The sun was beating down hard on the harsh and unforgiving desert landscape of Giza as a tour bus came to a halt outside a large white tent. The tent was bursting with life, people running around in breezy white garments, more for show than everyday fashion though they did help slightly with the heat. The door of the bus opens slowly, almost laboriously, and an older man, a professor, steps out and takes a deep breath; a firm smile planted on his lips as he looks around before turning back to the bus and gesturing for everyone to get off.

It wasn’t a huge group, maybe about 20 students, but they were mostly eager and ready to get on with the touring for the day. A young man with long-ish brown hair steps down off the bus and a large smile crosses his face and crinkles his eyes. His expression barely changes when another young man, with shorter, messy black hair, jumps down off the last step and throws his arms around him from behind.

“This is so exciting!” The black-haired man says in a rush, “Come on Daesung!” He yells happily, pulling on the brown-haired man’s hand after letting go of his neck. Daesung chuckles good-humoredly, considering he had just listened to the man whine and complain the entire ride over about how early it was and how bumpy the ride was and just generally how much he wished that he were back in bed in the hotel instead of out here.

“I’m glad you’re excited.” Daesung mutters, as he follows along. Their professor was leading them into the tent, talking rather expressively with one of the men who had come out to greet them upon their arrival.

“Alright, we are going to split into our groups for the first part!” The professor calls once they’ve all gathered in the tent. “Seungri! Seungri don’t touch anything!” The professor shouts, bustling over to stop the black-haired man from playing with the artifacts on a counter near the entrance.

Daesung chuckles softly but moves away from Seungri and his professor while the scene unfolds, hoping that the workers won’t equate him with Seungri while the younger man was making a nuisance of himself. Daesung was far too thrilled to be here to have Seungri’s inability to keep his hands to himself ruin his chances to see the pyramids and all of the other things that this trip was going to allow him to do.

Daesung knew, without a doubt, that he was probably the most excited of all of the students to be here. He didn’t care about going out drinking that night, something that the others had been talking about since dinner the night before, and that they’d been doing consistently every night as their trip wound on. No, Daesung wanted to see everything and he wanted to experience everything and God did he just want to get out there right now and soak it all up for as long as he could.

They break into their groups and Daesung waits anxiously, staring around the tent, for their tour guide to come over and take them out for their tour of the Great Pyramids. His wandering gaze leads him to spot a young man, most likely not much older than himself, sitting casually behind one of the counters, khaki pants rolled up into shorts and his hair a shock of various colors. The sight amuses Daesung, considering how casual the young man looked in comparison to practically everyone else that he had seen outside of his classmates. Their gazes lock briefly, and the colorful man’s mouth twitches up into a slight smile before he looks out across the tent. Daesung sighs to himself and turns around, hoping that the tour will start soon because he’s getting antsy and he just wants to get out there and look.

“Remember everyone! It’s hot out, so make sure to wear your hats… and did everyone remember sunscreen!?” Their professor calls out to them, and they all murmur and nod and Daesung pulls up the white floppy hat his mother had insisted he bring with him (and that he was secretly happy he had) and takes a deep breath, holding it in as he waits for the next set of instructions.

Daesung isn’t sure he’s ever been happier. As they walk around the burial chambers and the old temples, all in ruins and all still so utterly and completely fascinating, Daesung feels like he’s in a dream. He wishes fiercely, as they duck under a crumbling arch and move into an area undergoing restoration, that he could have seen what this all had looked like when it was newly built. He would even love to have seen it just a short time after that, when pharaohs were still the leading force in this part of the world, and the old religions of the area were still widely practiced if not believed, but pyramids hadn’t been built for some time.

