Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls a funeral gong for my ownership of the Beatles that ne'er was and ne'er will be.

A/N: Lotsa author's notes this chapter! Firstly, special thanks to Macca40 for helping me brainstorm the second part of this chapter. Also, thanks to all my other fab reviewers: On FanFiction, Macca's Little Teddy Bear and the Mysterious Guest; on WattPad, heroesforghosts, shineonyoudiamond, MasterofFire, and cityofstarlight. And thanks so much to everybody who read New Year's Eve, 1964! I didn't expect to have so many of you read my silly little oneshot!

Secondly - we're nearing the end! This is the second-to-last chapter, and Chapter 22 should be up (tentatively) on Friday! But Escape of the Nerk Twins will have Chapter 1 up then as well :0) See the A/N at the end of this chapter for an EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW of that pseudo-sequel!

Thirdly -- the photo over in Media is an actual picture of the Beatles in their Ipswitch concert on Haloween night, 1964!

George frowned as he paced around another corner in the backstage hallways of the Gaumont Cinema. John hadn't been in the bathroom (no surprises there), but he didn't seem to be anywhere else, either. Hands in his pockets, George started down the latest white-walled hallway.

"John?" he called. "Where are you?"

"Harrison!" hissed a voice.

George stopped dead in his tracks. "John?" he asked, slowly spinning in a circle. White walls, grey floor, white ceiling, brown door to janitor's closet – that was all he could see.

"Anybody else out there?" whispered the voice.

George shook his head, then realized that John couldn't see him. "No," he replied, peering down the hallway.

A hand shot out of nowhere, grabbed George's arm, and dragged him into the janitor's closet. The person's other hand pulled the door shut behind him with a miniscule snap.

George blinked, his eyes adjusting to the darkness. "What was that for, John?"

"Shh!" muttered John. "We have to whisper in here."

"Okay," said George dubiously, raising an eyebrow. Then, he realized that John couldn't see the raised eyebrow, so he gave up on that tactic. "What's going on?"

"I need your help with something," whispered John.

"Why me?" asked George in a low voice.

"Paul might tell Brian, and we all know Ringo can't keep a secret," reasoned John.

George shifted his position and started as his foot landed in a bucket full of water, but John seemed not to notice. "Fair enough. What's the plan?"

Half an hour later:

Paul and Ringo reached a fork in the hallway.

"I'll go right, you go left," suggested Paul.

"Okay," agreed Ringo. "Good luck!"

"Yeah," replied Paul. "We have to find them soon, we're going onstage in twenty minutes!"

"If we're late, Brian's going to ground us for the rest of the tour," moaned Ringo.

"You joking? He'll ground us for the rest of the millennium," answered Paul darkly.

Ringo waved farewell to him as they went their separate ways.

As Paul advanced down the hallway, the only sound he could hear was his Beatle boots echoing off the linoleum floor. Then, he heard something else. Someone was breathily humming "God Save the Queen."

Paul only knew one person who could hum "God Save the Queen" that weirdly. He followed the sound to an inconspicuous, narrow brown door about two meters away. He pulled it open.

George blinked at Paul nonchalantly from his seat on a large toolbox. John, leaning against the wall, continued humming and drawing something on the back of the "sad crumby gypsy" sign from earlier.

"What're you doing, then?" asked Paul.

John stopped humming and looked up at Paul with the famous "Lennon stare."

"Humming the national anthem while drawing a creepy eye," replied John, flipping around the paper to show Paul his drawing of a creepy eye. "See?"

Paul's already arched eyebrows shot up even higher. "What would the press think if they found two Beatles cuddling in a dark closet?"

"That's not what you said last night," replied John cheekily.

Paul and George both rolled their eyes.

"Listen, we have to go onstage in fifteen minutes," said Paul. "We've got to find Ringo and get our guitars before then."

"What're you waiting for, then?" asked George, leaping up and pushing himself past Paul. "Come 'ed!" he added, beckoning, as he set off down the hallway.

Paul eyed John suspiciously. "What were you two talking about, anyroad?"

John made a V sign for victory. "Victory at all costs," he blustered in a surprisingly good Winston Churchill impression. "Without victory . . . there is no survival."

