devil, so to speak. Still, perhaps this Tannen was different than the ones Marty had grown to despise. Maybe the Tannens that were centuries removed from the Hill Valley branch he was used to dealing with were more reasonable and not as evil as their future descendants. "Okay," he said slowly, still not entirely confident with his decision. "You have a deal." The king’s smile widened. He looked at the guards and made a gesture to them with one of his hands. "Sedgwick, Ludlow, thou may unbind... Robin Hood’s hands and escort him out of the castle." He looked back at Marty, his face draining of amusement so quickly that Marty wondered if he had been duped, or else had accidentally done something to anger the king. "I shall expect thee to return," he said in a low voice. "If thou shouldst not, then shall thy Clara’s fate be sealed." The guards untied his hands, none too gently, then led him out of the room, down the hall to a door, bookending him so he couldn’t dawdle or escape in any way. "Thou must leave the land," one said, opening the door and shoving him hard through it, to the outdoors. Marty turned around, rubbing the faint rope burns around his wrists, just in time to see the guards slam the door behind him. He stood there for a second rather dazed, blinking in the bright sunlight that was such a startling contrast from the dim halls of the castle. Then, once he realized that he really was free and, more importantly, that it was now sometime in the morning whereas it had been in the middle of the night last time he had been outside, Marty started to hurry away from the castle and towards the woods at the back where Doc was supposed to meet him. His head ached at his hurried steps, which went from a rapid walk to a run in just a few seconds, but he suddenly wondered if Doc hadn’t made it out. King Tannen -- How did a moron like that even get to be king? Marty wondered -- hadn’t said anything to him about another prisoner being taken and Marty hadn’t noticed anyone else around him in the dungeon. But, still.... Did he get away? Marty wondered as he tried to remember where Doc had tied up their horses the night before. The odds were likely in Doc’s favor -- he’d had the time to study the map more and likely didn’t become hopelessly lost like Marty had, although Marty knew the only reason he was caught was due to a stupid accident. If Doc hadn’t met a similar fate, then he should’ve escaped safely. And, Marty realized as he caught sight of one of the horses waiting half in the shadows, why would the king expect him to be in a tournament and not Doc if the scientist had been captured? After all, Doc was Clara’s husband, and it would seem Tannen would have enjoyed that aspect even more than battling a friend of the family. When Marty reached the meeting place, he noticed immediately that one of the horses was missing -- specifically Doc’s. But the backpack that the scientist had brought with him the night before was hanging off the saddle on the white horse. Marty frowned when he saw it, wondering why Doc had left that behind, but rather relieved as well. When he had last seen Doc in the castle, his friend had had that backpack with him. That it was sitting outside now, and the fact his horse was gone, was an obvious sign that he had made it out fine. Marty pulled the pack off the saddle and unlatched the buckle holding it closed, peering inside. The first thing he saw was the walkie-talkie. Marty pulled it out and clicked it on. "Hello?" he said into it, wondering if he would get any response. "Is anyone out there?" He waited a minute. Silence from the other end. "This is Marty," he tried again. "Can anyone hear this?" A couple seconds passed, then: "Marty, it’s Doc. What happened to you? Where are you?" "I should ask you the same thing," Marty said, sighing in relief at the sound of his friend’s voice. He hadn’t realized how concerned he had been for Doc until then. "I returned to the cottage last night after it became apparent that you weren’t going to come out," Doc explained rapidly. "What happened to you in there?" Marty rubbed his forehead. His headache was still hanging on. "I fell down those stairs and hit my head," he said. "The next thing I knew, I was locked in a dungeon and... hey, why didn’t you tell me that the king was a Tannen?" "I didn’t tell y
ou?" Doc said. "Well, it must have slipped my mind. How were you able to escape?" "I didn’t. The king let me out." "What?" Doc asked, surprised. "How did you manage that?" "We made a deal," Marty admitted. "Listen, how do I get back to your place from here?" "Follow the path," Doc said. "It’s not too difficult, considering it’s about the only place you can ride a horse in the woods. What was the deal you made with the king?" "I’ll tell you when I get back there," Marty said, wanting to get away from the castle as soon as possible. "Over and out." He cut the connection before Doc could say anything else. * * * Nearly an hour later, Marty reached the clearing before the dilapidated cottage. He dismounted the horse and walked towards the building, pausing to tie his stead to a tree