"Oh my God!" he muttered, leaning in close for a look at the sun-faded picture on the poster. It looked like him, more or less -- "more or less" being that he wore his hair a little differently in probably the current style of the moment, and his clothes were also sort of like the current styles, a kind of skintight jumpsuit with more denim and leather to it.

His words were almost echoed simultaneously by Doc, from inside the phone booth. Marty looked around the corner of the doorway. "You're not gonna believe this, Doc," he said.

The inventor's mouth was drawn into a rather bemused line. "Oh no? Look at this." He pointed to what looked like a logo on the top corner of the video screen in the booth. It looked vaguely familiar to Marty, but it wasn't until he leaned in that he was actually able to read it.

"E. Brown Enterprises," he said aloud. He blinked and looked at Doc. "You mean... your other self did this?"

"Apparently so. And he must be quite successful if something he created is literally on every street corner." Doc glanced down at the phone book, which looked twice as thick as the ones Marty was used to seeing. It also looked like it was mounted into the small structure, under the screen's numeric keypad. Doc reached out to turn the page, but it resisted his touch, like it was made of metal or something. "Odd," he muttered. "How am I supposed to look up Emmett Brown...?"

Both visitors jumped as the book's pages suddenly started turning by themselves, stopping near the beginning of the book on the page with the listings for all the Browns in the city. Marty chuckled nervously. "You don't know your own inventions here, huh?"

"Different world, different ideas, different results," Doc said. He glanced down at the pages and located his name, reading it aloud for Marty's benefit. "Brown, Emmett L., 788 W. Spruce, 456-3489." The inventor sighed. "Yet another unfamiliar address to me...."

"Where am I?" Marty asked.

Doc took his hands away from the book. "McFly," he said aloud, to it. "Martin."

The book paused a moment, then turned the pages to the midsection of the book. Doc blinked in surprise as he scanned the list. "Interesting," he said after a moment.

"What?"

"It appears that your mother is named Eileen, here... or else your father married someone else."

"What?!"

Doc scooted aside and let Marty have a look at the listing. McFly, George & Eileen, 5656 SW Ivy Glenn Ln, 643 -7672. "No way," the musician muttered aloud. "I seem to look the same here... so how could I have a different mom, then?"

"You might not," Doc assured him. "Remember, Jennifer had a different name in a different dimension; the same thing might have happened to your mother, too."

"Maybe," Marty said, skeptical. Remembering why they were looking for McFlys in the first place, he glanced down to find his name -- but it wasn't there. Oddly enough, it didn't surprise the musician.

"That makes sense," he had to admit when Doc made a sound of clear surprise. "Check this out."

Marty stepped out of the booth and ripped the poster off the outside wall. Doc glanced at it, raising his eyebrows in surprise. "It would appear we've both achieved a degree of fame here," he said. "How amusing -- and odd."

For the first time since they started popping into different places, Marty found himself genuinely curious about the things here. "Let's check this concert out," he said. "I'd love to see what this version of myself is doing with music."

Doc didn't look to eager. "I don't know if that's a particularly good idea, Marty...."

"Why not? It's not like we can find out where my other self lives. We know he'll be there, at the concert, and we can quiz him on what the hell's made this world so different."

"We could also simply visit my other self for that information, and I doubt he'll be half as busy as the local Marty."

The musician frowned, irritated. "Why can't we see the concert? If the me of this place is so famous -- and credited for inventing rock 'n roll -- it could be important to know all that stuff."

The inventor looked at him, one corner of his mouth twitching up. "You just want to see what it's like," he said, sounding amused.

Marty didn't see what was so bad about that. "Yeah, I do," he admitted, blunt. "If we're gonna go through the hell of visiting all these twisted worlds, we might as well do something interesting once in a while. And this is interesting to me, Doc. It's the first thing that's been really interesting to me since this entire mess started."

Doc stared at him a moment, clearly thinking. "Where's the concert?" he asked.

Marty looked at the poster in hand. "'The newly restored Orpheum Theater,'" he quoted.

The scientist took the poster from Marty's hand and studied it a moment. He sighed. "I have no idea where that is," he said. "This entire town seems to be laid out differently, with different street names and businesses and buildings."

"There's usually maps in the phone books," the musician said, nodding to the fat book. "We could check that out, or maybe just go to a gas station and see if they have one."

Fortunately, the phone book did indeed have a map. Unfortunately, there was absolutely no way that they were going to be able to tear it out; the pages seemed to be bolted into the spine of the book. It definitely looked like some twist of fate -- or, twists of fate -- had conspired to lay out the town differently. The Orpheum Theater was apparently in the town square, which was about two miles from their current location. But the name of the street had inexplicably changed from First Street to Monroe Avenue. The Emmett Brown of this world, however, lived five miles away, in the hills, and going into town would actually bring them closer to him, not further away. With that argument, Doc really couldn't think of a way to avoid stopping by the Orpheum.

They ended up walking the distance, uncertain of bus schedules and without any of the local currency for a taxi. They didn't pass many cars on the road -- most of the traffic seemed to have relocated in the air -- but there were many, many people on the streets, a fact that surprised Marty, considering it was late fall, after dark, and a Sunday night.

By the time they reached the center of town, Marty had almost gotten used to the weird fashions that everyone had on -- or else he didn't really notice them anymore. In fact, he didn't notice much of anything except a sensation that felt distinctly like butterflies in the base of his stomach. Nerves. And he knew it had to do with his other self, since the fluttery sensation got worse the closer they got to the theater.

Weird, he thought. Maybe it's just 'cause I haven't had anything to eat almost all day....

They stopped a block away from the theater -- by the sheer shock of what had become of their town in this world. The town square was still present, but the courthouse was a completely different piece of architecture that looked all streamlined and modern in the quasi-future style of this world. There was a clock near the top of it, but it was digital and it was displaying the current time of 7:39 P.M. Different shops were in different locations around the park that had sprung up in the center of the square -- similar to the way it would be in 2015, but with more trees.

The Orpheum seemed to have taken the place of the Essex theater, near the soda shop-turned-aerobics-studio-turned-arcade-turned-coffee-shop that would someday be the sight of the Cafe 80's. Currently, it boasted a sign in the window telling people it was "Wilson's Cafe." (Marty wondered: Had Goldie Wilson taken over it in this world?) It looked like it was doing good business at this hour of the night, and no wonder; people had already lined up halfway around the block to get into the concert. It looked like the popular ticket in town.

