Lucky Boys (8/?)
Title: Lucky Boys
Author: skelly_lector
Pairing: George/Ringo and John/Paul
Time Frame: 1964, American Tour
Rating: PG-13, for now.
Warnings: Violence, swearing, and general mayhem.
Summary: What do you get when you combine four hungover lads, one airplane, and one very big misunderstanding?
A/N: Ahh, finally got this done. My horrible, prehistoric internet is making life difficult, so I apologize if updates start slowing down from now on. But I shall try to prevent that. Anyway, a bit of a plot twist here, if I do say so myself. Progress, progress, progress...
Disclaimer: I totally know this is true because I was totally there to watch it nearly three decades before I was conceived. Totally.
First chapter is here! Second is here! Third is here! Fourth is here! Fifth is here! Sixth is here! Seventh shall be linked as soon as I can get my internet to work properly. >:C
Brian Epstein had no idea what to do. This was a stupendously rare occasion; he’d survived as the lads’ manager for as long as he had because of his quick mind, careful planning, and brilliant instincts. In short, he always had a plan.
And, yes, he’d seen the boys through crises before. Everything from John’s bigger than Jesus fiasco to George’s awkward comments at that press conference to Ringo driving that bloody boat into that bloody dock in bloody Miami just a few days ago. But that stuff? That stuff was nothing: a bit of PR damage control and smiles and apologies to a few angry locals, that was all. But this…this was totally different. And for once, his calculating managerial brain had completely shut down; he was standing, motionless, on the airport tarmac like someone had flipped off all his switches.
And then, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a little cluster of black heading towards a nearby door. Brought back to life like someone had shocked him, he spun around to get a proper look at the huddle of black-suited men hurrying across the tarmac. His heart leapt into his throat; there were four of them.
“Lads!” he cried joyously, bounding towards them. No matter that they’d just given him a potentially heart attack-causing fright; solitary confinement and alcohol deprivation could come later. For the moment, he was just glad to have them back.
That is, until the shortest of the four spun around and snarled at him, literally snarled, with one lip curled back like an animal’s.
“What do you want?” the boy demanded, and whoa, this pale, furious little foreign devil definitely wasn’t Ringo. Skidding to a halt, Brian did the biggest double take of his life.
“Uh…s-sorry,” he stammered. “I…I thought you were someone else.”
“Yes, it is a mistake many people seem to be making today,” the boy said coldly, nose wrinkling in distaste as his companions turned to stare at Brian. “That imbecile over there-” he indicated a small man a few yards away who appeared to be repeatedly hitting himself on the forehead with his clipboard, “-Put some…some impostors onto our plane!”
“Impostors?” Brian repeated hopefully. “Who were these imposters?”
“How should we know?” a second boy snapped, his English even more heavily accented than his mate’s. “They are the ones who stole our plane!”
“Nyet, Dimitri,” the short one murmured, putting a calming hand on his friend’s arm. “Why do you want to know?” he asked Brian, eyes narrowing suspiciously.
“I…I’m responsible for them,” Brian explained lamely, trying to ignore the fear that clenched his stomach when he finally recognized these boys’ accents. Russians. Shit.
“Well,” the short Russian smirked, “I can assure you that whoever they are, you will never see them again.”
“I…what…who…what is this meaning of this?” Brian blustered, even as his heart sank down towards his ankles.
“If they are really on our plane,” a third boy explained, a wolfish grin on his stupid fat face, “In about ten hours, they will arrive in our country. Empty-handed.”
“Do you know what we were supposed to be taking back to mother Russia?” the first lad asked dangerously.
“No, but I can guess,” Brian sighed. He might be comparatively clean nowadays, but he was no ingénue; he’d seen (and participated in) his fair share of shady deals back in the Pool. “Coke. Diamonds, maybe. You’re smugglers.”
“We’re not just smugglers,” the fourth Russian said quietly. As one, they all lifted their hands to show Brian the black tattoos emblazoned across their knuckles. He caught mixed glimpses of crosses, words in Russian, maybe an animal or two. He wasn’t sure; he had suddenly come down with a horrible case of vertigo. Because those tattoos could only mean one thing.
“The mob,” he mumbled, struggling to take deep breaths. “Oh, god.”
“The Russian mafia,” the short one corrected him with a smile that was dotted with flashes of gold. “And, let me tell you, our…comrades in Russia will not be pleased to discover that not only do your friends not have the goods, but they are not even mafia. In fact, they are not even Russian.” He stowed his ink-stained hands in his jacket pockets and shrugged, suddenly non-threatening again. “My guess is that they won’t last long.”
“Christ,” Brian muttered, running his hands through his hair as the boys-no, the smugglers, the stupid bastard red criminals turned away and loped back into the airport. “Jesus H. Christ.”