besides Doc’s horse. Marty hadn’t yet reached the cottage when the door opened and Doc came out, looking concerned. "What’s this deal you mentioned?" he asked by way greeting. Marty tried to smile to put the scientist’s worries at ease. "Well, it’s nothing much. I just have to beat the king in a tournament the day after tomorrow and if I win, we get Clara back." Doc paled -- not the reaction Marty was hoping for. "Great Scott! You agreed to this?" "Well, what else was I supposed to do?" Marty asked as he entered the cottage, Doc right on his heels. "It was either that or I stay a prisoner in that place. Anyway, how hard can this tournament be?" "Marty, are you even aware of what goes on in a tournament?" Doc asked, shutting the door. Marty shrugged. "Sports, I think. Isn’t it like a medieval version of the Olympics?" "Close," a voice said from behind Marty. He turned around and saw both Jules and Verne standing in the doorway to the second room. It was Jules who had spoken. "The tournaments consist of archery, jousting, and swordplay. The man who wins two out of three is declared the winner, and the loser is usually killed by the winner in a most malicious manner." Marty felt his own face pale as those words sunk in. "Are you serious?" He turned to Doc. "Is he serious?" Doc didn’t look very happy. "Unfortunately, yes." "But the king never mentioned any of that!" Marty exclaimed, feeling terribly cheated. He felt his temper well up at being tricked so easily. "That -- that jerk!" "He probably assumed you knew about it already," Doc said. "And you would, if you lived in this time. Tournaments are considered a form of popular entertainment now, like films are in the future." "Why’re you all so worried?" Verne asked, not looking all that concerned himself. "We can get Marty to win! It shouldn’t be that hard. Then we can get Mom back and go home." Jules laughed. "Verne, you are so naive! Do you honestly think that Martin has any experience, let alone any talent, for such sports?" "Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence," Marty said with some sarcasm, rather irritated at Jules for failing, again, to call him by his much-preferred nickname. "You know, we did do archery in P.E. once. I did all right." Doc turned to Marty. "You know, perhaps Verne is right," he said thoughtfully. "Perhaps with some extensive, aggressive training, you might be able to go up against the king." "But King Tannen is known all around for his expertise in tournaments," Jules said. He eyed Marty. "I doubt seriously that one foreign to this time period, as well as the practices and traditions, could be successful in tournament." "I am well aware of that," Doc said, starting to pace. "However, the king doesn’t have access to future technology as we do." "But that’s cheating!" Verne protested, aghast. "You always said that cheating is wrong an’ everything." To his credit, Doc did look rather guilty under his offspring’s disappointment. "Well, ah, Verne, sometimes in situations like this, it’s better to bend the rules a little rather than play fair," he said after a moment. "Would you rather not see your mother again and have Marty get hurt -- or worse?" "Uh uh," Verne said, shaking his head hard. Doc nodded. "You see my point, then," he concluded. "Now, the question is where can we find some lances, swords, armor, arrows, and other such necessary equipment?" he muttered, half to himself. "Doc, I don’t know anything about this stuff!" Marty cried, figuring he’d better speak up now. "How am I supposed to beat King Tannen? Do you know a lot about it?" "Don’t worry," Doc assured him. "During our stay here we’ve been to a tournament, and the rules aren’t terribly hard to pick up. And we have two days for you to practice with these techniques." He paused, thoughtful. "Of course, most tournament participants spend years in training, but that can’t be helped at this point." Marty stared at Doc, feeling rather sick. "Let me get this straight -- you expect me to cram years worth of training in only two days? Are you crazy?! I can hardly pass tests at school after cramming, and that’s only stuff from a few weeks of classes!" "Marty, calm down. We’ll tackle this thing one challenge at a time. And the first will be locating the proper equipment for these games," Doc added. He pulled a small notebook from his pocket, along with a stub of pencil, and began to jot some notes to himself, perhaps a list of the items they would need. "But Doc, what if I don’t win? What will we do then?" Doc looked up from his note taking, a determined glint in his eye. Marty recognized that look, having seen it several times before in the years he’d known the scientist. It was the same one that appeared whenever they had been faced with the near impossible before. Like getting the DeLorean up to 88 miles per hour by an 1885 steam train, or arranging it in 1955 so lightning could be captured for the flux capacitor to send the car back to the future. "Don’t worry about that, Marty. We have two days for you to master these skills. We’ve been faced with worse deadlines. And remember -- if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything." Doc turned his attention back to his notes. Yeah, but everything we’ve faced before has been scientific, he thought. What if he messed up? Doc’s calculations couldn’t help him out once he was on the field and facing off against another Tannen who would likely excel at this physical activity so ingrained in the times. Marty hardly cared to think about the levels of pain he might experience at the receiving end of some of the ancient weapons that were used now. But he sighed in resignation to the unavoidable, hoping his friend would be right and everything would turn out fine.
