A/N: For the YGO Fanfiction Contest Season 11 Round 4. The pairing: Lonershipping (Thief King Bakura x Mai Kujaku). This season is suddenly full of things I thought I wouldn't ever write and this fic features several at once: AU. Genderbent. Steampunk. My only saving grace (so to speak) is that there isn't that much steam present. (Also, hey, I finally managed to tell a story in less than 10k words.)
ETA: Now with 90% more proofreading.
Disclaimer: Kazuki Takahashi and all associated companies are the rightful owners of the Yuugiou! franchise and I claim no association with any of them. No copyright infringement intended with this and no money is being made from this. Please support the creator by purchasing the official releases.
Warnings: not explicit, but not worksafe either. Also contains character death.
Desert Sands
Michael "Mike" Valentine is experiencing the worst bout of luck he can ever remember having. Deployed to the edge of the world, Aegyptus, to bring back bales of fine linen, bars of gold, and decorative artefacts at the most unfortunate time of the year. It pays, of course; he wouldn't do this otherwise.
Back in his homeland Britannia he is known as a jack of all trades; a poor aristocrat's only son with questionable legitimacy, but his skill in trade can't be questioned. He gets the best deals for the best prices and is even the royal house's number one supplier – not that they'd ever admit that publicly. But everyone knows it anyway. In fact, his knack for haggling and bartering bought him his first airship. It is but a hand-me-down compared to the latest state of the art models, but he has friends who have acquaintances who can fix and improve just about anything mechanical and electrical.
The spyglass in his hand, for example. (He takes a moment to appreciate its warm brown tone and the finely polished wooden grain, the golden-plated hoops, and the pale amber-yellow lenses, admiring how the instrument compliments his rich midnight-blue velvet vest and how it stands out against the lace-trimmed cuffs of his white silk shirt.) It has also been touched up to adjust to differences in landscape without him needing to do so manually. It's quite mystifying how the redheaded mechanic has accomplished that, but that one isn't someone to reveal his secrets. But then, neither is Mike all that eager to share how most of his dealings are carried out.
He casts a look around the cockpit, briefly checking the course on the portolan charts and the measurements the automated sextant and astrolabe show on their monitors. He is quite certain that not even the royal battleships have the kind of technology that his modest second-rate piece of scrap metal has – courtesy of Allister, son of Allister of the McAllisters from… Mike doesn't know where exactly he hails from. (Sometimes he sounds like he's from Eire, other days – Albion, and yet others he speaks Welsh with a fluency only a native could possess.) His friend Raphael, who is a full-blooded French viscount on a regular day and part-Britannian when the situation demands it, doesn't know either, even though he is the one who introduced them. Mike supposes it doesn't really matter, for as long as the lad does his job and doesn't ask an outrageous price for it. And in this, he is lucky too, because the lad clearly has no idea of the true worth of his work, else he wouldn't be making adjustments to Mike's airship for just a few gold coins a piece. (The spyglass alone is worth a few thousand.)
Mike's usually good luck runs short with the timing of this trip. He is missing out on the grand opening of the Season. (And he had so looked forward to courting Josephine – a last year's debutante who hasn't been engaged yet – and Valerie – this year's little spark of a lady who has all the young gentlemen's neckties in a twist even before making an official appearance.) This trip is making him miss out on the best parties of the year.
The glare of the ocean's waves subsides as he approaches the land which the natives call Kemet. He doesn't like the look of it from above. There's not much to see here but sand with some jagged mountain ranges dispersed along the landscape, a few sparse clusters of trees, a glinting belt of a river in the distance, and a few impressive stone buildings that appear magnificent in size even from a distance. He drops the altitude and slightly adjusts the course towards the buildings that suddenly rise up out of sand dunes.
Then, before he can even blink, a sandstorm whips itself up from the bottom of the cliffs he has just passed over and the vision becomes zero, even with all the adjustments his ship has. The sand pounds against the walls and the windshield deafeningly, but he somehow manages to get himself strapped into the pilot's chair, even though the aircraft is being hurtled along in the gusts of the powerful winds like a paper lantern. He isn't sure when it crashes, but when he comes to, everything has stilled again. Even from the inside it's obvious how damaged the ship is. There are rips and tears and deformations not even the most skilled mechanic can fix. The windshield is cracked and the floor has disappeared beneath a thick layer of sand. It's a struggle to undo the belts keeping him bound to the chair and even more of a struggle locating valuables and travelling essentials before he abandons the ship. His money, some food, water, and a few of Allister's inventions are the only things he can take with him. He smashes the windshield with a metal pole that looks like it might have been a part of a railing and gets almost bowled over by the torrent of sand that rushes in.
