Yeah, I decided that I was going to do one of these(I mean, Pythor was my third fictional crush ever, so why not? *briefly wonders if I'm turning into an 18 year-old female version of the great George R. Martin, but except with fanfiction instead of  best-selling fantasy books* *shakes it off*), even after I haven't been keeping up to date on my Ninjago watching(I literally stopped watching halfway through season five due to forgetting to watch, completely forgot to catch up on watching all that I missed save for a few episodes here and there, and now I'm literally light years behind everybody else in the fandom, and like 4 and a half seasons behind in my knowledge of the series *sigh*.....).... But I'm going to try my best anyway! (And I should really catch up on my Ninjago, now that I think of it, but alas I am much too poor to afford anything like Netflix......)

 Anyway, hope you darlings enjoy, and I'll try my best to get everyone's character right! (Quick note, the prologue might not make a lot of sense at first, mainly because all you beasties probably won't have any idea what the heck happening in this first half before the flashback, but if you've got an idea of what is happening because you remember more Ninjago than me , great! : )   ), but it'll make a lot more sense later as I explain, trust me. Also, I'm trying something a tiny bit different than I've done in my other stories in terms of telling said story.....

 Oh, and here's the reader's outfit for the first part of the chapter(I literally had to look through 730 pictures on my usb drive for this one, and at least half of those pictures on there are of Betrayus, clothes, playlists, and other assorted things.....), for some visual reference because I don't want to have an overly long outfit description:

Anyway, hope you enjoy! : )    (Oh yeah, and the quote intergrained into this chapter is from the last line of that "hollow men poem", and coincidentally the only line of the damned thing I'm able to remember, much to my frusturation, just so we're clear on that.)

Everything was crumbling around you, giving away into the yawning blackness of the now open pit that yawned before you, as high up as you were on your perch. Dangling far above the open pit, your attentions had turned from trying to desperately free yourself from your bonds, to staring in mute terror at the thing, the thing that was in that pit, the thing that had been imprisoned for so long until this very moment....

The thing that would soon devour you, and everyone else here. And you were completely helpless to do anything to escape your fate...

This is the way the world ends.....

In any sort of normal situation, if you'd seen something like this, you'd have probably laughed aloud, thinking "that could never happen to me, it sounds far too ridiculous to even be true! What would the odds be that I  would wind up some sort of sacrifice for a creature of untold horrors, and have to watch everyone currently standing in this forgotten place get devoured before your very eyes"...... Unless you were the first one who ended up getting devoured in the first place. 

Oh joy. You could hardly await that prospect.

And yes, that was sarcasm. (Even now, your stellar personality still shone through.)

Was this fate's final way of saying: "Screw you y/n l/n"? Normally you would have tried to make light of a situation like this, maybe even adding a fun little jab at your own stupidity as a sort of black joke, but now, you were far too terrified at the prospect of what was about to be your demise to even consider that prospect.

Yeah,  preparing for your own death would do that to a girl.

But of course, it had been partially your own folly that had lead you, y/n l/n, disgraced member of the Crimson Sisters, thief, studier of ancient civilizations, aid to the Serpentine empire, to this situation in the first place, now dangling from a crumbling stone pillar, wearing a white flowy dress that looked like something you'd see on those ridiculous trashy horror novels; where the heroine who was about to either be ravished or have her blood drank(oh, how you scoffed at those stupid things, often joking around with Hana about those "bodice ripper horror" novels, and yet, here you were, wearing one of those pure white ridiculously frilly monstrosities only seen on black-and-white movie heroines...) , hands securely tied above you, preventing you from running, running as far away as you possibly could from whatever horrors awaited you. At least that was what every instinct of yours screamed for you to be doing at the moment.

This is the way the world ends......

But you couldn't run. It wasn't just your fear that stopped you, no, it was something else entirely. Mainly, the younger man-no, the naga- who was currently struggling against the seemingly iron grasp of the older man dressed in white, preventing him from escaping his grasp.

