Approaching the heart of this watery labyrinth, I hear the sounds of argument. Thank God Christine is still able to argue. I go as fast as I can, the weight of the blasted water slowing my feet.

I can see them. He's touching her. God help me, if Christine wasn't between us he would be dead already. Christine's in a different dress. My God, it's a wedding dress. What has that thing done to her?

He sees me. This Phantom's even more hideous than I could imagine. How many has he murdered just for seeing his face? My brave Christine, my brave stupid Christine. How did we get to this point?

And then he's got her by the neck. That maniac, he doesn't even realize it. He's going to kill the one thing we both love, if you can even call his twisted obsession that, and he won't even realize it. What can I do? I feel like I'm drowning, like time has slowed all around me and I can't move, I can't breathe, all I can see is Christine in pain. That bastard. And then he let's her go. He tells me I can see her. Does this thing have some soul after all?

As I run to Christine, wanting more than anything to protect her from this monster, a realization hits me.

This is my fault. This is all my fault.

I should have listened to her. I should have taken her away the moment she started talking about her Angel of Music, no matter how crazy it sounded. I should have kept her in my sight every hour of the day.

I shouldn't have forced her into this hell-spawn's musical, into his arms.

But no, I was so entangled in my own desire to see him behind bars, or better yet, dead, that I put the only important person in my life directly into his path. I thought I could outsmart him, but instead I baited the trap with the woman I should have protected.

Now he has walked away with the bait, and as I listen to the sounds of the mob seemingly ages away, and feel my fiancé struggle to catch her breath beneath my arms, I realize we are completely, utterly alone. I am going to die, but not without doing everything I can to save Christine.

May I have God's forgiveness, because I certainly don't deserve her's.

So this is ungodly short, but I haven't writted in a long, long time, and I thought the best way to get started was to try my hand at some drabbles.

I've found the 25th Anniversary Edition of Phantom to be incredibly inspiring. Sierra Bogess is wonderful, and Ramin, while not my favorite singer, does a very good job of portraying the emotions that have always appealed to me in Phantom. In fact, the emotion was the biggest draw. While the movie is visually beautiful, the 25th finally does justice to the sense of urgency, danger, and darkness that I always felt should have been brought to the front.

For me, this was most evident as far as Raoul was concerned. I know Hadley's performance was met with mixed reactions, and I understand both sides of the argument. Personally, I loved him. I'm a huge Hadley fangirl to begin with , but this really cemented it for me. Is he at times condescending? Yes, however, he's also an aristocratic male living in a time when the way he acted was considered proper. Also, HE'S WRITTEN THAT WAY. In fact, he's been toned down from the original script. It's up to the actors to chose how much they emphasize that. But beyond that, it seemed like Raoul's actions stemmed from a fierce love of Christine, and a need to keep her safe. This is a girl who's already been through so much heartbreak in her life, and Raoul doesn't want her to have any more. While it takes him a while to be convinced someone really is pretending to be this girl's angel of music, once he has solid evidence before his eyes, his immediate reaction is to assess the threat so after it with guns blazing. I'm really drawn to Hadley's Raoul because he's not perfect, and in fact, at time's he's misguided, but he's doing what he's been trained to do to the best of his abilities.

So, if you read this, thank you, and sorry about that. I'm not good at expressing my emotions or opinions, but I just found this really inspiring. I'd love to hear your opinions on the 25th Anniversary performance. I might add some more drabbles to this depending on what feels like it needs to be told. Thanks for reading!