The stage is washed in moonlight. The NARRATOR loads the table onto her back and walks in a weary circle, her body struggling beneath the weight of the table.

NARRATOR: On a cold and starless night, through the desert came the stranger.

NARRATOR now assumes the role of NANDI, offloading the table from her shoulders and placing her hands on her belly, comforting her unborn babe with reassuring whispers.

NANDI: Nearly there … nearly there.

NANDI listens, but there is silence.

NARRATOR: The only drumming she could hear was her unborn child's impatient fists. Ready … restless … longing to dance free.

The PERCUSSIONIST pounds three forceful beats on the djembe as NANDI collapses to the ground clutching her belly.

NARRATOR: That morning Nandi arrived in Tin Town, but it was hardly the place described to her by her husband.

NANDI rises, dusts herself off and notices a tin bucket on the other side of the stage. She rushes over to the bucket and raises it to her parched lips, she stops before drinking.

NARRATOR: Here she was to find a paradise ruined with rust, its rivers dry, wells near empty. All hope turned to dust.

NANDI turns the bucket upside down and sand pours out.

NARRATOR: Above, the sun burnt fiercely in the sky. Stony faced soldiers lined the gravel road as a procession of black umbrellas shuffled past in ghostly silence. It was a silence that hovered over the whole town. Here no dogs dared to bark, birds were scared to sing. Even the clocks had stopped ticking.