“What is it, Spike?” asked Pan, her head darting around. “An eel?”
“Ye-e-s!” Spike yelled, her voice panicky. She jerked. A second later, something slithered around her tail. The whale twisted in the water, rousing Henry from a deep sleep, and then without warning she jumped into the air with the eel wrapped around her. Spike submerged with a giant splash and dove deep, trying to shake the eel. Henry hadn’t had time to scream—or breathe.
“Henry!” yelled Florence, sitting up in alarm.
“Hold on tight, Florence!” Pan commanded. Florence leaned forward and held on to Pan’s neck. Together they dove underwater to find him.
Startled, Henry sucked in seawater and choked as he was dragged inside his cocoon at full speed. His lungs and throat burned, and water pressed against him like a thousand-pound weight, forcing its way into his mouth and nose, pushing against his eardrums and eyeballs. Blind and disoriented, Henry wound one arm through the straps of the cocoon and desperately swung out with the other, trying to connect with whatever was dragging them down. Don’t breathe! he told himself, but his body reacted in its own way.
With no air, Henry sucked in more water until his chest and head threatened to explode. Black spots wavered before his eyes. His thoughts became dull and jumbled. The pressure was daunting, and he felt himself slipping away. Knowing he was drowning, he tried to fight it, tried to strike out with his arm again, but he couldn’t get his body to move. Soon both arms slacked and the thudding pressure of the water pounded the consciousness from him.
Under the surface of the water, Pan went for the eel’s head. The eel dodged and sent out an electric shock, but Pan narrowly avoided it. Then the dragon struck out, weaving and striking again, and finally grabbed the eel’s face in her mighty jaws. The eel screamed. Pan clamped down hard, crushing its sparking head.
At the eel’s other end, Spike flailed in the water, trying to escape from its grip. She saw Pan and Florence and spurred toward them, hoping to move closer so they could help her.
Florence leaned over Spike and hurriedly unwound the trapped eel from her tail. “Go!” she cried through the water when Spike was free. The whale shot to the surface as fast as she could.
Still gripping the eel’s head between her teeth, Pan followed Spike to the surface so that Florence could help the boy, but the dragging tail of the eel thrashed and struck out. As Florence bent over Spike and saw that Henry wasn’t moving, the eel slammed into her head with a mighty blow, knocking her off Pan’s back. Florence yelled and made a desperate grab for Pan, trying not to sink all the way to the bottom of the sea. But Florence’s slick hands against the dragon’s slippery scales couldn’t keep their grasp.
Pan’s tail shot out like an arrow through the water. The dragon wrapped it around Florence’s wrist as the eel writhed and churned nearby. It was hard to tell which was which in the dark water. Florence grabbed on to Pan’s tail and pulled herself up hand over fist to the surface, desperate to see if Henry could be revived.
With a roar, Pan struck out with her claws and speared them through the eel’s skin. She opened her jaws wide to get a better grip, exposing rows of sharp teeth, and with a sudden movement, she clamped down again and chomped off the eel’s head, swallowing it whole. Its body dropped into the water, and with a few twists and splashes, it disappeared.
Florence made it to the surface and hoisted herself onto Pan’s back once more. When she was safely steady, she leaned over and began wrestling with the cocoon to get Henry out. “Henry!” she shouted, afraid. Was it too late?
The boy didn’t move.
A Close Call
Florence reached into the cocoon and pulled Henry out. His eyes were closed, and he flopped like a bundle of rags in her arms. She ripped off his component vest and threw it aside, then squeezed his abdomen and pressed on his chest and pounded his back, trying to get him to breathe. She had no breath of her own to lend him.
Pan worried over the scene as Florence tried everything she could think of to save Henry. But he didn’t respond, and he didn’t respond, and he didn’t respond.
Finally the dragon spoke. “Let me try,” she said. “Put him on his back and open his mouth.”
Florence turned Henry over, supporting his head. His arms fell to his sides. She took his face in her hand and gently opened his mouth.
Pan turned her neck, bent down, and closed her eyes as if making a wish. She blew a slow breath into the boy’s mouth.
Henry’s chest rose. Pan kept blowing, and then she pulled away and opened her eyes, watching him carefully.
Without warning Henry reared up, coughing and choking, water spewing from his mouth. He twisted to one side, Florence supporting him, and gagged and gasped until he’d cleared most of the seawater from his lungs.