It had happened almost too fast for you to even register, one minute they'd been standing upright, the older man blocking the younger one's route of potential escape, the next, they were both struggling on the hard ground below,  the younger man's violet tail twitching uselessly as he struggled......

The older man shouted something at the assembled teens(each dressed in their own distinctively colored ninja garb), clearly giving them some sort of order, but to do what? Practically everything you could hear from far above the scene was inaudible at best....

They were... leaving? No, you weren't seeing things, they were in fact leaving, fleeing from this rapidly crumbling place, ninja and  mecha included.  But why would they be.......

 It occurred to you all too soon what exactly had been said to the teens all too late when they stepped back from the two struggling men...

No, no, no....

Was your heart splitting in two? But that was impossible as far as you knew things to be. Nobody's heart just did that on their own, unless someone was quite literally ramming something through their chest cavity, and said implement was tearing through their organs. So why did your chest suddenly feel as if your heart was being torn in two?

It couldn't be, it just couldn't be, it would be too cruel for even you to comprehend, one final way that the fates would have screwed you over for potentially the final time........

This man, the sensei, was planning on sacrificing himself, to potentially "save" everyone . And with him, the man you cared for would be gone too.....

Were you dying already? You weren't sure, for although your heart still pulsed life throughout your body, the pain in your soul was enough to make you almost wish that you were gone from this earth.

Not with a bang......

Even if it had only happened mere moments before, your heart still ached when you remembered the look he'd given you when he had finally seen you at last, without the hood over your head obstructing your features, such a quick mixture of emotions,  the shock, surprise, and.....

Horror. Only now he realized what he had done would cost him, and he'd surged forward towards where you were held captive, only to be stopped by the sensei before he could even rush to your aid.

One of his first instincts was to rush to you..... somehow, that action repaired a small piece of your already mangled heart. He really did care about you after all.  Even after all he'd done to you, and after all you had done to him, he cared about you.

What a pity that you'd both learned that far too late.....

The cynic in you dismissed the sensei's efforts, however valiant they appeared. Didn't he realize it was pointless? The beast wouldn't just stop at the three of you, you'd be more like appetizers to it than a full meal, and once it had finished with you three... then it would set it's sights on the rest of the world.

The sounds of battle stopped, seemingly everyone holding their breath for what would happen, human and not-so human included. Most notably, the not-so human.

The earth gave a visible shudder.

This was it, the moment that had been prophesized about for centuries, where the beast rose, the Eldrich God, the Horror from the deep, the beast at the end of days, would make the world its own.....

And there was nothing you could do to save yourself, or the man you'd grown to love....

Or was there?

But a whimper.....

Flashback time(pay attention to this one, it'll be relevant later in the story.....)! This flashback brought to you by Dareth, the unofficial brown ninja, and one of my favorite characters.

Eight months before.....

Okay, so maybe, just maybe, you needed to work on your stealth skills a little bit more. But you weren't going to tell Hana that, because knowing her, she'd never let you hear the end of it if you admitted she was in fact right about you being as clumsy as a water buffalo when it came to sneaking around any area larger than a few feet.....(Your reasoning was that you weren't clumsy at all, she was the one to talk with her getting distracted by every shiny bauble that caught her eye, and calling her "Magpie" would often get her to drop the whole subject. Then she'd call you a "DustSniffer", which was probably a jab at your pastime of reading about dead civilizations, but it made so little sense, that you merely pretended to be offended by the comment instead of laughing aloud)

Leaving the orphanage that had been your home for almost all your life had been easy enough to do(Auntie Ang, the woman who ran the place never bothered to change the locks on the windows, as paranoid as she was, which made it a little too easy, and most of the younger kids had long since gone to bed long before then), but the journey to the outskirts of town? 

That was a different story entirely.