He sighs, a happy smile clinging to his lips as he wishes fiercely that he had at least eight more pairs of eyes so that he could take everything in that he wanted to see. Their tour finishes at noon, and they sit around underneath a palm tree, hoping in vain for some type of shade, while eating the bagged lunch that their professor had somehow procured for them. Their professor was an energetic man, full of life and excitement even though he had been teaching archaeology and history at their small college for probably longer than Daesung had even been alive. The man’s passion was ruins, and Daesung wished that he could be even just half as passionate as him, and half as unbelievably smart.

They answer questions, and ask some of their own, Daesung has to stop himself from just gushing about how wonderful everything was; and Seungri chokes on his laughter every time Daesung tries to speak. As they finish their lunches and fall into happy chatter, Daesung sees the colorful man again, this time walking backward as he gestures toward a nearby ruin for a small group of tourists. Their eyes don’t meet this time, but Daesung knows that the other man saw him.

“Alright students!” Their professor says merrily as he claps his hands together and looks around at them all. “Now we are free for the rest of the day!” This proclamation was met with cheers, some of which were sleepy and half-hearted; wandering around in the sun all morning had definitely taken its toll, especially on those who had been out the night before.

Daesung feels just a little bit anxious at the thought of having free time. This is what he had been waiting for all morning, if he were being completely truthful. It was time that he would be able to spend wandering around without any interruption. He could stare at the buildings for as long as he wanted and there would be no tour guide hurrying him along to get to the next landmark before another group came by.

“What time is the bus leaving?” He asks, and his professor looks down at his watch and then over at the small schedule in his hands.

“3:00pm, but there are taxis here if you want to leave earlier, or later.” He says, and immediately the rest of the class starts to talk loudly and excitedly, causing the professor to throw up his hands in protest. “Just make sure that you check in with me before 3:00pm so that I know where you are!” He says loudly, and the class murmurs in agreement.

“So, where do you want to go?” Seungri asks, as Daesung stares at the little tourist guide map he had been given that stated where they were and were not allowed to visit on their own.

“Ahh, Ri, I dunno, I was just going to wander around…” Daesung says, his eyes never leaving the map as he tries to decide what to do.

“Hey!” One guy from their class calls out to them as they start to walk away, “A group of us are going to head over to the Sphinx and then head back to take a nap before heading out to the markets…what do you say?” Daesung shakes his head briefly, a small smile on his face as he does so. He notices that Seungri seems torn about what to do, and decides to save them both.

“There are a couple of things I want to see…But Seungri, I know you wanted to go see the Sphinx, why don’t you go on?” Seungri smiles gratefully and nods his head.

“Ahh, Dae! You’re such a nerd!” Another guy from the group shouts with a smile on his face as he says it. Daesung laughs and shakes his head.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever!” Daesung responds, waving his hand at them smiling broadly. “You guys go have fun and rest up; I’ll see you at dinner!” They nod and laugh a little more before parting ways

It was as Daesung was squinting at an inscription on the side of a rather interesting pillar that someone cleared their throat behind him. He managed not to jump; though it was a hard thing to do and he was surprised himself that he had managed to remain calm. He had been so focused on inspecting the column that he hadn’t even heard the person walk up behind him.

“Beautiful craftsmanship, isn’t it?” The person behind him says, and Daesung realizes that he’s being rather rude by not turning around and facing this person who had probably been trying to get his attention for a short while.

“Yes, it’s remarkable.” Daesung agrees, turning around as he does so. He’s rather surprised to note that the person behind him was the colorful man he’d seen earlier. The man nods at the column and crosses his arms over his chest.

“Old Kingdom architecture was some of the most remarkable of its kind. Its beauty is only surpassed by its rather surprising longevity.” The man says, and Daesung nods, surprised and delighted by the man’s intelligence. “I’m Jiyong, by the way.” He says, sticking out his hand for Daesung to shake.

Daesung takes the proffered hand and shakes it with a smile. “Daesung! It’s nice to meet you.” Jiyong smiles and nods out toward the rest of the ruins.

“You came in with the college tour group, right?” He asks, and Daesung nods. “Mm, I’ve seen you walking around today. Where are your friends?”

