Back to the Future Part II

by CRAIG SHAW GARDNER

  The front counter in the place looked a lot like fast food places Marty was used to from 1985 - but he guessed that was the idea - with a big wall display overhead, complete with pictures of the burgers and other stuff they served. Every seat in the place, though, had a small video screen in front of it, sort of like a ‘Watchman’, and all the screens were showing images from the 1980s - news clips, movies, rock videos. The sound system was pounding out a song about heaven being only one step away, or something, that Marty thought sounded vaguely familiar. At least there was some good guitar work in it.

  There was still something strange about this place, though. A good part of it, Marty thought, had to be the counter help. They weren’t human, for one thing, but some kind of robots with large video screens that

  switched between showing human faces and food items. Beneath each robot’s screen was a tray to carry food, but - for some reason - all of the robots also sported a pair of red metallic wings to either side of their screens. Wings? Marty hoped they were just there for decoration.

  But Marty had come in here to do more than stare. He was supposed to order something. He walked up to the front of the restaurant.

  One of the red-winged robots smiled at him from the other side of the counter. The thing's video-screen face resembled nothing so much as a computer-generated Ronald Reagan.

  ‘Welcome to the Café 80’s,’ the television image announced, ‘where it’s always morning in America, even in the afternoon.'

  Music swelled behind the computer face, as what looked like an all-too-familiar political announcement from tho 1984 presidential campaign played itself out behind the Reagan image.

  ‘Our special today,’ The Reagan-thing continued, ‘is Mesquite-grilled sushi, cajun style, dipped in Thai cilantro sauce.’

  Marty frowned. He didn't know what everything in that concoction was. but it sounded terrible! You weren’t supposed to grill sushi anyway, were you? There was maybe such a thing as having a little bit too much of the 80s.

  The video image flickered and shifted, turning into this old guy with a beard and turban. It was the Ayatollah Khomeini!

  ‘No!’ the Ayatollah screamed. ‘It is the Great Satan Special'. I demand you have tofu!’

  The image shifted as the voice turned to a gentle falsetto. ‘Hey - be cool.’ The image resolved itself to approximate Michael Jackson. ‘Don’t be bad. We’re all friends here.' The head bobbed around on the screen as if the unseen body beneath might be moonwalking.

  Marty decided he should close his mouth and do what the Doc told him he should.

  ‘Uh -’ he managed. ‘Could I have a - Pepsi?’

  He held up the fifty.

  ‘Cash?’ the screen - now once again in Reagan’s image - replied doubtfully. ‘Well, it’s much easier to just use your thumb -’

  ‘My thumb? Huh?’ Marty looked stupidly at his hand. ‘Uh, no, look, I’ll just pay cash.'

  ‘Well, there’s a handling surcharge on cash, but -’ The Reagan-thing hesitated, as if truly considering Marty’s plight. ‘- well, OK, we’ll take cash.’

  The video creature pointed toward a tray on the counter. Marty placed the fifty there. It was instantly sucked out of sight. There was a quick series of electronic beeps and a small panel whirred aside, revealing a covered, see-through plastic cup with the words PEPSI PERFECT.

  ‘And your change,’ Reagan’s image continued cheerfully, ‘rounded off to the nearest five dollars.’

  A crisp, new five dollar bill shot out of another slot. Forty-five dollars for a Pepsi? This really was the future.

  Marty picked up the money and the cup. The cup’s lid seemed to be permanently stuck to the top. He had no idea how to open it.

  ‘Hey, McFly!’ a very familiar voice yelled from behind him.

  A very familiar voice? In the future.

  Marty turned around, and looked at the man sitting behind the plate of half-eaten sushi, a baseball game blaring from the walkman by his seat. The fellow who had spoken to him was maybe seventy, seventy-five years old, but Marty would recognise that smirk anywhere.

  It was Biff Tannen!

  Chapter Four

  ‘Biff!’

  Marty walked slowly toward the auto detailer, who now sported a head of thinning white hair and a full set of wrinkles.

  ‘Yeah,’ Biff replied with a smirk unchanged by the years. ‘I’ve seen you around. You’re Marty McFly’s kid, huh?’

  ‘Huh?’ Marty replied, still in a bit of shock from having run into his past. ‘What?’