But even after failing to successfully climb over a low rock wall(you had landed with a hiss of pain on your shoulder, probably bruising it in the process, but thankfully nobody had seemed to hear), nearly waking up the ornery shopkeeper's hyperactive guard dog(a quick bribe of a sausage swiped from the nearby meat cart had shut him up), and very narrowly running into a few night-wandering drunks, among a few other things(one of which you wouldn't be mentioning to Hana at all if you could really help it at all, because even you didn't think she'd believe you about what happened.....) that had taken up more of your time than you would have cared to really admit(Dear god, Hana was going to kill you for being THIS late, or at least she'd never let you forget about the whole incident if she could help it.....), you had finally made your way out of town(And how relieved did you feel indeed! Why hadn't you done this years ago?).

Hana's face lit up almost instantly when she'd seen you approaching. The dirty-blonde haired girl immediately leapt to her feet, throwing down her own traveling bag on the grass,  and grabbed you in one of her signature hugs, nearly knocking the wind out of you.

"Took you long enough you dork." You resisted rolling your eyes at that. Eventually she pulled away, with a little smirk playing on the edge of her full lips, but the look in her eyes betrayed the teasing expression on her lips.

"I'd almost thought you'd changed your mind at the last moment."  A moment of silence. Was she still thinking about what had happened earlier in the day? You were still sort of pissed about what had happened(you were sisters in crime, you were supposed to stick together after all....), but this was your friend you were talking about, and Hana would never even dream of hurting you on purpose( She'd promised you after all, almost three years ago when you'd met), right?  Briefly you considered telling Hana exactly what had happened before you'd made it fully out of the village(heck, you still couldn't fully believe it yourself), but you decided against it.

"Yeah, staying in that miserable heck hole for the rest of my life sounded more appealing than a life of adventure- I'm just kidding! Why in all of Ninjago would I leave you behind Magpie?" Your friend's expression quickly changed from confusion(had she really not understood that you had been kidding in the first part of the joke?) to a wide, dazzling smile that warmed a corner of your heart.

After a moment, your friend spoke up, this time in more serious tones. "So, nobody followed us? Even the....." She did a couple of goofy karate style moves with her hands to demonstrate who exactly she was talking about.

You gave a little shake of your head. "No, none of the ninja followed me. I think even jerks like those guys have to rest sometime, maybe that was why I didn't see any of them." Okay, that was a lie on your part, but it was merely a white lie, nothing more, nothing less. After all, what was a little white lie between two friends? It wasn't like it was going to hurt anyone, was it?

The ninja. Only a month and a half since they'd came to the village(before that they were fighting skeletons or something), and you were already sick of those four overly cocky teenage boys. Sure, they mainly stayed up in the dojo on the mountain, training or sneaking or whatever it was that ninjas did(you didn't really care, those guys were jerks), sometimes coming down to the village to "keep the peace" which mainly consisted of stopping that annoying little kid with the bowl-cut from trying to cause any trouble(the kid's name was Floyd or something, some little dark-lord wannabe) and catching the occasional petty thief. Like you and Hana.

Except Hana hadn't been caught today like you were. Why?  She ditched you, even after the two of you promised that you both would stick together, and if need be, share in the punishment.

That's what sisters in crime did. It was them against the world, loyal to only each other, and if one fell, the other would be there to take the fall as well. Because you two would always be there for each other, no matter what. 

And that didn't happen. One minute, your friend was right there by your side, the next, she disappeared, leaving you scrambling for a way out, your arms full of stolen merchandise(it had been a particularly easy day for two thieves like yourselves who were looking for a way to make some extra cash(you) or just didn't have enough money to buy everything they wanted(Hana), and since it was a market day, nobody had paid any mind to the two of you for a while, until it was too late....).

And then(and the part that still burned your blood to think about), you'd been caught. By the ninja no less. The black one had pushed you to the ground(you still felt the sting of the cobblestone on your cheek), and the other three had you surrounded in not time. Then.....

