Brothers at Heart
Disclaimer: I do not own the Beatles. I am just a young woman who was born in the wrong decade and loves to write about her all-time favorite band.
A/N: This is a collab story with georgieporgi31963 and Alene236.
*Somewhere toward the end of 1966 (before Sgt. Peppers but after John finished filming "How I Won the War")*
John stood at the entrance to the walking path, "Come on! Hut to! We gotta get to the top of the mountain before sundown."
George, Paul, and Ringo were taking their time putting their backpacks on; it was five in the morning, they had plenty of time to get to the top, John was just impatient.
"John, you forgot your bag," Ringo held up John's bag.
"I don't need it. What do we have 'em for anyway?" John grabbed his bag and held it in front of him.
"John just take it. It has food and water, and yours has the first aid kit. What if someone gets hurt?" Paul reasoned while stuffing his sleeping bag into his backpack.
"No one will get hurt, Paulie, you're just soft and **."
Paul ignored John and followed Ringo and George into the path, John following close behind.
"It's pretty dark in here. I don't think it will matter if we stay out here until night time, it's gonna be dark anyway!" Ringo attempted a joke but no one was laughing.
The forest that covered the mountain was densely packed with tall trees. Barely any sunlight could make it through the leaves, not that at five in the morning there was much sunlight, but none of the four Beatles could see where they were going. They walked along in silence for what felt like forever. Paul was the first to try to strike up conversation.
"So…George…how's it going with you and Patti?"
"Everything's good, Paul. How about you and Jane?" George didn't want to talk about his relationship with Patti, he wanted to keep that part of his life as private as he could.
"Would you ladies shut it? You're acting like a bunch of girls." John sneered while pushing his way to the front of the group. "I can't see where the path goes from here…anyone know what to do?"
"John, put on your glasses. Take a right, the path continues on that way." George pointed John in the right direction and they continued onward.
"I don't need glasses." John huffed as he and Paul and pushed their way to the front, leaving George and Ringo behind, as per usual. George saw John reach into his pocket and pull out his glasses though.
They continued walking in silence. The sun was starting to break through now; it wasn't as dark as before. It was around noon before they stopped walking.
"I'm hungry. Anyone else?" Paul asked stopping and opening his backpack.
"I am. What did you pack?" John opened his backpack and rummaged through its contents, "ugh. Tofu? Really? You vegetarian, you're going to drive me batty." John looked over at Paul and shot him a dirty look.
"It's healthy for you, John," Paul reached over and grabbed some tofu jerky.
"Meh." John continued searching for some real food.
"Here, John, I packed something you'd like." Ringo handed John a ham sandwich.
"Yay! Real food!" John took a bite of his ham sandwich and saluted Ringo, "You're a good man!"
"John, I can't believe you're eating that. That came from an innocent little pig!" Paul look aghast as John was eating away.
"Yes, and it is delicious." John finished up his sandwich, "Alright, let's go!"
The others finished up their lunch and continued down the path. It wasn't long before they came upon a river,
"Last one in shares a tent with Ringo!" Paul shouted as he quickly stripped himself of his clothes and jumped into the river.
"It's not going to be me this time!" George followed suit and joined Paul in the river.
"I don't snore that badly, do I?" Ringo asked John who was also stripping down.
"Nah, don't worry Ringo, it scares away the bears so it's quite helpful." John ruffled his hair and joined George and Paul in the river.
"Come on in Ringo! We was only joking." Paul attempted to convince Ringo to join them in the river, to no avail.
"Yeah, Ringo, with a shnoz as big as yours it's only natural that you snore that loudly." John's attempt at persuading Ringo to join them wasn't helping.
"You know, I quite like my nose. The better to breathe with, I say." Ringo sat at the edge of the river bed.
"Right you are, now come on Ringo, join us." George attempted to splash him but Ringo was too far away.
"Alright, alright." Ringo joined the other three in the river.
They swam for hours, none of them keeping an eye on the sun. It wasn't until sunset that any of them even noticed how late it was.
"We need to get going, the sun's going down," George got out of the river and pulled on his dry clothes. The others quickly followed and it wasn't long before they were back on the path, only it was much darker now than when they began.
John and Paul made a game of pushing each other off the path and into the nearby trees. Laughing as they pushed off of whatever tree they bumped into. Paul suddenly disappeared.
"Hey where's Paul? Arrgh!" Paul ran up behind George and bumped into him. George stumbled and then tripped over a large tree root with his left foot and stepped into a hole with his right, twisting both ankles.
"George! Are you alright?" Ringo ran over to check on George.
"I think I'll be fine just help me up," Ringo and Paul helped George up but when he finally put his weight down on his ankles he fell back to the ground.
"Ow! Alright, I think it's broken." George reached down to touch his ankles but quickly recoiled when it hurt too much to touch. "I don't think I'll be able to walk."
"There's a ranger station closer to the mountain, we have to get him there."
"But Paul, he can't walk, how are we going to get him there?" Ringo looked up at Paul with concern and confusion in his eyes.
John was the first to speak up:
"I'll carry him."
A/N: Alright so how did you like it? Please read and review. And I know Paul didn't become a vegetarian until the 70s with Linda but I just couldn't resist making a joke about it. This chapter was written by Alene236 the next one will be by gorgieporgi31963