Doc Brown spent the next few hours away from the cottage, on a mission to locate all the supplies he claimed they would be needing the next couple days. "I am reluctant to use the time machine to get these things and save us some time," he told Marty, Jules, and Verne as they watched him hitch up his horse to a small cart that he had hunted down somewhere. "I don’t want to use it during the daylight hours and we don’t have enough time to wait until tonight." "You could wait until this evening, gather the supplies with the time machine, then return to this morning," Jules suggested. But Doc shook his head firmly. "No, that won’t work. There are too many possible complications if we were to do that. I’ll just take a few hours to collect the materials we need in this time. I have some ideas where I can find them." Doc left soon after, leaving Marty alone with the kids for the first time. While Verne had behaved rather friendly towards him, asking him questions about both Doc and the time he was from, Jules retreated to the back room without a word and remained there. When Marty expressed concern for his behavior and wondered aloud if he should look in on him, Verne’s response was immediate. "No," he said, actually standing before Marty as if he thought the teen would make a run for the door to the second room. "It wouldn’t be a good idea." "Why not?" Marty asked, utterly baffled. Verne chewed his lower lip, looking rather uncomfortable. "Because," he said softly, his voice so low that Marty had to lean forward to catch it. "Because....?" Marty prodded. Verne’s eyes darted nervously towards the closed door. "Because he doesn’t like you," he said in a whisper, leaning close to Marty as if sharing a secret. "Jules doesn’t like me?" Marty said, trying not to sound as if his feelings were hurt by this revelation -- which they were, a little, he had to admit. Verne shook his head hard. "Uh-uh." Perhaps realizing that this conversation would be better conducted out of doors, Verne took Marty’s arm and dragged him outside. When they were several paces from the building, as well as on the opposite side from the room where Jules was holed up, Verne explained further. "Jules is mad at you," he said. "I think he thinks Dad likes you better or somethin’." Marty blinked. "Why would Jules think that?" he asked, wondering if he had said anything around the boy to give him that idea. Verne shrugged. "I dunno. But Dad has talked about you for years. Jules never really cared, but when Dad said he was gonna get you an’ have you help him get Mom away from the king, he really got upset." Marty didn’t get it. "Why?" he asked. "Did I do something when we first met that set him off?" Verne shrugged again. "I dunno. I don’t think so, but I dunno." Marty looked at the cottage. "Maybe I should go in there and talk to him--" "No," Verne insisted, blocking Marty’s path to the building. "He’d get really mad if he knew I told you this stuff. And I’m on his bad side enough already." While Marty considered this plea, Verne went into more detail. "Last time he got mad at me, he put something in my toothpaste that turned my teeth blue for a few days! It was kinda neat looking, but he knows too much about science and you don’t want to be on his bad side." "Well, that’s just great," Marty muttered. He decided to let Jules be for now, as his brother wished. But before he left, maybe he should have a talk with that kid and see what was up. Doc returned several hours later, his cart filled with a tangle of stuff that included swords, armor, long lances, bows, many arrows, a couple bulls-eye targets -- even what looked like a knight dummy of some kind. Marty couldn’t believe that Doc had tracked all that down so quickly and that they would need all of it for the training and tournament. "Are you sure we’re going to need all of this?" he asked doubtfully as he helped Doc unload it all in the front of the cottage, as the back was taken up mostly by the train. "Oh yes, I guarantee it," Doc answered. Marty examined what looked to him as a knight’s helmet before tossing it to the ground with the other equipment. "Where the hell did you find this stuff, anyway?" "It would be in your best interest to not ask," Doc said with a rather devious smile. "But rest assured that the objects will be returned to their proper homes before we leave this time." After a late lunch, the training began in the field before the cottage. Doc explained to Marty over the meal that they