Rocking, shaking. The scream of wind like a roaring train. Noise of crashing buildings, collapsing like matchboxes. Panic. Screams. Wild screams. Then quiet. Uncanny and eerie.

The child tried to move but was pinned. His legs – fastened under tons of debris. Did he hear more screams, or was that his own voice, distant and disembodied? 

Pain roared through his brain. He was trapped – this would be his burial place. Entombed. A horror scenario. 

This is like the darkness of hell. No-one will ever find me.

Pain threw a cloak over his mind, and he slipped into unconsciousness.   

Time passed. How long? He had no idea, as he struggled back to awareness and tried to shout. Called for help. Called for his mother. Called to God. Could his voice be heard? Did the darkness muffle even his voice?

He tried to think. Is it as dense as before?

Unchanged. Blackness, blackness.

Claustrophobia gripped him like a vice. Panic and pain, goaded on by the mocking monsters of darkness and death, were trying to claim him as a victim, tormenting him, ripping his body with stabs of pain.

Think. Think calmly. Be rational. Breathe! Try to breathe slowly. Thoughts zigzagged through his mind, back and forth.

Slow breaths. Don't choke! Then he tried not to think. It was too hard. The monsters clawed at his mind, continued to stab violently at his body.

Is anyone trying to find me?

Feebly he called, his eyes peering desperately around. He could see nothing!

Yes, now he understood the term “pitch black”. Yes, now he understood when people spoke of darkness being “thick”, impenetrable, absolute. He strained his eyes to see something, anything. Nothing.

So this is what it would be like to be blind!

Groaning with despair, he called again. His voice was dying too. Life was ebbing away. He almost wanted the cloak of unconsciousness again, to help him slip silently away from this horror.

No, not yet! I will not give up. Not yet.

He called feebly.

Did I hear something – far, far away?

He called again and again, mustering every ounce of strength. Waves of pain rolled over him.

Twelve hours later, his unconscious broken body was rescued from a collapsed building, one of many destroyed by the cyclone.

He was taken to hospital in a critical condition. Three days later he opened his eyes. The daylight was dazzling, unbearably painful. He closed his eyes again. He was not blind, not entombed; he was safe and warm, and there was light. 

He had defied those monsters of darkness and death.