The sun is blinding, reflecting off the desert sands. It beats down on the suddenly windless world without mercy. The settlement, when he finally reaches it, is a letdown, compared to even the smallest of Britannia's towns. The only trace of high technology this godforsaken corner of the Earth has is a tall clock tower in the city centre – and even that is dated – and some lanterns around the main square and along the main roads, but they have already fallen into disrepair and it's a wonder if they light up at all. There is a fountain that slowly churns a trickle of water over the lip of a tilted gourd that coalesces into muddy puddles in the large seashells holding up the graceful marble maiden in billowing robes. (No airships in sight, no electric vehicles of any sort, and good lord! Horses, carts, and… what was the name? Camels? And the stench…) There is no inn, which means he isn't getting that shower he's been looking forward to for the last hour of his tiring stumble through the desert. He yanks out the black silk ribbon from his hair in irritation, as his previously neat blond ponytail has gotten quite ruffled. He readjusts it, but the outcome is something a lot less presentable than it had been originally.
He locates the marketplace, which is easy enough, as it's the second biggest square amid buildings sitting so closely side by side that only cats can squeeze through the narrow passageways. On one side of the market, there is a gash in the buildings that opens up to a desert landscape, as if something large and heavy has torn through them. The rubble still laying scattered there seems to further prove this. There are barely any traders there. All he sees are empty stalls, abandoned broken crates, a peddler watering his two bony and clearly bedridden donkeys at a large stone trough, an alchemist or fortune-teller perched on a low boulder with all sorts of questionable paraphernalia laid out on a rug beside him, a smith, a half-empty bread stall, a table laden with modest heaps of strange fruits and dried treats, and a wagon with iron barrels of drinking water sold for a price that would buy him a pair of small turquoise earrings back in Britannia. Yet he has no choice but to pay the full price as he stocks up on provisions, even though he tries to haggle. Clearly, he's been lied to about that particular practice, as the sellers are unwilling to go much lower than what they are initially asking.
Mike's inquiries for a guide direct him towards the far end of the square. There, behind a tattered rug affixed to a pair of poles of a ruined stall forming a shelter that really isn't, he finds three people engaged in a game he's never seen before. They sit on a piece of a wide polished rock that might have been a roof of one of the ruined houses behind him. He addresses the one clad in red who sits with his back against the wall. He has short white hair that clash with dark skin and eyes the most curious shade of violet he's ever seen.
"I was told you are the best guide around here." (In a very broken and so thickly accented language that it took Mike a moment to understand what was being said, no less.)
"'e is, 'e is," answers one of the players – a dark-skinned man with a shock of sandy-blonde hair that stick out at wild angles around his head. He looks back over his shoulder and almost identical-in-colour pale violet eyes glint up at Mike.
The Britannian furrows his brow at how the white-haired man seems to ignore him, sparing only a brief shift of his gaze over the newcomer to acknowledge his presence. He doesn't let that deter him. "I need to cross the desert."
"Why don't you come play with us a few rounds?" says the same man again.
Mike studies the game pieces between them. It looks like some dice game, but there are flat rectangles with rounded edges of he can't determine what material arranged between them in patterns whose meaning he couldn't even begin to guess at. He might have thought them made of ivory if he hadn't known better, judging from the way the players are dressed. Thieves or beggars. The overall signature look of poverty. The game pieces are probably just some animal bone and the dice they roll is probably made of green glass. He spares a look at the third player, almost identical in appearance to the man who'd spoken with him.
"Twins?" he wonders out loud. Twins are a rare sight. He's only ever seen one pair back in Britannia. None in the other countries, though at first glance everyone in the far Orient where he travelled a few years ago looks the same.
"Sure. Let's go with that." The spiky-haired man flashes his teeth in a grin that sends a shiver down his spine.
The white-haired would-be guide throws down a few more bones, rolls the green stones, and grins. "I win."
The look on the spiky-haired player's face twists terribly for a moment and it seems as though he is about to protest, but the white-haired one slams a dagger down in the middle of the stone, eyes narrowing and lips parting in a snarl. "I win. So, I win."
The knife disappears as fast as it appeared and he stands, reaching behind him to retrieve the scimitar that had lain on the ground behind him to strap it back to his belt. That's when Mike realises that he's actually looking at a woman. The way her robes had been falling over her shoulders, as she'd sat there slightly slumped forward, had hidden the worn leather vest laced tightly over her chest and the way they had pooled around her on the ground had disguised the generous curve of her hips. Now that she is standing and the two-fold robes are aligned properly, all these details are quite obvious.