“Ahh, everyone else was tired, so they went out to visit the Sphinx before heading back to the hotel to rest.” Daesung says, his hands fiddling with the string under his chin from his hat.

“That’s a pity; there is so much to see here that the tours don’t cover.” Jiyong says. “I’m off duty right now…what do you say to a little tour?”

Daesung’s eyes light up and he has a hard time containing his excitement. “Really?” He asks, and Jiyong laughs delicately and nods, obviously pleased by Daesung’s enthusiasm.

“Of course! You look like you want to really see some of the stuff out here, and I know these tours aren’t as comprehensive as they could be.” Jiyong replies, and Daesung tries not to think about how desperate and over-excited and just plain nerdy he must look for being so excited over ruins, because how often do you get an offer like this?

“Wow, thanks!” Daesung says, because he’s not really sure what else to say. Jiyong just waves it away and gestures for Daesung to follow him.

They walk around the big ruins and the family burial chambers and Jiyong is a never-ending fountain of knowledge. By 3:30pm Daesung has a new idol when it comes to knowledge of history, and he is far more than willing to keep the day going.

“How long have you lived here? You speak really well…” Daesung asks as they make their way back to the tent for something to drink.

“Ahh, forever.” Jiyong says with a mischievous smile. “Feels like thousands of years to be honest.” He says, and Daesung laughs at the joke and hopes that he didn’t offend his new tour guide/friend.

“Ahh, that long.” He says, and Jiyong grins and shoves a bottle of water into his hands.

“Come on, I want to show you some of the smaller, more hidden tombs before it gets dark.” Jiyong says, taking a long drink of his water before hurrying Daesung out of the tent and back into the heat.

Daesung probably should have felt less trusting of this man that he had only just met. But he couldn’t help but to trust Jiyong completely and follow his commands and whims. When would Daesung ever get another chance like this? When would he be able to see and appreciate the less well-known ruins and places hiding around the Giza plateau, and with such a wonderful tour guide? Never. That was when he would have this chance again. And so even though he would have found Jiyong’s eagerness a little uncomfortable were he back home, Daesung took it as hospitality and a love of ancient artifacts.

It was getting dark, and Jiyong had just finished explaining what the faded hieroglyphs on the side of a partially uncovered tomb meant, when Daesung tripped and fell hard over an abnormally large pottery shard. He cracked his head against the side of the tomb as he went down and had to fight to keep his eyes open as the pain started to course through him.

“Gods! Are you okay Daesung? Don’t move yet, no wait I will check your head just sit still.” Jiyong whispers hurriedly. He presses his hand down on Daesung’s side to keep him still and brings his other hand up to Daesung’s head. “Aish, Daesung this looks serious.” He says calmly, his fingers only lightly skimming over Daesung’s forehead as he checks over the injury.

Daesung groans softly, unable to really get out any words as the pain thrums through him. That doesn’t stop him from trying though. “Hotel.” He gasps out, but Jiyong just shakes his head and with a strength that Daesung would never have imagined that the smaller man had, pulls Daesung up and into a standing position. “Professor.” Daesung grounds out, but Jiyong just shakes his head again.

“No, we are going to the medical tent first. You can’t take a taxi back to the hotel while seriously injured.” Daesung groans in protest, and possibly also in pain, “At least let them clean it out, you’re covered in sand…”

At some level, Daesung understands the logic of Jiyong’s words, but at a much more urgent level he feels like it is far more important to get back to the hotel and talk to his professor. Head injury be damned at the moment, because he was panicking and in a foreign country and he knows deep down that he probably shouldn’t have just agreed to stay out this late with Jiyong when he had schedules to keep and people that would be worrying about him. He then immediately feels awful for thinking like that because it wasn’t Jiyong’s fault that he had tripped, and Jiyong was even being so ridiculously helpful and nice about the whole thing.

