Open on a mother and a son. In front of a forge. The work is hard, and the hours are long.
-Mom, I told you, I don’t want to smelt bronze for the rest of my life. I have dreams!
–(scoffs) Silly boy. Your father was a bronze smelter, and his father before him. It’s in your blood, son. Who you were born to be!
-Arghhh, this is my life! I can’t just live in this Mesopotamian hut forever! I’m…I’m gonna go to Egypt, and I’m gonna-
-Oh, here we go again with Egypt. There’s no such thing as Egypt! You know what they have in Egypt?
-Mom, don’t –
-And even if it were real, it’s filled with snakes. They have snakes in Egypt. You really think you’ll be able to survive out there?
-It’s better than rotting away over here!
–(shocked gasp)
-It is! I’ll live by the Nile, and I’ll become a farmer, and I’ll –
-Oooh wee! La dee fucking da! You hear that, everyone, my boy’s gonna become a farmer! Whoppee! Who are you kidding? You aren’t a farmer’s boy, you don’t know a marshweed from your elbow. You’re a smelter. You’ll be back here in a week.
-(tearing up) You know what, Mom? Maybe I won’t. (grabs ceramic bowl and single shirt, storms off)
80’s music (1280’s BC) plays. Fade to black.
Fade back in. Three days later. A funeral. Somber.
-Cholera, huh?
-Yeah he ate a ton of his own shit by accident.
-What a shame. 18’s the oldest anyone’s made it in this village for years.