"Let's go," she says to him in a gruff voice, stepping down from the impromptu dais, passing right between her fellow players who look equally grim. If there had been a prize to the game, she doesn't collect anything that might constitute as such, which leaves Mike mildly puzzled.
He shrugs, though, deciding that it must be a regional thing, just like the pale violet eye colour and the contrastingly light hair to their dark skin.
She leads him towards the water trough, then past it to a partially ruined house. In the inner courtyard sits a group of men clad in black and with intricate tattoos on their faces, which he recognises as Mazoi from the tales of the few adventurers who have braved Aegyptus before. They are the military force of the region, as well as the suppliers of transportation for desperate travellers. Mike doesn't understand what they're doing in their dwelling, but his guide is already chattering away with one of the Mazoi in a language he doesn't understand. They seem to be haggling over something and eventually come to an agreement.
The woman turns to Mike and says, "Pay him. Two hundred gold for the horse."
Mike is about to argue because two hundred gold coins are, to him, far too high a price, considering he hasn't even seen the horse in question. But judging by the way the two of them are looking at him, he wisely shuts his mouth and does as he is told.
While the Mazoi pockets the money and disappears in one of the doorways, she says, "Pay me one hundred gold for being your guide."
This time, he does argue. "Isn't that a bit too much for being a mere guide?"
She shrugs. "Do or don't. You'll have the horse. Do what you want with it."
"What about you? Where is your horse?"
She smiles at him, quite gleeful, and whistles. After a brief moment of silence, there is a clatter of hooves against stone floor and a saddled and bridled horse emerges from another doorway and trots up to her. Grudgingly, Mike pays her and watches her stash the money away. Some of it in her clothes, some of it in her saddle bag. The Mazoi returns with a horse, bridled and saddled, and he has to admit that it's exactly the kind of creature he would pick for a difficult journey. Belatedly, he remembers that the Mazoi are the best horse-keepers in the area.
They have already travelled a good distance into the desert when he finally remembers to ask for his guide's name. She gives him a sidelong look and for a moment it seems like she won't answer.
"Kiefa."
"Kiefa," he tests the name. "You have only one name?" When she gives him a look full of confusion, he continues, "I am Michael Valentine. Michael is my given name. Valentine is the name of the family I belong to. Do your people not have a family name?"
She gives him another look, unreadable now.
"When there are people with the same name," he goes on, not knowing whether to scoff at the ignorance or mourn the lack of education in these barbarian lands, "how do you tell them apart from each other in a conversation with people who don't know them?"
She seems to consider this for a moment. "Kiefa. Kiefa of Kahun." Then she grins at him as if she'd told a great joke and he has no idea what that smile means. Is it the dawning of new knowledge gained?
The rest of the trip is quite uneventful and spent in silence. When the sun is hovering close to the horizon and a crag of rocks with a hint of green is drawing ever nearer, a sandstorm whips itself up from just below the sun. It's fast approaching and, much to Mike's horror, Kiefa turns her horse around to glare at the incoming murderous cloud with narrowed eyes.
"Yahmir," she growls and, judging by the tone she's using, he assumes it must be a curse in her language. "But I won," she snarls at the wind that's lashing at them. "I won."
Now, this doesn't make the least sense to him. He urges her to turn back around and ride for the oasis where they could hide in the shelter of the rocks, unaware that dismounting, getting the horse to lie down and then covering beneath a rug by its side is what they really should be doing. She doesn't seem to hear him. Instead, she dismounts, keeping a tight grip on the reins of her nervous horse, and takes a few steps forward.
"I won," she screams at the wind and the sand, and the wind howls at her as if in laughter.
The dark cloud is almost upon them and the horses are going crazy. She releases the reins and the horse leaps aside, trembling and shaking its head, teeth bared and eyes bulging as it dashes away, letting out a terrified neigh. Mike's horse almost does the same and he has to struggle to keep it in place. He just can't abandon his guide, even though every instinct he has is screaming at him to do just that. She seems to have gone insane, screaming words at the wind which he doesn't understand. He briefly entertains the thought if, maybe, that's another custom, but discards it almost immediately. He's heard horror stories from other travellers who've experienced the destructive force that is sandstorms. And he still remembers the tempest that crashed his airship just this morning.