"How do you expect to get in?" Doc asked as they looked at the crowd from the shadows of an alleyway, next to a shop that sold records and stereo equipment. The fact that it didn't exist in their world wasn't what made Marty's jaw drop -- it was the fact that it actually sold honest-to-God vinyl records, brand new, when they had become all but extinct at home. And there was the additional fact that someone had put an almost-lifesize cardboard cutout of him in the window, playing guitar, with a sign advertising: "Monday ONLY! Marty McFly Signs Latest Record! Be There or Be SQUARE!"

It was starting to get a little embarrassing.

"I don't know," the musician said as he tore his eyes away from the record store. "If everyone thinks I'm me, then I could probably just get in the back way."

That was exactly what he was able to do. The bouncers at the back door of the theater let him in without a problem, though one remarked on his apparently odd hairstyle and clothes. Marty just smiled and didn't say a word, figuring that might be the safest bet. What blew his mind, though, was the reaction the two overmuscled men gave Doc.

"Hey, Professor!" one of them said, smiling. "How goes it? Love your new home entertainment system -- pristine sound! It's like you're surrounded. What do you call it? Brown Sound?"

The inventor blinked, baffled, clearly at a loss on how to answer that question. "Ah... thanks," he settled on, hurrying into the theater with Marty. The musician didn't waste any time once the door was closed behind them.

"Professor," he said, incredulous. "Since when do people call you that? Weren't you always a doctor? I mean, when you were teaching and all that?"

"It's possible the me of this world never achieved the same degree of education I did," Doc said, looking a bit flustered from the recognition outside. "Or else I actually had that man out there as one of my students, and he simply thought of me as his professor, not as a doctor. It's happened to me before."

Marty could kind of see that. When he was in college, he'd had courses go by where he didn't even know his professor's last name by the time the finals came around, let alone if they were a doctor of whatever or not. Unless they were a real arrogant sort, it usually didn't matter if the students called them Professor instead of Doctor. They would respond to both.

There was a dark, brief hallway, at the end of which was a door that was ajar. Voices, loud voices, were coming from that direction. Marty started to creep towards it, recognizing his own name uttered by someone who sounded vaguely like Jennifer.

"...This is getting ridiculous, Marty! You gotta stop doing this! You're in your hometown, now, and people'll talk. You're like a hero to them!"

"Aw, Suzy, they won't notice anything. Nada damn thing. And I could perform in my sleep -- you know that."

Two things occurred to Marty in hearing just those brief snatches of conversation. One -- Jennifer's name had seemingly, inexplicably, revoked once more to Susan, or Suzy. And two -- his counterpart's words sounded a little sloshed. Like he'd had a beer -- or four. Marty's steps quickened to the door, until he was able to peer into the room through the three-inch crack.

Suzy -- it just seemed easier to think of her that way -- was standing next to the foot of a couch. She looked like her counterpart of the same name in the world where she was married to a music teacher -- except her hair was slicked up and back into a kind of tight fitted bun that rested on the top of her head. A few strands hung down around her cheeks, softly curled. Her clothes were equally bizarre -- a torn off-the-shoulder sweater in a sticky pink color, and baggy brown pants with fringe and beads on the cuffs. Her hands were currently placed on her hips, nails long and manicured, painted blue. Her face -- with a bit too much make up on it, in Marty's opinion -- was currently directing a frown at the Marty McFly of this world, sprawled on the couch with a guitar across his lap and a bottle of what looked like Corona in hand.

Marty couldn't quite see his counterpart's face from where he stood; it was just out of sight. It looked like Local Marty was wearing a white tank top, black leather pants, and shiny black dress shoes. On a coffee table, before the couch, the musician spotted a half dozen empties, as well as a half-consumed pizza. The sight of the food made his mouth water, but the decidedly negative atmosphere in the room provided a considerable distraction.

"You practically do," Suzy said, angry, in response to Rock Star Marty's comment. "When was the last time you ever performed sober? You've got talent, Marty -- you wouldn't be the most famous musician in the world if you didn't -- but you're doing a great job of flushing it down the drain!"

"I just need to relax a little before I go out there," the local Marty said, a distinctive whine to his voice that caused his counterpart hovering outside the room to roll his eyes. "Quit nagging me! You've been doing that since I came home this time!"

"Oh, well, maybe that's the only time I really see you anymore." There was a pause as Local Marty took a drink from the Corona and Suzy glowered at him. "When are you gonna grow up, Marty? You're thirty, now -- it's time to stop partying like this all the time. It's going to kill you if you keep it up -- and it's already killing our relationship!"

Marty's jaw fell a bit at the mention of his counterpart's age. Thirty! But he was only twenty-seven.... How could that be possible?

"Not this again!" Local Marty moaned. "Christ, why do you always bring us up. We're fine."

Suzy arched one overly plucked eyebrow. "Oh, are we?" she asked, icily. "I've just about had it, Marty! If you don't grow up soon, you're gonna come back here next time and find that you've got no one left. You've already had it out with your parents. Your friends all left a long time ago -- when you started getting that attitude with them. Only me and the Professor are still here, maybe 'cause we understand why you're the way you are, now -- and you're about this close to seeing me walk out that door, forever!" The young woman leaned forward and held her thumb and forefinger a quarter of an inch apart.

Local Marty was less than impressed. "Chill out, Suz -- you're too uptight. Everything's cool. After the concert tonight, you and I can go out to a nice, quiet dinner. After all the promo shit, I've got two weeks off. We can take a hyper jump to Paris and you can get some of those freaky fashions that are so on the up, now."

Suzy snorted softly, in disgust. "You think money can solve anything. Grow up, Marty!" She turned towards the door. The visiting Marty quickly stepped back, ducking into a dark alcove next to the door where Doc was already hiding. She left the room, slamming the door hard behind her, walking away without the slightest glance in the direction of the two visitors. Marty waited until the click of her heels had faded, then stepped forward and put his hand on the doorknob, ready to charge in there now that he knew his counterpart was alone.

