Later that day, Mattheau was watching Fèlicie's ballet practice from a balcony in the theater. He had been watching for a few minutes, and was very impressed at how good Fèlicie was. Suddenly he heard a light clicking noise that kept repeating in a pattern. He turned and saw a woman walking up to him on the balcony...with a cane. The woman wasn't elderly, or even severely disabled. In fact, she looked relatively young, Mattheau thought. The woman joined Mattheau on the balcony and watched Fèlicie's practice with him.
"Um...can I help you?" Mattheau asked her. The woman simply sat down next to Mattheau and rested for a moment before answering. "I am Odette," she responded. "I've been practicing ballet with Fèlicie for the last week, and I thought I'd come to see how her practice went." Mattheau understood what this woman was doing here now and felt a little ashamed at how he was rude. "I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say it so harshly-" he began, but Odette held up her hand to quiet him. "It's alright, it doesn't matter," she replied. "But might I ask, what are you doing here?" Mattheau shrugged and gestured towards the stage down below. "Same as you, watching Fèlicie's practice," he answered.
Odette nodded and turned her attention back to Fèlicie, proud at how well she was doing so far. Suddenly the theater doors slammed open and Camille stormed in, followed by a tall, sinister woman who Mattheau recognized as her mother. Camille rushed right up to Merante, who had been observing and critiquing Fèlicie's practice, and pointed a finger in his chest. "How dare you not give me the part at the audition?!" She demanded. "I'm far better than this street rat will ever be!" She cast an angry glare at Fèlicie, who had stopped dancing and was watching Camille's outburst.
"Really? Care to prove it?" Fèlicie asked. "What are you suggesting?!" Camille sneered in response. "Dance battle. Right here, right now." Fèlicie challenged. "Unless you're too chicken..." Mattheau was on the edge of his feet, he was so excited to see what would happen next. Camille folded her arms and tried to hide her embarrassment. "Of-of course not!" She replied. "I'm willing to take you on anywhere, anytime!" Mattheau was just settling in for what he knew would be a good show when the two ballerinas began their heated dance competition. The only regret Mattheau had...was that he didn't bring popcorn.
The dance battle was fierce, fast, and lasted nearly ten minutes. So far, it looked like Fèlicie was winning, since she had been able to perform moves that Camille hadn't. Mattheau was almost certain Fèlicie would win when suddenly she tried to perform a leap and landed on her leg. Now Mattheau didn't know much about dance competitions, much less about ballet in general, but he had a feeling that Fèlicie's error wasn't going to end well.
Apparently, Fèlicie's mistake was somehow enough that she lost the competition, and she looked devastated as she sadly walked off the stage. Mattheau sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. He knew that now Fèlicie would never hear the end of Camille bragging about how much better she was at dancing. It just wasn't fair to Fèlicie. Mattheau looked over and saw Odette had covered her mouth in shock and looked just as upset as Fèlicie. An accurate reaction, Mattheau thought.
Suddenly the sound of screaming rang throughout the theater and Mattheau's hair stood on end. As earsplitting as that scream was, he could tell it was Fèlicie's. He looked over the balcony railing and saw Camille's mother dragging Fèlicie up the aisle by the arm towards the doors. Mattheau felt anger and hate swell up inside him, and before Odette could stop him he bolted across the balcony and down he stairs, throwing the theater doors open and frantically looking at for Fèlicie. The sound of screaming once again alerted Mattheau to Fèlicie's presence, and he saw that she was locked in the back of a carriage. He heard a whip crack and saw horses start to pull the carriage away.
Mattheau started running after the carriage, eventually breaking into a sprint as it grew farther and farther away from him. He realized he couldn't keep up with it forever, and as a last ditch effort, he picked up a rock and threw it as hard as he could at the carriage. Despite the fact that what he did was illegal, Mattheau's distraction DID get the carriage to stop long enough so that he could read its identification number: 1F0R-35T1
As soon as he had the number memorized, Mattheau sprinted away, determined to rescue Fèlicie once the carriage driver had stopped looking for him. He ran down alleys, through side streets, and across plazas until he was finally safe in a tall tree with thick branches that would hide him. "I'll wait here until dusk," he thought to himself. "Then...I find Fèlicie."