With that, John darted past Paul and skipped down the hallway after George.

Paul looked at the toolbox forlornly. "I don't suppose you're going to tell me anything, either, are you?"

The toolbox didn't say anything.

Paul sighed and followed his friends back down the hall.

Ringo careened around another corner, glancing at his watch fretfully.

How am I going to find everyone and get onstage in twelve minutes? he wondered hopelessly. However, his train of thought was cut off abruptly as he ran into someone.

Ringo and the someone both staggered backward.

"What are you doing?" asked the someone, who Ringo now saw was Brian Epstein.

"Looking for the others," replied Ringo, glancing around as though he expected his bandmates to pop out of the walls.

Brian's eyes bulged. "You mean you and Paul split up? Of all the idiotic ideas . . . ."

"In our defense –" started Ringo, but he never got to finish what was sure to be an impassioned plea for forgiveness.

"Hello everybody!" yelled John, racing around the corner, brandishing his guitar. "Ready to take Ipswich by storm?"

George and Paul followed on his heels, armed respectively with a Rickenbacker and a Höfner. They were both grinning widely.

John skidded to a halt when he saw the stormy expression on Brian's face, abruptly backpedaling on the slick linoleum floor and nearly falling over. George and Paul only saved themselves from toppling to the ground by grabbing John's shoulders for balance.

Paul pulled a pair of drumsticks out of his back pocket with his right hand, his left still firmly clamped to his bass. "Here you are, Rings!" He held them out to the drummer, who pulled them out of Paul's hand slightly suspiciously.

"You haven't done anything to them, have you?" he asked, holding them up to his face and examining them carefully.

Paul had the decency to look mildly offended. "'Course not!"

George looked back and forth between John and Brian, who seemed to be engaged in a staring-contest-to-the-death. John snorted loudly, but Brian didn't bat an eyelash. For a lack of anything else to do, George looked at his watch.

"We've got nine minutes to get onstage," the youngest Beatle warned.

"Let's go, then," said Paul. He and George started off down the hallway, Ringo right behind them. When it became clear that John and Brian weren't going to follow them, they reluctantly trooped back to the rhythm guitarist and the manager.

Finally, Brian broke the silence. "Your wife called," he said steadily.

John paled. The manager continued, "She wants to know why you spent so much money on a dilapidated Volkswagen." Although Brian wasn't smiling, the Beatles could all tell that he was relishing every second of watching John's face change colour. After cycling through several strange shades of cream, purple, red, and green, his visage finally settled on an ugly shade of puce.

"Seven minutes," warned Ringo.

John leaned closer to Brian, their noses nearly touching. "I've an offer for you," said John softly.

Brian raised an eyebrow. "Very well; what is it?"

"I bet you the cost of that car that our fans will be totally silent for at least one second of our concert," murmured John, barely audible to Paul, George and Ringo.

Brian smirked. "That's impossible."

"Are you taking the bet?" asked John.

Brian nodded. "I haven't got anything to lose."

John gave Brian the Lennon stare for another second before grinning widely and ducking around the manager.

"Right, lads, away!" he called to his bandmates.

They raced down the hallway, toward the stage and the sound of screams.

"Where we going, Johnny?" shouted Paul from behind him.

"To the toppermost of the poppermost!" yelled John.

And with that, the Beatles burst onto the stage, under the bright spotlights, looking out over a dark room filled with joyous, screaming fans.

A/N I: The more you review, the more I smile! The more I smile, the more I write! The more I write, the more you review! (It's a vicious cycle.)

A/N II: And now, for an exclusive preview of "Escape of the Nerk Twins" (coming this Friday to an electronic device near you):

As John Lennon and Paul McCartney passed the corner of the remote gas station, a shimmer of silvery blue caught Paul's eye. He turned to see a battered Ford Anglia languishing in the shadow of the building. His mop top tossed about by a fresh gust of Highland wind, John also looked over at the old car.

They exchanged a pointed glance before walking over to more closely inspect the car. Paul was sure John also saw the handwritten "For Sale" sign stuck to the inside of the dirt-speckled windscreen.

Paul turned to John.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" asked Paul.