Doc stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. "What are you doing?" the scientist hissed. "You can't just walk in there...."

"Why not?" Marty whispered. "We barged in on that other version of me -- and, anyway, this guy sounds like an asshole. If he freaks out, he deserves it."

Doc sighed, but didn't stop him. Marty opened the door and stepped into the room. His counterpart had moved from the couch to a little mini bar set up in one corner of the dressing room, and was busy mixing up some toxic cocktail concoction. Well, Marty figured he was entitled to whatever he got out of that. What was it his friends used to say in high school and college? "Beer before liquor, never been sicker; liquor before beer, never fear." Having obviously downed a six pack -- maybe more -- beforehand, hitting the hard stuff now was probably a stupid idea.

The local's back was to the door; therefore the Rock Star Marty didn't see his counterpart come in. Marty could tell very little about his other self's appearance, beyond the fact that this version of himself wore his hair much longer, hanging down close to his shoulders. It gave him a kind of seedy look, even from the back. It was yet another difference between him and Marty; the visiting musician never really liked having his hair fall past the base of his earlobe. When he'd been ten and had fought his mom to let him grow out his hair a little -- and it had gotten halfway to his shoulders, like a lot of the rock stars of the late 1970's -- a woman at the supermarket had mistakenly thought he was a little girl. It had been a rather mortifying experience, both for him and the little old lady who had made the gender mistake. An hour after that, he was sitting in a chair at the barber's, getting it all cut off, foregoing any dreams of wearing his hair like Tom Petty or Joe Perry.

The local reacted to the second presence in the room, finally. "Forget your purse, Suzy?" he asked, rather rudely, without turning around.

The visitor smiled coolly. "No, I don't think she did," he said.

Rock Star Marty turned around quickly at the sound of the familiar voice, the ice cubes clinking in the glass he clutched in one hand. The visiting Marty's first thought, as he finally saw his counterpart's face, surprised him: Christ, he looks old! There were lines on the rock star's face that looked far deeper than anything Marty could imagine showing up on his face in the span of three short years. His long hair, combined with the tank top and leather pants, made him look more like a garage mechanic than a respected rock musician.

It was like looking at a reflection twisted in a fun house mirror.

The glass of liquor fell from Rock Star Marty's hand as he locked a slightly fuzzy gaze on his counterpart. "Jesus!" he gasped. He took a quick step back -- and his shoe skidded on the puddle created from his spilled drink. With a blood alcohol level that was probably legally drunk, at least, the local couldn't react in time to catch himself. He fell back, striking his head on the hard marble top of the mini bar, and hit the ground out cold.

Marty whistled softly at the fall and collision. "Whoops," he said softly, having the feeling that he ought to be more sympathetic. Instead, there was a wicked kind of satisfaction at his counterpart's unfortunate fall.

Doc had obviously been hovering just outside the door. As Marty bent forward to see if Rock Star Marty was all right -- aside from a nasty bump to the head -- the inventor stepped inside and closed the door behind them. "Marty," he said, his tone one of disapproval. "I warned you not to scare yourself...."

Marty rolled his eyes as he made sure his counterpart was still breathing. "If he hadn't been boozing it up, I doubt this would've happened," he said. "And I gotta admit, I'm not too sorry. This version of me looks like he's an egomaniac asshole. He deserves a headache later."

Doc sighed once more as he knelt down next to the out-cold musician. "I can't say I disagree with you, and I suppose something like this was bound to happen sooner or later when we showed up, but the timing is rather unfortunate." He quickly examined the celebrity, giving his assessment as he went. "His breathing is strong... as is his pulse... but I suspect he might be out for several hours. There's a rather large lump on the back of his head, and I don't think the alcohol will help him recover any faster."

Doc had hardly finished his diagnosis when there was a knock at the door. The visitors looked at each other a moment, then, as one, moved their eyes to the door. "Ah... yeah?" Marty called out, praying that whoever was out there wasn't going to take that as an invitation to stroll on in.

Fortunately, they door remained closed, the newcomer speaking through the wood. "Twenty minutes 'til showtime, Mr. McFly."

"Thanks," Marty said. He sighed in relief at the sound of footsteps heading away from the dressing room. "There's no way he's gonna be able to perform tonight," he added in a mutter, looking back to Doc. "Guess they'll have to give people refunds."

The inventor studied him a moment, then smiled faintly. "I don't know about that," he said. "This might be the opportunity you've been waiting for, Marty."

The musician had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. "Huh?"

"You've always wondered what it would be like to be a rock star. There's an audience full of people waiting for a show. Your counterpart isn't going to come around any time soon. If you don't want the audience to be disappointed, you could simply go out there in his place. It would certainly give you that experience you used to fantasize about."

Marty stared at Doc, not comprehending the words for a moment. Was he actually suggesting what he thought he was suggesting?! It seemed almost out of character, but there was a bit of a gleam in the older man's eyes. Either the inventor figured it might be better to give the people out there some kind of show rather than no show at all, or that if the visiting Marty accidentally ended his counterpart's career, it would be no big loss. After a moment of weighting the suggestion, he grinned. "Really? You think I could pull off something like that?"

"Maybe if you covered up your hair with a hat or something. I imagine few people would be close enough to tell you apart."

"But what about a song list? I have no clue what kinda stuff I play here."

"I'm sure whatever you decide will be fine. If it's new material, I doubt anyone will complain. Help me get him on the couch, will you?"

Marty grabbed the legs of his other self, while Doc slipped his hands under his shoulders, and they moved the unconscious celebrity up from the floor and onto the sofa. Once he was settled, Marty looked around the dressing room for something he could use to conceal his much shorter hair, finally locating a bandana. He tied that over his head so his hair was all but hidden, though it made him feel like some Axel Rose wannabe. Next, he stripped off his sweater and knotted that around his waist, rolled back the long sleeves of his white t-shirt, and took a look at the guitar that Rock Star Marty had been fiddling with during his conversation with Suzy. It looked almost like an antique, a model from the 1960's that had been souped up a bit, no doubt to the specifications of his counterpart. It didn't take the musician too much time to figure it out and get started on tuning it up.