Kiefa unsheathes her scimitar, brandishes it at the approaching storm, shouting words that sound very much like an incantation of sorts, and he doesn't need to understand them to know what they are. There's something about actual magic put in use that sends a distinct kind of shiver down his spine. The feeling is unpleasant. Frightening. Just like that one time in the far Orient, in Cipangu where an old man… But no, no, he mustn't think about that time and his mismatched eyes and the half a year lost from his life; the time which introduced him with Raphael in that land where nobody spoke his language. His friendship with the French man is the only good thing to ever come from that misadventure.
She shouts one final phrase, twists the sword, and drives it straight into the ground, going down on her knees as she does so. The spell sends a ripple across the sand and through the wind, hitting the cloud of sand dead centre. It doesn't seem to have worked at all, at first. Suddenly, the wind settles down and the dreadful cloud veers off to one side, petering out into nothingness in the moment it takes Mike to blink his eyes. She rises and sheathes her sword, a grim satisfaction on her face.
"Let's go," she says and starts to walk towards the cliffs.
He doesn't even think of offering her a ride behind him on his horse. For one, he is too shaken with what he has just witnessed in this strange and wild land. And two, she is of too low a class to warrant such generosity from him. After all, she's already been paid more than what he'd been willing to offer.
"What was that about?" he asks.
"Hm?" She glances up at him from where she's walking beside his horse. The sun has dipped halfway behind the horizon and the shadows are starting to thicken.
He makes a vague gesture behind them. "That. Sandstorm."
"Yahmir."
"Yahmir. Is that what you call a sandstorm in your language?"
She shakes her head. "Yahmir. Desert demon."
"Desert…" He can't bring himself to finish that thought. Magic and demons. No wonder barely anyone wants to travel to Aegyptus. He thinks that this is going to be his one and only trip this way as well.
"You met him. In the market. We played a game. He wanted you to join."
"That… that was Yahmir?" He can't believe it. "And the other player?" He almost doesn't want to know the answer.
"Melek? He won't be crossing the desert for a while."
"What? Why?" Now he is the one giving her confused looks.
"When you want to cross a desert, you play a game with Yahmir. You win, you cross. You lose, you die. Or you don't cross and wait for someone else to lose and die. But I win. Always." She sounds quite proud of herself.
He shudders at the predatory grin on her face.
When the bright orange flames of a modest campfire sheltered in a stone bed illuminates the nightly scenery around them, Mike finds himself stealing glances at Kiefa who sits a few steps away, her back to the cliff, sharpening her scimitar with a rock picked up nearby. Their horses are peacefully grazing at the sparse growth of the tiny oasis and the occasional dull thud of hooves affirm their presence. He's never met a woman like her before. She is about his height, slightly taller perhaps, with a muscular build and movements that scream battle training. The samurai of Cipangu come to mind, but he chases that thought away. She catches him looking and grins knowingly. She quirks an eyebrow and that's something he's never seen a woman do, either. Not one of the prim and proper gentle-ladies of high society would ever even entertain the thought, and the tavern wenches that had occasionally shared his bed had been too insignificant to even remember their faces.
"Interested?"
Intrigued would be a more precise descriptor, but yes, there is a fair amount of interest.
"For additional pay."
He nods before he knows what he's doing because the idea is not at all foreign to him. Not the first time he's paid for it. Not the last. Her grin widens. She puts away the scimitar and tosses the rock away into the darkness. Then she crawls on all fours towards him and the sight somehow makes him back up a little on the blanket where he's lounging. There is a thrill and just the tiniest bit of fear, and then she has already settled on his hips, grinding down and sliding along in an erotic dance the likes of which he has never experienced before. And her hands… oh. (Rough and calloused, and so, so skilled at what they're doing right now.) He becomes painfully aroused even before she has shed her clothes. She doesn't, fully. She unravels the dark linen tied around her waist and he unties the laces of her vest, but it stays hanging off her shoulders along with the other robes. He is in a similar state of undress as well. His coat, vest and shirt unbuttoned and pushed aside; the front of his trousers undone so that her hands can slip beyond the waistband and…
Mike moans, bucking against her hand. He wants her. He wants to touch her. He reaches out to run his hands over her chest and the surprisingly small breasts, feeling taut muscles shifting beneath her skin. He watches the dancing shadows and how they play over her. He watches the reflection of flames glint in the white of her eye where the light can reach. He lets his hands wander lower, over her sides and across her stomach, eliciting small responses; they pause on her hips and he lets himself enjoy the undulating moves for a while, hinting at what is to come. He runs one hand to the inside of her hip, stroking it gently, before moving back up between her legs. She is ready and he moans again, in surprise and disbelief. (How could anyone, so fast? Even the best and most famous Britannian courtesans were known to use ointments of a special recipe – a fact he'd learned during a lengthy conversation with an old doctor and a chemist in a gentleman's club over one too many drinks.)