They make it to the medical tents in relative silence: Daesung broke it with groans of pain and Jiyong with whispered words of comfort. Jiyong speaks quickly to the single man in the tent and then drags Daesung to a cot and helps him to lie down. The pain is even more unbelievably awful than before, but Daesung is too happy to be lying down to really care.

“Alright, he’s going to clean it up for you and then bandage it, please don’t fall asleep yet.” Jiyong says quietly, and Daesung tries to nod but that makes the room spin so he changes his mind about doing that almost immediately after starting. “Just lie still, it will be fine.”

Daesung falls asleep eventually, after wringing a promise out of Jiyong that his professor would be alerted to what had happened. When he wakes up, his head feels fine, though a little heavy, and he’s surprised by how silent it is. If he couldn’t feel the sun on his skin, he would think that it was still night and that that was why he couldn’t hear the rumble of engines and the chatter of the other tourists. He realizes rather belatedly that being able to feel the sun on his skin is odd, considering he had fallen asleep on a cot in a tent. He opens his eyes and is assaulted by early morning sunlight. He lifts his head slightly and can see the Nile, big, beautiful, and far closer to him than it should have been.

He’s about to panic when he hears people coming closer, and soon recognizes Jiyong’s voice. He had barely calmed himself down when he realizes that he doesn’t recognize the language that Jiyong is speaking, and he wonders at that for a bit because it didn’t sound anything like Arabic, which he knew that Jiyong spoke. Daesung turns his head to find the source of Jiyong’s voice, and sees a large white tent with people dressed in what Daesung could only think to describe as ‘period’ garb running around. He spots Jiyong walking toward him, a shorter and very muscular man following closely behind him, but finds himself confused by the image.

Instead of khakis and a pair of sunglasses, Jiyong was dressed in what Daesung recalled to be ‘High Priest’ garments. Not only was his outfit bizarre, but Jiyong’s hair, once awash in at least four vibrant colors, was jet black and fashioned in a truly old-world Egyptian way: the kind of hairstyle you would see in a history book, but most certainly never on an actual person. It was the same for the muscular man, who was wearing what amounted to being a white loincloth, his chest tanned and gleaming in the morning sun as he followed behind Jiyong who was talking at a mile a minute.

The two stop beside Daesung and Jiyong turns a bright smile on him, before opening his mouth to speak…except that Daesung couldn’t understand a word that he was saying as he was still speaking in that odd language. His confusion must have shown on his face because Jiyong pauses for a moment before turning an equally confused look onto the shorter man.

It was at this point that Daesung started to panic. What if Jiyong weren’t speaking a different language at all? What if the blow to his head had really addled his brain? What if this was just a dream? The last thought calmed him a bit, as it was completely and entirely possible that this was just some weird dream concocted by his heavily medicated head.

***

Jiyong let out what could be considered a growl and turned his head toward Youngbae as if it were his fault that Daesung couldn’t understand him. Youngbae just raises an eyebrow in slight amusement and returns his focus to the lost and confused man under the tree before them.

“Maybe you read the Oracle wrong.” Youngbae suggests lightly, hoping against hope that Jiyong will take it for what it was (a hopeless suggestion) instead of as some sort of attack.

"Maybe you read it wrong!” Jiyong explodes, and only the fact that Youngbae had known Jiyong for as long as he had stopped him from recoiling in fear at the reaction. “You weren't the one stuck alone in some foreign time doing the same thing day in and day out for basically a life time!" Jiyong adds on, and Youngbae nods, regretting his words.

"Woah! Calm down!" Youngbae says, grabbing Jiyong by the shoulder and pulling him away from Daesung who had only just started to look like he was relaxing. "I'm sure you picked the right person." Youngbae says in a whisper, "but maybe it will just take time before he can speak and understand us."

Jiyong grits his teeth before letting out a breath, “so we have to teach him our language? How do you expect him to get around?”