were going to start with the archery and sword play that day, then move onto the jousting the next day. "Jousting will be by far the most difficult," Doc said. "It’s extremely physically challenging. You must learn to stay on the horse while simultaneously wearing armor and holding up a heavy lance. And in the course of the practice, it’s almost guaranteed that you’ll fall off the horse a few times." Perfect, Marty thought, not looking forward to that exercise in the slightest. For reasons unknown to Marty, Doc had decided to involve both Jules and Verne in the training. Maybe it was to give the kids some feeling of doing something constructive while their mother was trapped, maybe it was to give them that extremely important sensation desired by all children -- to be helpful. Whatever it was, Doc had split each of the two tasks between his sons. While Jules sullenly sorted through the arrows for archery, Verne took the role of helping out his father with Marty’s sword play skills. Verne was handed a sword by his father and told to stand before Marty, who selected a sword of his own from the pile of gear Doc had collected. He nearly fell over from the weight of the sucker. It took him several moments to get a grip on the handle that was strong enough to lift the blade fully off the ground. Verne didn’t appear to be suffering from the same problem, however; Marty couldn’t believe that an eight-year-old kid could hold up the sword as easily as he was. He was more then twice as old as Verne and was having trouble lifting the weapon up several inches off the weeds! "How can you do that?" he finally asked the boy. "Do what?" Verne asked, swinging his sword back and forth through the air like a pendulum. "Handle that sword so easily?" "I can explain that," Doc broke in from the sidelines. "I knew the degree of difficulty that the boys would have handling that heavy weapon, so I managed to find one that was crafted specifically for youth." Verne stopped what he was doing, looking insulted. "Dad, that’s not fair!" he moaned. "What about mine?" Marty asked, having to rest the end of the sword on the ground for a moment, to rest his arms a little. "Is this what everyone else uses?" Doc nodded. "Yes. They won’t let you fight with any other kind of sword in a tournament and it’s best to rehearse with one you will end up using. You wouldn’t want to do battle with a lighter one, anyway, because it would have less power behind it and you’d have more difficulty deflecting your opponent’s blows." Doc took out his pocket watch and glanced at it with a frown. "We better get down to business." He looked at Marty. "What I’d like for you to do is fence the way you think you should. Right now. With Verne." "Isn’t that a little dangerous?" Marty asked doubtfully. "What if I hurt him?" "You won’t. Go ahead. Try it." "Yeah, try to hit me," Verne said, holding up his sword. "Unguard!" "The proper term is ‘en garde,’" Jules muttered from a dozen feet away, where he was busy nailing up a bulls eye target to a tree. Verne didn’t appear to hear him, watching Marty intently. Marty shrugged. "Okay," he murmured. "If you really want me to." He took a breath, adjusted his hands on the hilt, then swung his sword up towards Verne. He was stunned when Verne blocked his swing without much effort. It caught him so off guard that Marty dropped the sword in his hands to the ground. "I won!" Verne cried, thrusting his sword into the air towards the sky in a victory pose. Marty looked at Doc helplessly. "This is going to be impossible!" Doc stepped away from the cottage and picked up the sword quite easily, handing it back to Marty. "Let’s take this one step at a time," he said calmly. "Now, what you need to do first is get a good, tight grip on the sword’s hilt. To drop the sword during a sword play match would spell an instant loss in that area of the tournament for you, as well as giving you no way of defending yourself against your opponate. Your object will be to not only block the opposing blows and swings but to get your opponate to lose his weapon as well." Marty tightened both his hands around the handle of the heavy sword. "How’s this?" he asked. "You tell me," Doc said, taking a couple steps back. "Do you feel that if your sword was hit, you could keep your grip on it?" Marty swung the sword around a little through the air, in small arches. "I don’t know," he said after a moment. He looked at Verne, pretending to fight an imaginary opponate while he waited. "Hey, Verne, hit me," he said. Verne stopped goofing off, turned around, and slammed his sword hard into Marty’s. The shock of the blow traveled up the blade and jarred the handle under Marty’s grip. He kept hold of it -- but barely. "Okay," he breathed. "Now what?" "Sword play is a game of anticipating your opponent’s moves, getting an idea of where he plans to strike next so you can block the blow," Doc explained. "Doing that usually takes years of practice--" "Wonderful," Marty muttered, rolling his eyes. "--but we don’t have that much time, so we will have to do the best we can with what time we’ve got," Doc