In the heart of South Dakota lies a lake. The lake of Pactola holds what some would call a mystery. Others might call it a conspiracy. Most have referred to it as the Loch Ness Monster, living somewhere deep in the water, roaming around and pulling people down into his world. The tales of how it got there are speculative at best but something is down there. First it would be best to give some background on the lake. Pactola Lake holds more than a monster, it holds an ancient city, forgotten through the tales of time. Lost in a modern day fast track world. A once thriving city now sits in the deep dark shadows of the lake.

Pactola City was once home to a few thousand people. The city had a bank, grocery stores, lumber mill and numerous other establishments. The town brought thousands of tourists in each year.

Located in what looked like a giant bowl, surrounded by mountains on all sides, it sat just off the main highway and could be seen if driving by. Hundreds of people were trapped that night and died. It rained for weeks straight. Many citizens didn’t want to leave because this was their home. This was everything they’d ever known, but flooding was very real at this point, it wasn’t going to take much more rain to consume the entire city.

The rain came down so hard and fast it looked at times like a tsunami barreling through the city. No one had ever seen a storm like this in the state of South Dakota before. The first couple the days the rain soaked into the ground. After that it began building up in the yards and in the streets. The water was coming off of the mountains and pouring down into the city. By the end of the week the whole city was almost consumed by water. The last of the people, still in the city limits had gone from sitting in their homes loving their lives, to sitting on top of their homes praying for the rain to stop. The rain didn’t stop for months. Once it had finished the city was completely engulfed in water. Bodies were floating in the lake now. One by one they slowly sank to the bottom of the lake. Making their final resting place in what was once their city.

Before the rain had completely let up and the clouds parted to let the sun through a lightning storm came in. It struck the mountains and lit up the lake. Seven lightning bolts hit the water all at once and the clouds opened and dropped a monster from the sky. It splashed down into the lake and began swimming around. Right now it was only as big as a dolphin. Soon it would morph into the size of a house. It fed off the hundred of bodies that were left behind from the city. This kept it fed for years on end. Eventually the bodies would run out and it would have to find something else to feed off of. The lake finally was transformed into a tourist spot again. Bringing boats with families fishing and doing all different kind of water sports. The Loch Ness Monster was able to find a new food source. The people on top of the water having fun and enjoying their lives were all now in harm’s way.

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The Loch Ness Monster, now is what people were calling it, made nightmares among the masses. It brought fear among boaters and fishermen everywhere. This was becoming one of the most prominent lakes around and now was being turned into a horror attraction. Many people weren’t aware of what lied underneath these dark waters. Others just didn’t want to believe in these conspiracy theories and thought they were a bunch of rubbish like many tales before this one.

The monster was most active during the warmer months spring, summer and fall. During the winter it went in to a hibernation state sort of a like a bear. This was mainly for the fact very few people spent time on the lake during the winter. If they were on the frozen ice it was only to do some ice fishing. The holes they drilled weren’t big enough for the monster to go through and it certainly wasn’t going to use all it’s energy to break through the ice if there wasn’t a guaranteed kill.

The Loch Ness Monster certainly didn’t just fall from the sky. It wasn’t created in a lightning rain storm like some radical, big bang theory, type of believing. Where did it come from? No one is really sure but it’s believed it came from the planet Androgina. It was shot out from the planet and landed here. Most of the time they leave to search for other habitable planets. Always wanting to expand there race but making sure there is enough food source to support every creature that would reside there. Androgina, is roughly the same size as Earth and almost completely full of water.

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The only thing that isn’t under water are some mountains that shoot up in to the sky. There are no birds, mammals or anything else above water. The flowers and bushes are few and far between. The mountains are bare and have minimal tree coverage. Underneath the water is where all of the creatures live. The monsters feed off of small, krill or fish, that swim around underneath the water. They only eat these because there isn’t anything else that lives on their planet. Thousands of miles of tunnels and caves are carved in to the underbelly of this planet. This planet is full of sea like creatures, that look just like the Loch Ness Monster, ruling everything around them.

The monsters have tentacle like arms, sort of like an octopus, and use these to swim around the water at great speeds. It also has suction cup like fingers at the end of each arm, it uses to latch on to its prey. A giant hinged mouth, with incredibly sharp teeth, swallow up the prey it captures. The Loch Ness Monster that resided at Pactola was one of the smallest from the planet Androgina. It certainly didn’t take long for the monster to get from one side of the lake to the other. Even though being the smallest it was one of the most fierce. On it’s home planet it was one of the most feared and respected.

The Loch Ness Monster would swim through the waters looking at each boat passing by. The creature was rather intelligent. It had amazing hearing capabilities. Listening for the size of the propeller pushing water out, listening for the people on the boat, how many there were, it could tell how big the boat is. It tracked all of this information. Never wanting to go after a boat to big, the monster would stick to small fishing boats. They always had at least one to two people and usually had already caught fish on them. This was a win-win for the Loch Ness Monster. Once it found the boat it was going to go after it would swim up and ram the bottom of the boat with its head. Startling the people in the boat, the monster would then, bring its tentacles around each side of the boat and pull it under water. It would pull the boat all the way down to the bottom of the lake and set it in the streets of the abandoned city. Then the creature would wrap its tentacles around each of its victims and toss them into it’s mouth. With all of the razor sharp teeth it only took a few chews to make their food in to small little chunks. It would spit the bone fragments out and swallow the rest.

