Chapter 25

Suddenly the ship rocked violently, knocking everyone down, as if it was hit by something very huge. Edmund grabbed Edelle's hand, quickly pulling her up and they rushed to the bark to try and see what they've gotten themselves into.

"It's gone under the ship!" Caspian said in a troubled voice.

Some sailors went to the opposite bark, and just then Lucy screamed. The sound made everyone turn around rapidly, and when they did, they saw it. An enormous serpent-like beast shot out of the water and showed itself to the Dawn Treader crew.

Even though it was an underwater thing, it still looked like it was covered with slime and abscesses; it opened its jaws and let out a loud chilling noise, which sounded like a cross between wailing and hissing.

For a moment sailors stared in astonishment, facing a beast like that for the first time in their lives. The thing got closer to the ship, and Edmund, Edelle and Caspian took out their swords, while everyone else aimed at it with crossbows.

Suddenly, a torrent of fire hit the monster, forcing it to the side with a blood-curling howl. Eustace attacked it fiercely, clawing it, clinging to its head, while the thing tried hard to throw him off. It was obviously much stronger, so within a minute Eustace was sent flying to the side, but he quickly regained his composure and charged again. The beast caught him in mid-air and drawn under water, but before he could drown, it resurfaced again. Eustace was still in its jaws, but not for long. The monster gave a rough jerk with its head and thrown him square on a nearby rock, leaving him barely conscious from the hit. As it advanced him, intending to finish this, Eustace breathed another torrent of fire right into its snout, setting the beast on fire. It wailed loudly, as it fell into the water, the fire going out before it could do any serious harm, so it wouldn't be long until the thing attacked again.

"AWAY, BEAST!" yelled the mad lord, pushing the sailors aside, and throwing his sword at Eustace, hitting him right in the shoulder.

"NOT THE SWORD!" Caspian yelled

"EUSTACE!"

"NO!" Lucy and Edelle screamed as the injured dragon lifted himself off the rock and flew away, out of their sight.

"NO, COME BACK!" Lucy screamed after him.

The mad lord ran to the spinning wheel in attempt to turn the ship around, but Drinian was fast enough to punch him in the face, knocking him out.

"About time someone did that!" Edelle thought menacingly.

"CREW! On your positions!" the captain ordered, and the sailors hurried to oblige.

Just then, the giant serpent shot out of the water again, this time going over the ship, making everyone run in different directions and breaking a bark on its way. Then it came around the second time. To everyone's horror-it now wind itself around the ship, rocking it terribly, cracking it in some parts, water splashing all over the place.

"ED! ED!" Caspian called, eyeing a pointy rock near them, an idea evident in his eyes. "WE'RE GONNA SMASH IT ON THAT ROCK."

Edmund nodded, getting the idea "I'LL DISTRACT IT!" he shouted back and almost dashed away, when Edelle grabbed his arm.

"ARE YOU INSANE? THIS IS SUICIDE-IT'S GONNA KILL YOU!" she shouted, panicked at the thought.

He clutched her shoulders "IT WILL NOT! I'LL JUST DISTRACT IT, TRUST ME!"

"BUT HOW ARE YOU…"

Her question was cut off, as Edmund clashed his mouth onto hers, kissing her roughly. It was like he kissed her for the last time, but as soon as the thought came to her mind, she hated it.

He pulled away and looked into her eyes "I'll be fine, and when I'm back, you better be to!" he let go of her and rushed away.

Edelle quickly wiped away a single tear that managed to escape her eyes and tried to calm down. "Of course he'll be fine, it's not like it's his first time in Narnia. He's probably been through worse." She reassured herself, but then the beast hovered above the ship once again, dangerously close to where she was standing, reminding Edelle of her priorities at the precise moment.

She swiftly snatched out her sword and did the first thing that came to her mind-she stabbed the giant snake on the side, as it slithered by. The beast let out a wail of pain, and as Edelle pulled her sword back, her eyes narrowed at the sight of the green mist coating it. She looked at the wound she left and saw mist coming out of it too. So it wasn't even a real monster! And, most importantly, it could be destroyed!

Edmund ran to the nose of the ship, took out his flashlight, lit it and aimed the light in the monster's eyes, taunting it all the while.

"COME GET ME! I'M RIGHT HERE!" he shouted and the beast lashed forward, towards him, and slammed against the place where he'd been standing. From afar, it looked like Edmund was in its mouth.

"EDMUND!" Edelle and Lucy shouted, terrified for him.

The monster pulled back and they exhaled in relief, when they saw him still very much alive.

It was so distracted by Edmund's taunting, it didn't notice its back nearing that big rock, as the ship charged forward, making the serpent back away even more.

At that moment Lucy shot an arrow with Susan's bow, and hit the monster straight in the eye, blinding it, until finally, there was no more space left between the monster and the rock, as the thing was smashed into it by the ship.

The crash caused Edmund to fall from his place all the way down on the deck, the fall knocking him unconscious.

Edelle immediately rushed to his side, shaking him, trying to wake him up.

As the ship backed away from the monster, everyone was mortified to see that all their efforts to smash it where useless-the motion didn't seem to affect the serpent at all. In fact, the only thing they had accomplished, is making it even angrier.

Okay, that's it for now. Please don't hate me for making you wait again. It's just that…urgh…you have NO idea what it's like to have no network whatsoever. I don't have it at home (technical difficulties), I no longer have it at school, as some evil genius downloaded some lethal virus and clashed all the computers…the very fact that I'm able to update today is a miracle-my dad took me to his work and took me to the public computers. So, yeah, here's the update, which I had written LONG AGO, just had no chance to post it(

Pleeeeeeeeease review! The next chapter is the last one and I reeeeally want to reach 200 reviews by the time I end this. Thank you!)