Daniel Akech James sits at a desk. He is twelve million, nine hundred, four thousand, nine hundred, sixty-eight feet from home. The year is 2005. He writes in black ballpoint ink on a yellow legal pad, the top page filled with his careful handwriting. He wears razor-creased brown slacks and a button-down light blue Oxford shirt. His sleek skin is so black it’s almost blue. His lips move slightly as he reads the words that both tell the story of his past and determine the course of his future.

Daniel is a senior at the University of San Diego. He’s writing a personal statement, the first of many official documents he must complete to enter graduate school. It’s the story of how he came from Sudan, the largest country in Africa, and was one of thousands of children, mostly boys, who survived its civil war and walked for years before reaching neighboring Kenya and eventually coming to America. They are known to the world as the Lost Boys of Sudan.

Daniel is lost in more ways than one. He has no birthday. Akech, the name he was given at birth, means one who came into the world without a parent. As a boy, he lived without the protection of parents for nearly a decade as he wandered the desert and took refuge in a foreign land.

He can’t remember some things. Other things he wishes he could forget.

Daniel lays down his pen and glances out the window. He hears children playing at the pre-school only steps outside his east campus dorm room. Their gleeful noise reminds him that despite the horrors he survived, he has one happy memory. That memory, still vivid, offers insight into his passion for learning. The passion kept him going when he thought he could go no farther.

It’s 1987. At an age when the typical American kid is choosing a kindergarten lunchbox, Daniel sits outside his hut. He picks at blades of grass and scans the countryside. His job is to tend to the goats. Although he never says it out loud, in his heart he wishes he were older so he could go to school like his brother, Gak.

He’s starting to get bored when he sees Gak returning from school, books tucked under his arm. A huge smile spreads across Daniel’s face. He scrambles up and runs to his brother. He begs Gak to let him look at the schoolbooks. Flipping through them, he’s fascinated by the colorful pictures and strange words. In a singsong voice, he recites phrases he memorized after hearing his brother say them — A is for apple. One plus one is two. His tribe speaks a language called Dinka, but he’s thrilled to hear the funny English words come out of his mouth.

Sudan, which borders the Red Sea between Egypt and Eritrea, is in the middle of a civil war. The mostly Christian southern half of the country, where Daniel lives in a village called Maar, is pitted against the Arabs from the north.

Daniel’s best guess is that he’s about 5 years old. All he knows about the war is that his mother says he was born at the time the war first broke out.

One day, the war reaches his village. Daniel hears screaming. Billowing smoke blackens the sky over nearby villages. People run past him, their faces filled with fear. They say only one thing: The enemy is coming.

The boy doesn’t know what to do. Oldest brother Diing grabs his arm and runs, half dragging him, toward the bush, a nearby forest of acacia trees. Daniel and his brother spend the night there. He hears gunshots and screaming. He sees flames. He prays. The enemy doesn’t venture into the bush. Daniel and his brother survive.

When all is quiet, the boys creep out and make their way back to the village. Daniel sees his mother and runs to her, arms outstretched. She holds him. She rocks him. His sobs subside.

Daniel’s entire family survives. His mother, Aluel, is a Christian, active in her church. When he turned 4, she had him baptized and gave him the name Daniel. His father is Thiong. A career soldier, Thiong fights in the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army — because he has no choice and because he believes that the lives of innocent people must be protected. Daniel is the fourth of his mother’s six children. She is the first of his father’s three wives.

Together again, the family sifts through the debris of what had been their home. Daniel, digging with bare hands, finds his wooden cross. As he pulls it from the ashes, he remembers the day the 3-foot-long cross, with hand-carved points and a single nail in the center, saved his life.

It happened when Daniel was about 3 or 4. Sunday service had just ended. He and the parish priest, Simon Bul, were walking through the thick grasses surrounding the church. Suddenly a red cobra raised its head and flared its hood. Daniel froze. The snake struck. Thwack! The priest bashed the snake over the head with the cross. The cross snapped. The bottom half landed next to the lifeless serpent. Father Simon gave the broken cross, now only 12 inches long, to Daniel.

Thankful that he found his cross in the rubble, Daniel vows not to let it go. He brings the cross with him when he moves with his family, away from the scarred land, to start fresh.

Three years later, the war erupts again. The enemy gives chase and the family divides once more. Carrying some of the children, his mother and father run one way. Daniel and his older sister, Angeth, run another way.

When the sun rises, Daniel and Angeth hide in the bush. When the moon rises, they walk. Every day, with cross in hand, Daniel prays for protection from the enemy, for the safety of his family and for food. Daniel eats leaves and grass until eventually, there is no food. The only water is the dew that collects on the grass at night. He swipes at the grass with his palm and licks at what trickles down. It barely moistens his parched lips.

At one point, Daniel goes three days without food. The pain, which on the first and second days stabs at his belly, dulls on the third day, a dangerous sign. He’s dying. His sister knows it. The sun is up and Daniel sleeps. His sister, who knows it’s not wise to build a fire, rubs two sticks together and fans a tiny flame. She must feed her brother. On a rock she pounds the handful of grains she finds. The enemy hears the sound of rock against rock.

Daniel wakes to the sounds of gunshots and screams. He knows even before the others tell him. The enemy has stolen his sister.