#and while he's thrilled in the moment - the lone pine timeline was a lot rougher for doc in terms of the stress of getting the time machine

[doctorbrown]

DOCTOBER '24 ⸺ 「 11 / 31 * IT WORKS 」

22:06

November 12, 1955

Three blinding flashes of light.

Three earth-shaking tremors that shake him to his very core. 

Three sonic booms that lash out so fiercely, they pierce through the fabric of space and time.

Instinct tells him to raise his hand and shield his eyes from what he’s about to witness. This knowledge will blind you—you have already seen too much, you should not see this too. Awe, responsibility, and scientific curiosity stay that hand—I must make sure Marty makes it back to his own time—and keep his attention focused on the road as the temporal displacement occurs. 

It all happens in the span of a single one of Emmett's frantic heartbeats and when everything is finally over, when an eerie, artificial silence settles into the empty spaces around him, he isn't entirely sure what's happening.

Doubt burrows its way into his mind, carried on the long shadows cast by the brilliant burst of light. Something has gone wrong, the connecting hook wasn’t properly attached to the Flux Capacitor and the power overloaded the Time Vehicle’s delicate and complex circuitry, and Marty—

As he rises to his feet, slightly unsteady, Emmett blinks the spots from his vision and looks around for any sign that his worst fears have been made reality.

There's nothing there.

There’s nothing and Emmett has never been so grateful for that in his life. No crash, no great ball of fire–however, interestingly, the Time Vehicle did leave thin fire trails during displacement that were rapidly dying out–and, most importantly, no Marty. 

Emmett lets out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding to the relief of his burning lungs.

The Time Machine and Marty are back where they belong and, for the moment, Emmett allows himself to get lost in the excitement of a successful experiment and ignore the now-surfacing thoughts born of its conclusion and a mind coming down off the adrenaline, laser-focused on one singular thought.

No, there will be time for that later. Thirty years' worth of time.

A wide grin splits his face and he can’t find himself to care if it makes him look certifiably insane as he races down the street in Marty’s temporal shadow, shouting his enthusiasm to the sky. 

On the wire, the connecting hook holds strong, waving its goodbyes to a spectre.

Everything had been fine.

Everything will be fine; he’ll see to that, whatever it takes.

See you in the future, kid.