Disclaimer: I don't own anything to do with Phantom of the Opera, but only if I did…heehee.

A/N: I've decided to rewrite the first chapter. Don't worry, the second chapter will be up soon, but I really didn't like my version of the first chapter, and I only want to put out my best work. So here goes, the new rewrite of the first chapter.

I was running down a dank and dark corridor, feeling a fear constricting my heart. It was a fear like I had never experienced before. I felt something strange on my face and put my hands up to my face. I felt a strange half-mask on my face. I pulled it off and thought I recognized it from somewhere, but felt that the fear making cold sweat run down my back was more important than locating where I had last seen this mask.

Suddenly I was standing in front of a mirror. I felt the mask slip from between my fingers. I was horrified by my own reflection. One half of my face was totally mutilated. The mirror shattered into a million pieces. I felt myself sinking in something. Something sticky. When I came back up for breath, I realized it was blood.

"Meg?" Christine was calling for me. "Meg!" Why did she sound angry? "Meg wake up this instant!"

I jolted into an upright position, my hand flying to the necklace of the golden angel that Christine had given me before she left. Even touching it made me feel a little closer to Christine, even though she was very far away on her honeymoon with the Vicomte. I missed her terribly.

"Meg? Are you falling asleep again? Come, wake up."

I slung my legs out of bed and put on a ballet suit. The two of us went to the warm-up room. I felt that today had the potential to be very long.

The day had indeed been very long. I went to my room and changed into a nightgown. Then I sat down at my desk and tried to write a letter to Christine. She would be back within two weeks, but without her, this opera theater seemed so much emptier. It wasn't that I didn't have any other friends, but I did miss her. All the other girls could only talk about their last drinking binge, and the men they had been with. I loved being around Christine because she was the only one who could keep me decent. I had a wild streak in me that wouldn't go away, even with all of mother's strict rules and regulations. Christine kept me honest and now she was gone. I felt the jealousy rising up in my throat again, as I had so many nights before. This time I didn't try to do the ballet warm-ups and exercises until I fell asleep from pure exhaustion as I always did.

Ballet lifted me up out of anger, jealousy, sadness; anything that was wrong in my life, a few hours of ballet would always come back. But this lonely ache wasn't going away like all the others had. So I decided to go and do something else.

Not knowing what had come over me, I entered Christine's old dressing rooms. They definitely had an unused feel, but the smell of roses still permeated the room. I wasn't paying attention to the roses though. I went to the mirror. I slid it back and entered the corridor from my dream. It didn't end with a mirror though; it ended with steps leading to deep water. Thankfully, the boat was docked there, along with the pole. I dragged myself to the iron mesh wall and went into the phantom's domain.

The place was a wreck. Candelabra lay on the floor, sheet music in pieces and scattered everywhere. Anything that could be thrown or ruined was indeed. It seemed the phantom was truly a madman. I remembered the look in Christine's eyes when Rauol had called him that. A flash of anger, and then a deep sadness that took her a moment to get over. But then her head would lift and her trademark smile was again in place.

I heard footsteps from behind me. The fear from my dream gripped me again. I felt myself turning slowly, tortuously slowly. Then I saw him. The phantom of the opera. He was even more menacing than I had thought. I had seen his mutilated face, and I had felt the charisma he had had with Christine on stage. He was terrifying. Up this close, he was the most horrifying being there ever was.

"Meg Giry. Do what do I owe this great pleasure?" He took a step closer. I could feel my knees trembling and beginning to knock together as they always did when I was scared.

"I'm uh," was all I could manage.

One large hand lifted as though he would strike me.

"Here to see where you live!"

His hand went down. "Why?" The anger on his face made his eyes cold, like ice. He was no madman. He knew what he was doing. And that was even scarier.

"Because…I don't know why." I looked down at the floor. Relief surged through me at not having to see his face. My knees quit knocking together, but they were still trembling.

"Get out."

I looked up at him. He stared down at me with such blatant hatred. I turned fast and ran from the room. He walked over to a lever of some sort and lifted it. The iron mesh wall began to lift as well. I looked back and he already had his back turned to me.

I walked down the corridor and back to Christine's dressing rooms. Through the mirror I traveled back to a time and a dimension I much preferred over the phantom's. For the world of the light truly did seem so much different than what I had just experienced.

It was two days later and Mother had a severe fever. I took the day off from rehearsal though she told me not to. But she was terribly sick. Sweat beaded on her brow and she was completely bedridden. But she complained of being cold even though being within five feet of her you could feel the heat. I wouldn't leave her side for more than five minutes.

This fever went on for a week. I had to return to rehearsal. It was while I was dancing that the freak fever took her life and Mother died. I had never known such a terrible sadness. I had though missing Christine was bad, but this was the worst feeling I had ever had my entire life through. I felt like someone had ripped my heart out and then stomped on it over and over again until the pain was so bad I felt almost nothing. I was a void for the next two days when Mother's funeral took place.

It was when they lowered her coffin into the grave that the numbness melted away and I felt the pain all over again. The tears were so bad and so powerful that I actally crumpled to the ground and one of the danseurs had to carry me back to the opera house. I was folding up her dresses and putting them in drawers as carefully as I could when an envelope fell out of her favorite black dress. I unfolded the parchment within and looked at my mother's handwriting. The letter was addressed to me.

Meg,

I know you've found this soon after my funeral. I need you to do me a favor. Two actually. The first is that you must go on. Grief cannot take over your life, you know that I've taught you that and you must put all that I've taught you to practice now. I also need you…and here my daughter, I cannot take no for an answer to take over for me. I need you to take care of the phantom. He will not like it and I know he would be violent if there was no explanation. I have not been able to take him his meals for over a week now. He must be starved. Show him this letter when you go down there and he will not be violent toward you. You must be his keeper now. I am so sorry to put this burden on you my daughter. But it must be done. I love you,

Mother