They'd humiliated you. It wasn't just enough for them to make you return everything you'd stolen(you recounted with no small amount of pleasure how the blue ninja's eyes had practically bugged out of his skull when he saw the small pile of stuff you pulled out from your hoodie, boots, and sleeves.), they had you marched back, across the marketplace, much to the disapproving stares and whispers of everyone assembled(you were used to it by now, it mostly didn't affect you anymore. Mostly.) and straight back to the disapproving stare of Auntie Ang, the woman who ran the orphanage where you lived. And the jokes they'd made about you.... ugh!

They were jerks, no two ways about it.

Hana stifled a laugh. "Aw come on y/n, you have to admit some of those ninja are pretty cute, especially the red one. I mean, mmmmm...." Okay, now she was just trying to hit a nerve there.  You disliked at least half of the ninja at best(the red and black one) and were in neutral about the other two, mainly because the blue and white ninja seemed decent at best, even if the blue one was a touch annoying, and the white one was a little weird(Was he secretly some sort of robot? That'd explain the tone of voice).

"I don't see it." Sure your friend had a tendency to develop a crush on every cute guy she met(much like the girl in that cartoon with the shooting star sweater you'd watched with her in the past), but you really didn't see anything happening between her and any of the aforementioned ninja for a number of reasons.

And besides, when you finally reached your destination, you would finally put all this nonsense behind you, forever.....

Hana giggled. "Mmmhmmm... Sureee ya don't....."

You rolled your eyes. "Do you still have your note?" You had yours of course, and had it tucked up in the pocket of your hoodie, where it had been ever since you'd discovered it sitting on your pillow in your sad, single room, tied with a red ribbon.( The excitement from when you'd finally opened it still remained in you even all those hours later) You really hoped that Hana hadn't lost it, dropped it, shoved it into a trashy romance novel to use as a bookmark, as she sometimes did with every little scrap of paper she held. If she didn't have her note, then the two of you wouldn't be able to leave this place......

Hana nodded, and reached into her pocket of her jacket. Pulling it out with a dramatic flourish, she turned over the creamy paper and began to read.

"Two days before your destiny expires. Seek out the Crimson Sisters, blah, blah, blah, let nobody see this note, don't be late, yada yada yada... Yeah, I got the gist of it." She quickly slipped the note back into her jacket. "You know, for a bunch of supposed "men haters" who "dye their clothes with the blood of their monthly cycles" or whatever bull is being cooked up by those asshats in town, these chicks sure are cryptic."

Okay, that was given. The directions to where you were supposed to find the fabled compound were cryptic at best, merely instructing you to travel for two days, into the snow covered forests found several miles away from where you currently stood.

You shrugged. "Maybe so, but we're probably going to be some of those "chicks" soon enough. The prospect intoxicated you. The Crimson Sisters. An organization of purely female thieves, known for taking from those that deserved to be taken from, it was thought to be a myth, save for a few whispers here and there of seeing a red cloak in the dark of the night, vanishing over the rooftops. Many thought they were just a myth, created to warn of what became of girls who lied, girls who tried to gain a position more than what they were born for, merely a warning, a tale told around a roaring fire at best.

But they did exist, the note proved it, and finally, you and your friend would escape this town where you'd spent nearly your entire lives.

"I know! Isn't it exciting?" Hana was practically bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet, thinking of the prospect of her future. "Just think, no more waiting tables or scrubbing dirty pots or ten nasty siblings, it's just adventure and fun for us girls!  We'll be queens.... no, legends even! We'll wear silk and satin, eat chocolate truffles and drink pink champagne, have cute shirtless boys who rub our backs while we lounge around on velvet cushions in our luxury apartments in Ninjago City......" Her eyes were practically glazed over at the prospect of it all, making you laugh a little at your friend's goofy expression.

"I'm not really a chocolate truffles and satin robes type of girl, to be honest. I'll probably travel, maybe see everything there is to see outside of this town, the crystal grottos, the forgotten ruins, maybe I'll make a trek to Ouroboros if I find the time to see the ruins of the Serpintine villages....." A loud groan sounded off from Hana at that.