  ‘Marty Junior,’ Biff replied in a tone that assumed Marty was too stupid to figure it out for himself. ‘You look like him, too. Tough break, kid.’ Biff’s smirk got even wider. ‘It must be rough being named after a complete butthead.’

  Tough break? Butthead?

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Marty demanded.

  Biff picked up the cane that rested beside his feet. Marty noticed that the cane’s brass handle was sculpted into a clenched fist. Biff lifted the cane and knocked it briskly against Marty’s forehead.

  ‘Hello?’ Biff asked rather more loudly than necessary. ‘Anybody home? Think, McFly, think! Your old man - Mr Loser!’

  'What?' Marty was completely confused. What was Biff talking about? His father was a success now - a published author and everything - or at least he had been in 1985! Had the future changed things again? ‘A loser?’

  ‘That’s right.’ Biff seemed to be really enjoying himself now. ‘A loser, with a capital L.’

  But Marty refused to believe it. ‘That can’t be!’ he insisted. ‘I happen to know that George McFly is no longer a loser!’

  Biff looked up at the ceiling, as if he couldn’t believe Marty’s stupidity. ‘No,’ he explained even more slowly than before. ‘George McFly’s never been a loser. But I’m not talking about George McFly. I’m talking about his kid - your old man! Marty McFly. Senior!’

  Biff shook his head. ‘He just took his life and flushed it completely down the toilet.’ Biff’s smirk faded for an instant, as if even he couldn’t believe how far Marty senior had fallen.

  Marty senior? But he was Marty senior! And he had flushed his life away?

  ‘I did?’ Marty asked. ‘I mean, he did?’

  Behind Biff, Marty noticed a beat-up old convertible lowering itself - actually lowering itself, without wheels - into a parking space outside the window. A minute ago, he would have been fascinated by that sort of thing. But that was before he learned his life had gone down the toilet!

  Four people got out of the car. three guys and a girl, and one of them walked directly into the Café 80’s. He was a big guy. Huge. He wore black pants and a wicked-looking jacket over a black chain mail shirt. Each of his boots was adorned with a sharp, metallic rhinoceros horn. A cap full of sharp metal spikes was strapped to his head.

  ‘Hey, Gramps!’ the newcomer yelled at Biff as he crossed the restaurant. ‘I told you two coats of wax on the car, not just one.’

  ‘Hey,’ Biff answered just as belligerently. ‘I put the second coat on last week!’

  Yeah,’ the younger man smirked, ‘with your eyes closed.’ He jerked his thumb toward the door. ‘Come out here and scan it. It’s a lo-res job.’

  Marty knew that smirk. In fact, he knew the newcomer s every move. He had seen all those moves before, when he had met the teenage Biff back in 19551

  It was just like Marty’s son looking exactly like Marty. This new kid looked all too much like - he didn’t want to think it. Still, Marty had to ask - even though part of him really, really didn’t want to know.

  ‘Uh, are you two related?’

  Biff frowned back at Marty. He lifted his cane again, once more knocking the silver fist against Marty’s head.

  ‘Hello?’ he yelled even louder than the last humiliating time. ‘Anybody home?' He waved his cane at the boy. ‘Whaddya think, Griff just calls me Grandpa for his health?’

  Oh, shit. Marty looked over at the teenage-Biff l
ook alike.

  ‘He’s Griff?’ he whispered. The Griff that he had to face up to, to save his son? Doc Brown hadn’t warned him that the future would be this bad!

  Griff elbowed Marty out of the way to glower down at Biff.

  ‘Gramps ’ he muttered darkly as he pointed toward the door,‘nuke the bab-sesh and get out of here 'orrita! What the hell am I paying you for?’

  He turned and looked at Marty, with a gaze that held no kindness, no humour, no mercy - only contempt that something as low as a McFly should sully the face of the earth.

  ’And McFly- ’ He pointed a pudgy finger at Marty’s chest. 'Don’t go anywhere. You’re next!’

  Marty got the strangest sense that this had all happened before. He remembered how, back in 1955, Biff used to rap his father George's head with his knuckles as he yelled 'Hello? Anybody home?’ ]ust like Biff had rapped on Marty's head with his knuckle-headed cane! And Biff's attitude back in 1955 was almost exactly like his grandson's, here in the future. Apparently, when you were a teenager in Hill Valley, you either did what a Tannen said, or you paid. Marty might be standing here in 2015, but it was just like the past, all over again!

