Ruslan slipped away from the café and the curious onlookers. He began to run, not knowing exactly why, but instinct making him head away from the sea. His bare feet hurt, so he stopped at the house for a pair of sandals and snatched a yellow shirt from the front table...
And in the distance, along the seafront of Ujung Karang, screams rose from a hundred, a thousand, mouths.

Despite being from opposite sides of the world, Ruslan and Sarah are brought together in the aftermath of the horrific tsunami of 2004. Sarah is sailing with her family when the giant wave hits their boat, flinging the family apart. Her mother is killed, and alone with her younger brother, Sarah begins to search for their missing father.
Ruslan's father, a mechanic, was supposed to have been working on a ship when the tsunami struck, but all is not as it seems. It turns out that he had been using the job as a cover to travel to the rebel area of Bergang. In order to find his father, Ruslan must therefore undergo a dangerous journey through rebel territory.