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A small group of hunters called themselves the FTK. This stood for the Fairy Tale Killers. The group of men would find tales of monsters and then go searching for them. Anything from Bigfoot to now the Loch Ness Monster. Mark, Travis and Ricky have been friends for years. They started this group almost four years ago. Most of the time they would come up empty handed. Sometimes there would be some video recorded of the creatures but nothing substantial. All the men were experienced fishermen and hunters. Mark was a live off the land type hunter. What you killed is what you ate. Travis was more recreational. He was more of the fisherman type and always competed in competitions. Ricky was the trophy hunter and the one with all the money. He’d been to Africa and South America searching for the most fierce and exotic animals. He’d found his fair share of both. Tigers, elephants and monkeys. His other two friends didn’t care much for his hunting adventures and certainly didn’t think it was right to kill those endangered animals but they certainly admired his skills. He was the best long distance shooter in the tristate area. All of the men had of course heard the stories of monster that lived down in the ancient Pactola City. They had heard of the missing reports that came in from that lake and seemed to become more frequent. The Fairy Tale Killers decided they were going to the lake to take down this creature. They’d capture it and kill it. Bring it back to the middle of city and hold it up as a triumphant victory.

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Santa Cruz Island

Ricky, Mark and Travis all met at a coffee shop and hashed out the details of how they were going to kill the Loch Ness Monster. They weren’t entirely sure how big the monster was, what gear they were going to need or how this monster hunted its prey. All of the men knew that there was something down there and they were going to capture it. Ricky said they could use his twenty-five foot pontoon boat that had a sea-doo on the back end of it. The boat had a stronger than normal exterior and had racks built up above that could hold numerous weapons.

Travis brought along his harpoon gun that he used for his rare deep sea diving. He also had a giant net blaster that would shoot out like a harpoon but would wrap a net around the target. Mark didn’t have much to bring except a couple rifles and his trusty machete. He was a basic hunter so there wasn’t anything extravagant that he owned. Ricky brought the mother load. As if the boat wasn’t enough. There were two bows, a semi automatic weapon, tracking system and a fifty caliber rifle. This was the big one. It would only take a couple shots to completely neutralize this monster. Hoping it wasn’t bigger than they were expecting.

All three guys pile into Ricky’s truck and have the pontoon in back on the trailer. Chit chatting with each other trying to go over every last detail of their plan. Finally arriving at the lake they back the truck down the dock and unload it in to the water. Ricky went and parked the truck, came back down and jumped in the boat with the other two. Ricky drove the boat out in to the middle of the lake and turned it off. He set up his tracker and began scanning the water for anything. He knew the monster was going to be large and wouldn’t be very hard to see on his tracking device. Scanning the water for about ten minutes nothing was showing up and then there was a flicker. It looked like a glitch in the screen but Ricky wasn’t so sure. He watched it for another minute and there was another flicker. He signaled to Mark and Travis that the Loch Ness Monster was directly underneath them. They must be sitting on top of the old city.

Ricky told Mark to hit the button on the front of the boat. Mark went up and pushed it, bringing spikes out all along the bottom side of the boat, as another defense mechanism. All of the men felt a shift in the water. The monster was beginning to move and if they were right, it was heading directly towards them. Everyone grabbed onto the boat and braced for impact. The monster slammed into the boat, flying in to the air and back in to the water, shaking and rattled. Travis, Mark and Ricky looked at one another to make sure each were okay. Looking down in the water they saw red spots floating to the top. The creature had multiple stab wounds from the spikes on the boat and was starting to bleed. The tracker showed the monster had turned around and was coming up towards the back of the boat. Mark and Travis both grabbed rifles and began shooting. Unloading clip after clip. There was no way that they didn’t hit the monster at least a couple times. Ricky looked at the tracker, the monster went underneath the boat and back up on the other side.

image:KeenanAngelPhotography

The monster lifted up out of the water and slammed its tentacles on either side of the boat. Travis grabbed his harpoon gun and shot at the monster. The harpoon went through two of the monster’s tentacles and locked them together. A roar let out from the monster and it went back down in to the water. The harpoon had an extra tracer on it, making it easier to chase after this thing. It started heading towards a cove on the far end of the lake. Ricky slammed on the gas and began chasing after it. They blocked it into the cove. Mark grabbed the sea-doo and dropped it into the water. He pulled down on the throttle and whipped around to the left side of the boat. They wanted to come at the monster from two angles. Both inching in closer, Travis moved to the front of the boat, holding the net gun. Ricky parked the boat and came to the front also. Mark was holding a shotgun standing up on the sea-doo. The Loch Ness Monster jumped up in to the air out of the water and Mark shot it once in the chest. Simultaneously, Travis pulled the trigger on the net gun and it wrapped the monster up as it fell down into the water. Flapping it’s tentacles, the monster’s head was sticking out of the water. Ricky pulled out his fifty cal and set it down on the front of the boat. He sat down and looked through the scope. Dialing in on the creature he took a deep break and a gunshot echoed through the entire lake. The monster was hit right between it’s eyes and fell back down into the water. Red blood filled up the entire cove.

They locked the monster on to the back of the boat, still tangled up in the net and started driving back to the dock. They were going to leave the boat there and load the Loch Ness Monster up onto the trailer. Trying to maneuver the enormous monster onto the trailer, even while in the water, was a challenge that took hours to complete. Finally they were settled and everything was situated. The men jumped up in the truck and left the lake. Heading back towards town to show everyone what they had captured and that the historic lake was now safe once again.

Sitting at the bottom of the lake, underneath all the bones, in the center of the abandoned Pactola City, was an egg. The egg was moving around and a small crack opened up on the side. A tiny tentacle came out…
The End.