During the time Marty had been preparing for his first real big solo performance, Doc had been looking around the room. The musician hadn't understood why until the inventor pulled out a phone. It looked like a cordless from home, except this one had what appeared to be a small video screen set into it under the earpiece and above the buttons. "Who are you planning to call?" Marty asked, glancing over as he tightened one of the strings up.

"We might want to make contact with my other self before we show up in person," Doc said, eyeing the phone with both thoughtfulness and curiosity. "If we'd like some answers on the way this world works, it might be better if we don't startle him so much that we've got a repeat of what happened here with you."

Marty wasn't concerned. "Like I said before, I don't think the rock star would be out now if he hadn't had all that alcohol and slipped. He didn't pass out in shock at the sight of me, Doc."

The scientist nodded once. "Maybe so, but I think I've got more of those tendencies than you might."

Marty recalled a couple of instances and shrugged, conceding the idea. There was another knock at the door, which caused both visitors to jump. "Ten minutes, Mr. McFly."

The musician turned to Doc after acknowledging the warning. "So you're just gonna call up and ask to talk to yourself? Won't that still freak out your other self?"

"Maybe; maybe not," Doc said. "But I was actually thinking you might be able to do that." He held out the phone.

Marty grimaced, not partial to the idea, though he accepted the cordless. "Do we even know the phone number?"

"I memorized it from the phone book," Doc said. "Four five six, thirty-four, eighty-nine."

Marty shifted the device in his hand, stalling. "What would I even say?"

"Just ask him to meet you here, after your concert."

"Isn't that kind of like setting him up, Doc? What if I just asked if we could drop by his place afterwards?"

"We don't have a car; it might be a bit difficult. I suppose we could take the train out there for proof, but it would take even longer to hike back to the park to pick it up -- and then we've got to cross the skies with all of that air traffic."

Marty saw the points, though he didn't necessarily like them. He sighed, dialed the numbers that he had Doc repeat once more, and stared at the small little screen set in the phone as the line rang at the other end. It continued to ring, a dozen times, before Marty closed the connection and passed the phone back to Doc. "No one's home, and the other you doesn't seem to have an answering machine," he explained. "Maybe we'll have to try him later."

Doc nodded, though he looked a little disappointed. Marty finished tuning up the guitar, then looked down at his other self, sprawled on the couch. "What should we do with him?" he asked. "Leave him in here?"

"There's not really much else we can do."

"But what if someone comes in here while I'm out on stage? Won't that cause major problems? Or what if he wakes up and goes out to perform and I'm already there?"

Marty thought that fear was pretty valid; almost the same thing had happened during that stint in the future when he impersonated his future son. Doc seemed to think so, too; he bent down over the celebrity, checking his pulse and respiration, then peeled back one of his eyelids for a look.

"I don't think he'll be up and about for a few hours, at least," he surmised after a moment of study, straightening up. "As for someone finding him in here, while you're out there, it will certainly create major questions, but I don't think we should move him anywhere else. It would be a bit difficult, with the state he's in right now. If the door has a lock, we could just use that while you're on the stage. I doubt anyone would try breaking down the door of your dressing room, or find it unusual that the door was locked."

Fortunately, the door turned out to have a very secure lock. Marty supposed he shouldn't have been surprised. If performers came to the theater often and used the room, they probably wanted the ability to lock out the outside world at their whim. Doc opted to wait in the dressing room with Marty's other self, lest the rock star actually wake up and try to leave while the visitor was impersonating him. (Marty figured he also wanted the opportunity to ask the local a few questions, should that happen.)

With one last check to make sure he wasn't forgetting anything major -- like, say, his instrument -- Marty left the room, made sure the door had locked behind him, and made his way down the dark hall in the direction of the noise of the audience. Unused to the dim lights and the building, he hadn't gone more than a dozen steps before he ran right into someone.

"Sorry," he apologized immediately, taking a hop back, his hands immediately, protectively, going to the guitar hanging across his chest.

"That's all-- Marty! I was hoping to catch you before you went on."

Marty squinted at the dark shape before him, able to see little more than the outline of the person. But the voice was extremely familiar. "Doc?" he guessed.

One could almost hear the frown in the response. "Excuse me?" The form took a step back, perhaps to have a better look at him. "You are Marty McFly, right?"

"Yeah..." And you're the Doc from this world, he added to himself. But the Marty of this world apparently didn't call Emmett Brown by that nickname. Why? Maybe in this world, Doc's other self really was just a professor, never getting a doctorate in anything. And if that was the case, what would Marty call him?

"Professor?" he tried, tentative.

"Of course. What are you doing back here, still? Shouldn't you be going over the song list? Or are you trying to find Suzy?" The older man sighed as Marty tried to focus his eyes on the form. They were adjusting, slowly, to the dark and he could make out a few shadows, but nothing to give him an idea on what Doc's other self looked like in this world. They definitely sounded the same, though. "I saw her leave when I was coming in -- she looked upset. I think she's gone back home."

"Oh," Marty said. "Ah, no, I think I just got a little turned around back here...."

There came another rather weary sigh. "Can't say that surprises me if you've been drinking so much before shows."

The musician experienced a flash of surprise that his counterpart's friend knew that, and mentioned it so bluntly -- then figured that if he had been doing things like that back home, Doc wouldn't have hesitated to chew him out about it when the opportunities presented themselves. He wondered how his counterpart would respond to that comment, and figured the way Rock Star Marty was, he would've had some rude and snappish retort. Marty decided to spare his friend's counterpart that honor and merely grunted.

"Can you show me where I need to be?" he asked, hoping that wouldn't make Professor Brown suspicious.

If it did, the older man gave no indication -- at least verbally. The Professor turned and made his way down the hall, took a few turns, then went through a door marked, quite basically, Backstage. Stepping through that door was like stepping into another world. Lights were once more part of the landscape -- bright and in different colors. There were a couple dozen people scurrying around -- roadies and technicians, from the look of it. Marty blinked a few times, both to adjust his eyes and his mind from that relatively quiet hallway just a few feet away.

The man before him turned, and Marty finally laid his eyes on this world's version of Emmett Brown. He didn't look too different from Doc -- though his clothes were a bit more bizarre, even for this world. Same wild white hair. Same face -- although this one looked older than Doc's own, even though the Professor was no doubt younger than his foreign counterpart, if he hadn't spent a decade or so in the past. Marty had the feeling that the Professor was also single, without a Clara of his own -- maybe because the phone book hadn't had any mention of her in it. (Although, really, that didn't necessarily mean anything.) He studied Marty with eyes narrowed in both scrutiny and concern.