finished, ignoring Marty’s comment. "The most important thing to remember is to stay focused. Keep your eyes on the other sword." He paused a moment, scrutinizing Marty. "How are your reflexes?" Marty shrugged. "I don’t know. Pretty good I’d guess. Why?" "That will be very important in these games," Doc said. He backed up closer to the cottage. "I’d like you to just practice blocking with the sword right now." He nodded at Verne. "Proceed." Verne began to swing his sword at Marty again. Marty was able to block it once... twice... three times. But just as he thought he was getting the hang of the sport, he misjudged the angle of one of Verne’s swings. Instead of clinking against the sword and being blocked, the swing went right into his knee. Marty jumped back, dropped his sword, and sucked in a sharp breath, rubbing his knee hard. "Are you all right?" Doc asked with concern, rushing to his side. "I think so," Marty said after a moment, letting out a deep breath. Doc knelt down to look at it. "The blade didn’t cut you, did it?" "No -- I don’t think so.
Am I bleeding?" Doc tentatively touched the aching knee, causing Marty to wince. "I don’t think so," he said after a moment. But even if it wasn’t cut in any way, his left knee continued to throb in pain. Marty was willing to bet that there would be one hell of a bruise later. Verne’s eyes were wide as he stared at Marty, his sword hanging down by his side forgotten. "I’m so sorry," he said, sounding horrified at what had done. "I didn’t mean to hit you! It was an accident, I swear!" "Don’t worry about it," Marty said, straightening up and tentatively flexing his knee. "It’s probably inevitable that something like this’ll happen." "We can take a break if you need one," Doc said as Marty picked his sword off the ground. Marty shook his head. "No, thanks. We don’t have enough time. I’m fine, really. If I rest, it might just end up hurting me more when I get back to the sword play, anyway." The sword play practice took up a good portion of the afternoon. By the time Doc decided that it was time to move on to the archery, Marty’s arms and shoulders were aching worse than his knee from the effort of holding up and swinging the incredibly heavy sword. He didn’t think that archery was the best follow up activity, as it used the same part of his body that gave him pain every time he moved it, but kept his feelings to himself. As he had said to Doc earlier -- they simply did not have enough time. Jules took over the role that Verne had played in the sword play exercise, hardly looking at Marty even as he spoke to the teen, choosing instead to examine his arrows or two targets now nailed to a couple nearby trees. "You said you have taken archery before, correct?" Jules asked as he looked over one of the sharp metal tips of an arrow. Marty knelt down to pick up the other bow and a couple arrows on the ground, swallowing a groan as his arms complained from the movement. "Yeah, we had this course in school once," he said. "Actually, I thought it was kinda fun." Especially since Jennifer happened to be in that class with me, Marty added to himself, a slight smile tugging at his lips as he remembered that time. Unfortunately, the pleasant memories lasted only a moment before he was snapped out of his thoughts by Jules. "Archery is the most scientific of these events," Jules said, his voice already sounding like Doc’s when the scientist got into his Lecture Mode. The boy took the arrow he was holding and placed it into the bow, drawing the string back until it was taut. "It is best to know the correct angle in which to release the arrow, taking into account the wind direction and speed. It is also best if one adds in the approximate weight of the arrow." Marty tried to be as nice as he could with his reaction to all this. "That sounds like it would work, ah, Jules, but it’s a little too...complicated for me." Jules sniffed. "It doesn’t surprise me," he muttered. "You can’t even grasp the fourth dimension." Marty felt his face redden at the reminder of his constant error in that area of time travel. Doc, who had been hovering nearby, did not let his son’s words go by without words of his own. "Jules Brown!" he warned in one of the most threatening tones Marty had ever heard him use. "Comments like that are completely unnecessary -- especially for someone who’s already in hot water." Jules scowled, his back to his father. "Yes, sir," he said in a rather toneless voice. Marty shrugged and managed a smile. "It’s okay, Doc," he assured his friend, who was frowning at his older offspring. "Isn’t there another way to shoot arrows without being so... technical?" "Sure!" Verne piped up, stepping forward. "I’ll show ya -- it’s all a matter of luck!" He ran over and picked up a bow and arrow, inserted the arrow in the bow’s string, pulled it back, then let it go toward one of the targets. The arrow struck the very edge of the last ring on one of the bulls-eyes. "If the king and his people were viewing this pathetic display of archery craft, you could be brought to the gallows for that," Jules said as Verne frowned at