Arthur had always loved the heat. Perhaps it was because his ancestors were of Greek and Italian descent where the sun was always shining, but regardless, his body could acclimate to any temperature.
When his university gave him the choice to go to the deserts of Egypt to learn how ancient civilisations used the stars in navigation, archery tests, prophecies and more, he did not hesitate to sign the form. Sure it's gonna help him get some credits for his astrophysics degree but he was still more excited about the weather and looking at the stars through a sky that has not been touched by the industrialisation of mankind.
He was now in his final year, and instead of setting up equipment for stargazing right before sunset comes, he went on a walk. He did not really fit into this place. He was honey blonde with turquoise eyes. His complexion was healthy, but not really correct for this kind of weather, he always had to remember to put on his sunscreen right before leaving the tents. He was tall, really tall, about 6'3 in height. Amongst Egyptians, he truly stood out. And it wasn't just with Egyptians, it was with everyone even back home in England.
He loved walking through the desert at this time of day, right before the sunset where one side of the sky turned crimson and golden and the other started to take on a dark blue hue. It was like the red was being chased to the horizon by the blue. He still had to come back in about 2 hours before it became dark, or as he learnt, 'isha time'. He might be able to handle the heat of the desert in the daytime, but at night the biome took a full twist, turning extremely cold, and he definitely couldn't handle this cold, especially not when in winter.
"Oi! Do you need someone to come with you, besha?"
Arthur looked back to look at who was screaming, just to find Hamza looking at him.
Hamza was an Egyptian in his early 50s and stayed here for all his life, he was picked as the guide for this trip because of his mass knowledge in Egyptology and Astronomy, and also because he was pretty good with English despite never having left the country. He loved calling people 'besha' which was a friendly way of saying boss in Arabic; or more specific, certain dialects of Arabic like the Egyptian dialect.
"No thanks I won't be going far." Arthur responded calmly. He was yet to know if he was telling the truth, he didn't really know where he was going. But the calmness with which he responded to the question signalled to Hamza that Arthur knew was he was doing even if unbeknownst to him Arthur really didn't know what he was doing, so he just went back to doing his own thing. With that Arthur faced the vast desert again and began walking to God knows where.
It has already been 30 minutes since he left camp. The blue sky has already dominated most of the sky, pushing the crimson sky along with its sun over the horizon. It was about to be isha so Arthur decided to go back to camp. As he was maneuvering through the rocky patch that he found, where you couldn't get a stable footing, he slipped. Arthur was falling on his back so he used his hands to protect the back of his head in case a rock smashed into it. Fortunately there was no blow to the back of his head. Unfortunately he was still falling.
It took Arthur a bit of time to realise that he was still falling, his reactions slow mainly because he was tired; he hasn't slept since waking up the day before to prepare for sunset. He was still falling. It looked like he fell into a deep ravine. He looked downwards just to see the abyss staring right back at his soul.
'So this is the end' Arthur thought. He wasn't feeling dreadful about it, he saw death as a mean to an end, and he believed he lived a good life. He was always nice to his classmates and neighbours, he would always give charity to the homeless and even volunteer at orphanages and shelters. He was intelligent both academically and street-wise. He had no remorse, perhaps except that he didn't see his parents and his older sister for two weeks. But he accepted his fate.
He relaxed his body, he didn't bother hunching over into a ball, he was not surviving a fall from that height and he just had to hope that his death would come quick. Then everything became black.