  Biff waved in Marty's direction as the two of them walked toward the exit.

  ‘Listen Griff,’ the old man muttered, ‘don’t you go loanin' that McFly kid any money - even though he probably needs it - him and his old man both.’

  Biff smirked back at Marty as his grandson led the way out the door.

  ‘Hey kid! Say hello to your grandma for me!'

  The door shooshed closed behind them.

  Marty half-watched through the window, as Griff carefully pointed out all the spots on his car that Biff had missed. Griff’s three sidekicks - a tall, oriental fellow with a shaved head; a girl with long blonde hair, spiked bangs and 3-inch fingernails; and a shorter guy with a tattooed face who seemed to be wearing computer equipment as part of his clothes -all hung around in the background. Marty realised that was another similarity between the two generations. Teenaged Tannens always seemed to have a gang. And Tannens and their gangs always bullied McFlys.

  But it didn’t have to happen that way. Marty had changed things, unbalanced the equation, when he had ended up back in 1955. And he had to change things again, now that he was in the future. But how could he, if his future self had gone down the toilet? That strange sense of time-travelling deja-vu was back again, as if being trampled by a Tannen was his destiny, and maybe the destiny of every other McFly that had ever lived.

  No. He had to shake himself out of that feeling. Doc had sent for him because he had beaten Biff Tannen in 1955, and he could beat Biff’s grandson now. All he had to do was take it easy and follow Doc’s instructions - and hope there was nothing else here in 2015 that would trip him up. Marty just wished he knew more about how the future really worked.

  A rock video came on most of the tiny TVs around him. He recognised the group, Huey Lewis and the News, doing a song called ’The Power of Love’. It was a pretty good song, too. Marty nodded to the beat. He wouldn’t mind just sitting here for a minute, listening to the music and drinking his Pepsi - if he could figure out some way to get the lid off the container.

  Well, the music by itself would have to do. At least you could still count on some things.

  Three girls in their young teens watched the video along with Marty. They didn’t seem to share his enthusiasm.

  ‘Oh, shred that!’ one of the girls commented with a yawn. ‘I only scan that kind of vid at my grandma's!’

  ‘Yeah,’ the girl next to her added, sounding even more bored by the whole thing than the first. ‘What do they call it? Rock and rail?’

  The third girl shook her head in disbelief. ‘It doesn’t even sound like music!’

  ‘Yeah!’ the first girl agreed. ‘Thank god we didn’t have to live in the eighties.’ She rolled her eyes at the video. ‘It must have been terrible!’

  Shred that? Terrible? Rock and rail?

  Marty wondered what they listened to now, but he was afraid he didn’t want to know. He suddenly felt very old and out-of-place. He looked away from the video screens and the girls who were too bored to bother.

  Hey! Now this was more like it. Over in the corner was an old arcade video game called ‘Wild Gunman' that Marty used to play in the Seven-Eleven, in 1985.

  A kid of eight or nine stood in front of the game, looking thoroughly confused. The kid glanced up as Marty walked toward him.

  ‘How do you play this thing?’ the boy asked.

  Marty grinned. Now this was something he knew about! ‘I’ll show you, kid. I'm a crack shot at this one.’ He stepped in front of the machine as the kid moved out of the way. But there was something different about this version of ‘Wild Gunman’. For one thing, Marty couldn’t find the coin slot.

  ‘Where do you put in the quarter?’ he asked. ‘Quarter?’ the kid replied. ‘What’s a quarter?’ Marty had no idea what kind of change they used in 2015. He moved his hand along the side of the game’s console, feeling for something that would take the money. Didn't the coin slot used to be over here?

  The game beeped to life as his thumb hit a metal plate. Oh - so that’s what the Reagan robot meant by ‘use your thumb’. The name WILD GUNMAN appeared on the screen, followed by the usual instructions and previous high score. Well, Marty would have to worry about financial questions later. Right now, he had a game to play!

  He got into it right away, shooting every outlaw and gunfighter that showed up in the Western town on the screen. He’d give this kid from the future a real demonstration of video talent!

  ’You mean you have to use your hands?’ the kid whined. ‘That’s like a baby toy!’

