Chapter 11-Boat Ride On Monster Lake

The turtle brothers walked through a small tunnel, which contained a few coffins in the walls, and they were now on the other side of the brick wall surrounding the church.

When they looked over to the right where the locked gate was, the trio discovered that it was locked due to being bolted from the other side. Raph hurried over to the gate and unbolted it, so that is was open for them for when they return, before he and his brothers moved on towards a path on their left side which was leading towards mountain cliffs.

"This is definitely the way to the lake; the sign pointing towards that wooden walkway says so…" Donnie told his brothers as he pointed at the sign saying 'Lago', which was Spanish for 'Lake'.

Now in the right direction, the turtle brothers walked along the wooden path until they came across a house with a watchtower next to it.

"Ugh, I think I know where dis is goin'…" Raph groaned before he readied his gun.

"Get ready, guys…" Leo told his brothers as he too grabbed his gun and prepared it.

Suddenly, a man standing at the top of the watchtower had spotted the turtle brothers and alerted his friends in the house. Moments later, a few hostiles burst out of the house and started throwing lit bottles filled with flammable fuel.

"Take cover!" Leo shouted before he and his brothers dove behind a wooden wall.

Smash! Woosh!

The bottle smashed and the fuel spilled next to where the turtle brothers were hiding before it was set alight by the lit rag.

"Whoa! First, handmade mini bombs, and now fuel-filled bottle bombs!?" Raph exclaimed in shock.

"We need to tread carefully; if we're exposed whilst they're throwing those bombs at us, we'll end up becoming turtle flambe…!" Donnie warned.

After the flames had died down, Leo peaked his head out and looked around before his eyes stopped at a red fuel barrel near the house. Luckily, some of the hostiles were walking closer to it with weapons in hand, so Leo pointed his gun at the barrel and pulled the trigger.

BOOM!

The fuel barrel exploded and blew the hostiles to pieces, but there were still a handful of stragglers left and were moving towards the turtle brothers' position.

"Go, go, go!" Leo shouted before he and his brothers ran from the safety of the wooden wall and across the wooden walkway.

The trio parried against the hostiles' sharp weapons with their ninja weapons before they took them out with their firearms. They then decided to search through the now empty house for any ammo or medical supplies before moving on.

Sometime later, after venturing through a quarry, the turtle brothers were nearly at the lake when they spotted something on the water's surface. To take a closer look, the turtle brothers took out their technological binoculars, which Donnie made before their mission started, and looked through them.

"It's a boat carrying two people…" Donnie identified.

"Yeah, and-…What da-!? Those freaks are throwin' a body into da water!" Raph alerted as soon as he saw the two men lifting a body and throwing it into the water, but it didn't sink.

"Wait, isn't that the policeman we found dead back in that hunter's house…!?" Leo questioned in realisation when he recognised the police uniform on the body.

"Yeah, it is…but why are they dumping his body in the lake?" Donnie answered in wonder.

Then, suddenly…

Roooooaaaaarrr!

Something ginormous and monstrous jumped out of the water with a roar and ate the policeman before diving back into the water. The turtle brothers looked on in shock and horror with widened eyes and mouths.

"What. Was. Dat!?" Raph managed to say through his shock.

"I-I don't know, but it sure didn't look like the giant friendly whale from Free Willy…!" Donnie answered shakily.

"Still, we need to get across that lake; I spotted an entrance leading somewhere after that monster disappeared…Let's go find ourselves a boat and check it out…" Leo reminded.

Despite their fears, Raph and Donnie agreed and followed Leo as he walked further down the path. They reached the edge of the lake within a few minutes of walking.

"Look! There's a boat we can use…!" Donnie alerted as he pointed at a small fishing boat docked a mile away from the trio.

The turtle brothers rushed over to the boat and checked it over; the structure of the boat was sturdy and just big enough to hold all three turtle brothers in it, and the motor still looked in good working order too.

"Is there enough fuel left in the motor's tank?" Leo questioned.

"Yep, just enough…" Raph confirmed after checking the tank himself.

"Alright, then let's head over to that cave…" Leo replied before he and his brothers climbed into the boat, started the motor engine, and sailed off to head for the cave that was marked on the map they found earlier.

Just as they had reached the middle of the lake, the boat suddenly slowed down and came to a stop.

"What da-? Ah, shell, da motor's stopped…!" Raph alerted before he worked on trying to get back up and running again.

