She finally arrived at the point where she thought she’d last seen Jack when he’d been washed out to sea. But he was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, a deep rumbling sound engulfed her. It was much louder than the previous wave. She froze. Was it an earthquake? But as she turned to the shore she saw to her horror a second, huge wave returning with a vengeance. It was mightier than the first and was crushing anything that had been left standing. She frantically tried climbing up one of the trees, but her shoes kept slipping off the wet bark and then it hit, blue oblivion. It ripped Mina like a rag doll from the tree she was holding on to with her last strength, and swept her into the road.

The second wave had carried Jack like a cork back towards the shore, much farther this time, two blocks inland. He was unable to move left or right, pressed and paralysed by the ferocious current that was pinning him against the wall. Stricken with horror, he watched as a huge Coca-Cola lorry was washed away sideways like a matchbox toy and literally crushed on the hotel’s outside wall, just a few paces from where he was trapped.

Mustering his strength, he clawed his way back around the side of the building, inch by inch, to avoid being taken further inland by the current. He heard high-pitched screams nearby. As he turned the corner, he saw them: two boys, one about fifteen and the other around ten. They were stuck by the hotel entrance, screaming for help. Two mangled motorboats, which had been sucked in by the force of the tsunami were hurtling towards them. Jack calculated that if he could let go of the railing and let himself be taken by the current he might just get close enough to help the boys. A torn volleyball net was entangled in what was left of the entrance to the hotel. The free end of the net was thrashing about in the water. He jumped forward, and was immediately taken by the current with tremendous force. He had just a few seconds to reach out for the net. He caught it and pulled himself forwards to the hotel entrance. He felt one of his fingernails rip as he made one last lunge towards the boys and yelled at them to join him. The older one did but the younger was frozen in panic. Jack pulled the elder one around the corner and safely into the restaurant. ‘Climb the stairs and go as high as you can’ he barked at the terrified youth. He saw the smashed boats arriving at full throttle. He reached out, searching for the younger boy’s hand and yanked him towards him. They struggled around the corner together and the young boy managed to get in and run to the stairwell. Jack wasn’t so lucky. He had managed to avoid the thunderous crash of boats into the hotel lobby, but a huge splinter of carbon fibre from the smashed hull had pierced his right thigh.

The two boys huddled on the roof, watched their saviour’s body drop back into the waters as he passed out from the pain. That was the last they saw of him, as he was carried away by the wave. They could see other people vainly trying to swim in the debris but being cut to pieces by all manner of sharp objects and shards of glass from smashed car windscreens and hotel windows. The two boys looked at each other as surviving soldiers do after a raging battle, without feelings, but with the palpable relief that life was still pumping through their veins.

Chapter 34

December 26th, 2004. Noon. Patong Beach

Mina was being pulled up onto the top of a truck by two men. When she reached the top and looked around her, she counted four other people in their small group of survivors. One of the men said to her with a strong French accent, ‘This is my brother, and this is his wife and this is her two cousins.’ The wife was screaming relentlessly.

‘What happened to her?’ asked Mina.

‘The baby, she lost the baby,’ said her brother-in-law, tears running down his cheeks.

‘Oh my God,’ said Mina.

The truck was very heavy and was lying on its side, having been knocked over by the first wave. But now it was grinding slowly inland with the force of the new wave. They could all hear the screeching of the metal container against the ground and the sound filled them with dread.

Mina moved to the edge of the container to get a better look at their surroundings. She had never felt so helpless in her life. Although never a religious person, today, for the first time, she felt like a tiny speck in the fury of God’s path. If the authors of the tablet were right and this was just a foretaste of worse events to come, she could not begin to fathom what they might be.