his misaimed attempt. "Now allow me show you how an expert would do it." Jules loaded his arrow in the string and stretched it as far back as his arms could manage, eyes narrowed in concentration. He held it like that for almost a minute, shifting his upper body a bit to adjust his aim before letting it go. The arrow hurtled toward the target and struck the target hard, coming within two inches of the bulls-eye. "You were saying, Verne?" Jules asked his brother, a slow smile spreading across his face. "Well, there’s such thing as dumb luck," Verne muttered, frowning. Jules glared at him, but Verne didn’t seem to care, turning around and heading back to the sidelines where Doc was watching. Jules exhaled slowly, still looking rather peeved. He looked at Marty, finally, an obvious disgust shining behind his eyes. "Why don’t you try it now, Martin?" he said. "You might need much more practice at this skill than myself," he added, managing to subtly insult Marty once again. Marty ignored the quip as Doc shot his son a strong look of warning, instead examining the bow and arrows for a moment to see exactly how they worked now. The arrows had a small niche at the end, which appeared to be where the string was supposed to go. Marty put the bow string in the niche and pulled his arm back until the string was stretched as far back as it could go and his arm was back as far as he could do it without overwhelming pain. He was able to hold it there for only a few seconds, his arm shaking a little from the trials it was being put through on this day, before he let the projectile go, in the general direction of the targets. The arrow headed in an upward arc, straight for a tree branch, embedding itself into the wood a good deal off course from the targets. Marty frowned at his misguided attempt. "Well," he said after a moment of silence, "I suppose it has been a while since that archery course." "At least you have a general idea of how how to do it," Doc pointed out, ever the optimist. He went to Marty’s side and took the bow from his hands. "You might want to try holding it more like this--" "I thought I was the one who would educate him on this matter," Jules interrupted from his father’s side. "I never said you couldn’t assist me, Jules," Doc replied, glancing down at his son. "Anyway, after the way you’ve been acting today, maybe it’s best if you sit out for a while." Marty watched as the boy’s face paled, then flushed with color. A very hurt look flickered across his features, but it was gone so quickly that Marty wondered if he’d just imagined the expression. "All right, Father," he said in a flat voice. "It’s plain to see that you’d much rather spend time with your old friend than your own son." With that, he turned and walked quickly to the building. "Jules--" Doc began, the rest of his sentence never leaving his mouth as Jules opened the creaky door and slammed it so hard that Marty believed he actually heard it crack a little. Doc sighed, looking rather irritated. "I’m sorry about his behavior, Marty," he said. Marty shrugged, wincing a little at the move. "It’s okay, Doc," he said. "You can’t really control your kids. Do you want to talk to him?" Doc eyed the cottage for a moment, then turned back to the archery project. "No, he could use some time to cool down, I imagine. Anyway, we should take advantage of the daylight hours as much as possible." It was good advice, but Marty couldn’t help feeling that this would be one more strike against him in Jules’ book. What the hell is bothering that kid? But he would have to try and figure it out later, when Doc wasn’t giving him tips and instructions on the best way to go about archery. "Aim at the target," Doc said, handing the bow back to Marty. "And this time hold your arms as steady as possible." Good advice, perhaps, but harder to actually do. It took all of Marty’s concentration to hold still as he drew the bow back, aimed directly at the target, and let the arrow go. This time, the arrow hit the tree trunk right above the target. "Well, it’s better’n last time," Verne said, even as Marty sighed in mild frustration. After six more times of trying various ways of aiming the arrows, with Doc and even Verne throwing out advice, it finally hit the outermost ring in the bulls-eye. "I think you’d do best in aiming slightly below the target to strike it," Doc observed. "Try it a few more times and we’ll see if this one time wasn’t a fluke." The "few more times" turned out to ten... then fifteen... then twenty... and then Marty finally lost count. His headache, which had more or less faded after lunch, came back with a vengeance, and his arms and shoulders started to feel rather numb. Yet as he plugged away, hardly even aware of Verne passing him arrows and Doc retrieving them, Marty managed to get close to the center of the target -- and twice he even scored a bulls-eye. The satisfaction in that was short-lived, however, as he seemed to go downhill fast from there. He simply couldn’t hold his bow or arrow steady anymore and the arrows started to go wide, one even narrowly missing Doc as he was walking