Read Back to the Future Part II Online
Authors: Craig Shaw Gardner
Back to the Future Part II (19 page)
Marty knew this was stupid, but he couldn’t help himself. His mother always told him to count to ten - but, when it came to this, he was way beyond counting! Maybe he always felt he needed to do this because he was so short. Or maybe he needed to do this just because Biff was such an asshole.
Whatever it was - he didn’t let anybody call him chicken!
Biff and Marty stared at each other for a long moment. Marty felt as if all his senses had been heightened. He could feel his heart beating in his chest and could hear the crickets on the high school lawn, the cars passing on the distant street, and even the voice of the other Marty, who spoke to George and Lorraine on the other side of the fire door.
‘- if you guys ever have kids,’ the other Marty was saying, ‘and one of them, when he’s eight years old, accidentally sets fire to the living-room rug - go easy on him.’
‘C’mon,’Biff said, breaking the spell. ‘Take a poke at me. chicken.’
All right. If that’s the way Biff wanted it.
As Marty took a step forward, the fire door swung open, smack into his face.
Marty fell to the ground, stunned. He had been knocked down by the earlier version of himself who was running off to rendezvous with the other Doc for the clock tower lightning bolt. Marty blinked and realised that the Almanac had fallen out of his pocket and was laying on the ground next to him.
Biff realised it too.
'What the hell?’ Biff demanded, bending over Marty to pick up the Almanac. ‘Steal my stiff will ’ya punk?’ He grabbed the Sports Almanac from the ground.
Marty groaned in pain as Biff kicked him in the gut, one, two, three times.
'And this is for my car!’ Biff added, kicking him once more, even harder than before. The pain was like fire.
’Butthead!’ Biff called over his shoulder as he walked to his car.
Marty moaned as he clutched his stomach. No matter how much it hurt, he had to get up and follow Biff.
He managed to get to his knees. He saw Biff throw the sports book into the back seat, then get in the car and drive away.
There was no way Marty could chase Biff. Marty was having enough trouble just getting on his feet. He swayed unsteadily as he finally forced both his sneakers beneath him and slowly stood. He took a couple of careful breaths. Everything seemed to be all right. He was bruised, but nothing was broken.
He had to meet Doc! His arms hugging his sore sides, Marty headed for the metal stairs that led to the roof of the gym.
Marty was a little late. Oh, well, it gave Doc a chance to untangle all these pennants from the drive mechanism of the DeLorean. But, once he had the whole rope’s length of them all rolled up, what could he do with the roll?
He tossed the ball of pennants in the back of the DeLorean. One of these days, he would have to clean up back there.
He turned as he heard a groan behind him..
Great Scott! It was Marty. But his face was smudged, his clothing torn. He looked like he’d been run over by a truck!
Marty tried to smile at Doc as he struggled up the last few steps of the metal ladder.
Doc rushed over to help him onto the roof.
‘Marty!’ Doc asked as he helped Marty from the ladder. ’What happened?’
Marty shook his head.
‘I blew it, Doc! Biff nailed me and got the book back. He drove off with it in his car.’
Doc looked back down over the roof. He could see no sign of Biff or his old Ford convertible.
‘Which way did he go?’ he asked Marty.
Marty thought for a minute as he managed to stand on his own.
‘East.’
Doc told Marty to get in the DeLorean. They had a job to do.
Marty felt better, once he got his breath back. He’d be sore for a couple of days, but otherwise, he felt all right. Doc was flying the DeLorean east, following the main highway out of town. Now, ail Marty had to do was concentrate on sweeping the area below them with his binoculars, until he found Biff.
He saw a single car, really tearing down the high, way. He looked through the binoculars. Yeah! It was Biff, all right! Marty could even see the Sports Alma-nac on the back seat!
He pointed down at the car beneath the flying DeLorean.
‘That’s him. Doc! We can just land right on top of him and cripple his car!’
But Doc frowned and shook his head.
‘No, Marty, we can’t risk damaging the DeLorean. We don’t want to be stuck here in 1955.’
Marty looked down at Biff’s car, then back at Doc.
‘Then what do we do?’ he asked.
Doc grinned at Marty. Marty knew that smile.
