*2*
3/4 TIME
"Am - am I...?" Paul dropped his guitar to feel his face again.
"Back to the egg," John whispered. Behind the granny glasses he was barely an adult. "Fuck, Paul, why didn't we notice?"
A head bobbed between them. Ringo threw his arms around Paul, body heaving as he struggled to get his breath back. "You're - I'm - glad - "he wheezed. "Can't - George - asshole - he won't - "
Paul ignored the embrace, stared at his soft, pink, impossible hands. Years of guitar-player calluses had vanished. I'm a kid again, I'm a kid again.... The fingers blurred; Paul reeled, and if Ringo hadn't been holding him he would have fallen over.
Beside him, John growled, "I am not gonna let this get to me. Why shouldn't we be kids again? We're on another planet, for Christ's sake, anything's possible. Right?" he snapped at the approaching George. "Right!" he answered himself. "Right! Left, right, left! Human rights! Right-handed...." His voice trailed off, leaving him with nothing but an empty, manic grin that slowly faded into a neutral mask.
Not seeming to hear any of this, George stopped with a jerk and stared at the ocean, his lips moving in silent Hare Krishnas. Then he lifted his head to look into the sky. Silhouetted against the bright blue, he intoned, "We've been sent here by the Lord."
Paul snapped out of his trance. As he was an agnostic, the idea that God was responsible for their predicament made him extremely uncomfortable.
Ringo let go of Paul and whirled around. "Oh, piss off!" His voice cracked, he was so angry and scared. "That's all you've said for the last ten years, I can't stand it any more!" He swept his arm around to take in sea, sand, meadow. "What's the point of all this? Why would God do this to us? Do this to us?"
"I told you why," George said, trying to sound calm and in control, but his voice shook a little all the same. "He has his reasons. We may not understand them, but they're there."
Meanwhile, Paul pulled John aside and murmured to him, "What d'ye think, then?"
"What, about God?" John shrugged. "God's as good as anything I've come up with. I thought of God too, actually."
"Oh. D'ye think we should... well... pray?" Paul pictured himself sheepishly saying "Er, hi," to a frowning, bearded God and being blasted with lightning.
John's face grew dark. "I don't think anyone who's scared the shit out of us like this deserves to get prayed to."
Relieved by this three-to-one majority, Paul said loudly, "Right, it could be someone else, couldn't it? We aren't alone in the universe. Why shouldn't some alien hear our music and want to reunite us? Maybe some UFO came down and picked us up."
George gave Paul a poisonous look. "You mean someone wanted us reunited so bad they put us on another planet and didn't bother to drop by for a listen."
"Well, maybe they did. Maybe they're invisible or tiny—" Paul glanced at the bottom of his shoe, but there wasn’t a squashed leprechaun embedded in the sole "—or those big plants or the sheep. They could be anything."
"Why not the grass or the water, then? That's all sci-fi rubbish, Paul."
"This isn't sci-fi?" Ringo demanded.
"Maybe lo-fi," John said, bending to pick up a scalloped pink shell.
"It's certainly not fiction," George said smugly. "And since the Lord created it, it's not science."
This is getting nowhere, Paul thought, and held up his hands. "Cool it, lads. Look, I didn't mean to knock God or anything. I just think there might be other explanations for this madness. I mean, we can't just dismiss everything else out of hand."
George sniffed. "Yes we can."
Paul ignored him. "Come on, we're doing no good here. We've got to keep moving, keep exploring. If we can find out where we are, maybe we can figure out why we're here and who sent us. It could be God," he said quickly, seeing George about to speak. "But we won't know for certain till we check things out, right?"
George grudgingly conceded that this plan made sense, and after a bit of discussion about the best place to go, the four continued down the beach in the direction that John and Paul had been going, getting a good view of the meadow and (most importantly) minimizing the likelihood of being snuck up on or ambushed. Paul and Ringo walked together, while John and George trailed behind like two tails on a kite, their paths crossing and recrossing as John scampered back and forth collecting shells. The beach was strewn with them, pink and black and striped, clam and spiral and snail, and he was constantly stooping to snatch one, then straightening up and running after the others. Soon his pockets were crammed, and he started dropping the shells into his guitar. "Souvenirs," he said to anyone who looked at him quizzically.
Ringo talked nonstop, half to Paul, half to the air. "When I woke up, I thought I'd gone mad, I couldn't get me bearings at all, George was moanin' to Krishna, and Christ, I thought it was a dream, he looked so bloody young, and when we saw the other moon, I nearly shit meself right there...." Ringo punctuated this monologue with broad gestures and much waving of the tambourine, so that he seemed to be singing a long, rambling song.
George drifted along, his "Hare Krishnas" audible now, his eyes blank. When a bird dropped a clam shell at his feet, he didn't even flinch. Occasionally he muttered snatches of the Bhagavad-Gita, trying to find a parallel with this world or a reassurance from God or anything comforting. His guitar dragged through the sand, bumping over shells and weeds.
Why are we here? Paul shouted the words in his head to tune out the others' noise. What possible reason could we have for being here? Is it a reunion? It has to be, there's no other reason for the four of us to be together. But why here? God, I hope we're not supposed to save this world with music or something.
A horrible thought came to Paul then, and he stopped short and blurted, "Oh, Jesus, this better not be Pepperland."
Ringo paused in mid-babble, having heard only the most important part. "Pepperland? We're in Pepperland?" he rasped, already hoarse.
"No. No, we're not," Paul said forcefully, quickly walking again (and pulling Ringo with him) before the others could catch up and ask why he'd stopped. "It's not insane enough here, it's too—it's not cartoony enough, it's too dull. Sorry, silly idea. Forget I mentioned it."