back with some of Marty’s shots in hand. With the near miss, Doc paled a little and finally seemed to notice that Marty’s arms were trembling as he raised the bow for another try. "You know, Marty, I think you’ve had enough practice for now," he said. "Perhaps we should call it a day." * * * At Doc’s suggestion, Marty sighed and lowered his arms. "Thank God," he said, sounding incredibly relieved. "It feels like my arms might fall off." Doc turned around and headed back to the trees, stooping to gather scattered arrows as he went. Verne scurried around helping, without being told, and Marty collected the few bows together. "Where do you want this stuff?" he asked. "Just set it near the door, next to the building. It should be all right there." Doc finished getting as many arrows as he could find on the ground and embedded in trees, realizing with a slight bit of concern that the supply was only half of what they had started with. Most of Marty’s shots had gone into the forest and weren’t going to be found without a flashlight and someone with some time to beat down wild brush. Doc had the former but not the latter. Well, I suppose these will have to be enough for the tournament, he thought, collecting the arrows together in a canvas sack. Verne continued to crawl around in the brush until Doc called for him to not worry about getting every arrow. The towheaded boy emerged from the trees with leaves scattered in his hair and a satisfied smile on his face as he brought two arrows to his father. "These were kinda hidden, but I got ‘em," he said as he handed them to Doc. Verne paused, looking past his father, then stepped close to him and stood on tiptoe as far as he could, his head reaching only a little higher than Doc’s elbows. "Dad, do you think Marty can win against the king?" he whispered loudly. Doc looked over his shoulder, noticing that his friend had already gone inside, then turned back to his son to answer the question as quietly as he could. "I don’t know," he said honestly. "I’m sure he’ll be able to with our help--" Though that was stretching the truth, just a tad. "--but he’ll have to work hard. King Tannen is very good at the tournaments." "What if he loses?" Verne asked, looking up at his father with wide eyes. "Will we get to see Mom ever again?" "We’ll think of something," Doc promised, squeezing his son’s shoulder. "I’m not leaving this place without your mother. That’s absolutely not an option." Verne looked reassured -- but only a little. "What if Marty gets hurt?" Doc winced at the very idea but it was possible, as much as he hated to even think it. "Why, ah, why don’t we worry about that only if it does happen?" he said. "There’s no sense in wasting energy planning for something that might not happen at all." Verne seemed to accept that. "I like Marty," he said. "He’s neat. How long’ve you been friends with him?" "That depends on the perspective," Doc said, smiling and feeling rather pleased at his son’s approval. "If you looked at it from my perspective, I’ve known him for the last... oh, 14 years. I’ve known of him for 41 years. But from Marty’s perspective, it’s been about three and a half years." Verne looked rather confused about the various gaps in time but said nothing. Doc knew he was more apt to understand that sort of thing better if he could work it out in his own way, rather then have his father explain the technicalities behind it. "I don’t know why Jules is so angry at Marty," he said, dropping his voice again. "I’ve got a good suspicion," Doc admitted. He sighed. "I wish your mother was here. I could very much use her input on the situation." "She’ll be back in a couple days," Verne said. He hugged his father quickly, then scurried to the cottage. Doc followed at a slightly slower pace, setting the sack of arrows next to the bows, then entered the dilapidated building. Inside the cottage, Marty was sitting at the table on one of the wooden crates Doc was using for temporary chairs, his chin in his hands and looking rather worn out. Verne was already lighting some of the lanterns with a box of matches Doc had brought with them from the future. Not surprisingly, Jules was n
owhere to be seen. "What did you mean this morning when you said something about using technology?" Marty asked when Doc entered, before he had even had a chance to shut the door. "Technology?" Doc echoed, surprised at the mention of the subject. "Well, I had a few ideas about that." "Can we talk about it over dinner?" Verne asked, whining slightly. "I’m starving!" "Yeah, that sounds like a good idea," Marty agreed, smiling at the boy. "All right," Doc agreed, easy enough. He went over to one of the small trunks they had brought with them and found a couple cans of soup for dinner. At the sight of the soup, Verne immediately made a face. "Soup again?" he groaned. "We’ve had soup for the last three days!" "Canned goods are the best kind of food that keeps well without refrigeration," Doc told him as he picked up the can opener and began to get the cans opened. "I’m sorry that we’ve been having this food so much, but we weren’t