"Are you all right?" he asked. "You feeling up to performing?"

"I'd better be," Marty half muttered, becoming aware of the sound of the crowd, then -- a low roar that rose and fell with the small-talk conversations that preceded any performance. He could feel his nerves starting to kick in with the sound. It had been a while since he performed before a group larger than a few dozen people. By the sound of it, this was hundreds, maybe even a couple thousand depending on how many seats the theater had. At least it wasn't a stadium show -- those could seat tens of thousands....

Marty swallowed hard, feeling faintly ill. His nerves were clear on his face, apparently; the Professor looked even more concerned and put a hand on his shoulder. "Is something wrong, Marty?" he asked.

The musician took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I'm fine," he said. "What are you doing here... Professor?"

The Professor blinked. "You asked me to come," he said. "Something about a favor you needed."

Marty, naturally, had no clue what that might be. "Oh yeah," he said, vaguely. "Sorry, ah... I seem to be having one of those days, you know, where you forget everything."

Maybe that was the wrong thing to say. Doc's counterpart looked even more concerned. Before he could grill him, and undoubtedly make Marty look even worse, a tall, blond woman with a headset came out of nowhere and latched onto his arm. "Show time, McFly," she said, very businesslike. "Let's go. Your adoring public awaits."

The Professor frowned, but didn't try to stop him. Marty let himself be dragged to stage right, mostly because he would have had no idea where to go otherwise. When they stopped, he was standing just so, able to see most of the audience that was waiting eagerly for him. His heart did a quick skip, then plummeted to the bottom of his sneakers. The theater was darkened, so he couldn't get a good idea as to how many eyes would be looking at him. But based on the sea of faces he could see so far, illuminated by stage lights, and the size that the theater had appeared to be from the outside, he guessed it was at least a thousand. Maybe more.

"Oh jeez," he murmured, even as the woman with the headset was urging him forward. He'd never really had problems with stage fright, before -- but, here, he was The Rock Star! At home, he was... well, at one point in time, a member of the Pinheads, which never really played for anything bigger than a school dance, or in bars where it was dark, smokey, and most of the audience was pleasantly buzzed. Nowadays, if and when he played, it was usually in a studio setting to lay down a track for a song. Once in a great while, he got on stage, but it was always in the background on guitar, usually as a sub for a regular in whatever band that was in the area, or else the musician was up and coming. For the most part, the last few years, he worked on writing songs.

So, in short, never before had this many eyes been trained on him, with expectations resting completely and solely on his shoulders.

Now, it wasn't the Pinheads here that was the draw; it was simply Marty McFly. Likely the people on stage backing him with drums, bass, keyboards, and so on, were doing the same thing that Marty did on occasion -- although, admittedly, he'd never filled in for anyone famous enough to headline, yet.

Without even being aware of what he was doing, Marty started to turn, to flee back to the dressing room where Doc and his drunken counterpart waited -- the guy who should, by rights, be out here instead of him. He felt a sudden, unexpected sympathy to that guy; no wonder he tried to get drunk every night. If he had to deal with this kind of performing on a regular basis, and had this kind of reaction each time, Marty might've followed in those unsteady footsteps.

He was jarred to a stop one step in his journey by the blond woman. "Where do you think you're going?" she demanded, rather coldly. "Go out there, McFly! Let's start on time, for once."

"I--" was all Marty got out before she pushed him, firmly, onto stage. A spotlight found him and settled on his form, blinding him. The crowd, which had been murmuring anxiously, suddenly roared at the sight of him. The screams of teenaged girls split the air, making him wince, and worsening the headache that had been hanging on since their bumpy arrival in this world. His feet stalled a moment then, with another push from the blonde taskmaker, he found himself walking towards a solo microphone set up in the center of the stage.

No clip-on mikes here, he noticed, surprised. The thought was an odd one, considering the moment, but a second later his mind leapt to far more panic-inducing things.

A set list! Christ, I have no idea what to play! I don't know anything about what my counterpart has going here, and the other people backing me up are gonna think I'm nuts if I go and do a song no one's heard of before!

He started to sweat, a lot, in the walk, even as the cheering grew more frenzied the closer he got to the microphone. Marty's mind locked up with the worry, and the sound of the crowd -- the pressure and expectations he could feel in the air to put on a good show -- didn't make him feel any better. His mind had completely blanked out by the time he reached the mike. If someone had asked him for his name or birthdate at that moment, he wasn't sure what he would tell them.

The audience screamed for him as he stood at the mic, probably thinking his deer-in-the-headlights act was all part of some show. Marty stood still, staring at the faces that were all blurring together to simply be "the audience," not a collection of individuals. He tried to simply breathe and get through the next heartbeat. After some time -- it could've been ten seconds or ten minutes, he wasn't entirely sure -- he finally found the strength to move, to adjust the mike a bit.

"Hello," he said in a half whisper -- only to hear it picked up and amplified throughout the theater. The crowd's cheers dimmed in volume for a moment as he spoke, the audience clearly waiting for him to start a song. Marty smiled quickly, the expression borne of pure nerves.

Someone tapped him on the shoulder and he nearly went through the roof -- or, in this case, fell off the edge of the stage and into the orchestra pit. He spun quickly to find the blonde woman with the headset shoving a paper into his face.

"Set list," she whispered, turning her face away from the mike so her voice wouldn't be picked up by it. "Gary forgot to set it out."

Marty let out a deep breath, relieved by the mistake and that he hadn't simply kept those lists in his head. "Thanks," he breathed, grateful, glancing down at the first song on the list as the blonde clipped it to the mike stand. An amused smile turned his lips.

"Johnny B. Goode," he murmured. He closed his eyes a moment, remembering the Enchantment Under the Sea Dance ten -- or forty -- years ago, then started to strum the opening chords. The crowd shrieked in appreciation, either recognizing the song or voicing their approval of his skills.