But, he thought suddenly, dropping his hands and lifting his head, there was something to be said for this horrible new information. Because it was information. It was a clue, and suddenly he wasn’t up shit creek without a paddle. Well, he was still up shit creek (so far up, in fact, that he was probably near the headwaters), but at least now he had a paddle. Well, okay, maybe not a paddle, but a stick with which he could steer. And for now, that was good enough.
He strode indoors, dodging half-awake travelers and perplexed airport workers until he found a phone booth. Digging deep into his pockets, he fed the phone all the change he had, picked up the receiver, and said, “Get me the British Embassy in Moscow. Yes, you heard me right. Moscow. I don’t care if it takes time; I want the embassy. Believe me, this will be well worth his time.”
Eleven hours later, and far closer to Moscow than Brian, the old Russian man with the shotgun had found himself in something of a pickle.
For one thing, the aforementioned shotgun was gone, broken easily over the enormous knee of an enormous man wearing an enormous suit. For another, it had been replaced by three sleek Russian-made handguns, all of which were currently aimed at the old man’s face.
“I t-told you,” he stammered in Russian, raising his hands defensively, “I never got anything.”
“Then what the hell happened?” one of the shadowy faces between the handguns demanded. “We saw the plane land, you old fool. Are you trying to tell us that they didn’t give you anything?”
“They weren’t there,” the old man protested, trying to step away from the guns and running into the stone wall at his back. “After I heard the plane, I went to look, but they weren’t there.”
“Do you mean to say that the plane landed and took off and didn’t leave anyone behind?” a second man snorted. “We are not stupid.”
“There were people there,” the old man explained hastily. “Four men. But they were not the right ones.”
“Who were they, then?” the third gunman snapped, impatiently pushing the barrel of his firearm closer.
“I did not recognize them,” the old man whimpered, his face draining of all color as his eyes crossed in an attempt to focus on the barrel hovering in front of his nose. “I got my shotgun and went to interrogate them, but…” He shook his head, confounded, “They did not tell me anything. They were just standing there in the middle of the field, looking at it.”
“Looking at what?”
“The field. They were just…looking at it.”
“What in the world…” The first gunman shook his head incredulously. “He’s lying,” he called over his shoulder at a giant shadow lurking in the darkness. “Search this depressing little hovel. The goods must be here somewhere.”
“Yes, boss,” the giant man rumbled. The old man’s eyes widened as out of the darkness came the sudden crash and tinkle of some small, precious porcelain object being smashed into oblivion on the hard stone floor.
“P-please,” he groveled, clasping his hands together as if in prayer. “I’m not lying. I don’t know who they were. They didn’t…they weren’t Russian.”
“Weren’t Russian?” The gunmen exchanged glances.
“They didn’t speak it, anyway,” the old man shrugged, encouraged by this new reaction. “I asked them who they were, and they replied with a bunch of gibberish. They kept shouting and waving their arms around, but they were talking complete nonsense. It sounded like made-up words. And when I told them to go away…they stood there like they didn’t understand. For nearly a minute! They ran off into the woods, but I don’t know…” His eyes lit up with a sudden realization. “I think they were simple. You know?” He raised a hand and tapped at his temple. “Not right in the head.”
“You let them get away?” a gunman said incredulously.
“Well, what was I supposed to do, shoot them?” the old man said testily. “They were just stupid kids or something.”
“Did it occur to you,” the first gunman began quietly, his hands twitching on his gun like he was barely restraining himself from turning the old man’s face into a bloody pudding on the opposite wall, “That this…gibberish that they were speaking…might have been another language?”
“I don’t…” the old man broke off, his face going blank with shock. “Oh.”
“What, what?” the third gunman demanded.
“I think it might have been English,” the old man squeaked.
“English? Shit,” the first man swore, turning away from the trembling old man. “Yevgeny, stop, stop!” The giant paused in his systematic destruction of everything the old man owned. “Come, Yevgeny. We’re leaving.”
“They went into the woods going north,” the old man called after the four retreating men. “Towards Moscow.”
The three gunmen stopped short and exchanged dark looks.
“Moscow? Shit,” the first gunman snarled. With that, he turned back to the old man. “Thank you,” he said in a voice as sweet and sticky as a flytrap. “You’ve been very helpful.”
Outside the old man’s tiny stone cottage, the valley was cool, green, and peaceful, the soft golden light of dusk spilling down from the mountains like tea pouring into a bowl. A flock of birds erupted out of the trees surrounding the field, winging off into the darkening sky as a single shot rang out.
One of the two windows in the cottage suddenly went dark, completely obscured by a splatter of blood. Inside, the old man’s body slid down the wall and hit the cold stone floor with a thud, what remained of his head lolling forward onto his chest. The four men stalked silently out the front door, not a single drop of blood soiling their immaculate black suits.