"Come on y/n, this again? When are you going to look up from you studies of.... I don't know, Pareseltounge or whatever and snake peoples?"

It was known among a few people that you had a fascination with ancient cultures and myths, even from an early age. Reading everything you could about the Serpintine from the village's tiny library after hearing a legend about them from the older kids when you were ten. Getting frustrated when you couldn't find any information you wanted. Seeking out a travelling historian who was staying at your village to learn more about them. Asking a million and one questions about the language, the culture, everything that popped into your mind at the moment. How the historian taught you more than you ever dreamed, even helping you to learn the language of the Serpintine through hours of careful study and perusing ancient documents and tomes. Trying out some of the words you'd learned on Hana, and her frustration at not understanding you weren't saying anything bad about her, you were calling her your treasured one instead of secretly insulting her behind her back.

And from there, your curiosity(or as Hana called it, your obsession) had only grown, fueling your fascination with the long-since dead and gone culture, and allowing you, an orphan for most of your twenty years to dream of seeing those places that you'd only read of  in dusty tomes, to really go out into the world.....

Just to finally start really living your life!

"Hey, it's not Parseltonge okay? That's from Harry Potter, and I'm pretty sure that's different sister of mine ."  

( A/n: Yeah, anytime anything isn't spoken in "common" it's gonna be bolded and slanted like what you saw there. Just to prevent any confusion. for later.)

Hana scoffed. "You know I can't understand you when you speak like that. Could you just try to speak common from now until we reach the compound?"

"Hey, I distinctly remember somebody refusing my very generous offer to get some lessons on the language-"

"Mmmmm... Nope, don't remember that."

"Uh huh, sure..."

The two of you glared at each other for a moment before breaking out into peals of laughter at how ridiculous the two of you were acting. Here you were, about to take on an opportunity of a lifetime, and you two were arguing like you were ten years old all over again! It was almost too ridiculous.

Eventually, the two of you calmed down. "So, you ready to say goodbye?"

You were all for responding to your friend's question, but yet, something stopped you.

Sure, your life in the village wasn't going to be anything that you'd really think about ever again, and you'd probably never return to the place that held such horrible memories for you, but in some strange way, you'd miss the place.

There were all the things you definitely wouldn't miss: Your tiny attic room, the feeling of hopelessness you'd gotten every year when you were passed over for another child, the disapproving stares of the villagers, the teasing, the name calling, the look of disappointment Auntie Ang tended to flash your way, the general backwardness of the entire town compared to other parts of Ninjago(your village had very few modern advancements to it's name), the expectation from the nuns who ran the orphanage that you'd go and become one of them as was common for  "unwanted girls" rather than hold onto your "flights of fancy".....

But then again, there were the things you would miss: The littles(you'd often complained at having to watch over them, but they really were the sweetest things), Auntie Ang's mooncakes, the cherry tree where you and Hana used to play around, studying by candlelight in the researcher's home......

But as a thief, you knew one thing for certain. If the bad typically outweighed the good in a decision, then it was best to make it accordingly, and let go.

So, with one last turn of your head, you regarded the village for the final time.

"So long village, and May all your scales slough off in the sands!"    It was a rather weird curse you'd learned from your studies, but somehow, it seemed slightly fitting to the moment. Hana gave a little cheer at that, pumping her fist in the air.

Joining your friend, you prepared to begin the first steps of your journey. But not before Hana gave you one final remark.

"I literally didn't understand anything you just said back there."

Well beasties, I've finally finished this chapter! I hope that it was good,(I really hope it was, if not please let me know where I can improve), and that you enjoyed it! : ) This sort of writing style is kind of new for me, so I hope it isn't too confusing......

Next chapter, we'll get into some good stuff, mainly with........

Nagas! Specifically the Serpintine, because I'm pretty sure you haven't gotten your daily dose of snakes as of yet, specifically, Pythor!

But anyway, I'll see you soon beasties.......