  Use your hands? Baby toy?

  The kid wandered away.

  Marty’s hands fell from the controls. He suddenly felt older than old.

  He supposed he might as well finish the game. Somehow, it wasn’t the same. His eyes wandered from the video display. He saw himself walking on the other side of the window, right by Biff and Griff's gang, who were all too busy arguing to notice him. He headed straight for the door to the Café 80’s.

  Himself? On the other side of the window? Straight for the door? Marty realised he was looking at his future son - Marty Junior!

  ‘Damn!’ Marty whispered. He couldn't possibly let his future son see him - that could ruin all of Doc’s plans. But his son was coming in the only door that Marty saw in this place.

  Where could Marty go?

  He jumped behind the counter, dodging the Reagan automatons. He ducked down as his future son walked into the restaurant.

  ‘Welcome to Café 80 s,’ the Reagan-thing began, ‘'where it’s always -’

  ‘Pepsi Perfect,’ Marty Junior interrupted before the Reagan image could go into the whole routine.

  ‘Hey, McFly!’

  Marty Senior peeked above the counter long enough to see Griff and his gang walk through the door.

  ‘Hi. Griff - Junior replied hesitantly, ‘- guys. How’s it going?’

  Griff walked right up to him. ‘Hey, McFly. your shoe's untied.'

  Junior looked down at his sneakers as Griff flicked the other boy’s nose with his index finger. The gang laughed. Marty couldn’t believe it - his son fell for a joke that had been old back in 1955, when Biff used it on George McFly, Junior's grandfather! And it was worse than that. Even though he was the butt of the joke, Junior had laughed, too, along with the rest of them.

  The déjà vu feeling was back, but this time it lurched around in Marty’s stomach. There was something about Junior, something that reminded Marty Senior an awful lot of the teenaged George McFly, back in 1955. Maybe it was the way Junior’s coat didn’t quite seem to fit. like the coat's uni-form-fit-patch was broken or something; or maybe it was those food stains on his white t-shirt; or the way his hair had been shoved, uncombed, under the colour-changing cap. Yep, Marty Senior had to admit it. No wonder Griff picked on him. His son was a prime McF
ly nerd.

  So, McFly,' Griff smirked, ‘have you made your decision about - tonight’s little opportunity?’

  Oh. no! This was what Doc had sent Marty to stop, and here he was hiding behind the counter while his son was out there with Griff, about to ruin his life!

  ‘Uh, well,’ Junior began in the awkward way he seemed to use around Griff, ‘I’m still not sure. It seems kinda dangerous -’

  All right! Marty Senior thought. Way to go, son of mine! You tell them! Marty Senior almost cheered. Maybe Doc had been worried about this whole thing for nothing. No matter what he looked like, a son of Marty’s had to have spunk!

  ‘What's wrong?’ The female gang member stared at Junior with a twisted grin. ‘You got no scroat?’

  Griff nodded in a way that said - yeah, anybody named McFly had to be scroatless.

  ‘What's it gonna be, McFly?’ he demanded. ‘You in or out?’

  ‘Well’ - Junior hesitated, his eyes darting from one gang member to another - ‘I don’t really think I should, but I guess I should discuss it with my father -’

  That’s right! Marty made a fist where he hid behind the counter. Marty Senior would tell his son just what to do, and he’d tell the gang where to go, too!

  ‘Are you saying no, McFly?’ Griff cut off Junior’s ramblings.

  ‘Uh,’ Junior muttered, ‘well, yes.’ He tried to smile politely. ‘That is. I’m saying, “no, thank you”.’

  Griff grabbed Junior’s shoulders.

  ‘Wrong answer, McFly.’

  He picked Junior up and tossed him over the counter! Junior crumpled with a groan a yard away from Marty.

  Griff’s gang laughed.

  ‘Now, now,' the Reagan video chided, ‘let’s behave ourselves!’

  Marty looked back at his future son. Junior lay there, eyes closed.

  ‘Yeah, Griff,’ he muttered, ‘sure, whatever you say -’

  No, no. Junior couldn’t mean what he was saying. He was delirious!

  And he was in no shape to face Griff again.

  ‘Stay down and shut up!’ Marty whispered in Junior’s ear. His future son moaned softly with his eyes still shut.