They marched along, Ringo silent for a change, triggered into some thinking, while Paul determinedly worked up more reasons for their being anywhere but that place.
Then Ringo said, "Pepperland wouldn't be so bad, actually."
"Uh?" was all Paul could say to this astonishing statement.
"At least we'd know what to do and how to get home. Play a concert, unfreeze everyone, smash the Blue Meanies, and get taxied home in the yellow submarine."
Paul nearly replied that he hoped he had a higher purpose in being here than participating in a live version of that wretched cartoon, thank you very much. Instead, his mind went sideways, following a notion.... and a realization burst upon him with such force that he stopped in his tracks again. "Yes! God, it's so simple! Why didn't I think of this before?"
"What?" asked Ringo, at once alarmed and hopeful.
Paul just laughed in delight, a strange sound after that morning of terror, and waved like mad for John and George to catch up. "We're such idiots!" Paul said when they had assembled. "It was right in front of our noses all along!"
"What, air?" said John.
"How to get home! We've got to play together, that's all!"
"How d'ye figure that, then?" asked Ringo.
"Well, what's the best reason for us to be together? A reunion! It's a queer place for one, but someone must have a good reason for it—maybe 'cause it's easier to get along under these conditions. So if the Beatles play together, that'll satisfy whoever or balance the universe or something and we'll get home!"
"I am not a Beatle any more!" George shouted, face reddening. "You got that? That's all dead and gone!"
"Don't matter, son," John said lazily, "someone thinks stickin' us together's gonna make us you-know-whats, even if we don't think so. I think it makes sense." He started shaking the shells out of his guitar.
Pleased, Paul glanced at Ringo, who was looking at his tambourine and the guitars doubtfully. "Think these'll be enough?" said the drummer.
"Sure, or we'd have more." Paul hoisted his guitar and tried a C chord, only to discover that the instrument was woefully out of tune. "Come on lads, let's tune up."
He sat on the sand; John sat on the sand.
George remained standing.
Paul and George stared at each other.
"Coming down?" Paul said softly, warningly.
George turned his back on them, started to walk away.
Paul erupted from the sand, scattering John's shells, and leaped on George, sending him sprawling across the sand and his guitar skidding away. "I don't care what you think you are or why you think we're here, you holier-than-thou son of a bitch!" Paul screamed in George's ear. "If you don't do this with us I'll kill you! Do you hear me? I'll murder you!"
"Mmph mmph! All right!" George forced his head up and spit out sand. "All right! Leave off!"
There was a pained silence while Paul rolled off George and both got up, George wiping sand off his scraped palms and arms and spitting more out, Paul taking deep breaths and counting slowly to ten. At the end of ten, he had forced down the great, nauseating anger/fear that had propelled him so effectively. "Didn't know I had it in me," he mumbled, embarrassed.
"We're all scared, man," said Ringo, putting his arm around Paul's shoulders. "You just don't let it out enough. Besides," he added sotto voce, "he deserved it."
"Um," said Paul, keeping a neutral face but very glad that Ringo was on his side. He watched while George, looking martyred, picked up his guitar and, sullenly obedient, sat down next to John. Guess it's worth it if it worked, Paul thought, but can't lose it like that again—one of us has got to see things clearly, or we'll just fall apart, and right now I'm the only one who can keep us going. "Thanks," he murmured to Ringo, and he sat down with the others to tune his instrument. Taking a cue from John, he and George unlaced their sneakers and tied them to their guitars as support straps.
"What shall we play, then?" John asked when all guitars were ready to go and the three had stood up. "`Magical Mystery Tour'?"
By now Paul was recovered enough to feign a punch at John and grin. "I thought `Yesterday' would be good. D'ye remember it?"
"Yeah, yesterday we weren't here," said John.
"I'll play whatever you want me to play," George said stonily.
"Isn't it a little too relevant?" asked Ringo.
Paul shrugged. "Suggest something else, then."
But no one had any better ideas. So they practiced a bit, George and John reminding themselves of the way they used to play it on stage. They meshed well—almost too well; their ten-year separation had had about the same effect on the group as a trip to the bathroom between takes. Then, facing the sea, which sounded sort of like an audience, they positioned themselves as of old, John on the left, Paul on the right, George in the middle, Ringo sitting behind them on the rise (and feeling quite the fool with just the tambourine in his hand).
And they played.
They were lousy. Ringo was too nervous to keep the beat; John clowned around; George played carelessly, at times repeating the same note over and over; and Paul winced at each missed beat and muffed chord until he could barely sing.
They lumbered to a close and waited expectantly.
Nothing happened.
"I knew it," George said, unable to hide a superior smile. "That isn't why we're here."
John sucked his torn and bloody fingers. All the guitarists' hands were in bad shape, their young, virgin hands shredded by chording and picking. "Christ, I thought I was used to this when I was 24."
Torn between disgust—at the others for collapsing, at himself for not being able to perform when it counted—and a sick fear that his idea was utterly wrong, Paul forced a professional mien. "Right, that's Take One. We'll need a few more sessions before we pass the audition." Noticing that George looked rebellious again, he added sharply, "Well, if I were a Beatles fan waiting to hear us play, I bloody well wouldn't be satisfied with that rubbish. We'll have to do it well, or we won't fulfill the conditions. We may even need an audience."
"Ah," John breathed: a note of pure terror. The others looked over. Face pasty-white, he was staring up the beach. "I think we had one."
About a hundred feet away, a small, grayish, humanoid figure with a long sack in one hand crouched next to one of the large lettuces, watching the four. When it realized it had been seen, it emitted a sharp cry, dropped its bag, and fled.
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