"Then, get it started again; we're sitting ducks out here…!" Leo commanded in an urgent tone, knowing that the creature they saw early might strike again.

Whilst this was going on, something bumped the boat from behind, making the turtle brothers freeze. Donnie then noticed that the ripples on the water's surface were a bit bigger than normal, and they were slowly getting nearer to the boat.

"Oh, shell…I think it knows we're here…!" Donnie said fearfully.

Leo and Raph immediately put their guards up and readied their weapons whilst keeping a look-out for the underwater creature.

Suddenly, the monster jumped out of the water and flew over the turtle brothers' boat before diving back into the water, causing the boat to wobble. Then, the boat's rope was tugged very hard and pulled the boat quickly across the water!

"Waaaaaaahh!" The turtle brothers screamed and held on tight to the edges of the boat.

"It's got the rope! Hold on!" Leo told his brothers.

"Look! There's some large spears in this boat! We can use these to take that thing out!" Donnie alerted when he found a pile of spears underneath a blanket in the middle of the boat.

"Alright! Ya wanna fight, ugly!? Let's go, then!" Raph cried out as he grabbed a spear and steadied himself to keep an accurate aim at the creature.

The red-banded turtle threw the first spear at the monster, but it still kept on swimming, so he threw another two spears before it roared and dove into the water.

"Stay sharp, guys; that thing could be anywhere!" Leo commanded.

The turtle brothers chose a direction each; Leo on the north-west side, Raph on the north-east side, and Donnie on the south. They all had their guns at the ready and keeping a sharp eye out for signs of the monster approaching them.

The difficult part of doing that was predicting its actual movements, because the floating trees and ripples in the water were camouflaging the creature's movements.

Then, the lake monster resurfaced from a far distance and started circling around the boat.

"Get ready, you two; circling around means it's getting ready to attack…" Donnie told his brothers observantly since he had a fair amount of knowledge in animal behaviour.

Donnie was right; the lake monster stopped circling and started advancing towards the boat. Then, the creature opened its mouth which contained dozens of razor sharp teeth. Raph threw a spear into its mouth, and the monster roared in pain before diving back into the water.

"The mouth! That's its weak spot!" Donnie alerted before he and his brothers felt the boat being pulled by the lake monster again.

"Whoa!" They shouted whilst keeping themselves from falling out of the boat.

"Man, dis thing is givin' us one shell of a ride…!" Raph exclaimed before he started throwing spears at the lake monster.

"Yeah, but we're not planning on being on it for much longer!" Leo replied as he joined in with the spear-throwing.

Once again, the boat stopped when the lake monster released the rope and dove back under the water.

"Where'd ya go?" Raph questioned quietly as he surveyed his side of the lake surroundings.

"Ahead of us!" Donnie shouted as he pointed at the incoming monster ahead of the trio.

"Ready your spears, but wait until it opens its mouth!" Leo ordered with a raised hand.

The turtle brothers waited and readied their weapons as the creature slowly swam towards their boat. As soon as it was a few metres away, it opened its mouth.

"Now!" Leo shouted before he, Raph, and Donnie threw their spears all at once into the lake monster's mouth, striking it in the middle of its throat.

The turtle brothers watched as the lake monster roared in agony and dived back into the water one last time, and a huge amount of blood then appeared and started to spread out from where the monster sank, indicating that it was officially dead.

"…And da monster's finally sunk…" Raph breathed a cheer as he sat on one of the boat's seats.

But just as they were about to finally relax and catch their breaths…

"Ngh! Ugh!"

Raph and Donnie heard Leo grunt as he began to feel an intense pain in his chest and a bit woozy in his head. They turned around to see Leo slightly hunched over near the edge of the boat with one hand on his head and the other on his chest.

"Leo? What's wrong?" Donnie asked in concern.

But before he could answer him…

"Cough! Cough!"

Leo suddenly coughed into his hand, and then he gasped when he saw a mouthful of blood in it before watching it spill into the water!

"Leo!?" Raph and Donnie called worriedly when they too saw the blood.

"Ngh! Aaarrgh!" Leo cried out in pain, gripping his chest again, before his eyes rolled back and his body collapsed in the boat.

"LEO!" "WAKE UP!" Raph and Donnie shouted as they tried to bring Leo back around, but their oldest brother wouldn't respond.

Instead, Leo's consciousness continued to fade until he heard nothing but silence.