Doc had a plan.
Boy, Marty had to admit it, when Doc came up with a plan, it was a plan.
It also helped that Doc never cleaned out the rear section of the DeLorean. It seemed there was still a certain pink hoverboard back there - the one a little girl had given to Marty in the future!
Doc turned off his headlights and brought the DeLorean down so that it almost brushed the ground, then eased it forward so that it was almost touching the Ford’s rear bumper.
The rest was up to Marty.
He opened the gull-wing door, and tucked his left foot snugly into the strap at the rear of the hoverboard. Then he pushed the hoverboard out of the car, and, while still keeping one hand on the DeLorean, was soon hoverboarding over nothing but air!
Now, all Marty had to do was move forward along the DeLorean, and grab some part of Biffs car. He pushed the hoverboard forward, skating across the space between the cars.
There! Marty grinned as he grabbed hold of Biff’s rear bumper. He waved at Doc with his free hand. Doc waved in return, then lifted the DeLorean back up into the sky.
Biff was blasting tho radio, and had his foot down on the gas. But he wasn’t even glancing in his rear view mirror. And the book was in the back seat, only a few feat away.
Marty moved into position. But just as he prepared to grab the Almanac the sports news had come on the radio - and Biff reached around to grab the book. Marty ducked as Biff turned, squatting on the hover-board to hide himself outside the car.
‘In collego football today,' the sports announcer droned. ‘UCLA defeated Washington, 19-17; Stanford over Oregon, 24-10...’
‘Son of a bitch!’ Biff muttered. Marty’s heart sank. Biff had found that the scores were really in there. It would be twice as hard to get the book now.
But he still had to try. Marty waited a minute, then rataed himself slowly, only to see Biff drop the book on the front passenger seat.
Double damn! Marty thought. The book had been so close! But he told himself to calm down. Biff was just making this a little more challenging.
Marty ducked down low again so his head was below window level, and pulled himself forward using the door handles. If Biff was going to leave the book in the front seat, Marty would simply have to go up to the front seat.
Marty reached the front door. He grabbed the handle, and pushed the button. The door swung open.
Marty reached his arm inside the car, just above seat level. His fingers closed around the Almanac.
Then Biff looked over at the passenger seat.
‘Hey!’ Biff yelled.
He saw Marty’s hand on the sports book. Biff grabbed the book, too, and looked up at Marty, standing inside the open door.
‘You again!’ Biff screamed.
Marty tried to pull the book toward him, but Biff had too strong a grip. Maybe, Marty thought, he’d have to get all the way into the car.
But Biff had other ideas. He picked his right foot off the accelerator, and stuck his left foot there Instead. He kicked his right foot out, against the door, forcing it open with Marty still on it.
Marty lost his grip on the book. But Biff had lost his hold, too.
The overmuscled teen took his foot off the gas as the sports almanac went flying. It landed on the hood, and the wind whipped it on to the windshield.
Marty had to get that book, now.
He started to pull himself up past the door, up toward the windshield.
To his surprise, Biff didn’t try to stop him. Instead the burly teenager grinned, and floored the gas pedal.
Doc had put the DeLorean on autopilot, so he could watch everything below on his own set of mini-binoculars - except when the occasional cloud got in the way. It was taking far too long! If only there was some other way he could help Marty! But he couldn’t get any closer. He’d risked showing the DeLorean far too much already.
He saw Marty reach the front of the car, and actually get his hand on the book. But then Biff had it, too, and, after a brief tug-of-war, it ended up on the windshield! Marty started pulling himself toward the book again -
There was another one of those pesky clouds.
Oh, no! There was a hill up ahead - Deacon’s Hill, as Doc recalled - which meant they were coming up to the Deacon’s Hill Tunnel! And Marty was so busy trying to get that book, he wasn’t paying any attention to where Biff’s car was going!
Biff swerved the car to the right. He was going to wipe Marty off the side of his car like an insect.
Doc pulled out his walkie-talkie.
‘Marty!’ he yelled. ‘Look out!’
But the DeLorean was already flying over the hill, and Doc lost sight of Biff’s car below.
If only he had been in time!
Marty had almost bought it.