supposed to be here so long. I did get these from my place in the future, however, so perhaps the cuisine might be a little better than what you’re used to." He paused as he poured the cans into a metal pot, resting on a portable gas-operated camping stove that he had picked up from his lab a while back. "Where is your brother?" "I think he’s in the other room," Verne said. "Can you check, please?" Verne sighed and rolled his eyes. "All right," he muttered. "He’ll probably bite my head off, though." He approached the other closed door, clearly dragging his feet. But there was not a noise from the other room as Verne entered and shut the door behind him. Doc turned his attention to preparing dinner, locating the last of a loaf of bread picked up from when they had gone to the market five days before -- and the day Clara had been snatched away from them. Doc sighed as he set the semi-stale bread on the table, wishing again that they had done things differently that day. He had considered going back in time to make sure Clara wasn’t kidnapped, but then realized that such a trip couldn’t be made in the first place unless she had been kidnapped -- a nice paradox. Verne appeared a minute later. "Jules is in there," he said, closing the door. "He says he’ll eat dinner, but otherwise doesn’t wanna leave the room." He paused, looking at the food cooking. "I think you should talk to him, Dad." "I’ll do that after dinner," Doc agreed. The soup heated up quickly, Verne helping to set the table without being told. Doc was tremendously thankful for his younger son’s assistance the last several days. With Jules in some kind of strange funk and Clara in the castle, Verne’s behavior was an incredible help and relief. And rather a pleasant surprise to Doc, as his younger boy was usually more mischievous in nature. When the meal was ready, Doc called Jules and the boy came out of the other room, scowling faintly and refusing to look at either Marty or Doc. Doc served the soup in the four dishes they had, giving everyone some of the water from the creek nearby that he had boiled to be sure it was safe. The meal was bland but everyone ate without complaint. "So," Marty said a few minutes into the dinner, breaking the silence that had settled in the room. "Are we going to use future technology in this tournament thing?" Doc took a sip of his water before answering, making a face at the lukewarm and flat taste of the beverage. "I think we could, if need be. Do you want to?" "I don’t know," Marty said slowly. "What would we do if something went wrong?" "Well, we could handle it the best we can." Marty smiled tiredly. "Handle it like we did when the sleep inducer broke? I think we were lucky then but if this thing breaks during the tournament I’ll be dead meat." Marty stirred the soup in his bowl, staring down at it. "It’s not that I don’t trust you, Doc, I just don’t know about using technology in this. It might end up being worse, since we’d be relying on it so much." Doc nodded in understanding. "You could be right," he said. "There’s also the chance of the technology -- even if it is concealed -- to be considered some type of magic. If people get that into their heads, we could have a real mess on our hands." "Maybe not," Verne said. "Maybe doing that could scare everyone and you could get Mom back then." "More likely, we would be arrested and imprisoned for witchcraft or something of that nature," Doc said, knowing that Verne did have a good suggestion. But the idea of showing off future science from times these people could only dream about wasn’t his idea of a good time. It could have serious repercussions on the future. He turned back to Marty. "If you don’t feel comfortable using technology then we won’t. But there is no reason you can’t apply knowledge about future technology towards the tournament. I know you’ve had no problem with that in the past -- such as when you used a skateboard in 1955 before they were around." Marty nodded. "I’ll think about that," he said. "But I don’t know if there’s much I can do with the stuff here. It’s kinda unfamiliar to me, you know." He sighed. "At least in the ‘50’s I knew what most of the stuff was and what it did." "Well, we’ll just work hard tomorrow on the jousting. I’d like to get an early start on that to take advantage of the daylight as much as possible." Marty sighed again. "How hard is that going to be?" Doc decided he’d better be honest. "It’ll be difficult to master. Much more so than the skills of today." "Wonderful. Do you think Clara is all right out there?" Doc managed a smile for Marty and his sons, determined that they wouldn’t know about the unease he felt on that matter. "I’m sure she’s fine," he said. "Perhaps very miserable and very angry, but fine." But Doc was lying. As long as Tannen had her trapped in the castle, Clara was not fine. No one said anything to challenge his words, though; sometimes it was better to believe things were okay. It allowed one to continue forward with the tasks needed. Thinking the other way would only disturb them all and increase the feeling of helplessness that Doc w