Youngbae just looks at Jiyong. He refrains from stating that it wasn’t his fault that Daesung was here, mostly because he can only handle so much of Jiyong’s anger at a time. In truth, though, he doesn't have an answer for Jiyong’s question; he’s just hoping that if he waits long enough than Jiyong will come up with some type of idea.

“Oh no, that’s brilliant!” Jiyong says suddenly, and Youngbae manages to contain his surprise and force a smile onto his face. “If Seunghyun is forced to help Daesung around…” He lets his idea trail off and Youngbae tries not to think about everything that could go wrong with that idea.

“Great..um, maybe you should try to say something to Daesung…in his language?” Youngbae suggests, nodding over at Daesung who was still watching with a look that was somewhere between confusion and growing terror. Jiyong nods absently before moving to squat down next to Daesung.

“How are you feeling?” He asks, and it comes out just a little slower and with a little more accent than he had anticipated.

Daesung blinks at him for a short moment before taking a deep breath. “Ah, I have a slight headache…” He says quietly, and Jiyong nods.

“Alright, I’m sorry about earlier, it’s much harder for me to speak in your language now that we are here, and I kind of expected you to be able to understand me anyway.” Jiyong says. He really does feel bad for doing this to Daesung, and he was truly confused by how difficult it was for him to speak Daesung’s language.

“It’s…alright?” Daesung says uncertainly before looking around him. “And where, exactly, is ‘here’?” He asks, and Jiyong smiles.

“The Nile, of course.” He says, gesturing out to the glittering river before them. Daesung shakes his head and Jiyong lets out a rather world weary sigh. “I would say, according to your calendar… It’s the ‘Middle Kingdom’ period.” Jiyong pauses after speaking, allowing these words to sink in as he watches Daesung’s face.

“No.” Daesung says simply, shaking his head a little more forcefully than he probably intended. “This is a dream. A very, very realistic dream.” He says, his eyes never leaving Jiyong’s face; his eyes begging Jiyong not to disagree with him.

Jiyong takes in a deep breath and lets out a sigh, scrubbing his hand over the back of his neck as he looks down and away from Daesung’s pleading gaze. “No, Daesung, no it isn’t a dream.” He says softly, before peaking up to look at Daesung.

To Daesung’s credit, he managed to hold himself together rather well. His body convulsed only a little, almost imperceptibly, and his lips quivered for but a moment before he collected himself with a shaky breath. “What…?” He starts to ask, but Jiyong cuts him off.

“Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of time for answering questions right now, I have a pretty big ceremony to be preparing for and I’ve been absent from my duties for far too long.” Jiyong waves Youngbae over. “This is Youngbae, we work for the Pharaoh. We oversee the Oracle.” Jiyong felt uncomfortable for having simplified his job so much, and for having put himself on the same level as Youngbae (who was technically a step below him) but the intricacies of his job were not things that he could easily explain to Daesung in the short amount of time that he had at the moment.

Daesung nods and looks over at Youngbae who was smiling kindly down at him. “Ah…okay.” He says, turning his attention back to Jiyong.

“You will be spending your time with Youngbae until I can come up with a more permanent solution…” Jiyong says, turning to look up at Youngbae from his position crouched down in front of Daesung. “He doesn’t speak your language, but he is very nice and patient so you shouldn’t have any problems.” Jiyong wants to tell Daesung to hurry up and try to understand their language, but he refrains because he hasn’t even told Daesung that he can’t go back to his own time.

Daesung just nods, obviously still trying to digest everything that has happened to him. Jiyong sighs and stands up, beckoning for Daesung to do the same. It’s not like he could have expected this to be easy. “Come, we will get you into a proper outfit and then Youngbae will find something for you to do.”

Daesung simply nods again, and Jiyong sends a silent prayer to the gods that this whole thing will get easier with time. It had been so easy to recognize that Daesung was the one to fulfill the Oracle’s proclamation…he should have guessed that it wouldn’t continue to be so easy.

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