A minute into the song, and Marty started to forget where he was, losing himself in the music and in the intense concentration that came with playing, a focus where the only thing that existed was the melody and the moment. It was probably the best thing that could've happened to him in the current circumstances. He started to relax a little, becoming peripherally aware of the audience at best.

When he finished the first song, he looked up only long enough to see what was next on the menu -- another oldie, Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady" -- but by the third and fourth songs, he glanced up at the audience, occasionally, and grinned. Halfway through the concert, he realized he was kind of enjoying himself.

He also noticed something odd -- all the songs on the list were all old ones, before the early Eighties, and ones made famous by other people. Springsteen's "Hungry Heart." "Rock Around the Clock." A few selections by Hendrix and the Doors. Van Halen. Queen. Led Zeppelin. Some Tom Petty tunes. An Elvis ones. There wasn't one bit of original material in the set, nor was there one song that seemed to be released beyond the mid-1980's. The youngest song of the bunch seemed to be a song off Journey's 1981 album, "Escape."

Why on earth would his other self be playing so many songs made famous by other people? It didn't make much sense to Marty. The Pinheads might've done a cover or two in their concerts, but the majority of their performances was with material that they created themselves. If you only did covers, you weren't a real band -- at least not one that should be world-famous and headlining shows. You were a cover band, then, that probably played mostly weddings and dances.

Something was definitely off.

After those first few agonizing minutes, the time flew by. Marty was a bit surprised and a bit disappointed when he reached the bottom of the list and the end of the concert. The crowd seemed let down, as well. When he raised his hand and thanked the audience, the screaming grew more frenzied. Marty turned around and headed back to the wings of the stage -- but the blonde (and what was her name?) motioned for him to go back, her expression telling him clearly that she thought he was crazy.

"What are you doing?!" she hissed. "Encore!"

"Encore?" Marty repeated dumbly.

"Yes!" To emphasize her point, she gave him a firm shove back in the direction of the stage. Marty resisted for just a second, then walked back out without any further provoking. He had an idea he wanted to test out.

"You want more?" he asked the crowd. The screaming grew louder; he took that as a yes. Marty glanced at the set list, saw there was nothing down for this particular situation, then decided he might end up going solo by playing songs that the band behind him had never heard. He turned around a moment to look at them, then turned back to the crowd, impish ideas crowding his head.

Songs beyond 1982, he thought. Let's see if they've heard of any of these before....

He launched into Bryan Adams' "Summer of '69," splintering his concentration enough to watch the crowd and gauge their reaction. They quieted down for a moment, the way an audience would when a band played a new tune that hadn't yet been heard. Interesting. He covered U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" next -- which also looked like it was new to the audience.

Finally, feeling experimental, he performed a modified song he'd done as an assignment in one of his music classes in college. A professor in a music comp class had had his students take a tune from one song, lyrics from another, and try to make it work. Marty had chosen the tune from the Van Halen song,"Jump," and meshed it with the lyrics to "Heaven" by Bryan Adams, which had created a rather interesting combo, to say the least. Both songs were newer than 1982 -- the former just barely -- and it gave him an idea as to the "situation." Since no one in the crowd acted like there was anything the least weird with the final song, it all but confirmed his suspicions.

The Marty McFly of this world was famous -- for stealing the material of other people!

The entire experience suddenly felt like a sham.

After he concluded the hybrid song, he paused to catch his breath, really wishing suddenly that his counterpart was standing right there so he could chew him out for his deceit. But maybe there was a way he could sort of do that. An old song suddenly occurred to him and he smiled to himself.

"This is dedicated to a guy I know," he told the crowd, then began to play -- somewhat tentatively -- the opening chords to a Styx song from the mid-seventies: "Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man)." Never before had lyrics been so incredibly apt for a situation; Marty wished the rock star was sitting nearby so he could hear the song, since it was quite obvious exactly what his message was to the guy.

The crowd, meanwhile, ate it up. Maybe it was his raw and passionate performance; maybe it was just one more new song they'd never heard.

After he finished the Styx song, Marty left the stage quickly with a bow to acknowledge the outpouring of praise from the audience. The blonde woman made a move as if to grab him and maybe propel him back on stage, but Marty dodged her, in a hurry to get back to the dressing room and Doc. The shadows backstage, and out in the hall, worked to his advantage. He passed a few people in the dim corridor, heading to the dressing room, but kept his head down and moved quickly, lest they recognize him and want him for something.

The dressing room door was still closed and locked. Marty knocked twice, paused for five seconds, then knocked three more times. "It's me, Doc," he said in a low voice, his lips nearly touching the wood, in case the inventor had any doubts. A moment later the door was opened and Doc ushered him in.

"How did it go?" he asked as Marty entered.

The musician raked a hand back across his head, removing the scarf that concealed his hair and tossing it aside. "Why'd you think I should go out there?" he asked, not answering his friend's question.

Doc studied him a moment, his face serious. "I thought it might be a good learning experience for you," he admitted. "I know there's been a part of you that's always wondered about this sort of life. Now, you've gotten to have the experience for one night. Did you enjoy it?"

Marty glanced at his still-unconscious counterpart with a dark frown. "It was a mixed bag," he said, slipping the guitar strap over his head and setting the instrument down on an empty armchair. "I never really thought I was the stage fright type 'til I realized I was the number one attraction out there to a thousand people or more. But even that wasn't so bad once I started playing -- until I noticed all the songs on the list were ones that someone else did. Doc, my other self's rippin' people off!"

The inventor looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"Every single song on the list was done by someone else -- and none of the songs went past about '81, which I think is kinda weird. But there's no way so many people would be cramming that theater to see someone cover popular songs. My other self stole those songs from other people, Doc -- he's a complete fraud!"

Doc opened his mouth to ask something, but there was a knock at the door. "Marty?" asked a very familiar voice.

The musician looked at his friend. "Oh yeah, I ran into your other self out there," he said, sitting down on the couch near the feet of his counterpart. "I guess if you wanna talk to him, there's no better time...."

Doc's eyes widened at this bit of information. He froze for a moment, then headed for the door, unlocked it, and pulled it open, concealing himself from view from the Professor. The slightly older-looking version of Emmett Brown took a few steps into the room, talking. "Why did you run off so-- oh my God!"