He had turned the second he heard Doc’s warning, and seen the tunnel coming up fast!
He let go of the car, more from panic than from any plan. The hoverboard fell back away from the speeding Ford as Marty grabbed the rear bumper, barely swinging himself away from the wall as Biff threw the car to the right. Sparks flew when Biff scraped the side of the car against the rough brick of the tunnel.
But Marty was still here, hanging on to the back of Biff’s car. And he was still going to get that Sports Almanac.
He started to move the hoverboard forward again, this time on the driver’s side.
All he had to do was keep low as he pulled himself past Biff.
Marty glanced up and saw Tannen grinning at him in the side-view mirror. He couldn’t duck fast enough. Biff socked him in the ear, hard.
His head ringing, Marty almost lost his grip. Somehow. he managed to hold onto the windshield. Biff swung at him again, but this time Marty was ready. He dodged the blow as Biff had to throw his hands back on the wheel to straighten out the car.
Biff jerked the wheel left. He was going to try to crush Marty against the other wall.
Marty had to get out of here.
There was the sound of an air horn, and Marty saw two truck headlights, headed straight for them! Biff swung the car back into the right lane, and the truck missed Marty by inches. It was a dump truck of some sort - Marty watched it travel away from them through the tunnel for a second until he felt Biff jerk the car back into the left lane. They were awfully close to the other wall. Marty had to do something!
But then he remembered how, when he had been in the future, the hoverboard had been able to skate over more than just the ground. In fact, it could go over anything but water! Maybe, he thought, he should stop trying to avoid the wall, and lean the hoverboard into it, instead.
Yes! It really worked. Still holding the side of the windshield, he pushed the hoverboard away from the car and skated up the side of the tunnel! And - this was even better than he thought! - going up the tunnel wall brought him above the hood of the car, that much closer to the Sports Almanac.
He grabbed the book.
Biff reached over the windshield in a wild grab for Marty.
‘You son of a bitch!’ he yelled.
But Marty simply let go of the car. The Ford shot . ahead, and Marty, no longer sharing in the car’s acceleration, fell behind. He shoved the almanac in his inside jacket pocket as his hoverboard glided to a halt. He zipped the jacket up, and started kick-pushing the hoverboard with his free foot toward the end of the tunnel where they had come in.
He heard a squeal of tyres behind him. Marty glanced back as he tried to kick the hoverboard forward with greater speed. Biff had stopped, and was turning his car around in the tunnel.
Without a car to tow him along, Marty could only go as fast on this hoverboard as he could kick it, just like the skateboards Marty was used to. But he had to get out of this tunnel before Biff caught up to him.
He just hoped he could kick this sucker fast enough!
So where was Marty?
Doc had kept the DeLorean hovering over the exit to the tunnel for the last minute, expecting Biff’s car to show up at any second. But there was no sign of Biff, and no sign of Marty - no sign of anything, really, except a big old truck carrying fertilizer that had gone into the tunnel beneath him.
Gone into the tunnel?
Oh no, Doc Brown thought, Marty didn’t have to come out this way at all.
He raised the DeLorean quickly. He only hoped he wasn’t too late to rectify his error.
Oh, shit.
Marty saw the mouth of the tunnel in front of him. But he could hear Biff behind him, coming on fast. And Marty couldn’t push the hoverboard any harder. His leg felt like it was going to fall off, and his ribs had started aching all over again.
But he couldn’t stop now. He was so close to the mouth of the tunnel, so close to getting away.
He didn’t want to look back again. He expected to get run over by two tons of Ford convertible at any second.
Marty kicked even harder.
Pour it on, McFly! Pour it on!
He swore he could hear Biff laughing, over the sound of the revving engine.
Oh, God!
The tunnel mouth was just in front of him, but Marty had no energy left. Even his adrenalin was all used up!
Biff’s car roared behind him. Marty had never heard a car sound so loud. Kick! He had to kick!
A rope tied with multi-coloured pennants dropped down in front of him. It looked like the rope from a used-car lot - or the Lyons Estates sign!
Marty grabbed it, and felt himself being lifted aloft, the hoverboard still strapped to his foot.
Marty looked up.
Doc waved down at him from the open door of the DeLorean.