Author's Note: My first Phantom fic! ALW lyrics appear in this story as marker points so that the reader can see where the story lines up with the musical. This is something that came to me while watching the 25th Anniversary at RAH on Netflix, and just wouldn't leave me alone until I got it written up. I have no idea how long this will end up being, as it is still a work in progress.

Prologue

"You alone can make my song take flight. Help me make the music of the night."

And with that, Christine was asleep and dreaming of the man who inspired her music, protected her, and made her feel safe and loved. The Angel of Music faded into the shadows.

The next morning, Christine awoke, unsure of her surroundings.

"I remember there was mist, swirling mist upon a vast glassy lake. There were candles all around, and on the lake there was a boat, and in the boat there was a man."

Christine looked around, getting up from her slumbers. A masked man was working on something, oblivious to the world around him. She recognized him from her dreams:

"Who was that shape in the shadows? Whose is the face in the mask?"

In her naïveté, Christine playfully took the mask from the man's face. She thought for sure he was someone she knew – and that he was hiding from her.

"Damn you! You little prying Pandora! You little demon! This what you wanted to see? Curse you, you little lying Delilah! You little viper! Now you cannot ever be free! Damn you, curse you..."

The masked man showed Christine the deformity on his face – that which the mask had been covering. In his anger at being exposed, the deformity darkened to a purple hue, looking increasingly frightening as the man became more and more angry. As he looked at Christine, cowering in the corner, his anger changed to a desire for understanding.

"Stranger than you dreamt it. Can you even dare to look, or bear to think of me: this loathsome gargoyle who burns in hell but secretly yearns for heaven? Secretly, secretly… But Christine... Fear can turn to love! You'll learn to see, to find the man behind the monster. This repulsive carcass who seems a beast but secretly dreams of beauty, secretly, secretly..."

Christine looked back at the man, her heart breaking as she saw the tears in his eyes and heard the words he was saying to her. The man noticed this, and started to cry:

"Oh Christine. No, no."

He looked away from her, and began to inch away, realizing that he had frightened her. Christine looked down at the man's mask, lying next to her on the floor. Feeling terrible, she handed the mask to the man – a peace offering of sorts. He replaced the mask on his face and turned to her. Just as he was about to speak, she looked up at him and said, "What is your name?"

He looked down at her in disbelief. What a question to ask, that she, his angel, would ask him such a human question. That she, his angel, would see him as a human being – as a person – who would have a name.

"Erik."