Everything was muffled. Everything was dark. He only knew what direction was up. He didn't know what was below or to his right and left. His ears were ringing in the back of his head - fair in the distance. The only noises he could make out was the blood pumping through his heart and the slow wheeze of air as it left his lungs.

Night dives had always scared him - the lack of visibility, the creatures that emerge - the darkness that encases you. Tonight it was worse.

He had reached 80 feet and began probing with his light. Hoping to catch something in it's rays. The wall of the reef, fish, coral, anything. To his alarm, the current was stronger than the dive master had said - it quickly tired him out and pulled him away from the wall of the reef - into the black of the open ocean. He was exhausted, breathing hard, beginning to panic.

That's when it got worse. Breaking a basic rule, he started swimming with his arms, in frantic sweeps, trying to find the wall and the rope that would guide him to the boat. Flailing in the dark, his light slipped off his wrist and floated away from him, up towards the surface.

He was in the abyss.

He stopped - he was blind and deaf. All that he heard was the echoing of his breathing in his chest and his heart thumping in his ears.

He breaths were becoming more erratic - scared and labored. His mouth was becoming more dry.

That's when it happened. It began getting harder to breathe. He had to draw the air from his tank.

He was out of oxygen.

Everything flashed before his eyes - his life, his family, his job, how stupid it was to dive alone at night, if his body would ever be found.

He sucked with all his might for his last breath, pulling everything he could from the depths of his tank and began his assent.

He was 80 feet down, with one breath, unable to rise faster than the bubbles he was releasing from his mouth to remain pressurized. That was the worst part - having to let out air in order to surface.

You were supposed to sing or hum - he whimpered. The wheezing of the air seeping from his lungs was all he could hear in the darkness.

He rose slowly, unaware of where he was - if he was close or when he'd run out of air. It wasn't long before his lungs began to scream at him. Burning. Churning. Quaking. He could see red speckles creeping into the corners of his eyes.

Then, a strange thing happened. As he continued to wheeze, his lungs began to feel more full. The higher he went, the lighter he felt. His lungs still burned, but less. As he rose, his lungs grew - the pressure on his body reduced - allowing for the air inside to expand.

His eyes had begun to tear. He looked up in desperation, hoping to see surface. All he could see was the glimmer of the bubble stream guiding him up.

His lungs felt like they were about to burst when his head broke through - within 50 feet of the dive boat.

The regulator fell out of his mouth and he gulped.

The surface had never tasted so sweet.