“Where is she?! This whole
thing was her idea!”
George didn’t feel any easier than
Linda did, as they waited anxiously for Marty and her two friends to show up at
Century Café. The joint was fuller than usual for a Saturday afternoon, thanks
to George advertising the event for the entire school. Of course, Linda had not
approved any promotion, and with Marty being a no-show, she was highly
regretting it.
“She’ll be here,” George tried to
reassure her, even though he wasn’t so convinced himself of that. “We worked
our butts off for this gig. She wouldn’t just bail at the last minute.”
Linda’s nerves were shot. “Oh! Just
forget it! Forget the whole thing!”
She rushed for the exit, only to
find herself face-to-face with Tiff Tannen and her weasel cronies. The entire
café suddenly went silent in their presence, all eyes focused on them. “Whoa,
Flynn! Where’s the stampede?” Tiff asked.
“Fire,” George uttered. “Where’s the
fire.”
“Shut it, McFly!” Tiff thundered.
“We ain’t here for a grammar lesson! We’re here for that redheaded floosy you
two have been hangin’ around with the past few days!”
“Marty?” Linda figured. “We don’t
know where she is. Trust me on that.”
“Yeah, right!”
Tiff barked. “I got a hundred bucks tellin’ me that you
do – and nobody’s leavin’ here ‘til we find out where she’s hidin’!”
---------------------------
Marty was more than thankful
Emma allowed her to borrow the Pacer Wagon for whenever she and the boys needed
to go into town. It helped that particular day, driving to the Century Café.
She tried to obey the speed limit, so as not to get a ticket in 1985.
Thankfully, she and the boys made it there safely, albeit much later than they
wanted. Marty just hoped Linda and George wouldn’t be too upset with
them being late.
But that was the very least of their
concerns, once they stopped at the café entrance and spotted Tiff and the
weasels through the window. Luckily, none of them noticed Marty and the boys,
considering their backs were facing them and the entrance that they obstructed.
“I guess the show’s kaput with them here,” Phineas noted.
“Why are they here?” Marty
griped. “Don’t they have a 7-Eleven to rob?” She noticed the extra
threatening way Tiff addressed Linda and George. Curious to find out what this
scene was all about, Marty and the boys snuck into the café unnoticed.
“I got a hundred bucks tellin’ me
that you do – and nobody’s leavin’ here ‘til we find out where she’s hidin’!”
They heard Tiff vehemently demand.
“For the last time, we don’t
know where Marty is!” Linda told her.
Knowing she was the reason for all
this, Marty felt guilty. She didn’t know why Tiff Tannen was looking for her or
even how she knew about her; out of everyone she, Phineas, and Ferb knew from
2025 that they interacted with in 1985, Tiff was the only one they steered
clear from.
Regardless, Marty knew she had to do
something.
Acting fast, she snatched a full
glass of chocolate milk from a nearby booth and hurled it at the back of Tiff’s
head, striking a direct hit. This took the entire café by surprise, with a
collection of amused mutters emitting from the crowd. Infuriated, Tiff turned
and faced Marty, who saw that someone had already gotten to Tiff’s karate gi,
with the large purple stain on its front.
“Lookin’ for me?” Marty
teased.
“GET HER!” Tiff roared to her
weasels.
They chased Marty out of the café.
Phineas, Ferb, and Lewis stayed inside with Linda, George, and everyone else,
watching the chase as it stormed out onto the town square. Marty passed a group
of teen skateboarders just loitering outside the Texaco gas station, snagging
one of their boards in haste.
“Hey, get back here!” yelled the
owner, who was the tallest of the skateboarders.
“Yo, why she jack your wheels,
Tony?” one of his friends inquired.
Tony shrugged. “How should I know?”
He and his friends then jumped back as a ’76 Ford Thunderbird Convertible flew
by in pursuit of Marty, who hopped right onto Tony’s skateboard and rode it
faster than the Thunderbird. Needless to say, Tony was impressed. “Wow! Look at
her go!”
Marty never pedaled as fast on her
own skateboard back in 2025 as she did on Tony’s. All this over chocolate
milk! Scared as she was, she couldn’t shake off the exhilaration she got
from throwing that drink at the girl who would be her future coach. If she had
done that in the present, Tannen would’ve gotten her expelled for sure. Doing
it in 1985, however, might just get her killed; if not by being rammed by the
Thunderbird Convertible, then certainly from all the activity happening in
town.
Several obstacles were in Marty’s
way, such as moving men carrying a pane of glass and hula hoop girls. “Why is
there so much stuff going on the streets today?!” she complained aloud.
Her luck changed just as she came up
on a truck that was driving ahead, latching onto its tailgate to help pick up
some speed. She noticed the truck’s cargo: bowling supplies, mostly balls and
pins. She smirked just as an idea formed in her head. Positioning herself aside
the moving truck, she popped open the tailgate and released all the pins and
balls onto the road. “STREEEEE-IKE!” Marty bellowed, not caring how corny or
cliché of a one-liner it was.
Tiff swerved in reaction to the
bowling materials that were scattered in her path, but the wheels of her
Thunderbird Convertible still hit a few items, sending it spiraling out of her
control. To make matters worse, it spiraled right towards a manure truck parked
in front of a gardening store.
Tiff and the weasels shrieked as the Thunderbird Convertible collided with the
truck, burying them under a large mound of manure.
A crowd gathered around the scene of
the accident but also kept several feet from it, due to the horrendous stench.
From the alley, Heinz Doofenshmirtz witnessed the entire chase up to its messy
climax, seeing how Tiff and her goons failed. “Oh, great! A hundred bucks
flushed down the toilet – a rather stinky one at that!”
With Tiff and the weasels taken care
of, Marty returned to the café. She was welcomed with applause from all the
teens there – except for a peeved George. Marty saw that Linda wasn’t with him
and inquired, “Where did she go?”
“She bounced just after Tiff and her
gang went after you,” George said. “What was that all about
anyway? Why were they looking for you?”
Marty shook her head. “No idea.”
“Well, we better come up with a
better one, ‘cause Linda’s back to not performing in the Battle,” George
alerted. “Her interest has pretty much crashed and burned.”
Unable to accept this,
Marty thought up another plan on the spot: “Alright. Here’s what we’re gonna do
– George, you tell Linda to meet me at the school on the night of the Battle, not
to perform but to have it out with her.”
“You’re gonna fight her?” Phineas
presumed.
“No…well, yeah, but not physically,”
Marty elaborated. “I’m just gonna tell her off, ya know? Pretend to be upset
with her, insulting her talents and all that.”
“Oh, reverse psychology!” Lewis
reckoned.
“Right!” Marty told him. “George
will then step into Linda’s defense, playing the hero and building Linda’s
confidence back up.”
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