He fumbles to get his trousers down and she helps him along, leaving them half-mast and pushing him back down onto the blanket with one hand. His surprised yelp at the amount of strength she has in her body brings out her predatory grin again. He swallows visibly as fear and erotic thrill shoot up his spine. Flickers of white come alive at the back of his mind, rising in intensity as she aligns them and then slides down onto him. She moves up instantly, both her hands now resting on his chest, pressing him down and stealing his breath a little. He's only dimly aware of all the shameful sounds he's making while she moves atop him, swift and steady, and as imperturbable as a mountain. He doesn't know when and if she comes, but his own release hits him like a tidal wave, sweeping his vision a pure, brilliant white and leaving only a low buzzing sound in his mind.
After his business in Aegyptus is concluded and he has managed to secure himself a new airship – for which he had to part with his custom made spyglass, astrolabe and a few other things which he'd had the wits to take with him before abandoning ship – Mike finds himself wandering the streets of Akoris. (His new aircraft is a far cry from his broken one in more aspects than one. It lacks the incomparable technology upgrades done by Allister and thus has a considerably inferior navigation system, but it is a far more advanced model made of a better tempered metal and with a shape that makes it easier to glide through air currents. And the comfort of the pilot has clearly been taken into consideration, given how plush the chairs are.)
Akoris is a bustling city, the exact opposite of that nameless town where he crashed his old airship. He's been told that he can forget about ever recovering it. By now, it must have already been buried by the sand. Before that, though, it would have been looted by the poor inhabitants of said town and traded away in scrap metal or put to use in someone's household.
He could have left for Britannia already today, but something makes him dally here. He has a bagful of assorted knickknacks to present as gifts or trade away upon his return, and still he's searching for something. He knows the name of that too. Kiefa. Now he knows – partially – the reason behind her smile when she'd told him that she was from Kahun: it's a dead village at the foot of a burial mound of one of the Pharaohs of the old dynasty and no one has lived in it for centuries now. The other part of the reason he simultaneously wants and doesn't want to find out.
Belatedly, he realises that his feet have carried him outside the protected inner city where the high lords, priests, and the wealthy ambassadors reside and into the fringes of the outskirts where sparse olive groves hide the ugly dwellings of the poor and less lucky. There, in a half-abandoned square eerily similar to the one in the nameless village, he finds her.
"Kiefa!" He starts towards her, but suddenly realises that he's wrong. The shoulders are just as broad, the stature just as proud as he leans against the wall, but the white hair are much wilder and the leather west is nowhere to be seen, a broad and muscular chest in broad display, framed by twin layers of fine linen. He pauses, the differences registering in his mind at once – and the meaning behind them – and the name springs to his lips even though he'd already managed to forget it, "Yahmir."
He grins at him, white teeth flashing. He beckons him closer. "Come, play a game with me."
He's heard the tale of the shape-shifting desert demon as well, and how he collects the souls of those who lose a game against him. Mike doesn't want to believe it. Mostly because he's crossed the desert several times already, taking paths deeper into the land alongside other travellers, and not once has anyone played a game with anyone before departure.
"I'd rather not."
His lips pull back in a sneer and now he shows his true face for a moment. His mouth is full of needle-sharp teeth. "I insist." It is a command in a tone that brooks no argument. He continues in a more mollified fashion, his mouth appearing perfectly human again, "You owe me at least that much."
"I don't owe you anything." Still, Mike feels himself compelled to approach by some strange power – which must be the demon's pull.
"Oh? Let me remind you then. First, I let you survive that crash and make it safely to the village. Second, I offered a game to you, which you refused and I let that slide. Third, I let you cross the desert even though Kiefa was the one who won. A game is long overdue."
He doesn't want to sit down on the dusty ground across from Yahmir, but he finds himself doing so anyway. "I don't know how to play that," he hears himself saying.
"It's easy," Yahmir says with a predatory grin stretching his face in ways Kiefa could never manage. He retrieves a black silk satchel from the folds of his robes and upturns it, spilling out its contents on the ground between them, explaining the rules.