The exclamation came as the Professor caught sight of dual Martys on the couch. Doc closed the door as soon as his counterpart had cleared the doorway, probably to make sure that no one else wouldn't stumble inside. At the sound, Professor Brown turned quickly. His eyes bugged out as he took in this view of his own dimensional "twin," and his mouth opened and closed a few times, wordlessly. He took a few quick steps back, his legs colliding with the coffee table hard enough to knock over all of the empty beer bottles. They made a great racket -- local Marty stirred a little at the sound -- but nothing shattered.

"Calm down, Doc -- er, Professor," Marty said softly, already on his feet in case the guy did take a dive to the floor. That would've been just their luck -- both their counterparts on the floor, out cold, before they could get any useful information out of them.

The Professor took a couple of breaths, his eyes locked on Doc, then turned to the standing Marty. "What's the meaning of this?" he wanted to know -- but he didn't sound angry, just very, very curious. "Why are there... two of you and me?"

"Perhaps I can explain best," Doc said, the sound of his voice startling the local. He gave a very succinct summary on their situation. By the time he finished, the Professor looked far less pale and far more intrigued.

"You're certainly in an enviable situation," he said. "At least from my perspective. I don't expect you might feel that way. I suppose I can't say that this surprises me in the least," the Professor curiously added. "Marty came home to a different world when he returned from 1952 -- so he says. I, naturally, have no memory of this."

The visiting Marty glanced down at his counterpart, fighting the urge to shake him awake -- and slap some sense into his obviously messed up head. "1952?" he said, immediately noticing that discrepancy. "Not 1955?"

The Professor shook his head once. "No. Apparently, before, my other self had created a time machine in his home in 1982, and Marty was sent back quite by accident. Some government agents showed up during a test I was conducting and... well, it wasn't pretty." The Professor glanced down at the celebrity, frowning and running a finger along the bottom of his chin. "I sent him back home in the Nevada blast, but his presence for just a week in the past changed a lot of things -- the whole world, he's told me before."

Marty and Doc were both interested -- for different reasons. Just as Marty wondered, "What Nevada blast?" the inventor asked, "What sort of changes did he mention?"

The Professor smiled at their curiosity. "The only source of power great enough to activate the time beam was a nuclear detonation," he said, to Marty. "We had to use a test site to send my Marty back home -- which was a real pain in the ass, let me tell you." He shifted his eyes to Doc. "As for the changes, well... I suppose some of it is my own doing. In the world Marty came from, I'd only recently discovered the formula to run my Power Converter -- which was key in the time machine's success. Marty didn't tell me what it was in 1952 -- on purpose -- but I checked where he said it was and... well...."

"You used that knowledge thirty years sooner?" Doc guessed. He winced as his counterpart nodded. "How could you do something so irresponsible?"

"Is that why there's flying cars and no pollution?" Marty asked.

"Indirectly, yes," the Professor admitted. "When I presented the Converter to the scientific community, it revolutionized the power industry -- and my fellow scholars, as well as the general public, suddenly became interested in dozens of other ideas I was working on. I had no problem establishing my company or selling my products worldwide, then. E. Brown Enterprises was cited in Forbes last year as one of the most successful companies in the world. I never did build a time machine, though -- and yet Marty is proof that somewhere out there, a version of myself did. Not the same one you are, though, I take it."

"I think not," Doc said, sounding a bit amused. "They sound like they operate under completely different principles -- and I didn't finish mine until 1985, thirty years after I conceived of the key to it all: the flux capacitor."

Professor Brown made an odd face. "I don't recognize that term," he admitted.

"How did my other self go back in time in the first place if you never built a machine?" Marty asked, confused, as the words of the Professor sank in. "Wouldn't that cause some kind of paradox?"

"It's a puzzle," the Professor agreed. "Marty's girlfriend -- Suzy Parker -- was seeing a movie with him the night he left, and when he got up to use the bathroom, he never returned. Since the version of myself who created a time machine actually lived in this building at the time -- it had been abandoned or closed down, then -- I can only assume that the operation of the time machine in a different reality crossed over to this one and created an interdimensional time warp."

Marty let out a low whistle, understanding only about every third word in that last sentence, but enough to get the general point. Doc looked really interested. "Fascinating," he said. "Then it would seem the universe has some compensatory mechanism to disallow eventual or instantaneous destruction from paradoxic events caused by time travelers."

"Obviously," Marty muttered.

The Professor nodded at his counterpart's words. "I suspect parallel dimensions are that form of compensation," he said. "If Marty had failed to get his parents, George and Eileen, together in 1952, then he might very well have erased himself from existence, but the world -- and, subsequently, the universe -- wouldn't have ended."

"Yes -- and I suppose if I had any doubts before this, I really can't any longer," Doc said. "Marty and I have seen a few odd variations to history and our own lives so far -- beyond the events of today, I might add. I can't say that it delights me to think that there might be billions upon billions of worlds out there, to account for every 'path not taken' in all of history -- but if it acts as a failsafe to allow for the presence of time travelers and their interactions with the past and future, then I also can't say I'm sorry. It's far more preferable than the end of life as we know it."

"Yeah, but if we don't get back home, then it might as well be the end as life as we know it," Marty couldn't resist saying, feeling like he was listening to Doc talk to himself. Technically, he supposed he was, but it could really make a bad headache worse when both inventors were in their scientific speculation modes.

"Yes," the visiting inventor agreed, looking at his counterpart. "I suppose you'd be of little help to us, then, if your time machine no longer exists -- and operated completely differently than mine, using different forms of technology."

"Probably," the Professor agreed. "Although if you wouldn't mind, I'd love to see it myself...."

While Doc hemmed this over, Marty looked down at his counterpart again, wishing once more that the guy was back in the land of the living so that the visitor could rake him over the coals about his unethical ways. "Did you know about him swiping all of his music from other artists?" he asked the Professor. "There wasn't one note of his work that wasn't stolen from someone else!"

The local inventor sighed. "It wouldn't surprise me," he admitted softly. "Since his singular time travel experience, Marty has seemed a bit... different. I suppose anyone, having spent the first seventeen years of their life with the parents he once had, might suffer from a few problems. Particularly since the world he spent the first part of his life seems much more unpleasant in my view. Wars. Pollution. Rampant crime...."

