"How's he doing, Zippy?" I asked as I brushed the dust off my robes and stepped out of the hot sun and into the tent.
"Douglas!" my sister snapped at me as she looked up. "How many times have I said not to call me that?" She turned her attention back to the pallet in front of her. "Pay no attention to my stupid brother," she said in gentler tones to the sun-burnt, emaciated fellow who lay there. "My name is Tzipporah. Aharon here has a strange sense of humor to go with his strange accent."
"A-a-a-ah-ron?" the refugee I'd found earlier in the day whispered hoarsely, with a clear stammer in his ordeal-roughened voice. "Y-y-y-you c-c-called h-him 'D-d-d-douglas'." I frowned for a moment as he stumbled over the extremely foreign word. He had an accent of his own, one that sounded almost... Egyptian.
She nodded briskly as she bathed his weatherbeaten, bearded face with a cool, damp cloth -- one of my old shirts, from the look of it, unless bronze-age nomads had easy access to "Megadeth" concert Ts. "That is the name he was born with, or so the fool claims" (and here she shot me the snarkiest smirk I'd seen in quite a while) "but we call him 'Aharon' both because he's been teaching us a few things, and because of his hair."
"H-h-h-his h-h-h-hair?"
Zippy shot me another glance, and with an amused snort I pulled off my keffiyeh to reveal my blond mane, which after the years I'd spent here was both sun-bleached and not quite a close-cropped as I usually kept it. The tribe's new guest inhaled suddenly in the usual surprise and shock at what to him must have been an impossibly, maybe even unnatural, hair color.
"It's a sort of pun," I added unnecessarily. When his eyes just got wider, I continued. "I'm a traveler, not from around here; the tribe adopted me a few years back as one of their own when I saved Zippy's..."
"Tzipporah!"
"...Zippy's life." I peered at him as Zippy muttered darkly about stupid adopted brothers and the scorpions they would find in their beds, just you wait and see. Interesting features under all the chap and sunburn and hair. Definite Egyptian influence, but... something else, too. "And what's your name, stranger?"
"S-s-s-setmose," he managed to get out.
Oh yeah, definitely Egyptian. And with that name, probably aristocracy of some sort. Which begged the question, what the hell was he doing all the way out this far in the Sinai?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
"Douglas!" my sister snapped at me as she looked up. "How many times have I said not to call me that?" She turned her attention back to the pallet in front of her. "Pay no attention to my stupid brother," she said in gentler tones to the sun-burnt, emaciated fellow who lay there. "My name is Tzipporah. Aharon here has a strange sense of humor to go with his strange accent."
"A-a-a-ah-ron?" the refugee I'd found earlier in the day whispered hoarsely, with a clear stammer in his ordeal-roughened voice. "Y-y-y-you c-c-called h-him 'D-d-d-douglas'." I frowned for a moment as he stumbled over the extremely foreign word. He had an accent of his own, one that sounded almost... Egyptian.
She nodded briskly as she bathed his weatherbeaten, bearded face with a cool, damp cloth -- one of my old shirts, from the look of it, unless bronze-age nomads had easy access to "Megadeth" concert Ts. "That is the name he was born with, or so the fool claims" (and here she shot me the snarkiest smirk I'd seen in quite a while) "but we call him 'Aharon' both because he's been teaching us a few things, and because of his hair."
"H-h-h-his h-h-h-hair?"
Zippy shot me another glance, and with an amused snort I pulled off my keffiyeh to reveal my blond mane, which after the years I'd spent here was both sun-bleached and not quite a close-cropped as I usually kept it. The tribe's new guest inhaled suddenly in the usual surprise and shock at what to him must have been an impossibly, maybe even unnatural, hair color.
"It's a sort of pun," I added unnecessarily. When his eyes just got wider, I continued. "I'm a traveler, not from around here; the tribe adopted me a few years back as one of their own when I saved Zippy's..."
"Tzipporah!"
"...Zippy's life." I peered at him as Zippy muttered darkly about stupid adopted brothers and the scorpions they would find in their beds, just you wait and see. Interesting features under all the chap and sunburn and hair. Definite Egyptian influence, but... something else, too. "And what's your name, stranger?"
"S-s-s-setmose," he managed to get out.
Oh yeah, definitely Egyptian. And with that name, probably aristocracy of some sort. Which begged the question, what the hell was he doing all the way out this far in the Sinai?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.