When Mike touches one of the white rectangular pieces, he feels its smoothness, and upon closer inspection he realises that it is, indeed, ivory. Of the highest quality he's ever seen. And the dice turn out to be balls of emerald inlaid with pure golden letters he doesn't know how to read, carefully chiselled in a way he doubts any human could ever achieve. He doesn't know what has him in such a thrall during the game, but he loses it.
Yahmir laughs as he collects the game pieces and puts them away into the satchel.
"See you in the desert." He grins, his needle-teeth revealing themselves once again, and then a sudden gust of wind throws up a cloud of sand, forcing Mike to shield his face. When he lowers his arm, the desert demon is gone.
He slowly makes his way back to the house in the inner city where he is staying with the Britannian ambassador, contemplating his luck. He wants to leave this land as fast as possible now. As a child grown up in the world of modern technology, he can't fully believe in magic, even though he has witnessed it already several times during his stay here – as well as in other far removed countries from Britannia's sophistication. He can hardly wait for the morning to arrive.
The farewell banquet the ambassador has arranged for him is grand, with plentiful food and a lovely troupe of native dancers – slender and willowy, dark skin, dark hair, oiled bodies dusted with golden glitter – one of whom is willing enough to follow him into his bedchamber for a few extra gold coins, though she is a far cry from Kiefa. And he can't quite seem to get his white-haired guide out of his mind.
In the morning, he boards his new airship and takes a relieved breath, all too eager to leave this place. The flight is as smooth and effortless as he has been promised by the man who sold him the ship, even with its holds laden with fine linen, gold, and other trade items. The sky is clear without even the tiniest cloud in sight. And then the desert rises up to meet him. A torrent of sand locks him in a deadly grip, ripping away the panes of metal one by one. And Yahmir is laughing. Howling with the wind as he cheerfully destroys the airship and flays Mike's skin with the sand and the wind, and snatches up his soul with his needle-teeth.
As soon as the sand roared up, it settles down again. Somewhere, on the other side of the desert, perched on the top of the wall of a ruined building, Kiefa scowls at the distant cloud of sand. She wishes the dead of the Kahun would tell her a way to get rid of that abomination once and for all, but they are silent and unyielding in their cold graves. The only voice that carries on the wind amid the ruins is that of her frail brother Khisir.
A/N: So, the reference notes. Again. Always.
On the name change:
Mike because [Mai].
Kiefa because Thief (well, and Akefia, but I have a special love-hate relationship with the use of that one, so let's just stick with thief.)
Yahmir because Yami (and I'll let you guess which one of the three 8'D).
Josephine and Valerie because Joey (and the fandom's penchant for calling him Joseph) and Valon.
Allister, Raphael, Melek, and Khisir because, well, obvious.
Places:
Britannia for Britain; Eire for Ireland, Albion for Scotland, Wales for, well, Wales.
Aegyptus – Latin name for Egypt.
Kemet – Egyptian name for Egypt.
Cipangu – Japan, as it was known in Europe circa mid-15th century, courtesy of Marco Polo. (If the samurai didn't tip you off. XD)
Kahun, also el-Lahun is a worker's village in Faiyun, Egypt near the pyramid of Senusret II (4th pharaoh of the 12th dynasty, ruling from 1897 BC to 1878 BC) located near a modern village of the same name.
Akoris – the Greek name for a very old settlement and an important administrative town in ancient times, during Old (c. 2686 BC–2181 BC) and Middle (c. 2000 BC–1700 BC) Kingdoms known as Mer-nefer(et); Per-Imen-m3t-khent(j) during New Kingdom (c. 1550 BC–1069 BC); Dehenet since 26th Dynasty a.k.a. the Saite Period (c. 685–525 BC); and also the (Greek) name of the nearby modern village of Ṭihnā al-Ǧabal. (Don't ask me how to pronounce that one; I haven't the foggiest, as Arabic is, sadly, not a language I speak.)
And the hinted-at old man with mismatched eyes… well, let's just say I was having fun reinventing canon. XD
Portolan/portulan charts – navigation maps. They show the approximate distances according to compass directions.
Sextant – a navigational instrument used for measuring angles between two objects to determine the altitude, latitude, longitude, and position on the map.
Astrolabe – here: used for determining latitude, but also doubling as a clock and a star map. (Allister the tech whiz. :'D)
So, why genderbend, right? I considered the plot and the setting and it left a bad taste of "Mai as the damsel in distress" in my mouth, which I just couldn't see happening. So I turned the trope on its head without really turning it. Because, fem!Thief Bakura? She tops.