"You can't mean that you don't have any of that here, in this world," Doc said skeptically.

Professor Brown made an ambiguous gesture. "Maybe some small pockets here and there, but nothing like the strife Marty told me about the world from before."

Visiting Marty looked once more at the celebrity, thinking about what the Professor had said. He basically walked out one day, got mixed up in time travel, and when he came home, it wasn't really home. It was some weird world, where people might've looked the same, but acted differently.

Marty could understand that sensation -- he vividly remembered his first encounter with his "improved" parents -- but he hadn't had to deal with the world itself being drastically different. His parents and brother and sister seemed a bit changed, but Doc was the same, Jennifer was the same, his friends were the same. If he'd had to deal with an entirely different world on top of the other changes in just his own family, he might've gone crazy.

"What was he like, before?" Marty asked the Professor. "Before that time travel stuff, from what you remember?"

Professor Brown's eyes narrowed in thought. "I'm not quite sure," he admitted. "When I met Marty at the test site, thirty years after his departure, he didn't strike me as inherently different than the kid I'd known for years -- at first. After he came home, he almost immediately started pushing his music -- what he called 'Rock 'n' Roll' -- and graduated high school the day before he signed with a record company. When the music he was creating came out, it caused an incredible stir. Nothing like it had ever been heard before. Marty got tremendously popular in a very short span of time. His dream, apparently."

The Professor paused a moment, glancing at his unconscious friend, perhaps to make sure he wasn't going to be sitting up any time soon. "I suppose that alone could account for change in anyone," he went on, his tone softer. "But in the conversations I had with Marty in the months after March of '82, I'd gotten the impression that the experience of growing up with a bullied father and an overly prudish mother -- and as their only child, no less -- had certain... repercussions."

"What kind of repercussions?" Marty asked, a bit taken aback by the mention that his other self was an only child. "I mean, I had a similar situation 'til I went back and accidentally changed things with my parents."

"You were into gambling, then, too? Running an illegal media pirating operation?"

The musician's eyes nearly bugged out. "No! No way! You mean he was?"

"From what he's told me... I believe so. Although apparently I aided his pirating operations. I can't imagine doing such a thing now, but I suppose circumstances can change one's sense of right and wrong."

"Perhaps," Doc said. "As much as we might hate to admit that to ourselves. So I'm to assume that this Marty's problems grew more numerous the more famous he became?"

The Professor half shrugged. "I suppose that's an accurate assessment, yes. He's got almost as much money as I do, now, but he's alienated just about everyone around him. His behavior is becoming more erratic and atrocious -- but his music remains wildly popular and sells so much. Even if he wanted to take a break for a year or so, I don't think he could, contractually; the record companies expect a new album every year, and a tour to support it. Poor Suzy's just about reached her limit. I think she expected a proposal by the end of this latest world tour, and perhaps a long vacation for Marty away from the trappings of fame, but it's the last thing on his mind. The only place he should be heading right now is a health clinic, but I suspect if I brought that up, he would cut off one more caring friend." The older man sighed, shaking his head, his face falling into lines of deep concern. "I never thought I might out live him, but that possibility seems far too likely as the years go on."

Marty felt a chill snake down his spine as he studied the face of his other self for a moment, relaxed in a quasi, unnatural sleep. He couldn't imagine a worse life for himself at the moment, and it sickened him because he could also imagine that, had a few things been different, maybe he might've ended up in the same way. He had a feeling that one of the reasons this Marty's life had fallen apart might've been due to old-fashioned homesickness. If he had ended up in a world so incredibly different from home, it wouldn't be going home; it would be... well, like landing in the kinds of places he and Doc were bouncing around in. And there wouldn't be any hope of going back.

"Maybe we should just leave now, Doc," he suggested softly, looking up at his friend. "Before he wakes up and we have to go through the whole song and dance again."

The Professor responded before his counterpart could. "That might be a wise idea, under the circumstances. Marty's under so much stress, now, I don't know how he would accept news of dimensional counterparts dropping in."

Doc nodded. "I suppose he'll have enough questions after hearing about a performance he supposedly did when he won't remember a thing about it."

The expression on the Professor's face was more akin to a grimace than a smile. "It wouldn't be the first time...." He changed the subject, quickly, moving it to something that was far less depressing. "If you need a ride to your time machine, I can give you one in my Aeromobile. It wouldn't be any bother to me...."

Doc looked at the Professor, and smiled. "I suppose if I take you up on that, it would only be fitting if I allowed you a look at it, then."

"Well, if you insist...."

When the Professor left for a moment, to check the hallway and make sure the way to the outside door was a clear one, Marty cast one more nervous glance at his other self, then headed to Doc's side. "There's really nothing we can do about stuff here, is there?" he asked, keeping his voice low lest the Professor walk in.

Doc shook his head once. "No. And even if we could, we don't dare. These problems are not ours, Marty. Your other self will have to find his own way out of the messes he's created."

Marty sighed. "Yeah, I guess so. It really sucks, though. I mean, it doesn't sound like it's his fault, getting mixed up in the time travel...."

"No -- but do you think his life would be any better if that hadn't happened?"

Probably not, Marty had to admit to himself. If the Professor's words were right, it sounded like this version of himself was already a delinquent punk before he'd stumbled into the past, and went home to an alternate future.

Doc sighed softly, the sound sympathetic, when Marty didn't answer his question. "I suppose both of us better get used to meeting people that we wish didn't share any aspects of our genetic make up. He's not you, Marty -- he's a rather far flung version of what might've been, but what didn't come to pass. From what little my other self has told us, it sounds like there were a lot of deviations between his world and ours -- even before my other self revealed an invention that changed the entire world."

"I know, Doc -- I just feel kind of bad for him. I mean, yeah, he's an asshole, and worse than that, he's an asshole who's made a name for himself by stealing from other people -- even though I guess those songs probably didn't exist at all in this world before he recorded 'em -- but.... I guess I can see the stuff in him that's still like me, you know?"

Doc nodded once. "I know," he said. "Believe me, I know."

The Professor returned, then, clearly excited about the chance to see a working time machine himself. "All clear," he reported, ducking his head into the room. "Are you ready to go?"

Doc and Marty looked at each other. The inventor answered for the both of them. "Yes, I think so."