Note: this chapter may be confusing and strange, but i will CLEAR IT UP, i promise. and it's not that funny either. sorry...i tried... boo hoo. i feel the humor leaking out of me.

this story has now become humor-turned-sinister plot...

All the people in the world possessing sainity: twitch

I've made it a point to try and personally respond to all of your current reviews...if I can! Well, here goes! If I missed you this time, I will definitely get you next time! )

erikorlando'sgirl: hehe! I'm glad you like it! ) Is Chibi-Erik pleased? o ('cause I know he hates me, just as the REAL Erik does...)

Erik: damn straight! gives authoress a filthy look

Authoress: gives him an even filthier look

Erik: OO whoa, mask or not, I don't think even I can match that ugliness!

Authoress: Erik, you're a bastard.

Erik: bows

Authoress: but I love you ANYWAY! glomps him

Erik twitch I thought you thought I was a bastard!!

Authoress: I know! I do!! It's called unconditional insanity! eyelid twitches feverishly

Erik: ....AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!! runs

Authoress: follows him road-runner style off into the horizon

Erikorlando's girl: eh????

Hehe!! Forgive my random weirdness, friend!

Tremulousandtender: GOOD FOR YOU!! ALL MUST VALUE ERIK IN ALL HIS WONDERUFL-NESS!! I hope you liked the story!

MetaChi: Hehe, Cosette! Wait till you see! The thlot pickens! Bob the Chinchilla?? 0o whoa, I love you for being utterly nuts! gives you a mini Herman to take home

InnoscenTorn: Let me explain: Cosette is a character from Les Miserables, the famous Victor Hugo novel and musical. I recommend reading "The New Production" by LeMisLoony. It's terrific, and LeMisLoony uses the libretto from the musical and highlights it so you can follow along! I wish I could explain it to you, but believe me, it would take FOREVER!! (It's a waaay long book). If that is confusing as well (and if it is, I do not blame you) I can also recommend searching "Les Miserables" on google for a plot summary. Trust me, it's much easier that way than ME rambling on about it and giving you highly opinionated views of many of the characters. I hope that helps, and I sincerely hope that you like my story! ) I look forward to your reviews, and, oh yeah, UPDATE YOUR STORY!!!!

Elyse3: Oh, thanks sooo much! And about you not being as creative—I read one of your stories (and reviewed it too), and I do believe that you are VERY MUCH MISTAKEN!!! You are a wonderful author! All the same, I truly appreciate the compliment! And about your nit-pick...I blame you not for having it but...well, you'll see!!

Lady Solei: Oh! bows of that I am not worthy. Thank you!! And about me being thirteen? Yes. I am thirteen (quite unfortunately—I hate it! there's so much I CAN'T DO!!!!). In fact, you can get it confirmed (if you so desire) by "alucardshallbemysquishy", a fellow author on this site who goes to my school. We're both thirteen and completely rabid American teenagers. And you added me to the Recommended Reading thread? What can I say? I'm so flattered! ) Thanks again for the incredibly generous compliment! I hope I will ever be as good as you say I am!! : P Please keep reading!

Madame Butterfly: Now really. How DARE you tell me to update, when YOUR OWN REMARKABLY HILARIOUS TALE IS LEFT ABANDONED!?!?!?!??!?!?!? I shun you!! SHUN! SHUN! SHUN!! shuns you

Er, ok. With that outburst out of the way...

I really appreciate comments from you, dear! It's kind people like you that make straaange people like me feel worth it! And I return the 33333!!! XD. OH yeah, I also modified my plot summary (TO BETTER FIT YOUR POINT). Forgive me, I am struggling to get through my first year of high school, killing myself. So my updates are gonna be a bit shaky...but I still have a chappie brewing right this moment! pats head

Madame Butterfly: 0o

Hehe! Once again, thank you sooo much! Please keep reading, I really love and appreciate your comments! (I feel, by some weird cosmic force, we are both strongly akin!)

EVERYONE ELSE: a thousand and one expressions of my love to you, in virtual candy form.

And now, let the idiocy commence!

"Just three words," said Erik, drying himself with a towel that the lockjaw Nadir handed him, "aren't you married?"

"Well," said Cosette daintily, sitting upon the edge of Erik's bathtub and peering into the depths of it, "Technically. But not spiritually, emotionally, effectively, grammatically..." she checked each off with her fingers.

Erik shot Nadir a terrified look.

"I don't want to be committing incest," he whispered to Nadir, who shrugged.

"You won't be," said Cosette, trailing a delicate finger in the lukewarm water. "Please allow me to explain."
"Just one thing though," said Erik in a deep voice, standing up to his full height (which was exactly six feet and four-point-five inches), towering over the girl.

"Yes?" she stared at him through glassy orbs, slightly afraid, fully seduced.

"Can I put on a shirt?" he sheepishly inched away.

"What? Oh, all right," said Cosette, sounding as though summer holidays were cancelled forevermore.

A few moments later, Erik appeared in a shirt perhaps better suited on Raoul. That is to say, made with dashing scarlet silk and edged with black lace. He felt highly uncomfortable: in an effort to quickly wear a shirt that wasn't wrinkled (he was a fussy Phantom, and at the risk of sounding unfeasible, possibly even fussier than your mother), the only thing that the Phantom could find was this, clearly an emblem from the set of Don Juan Triumphant. He trudged into the seating room where Cosette was scribbling something furiously on a little notepad in the shape of a guillotine, and Nadir was watching her, apparently, with growing interest. When Erik stepped in, Cosette looked up in quiet confusion at his choice of dress. Nadir and Julio, however, made their horror a little more apparent.

"What the blazes are you wearing, mate?" demanded the Persian after a bout of incoherent sputtering.

"Is it so bad?" asked Erik, wishing very much that the red was not quite so sensuous.

"Like my seester in ze morning," said Julio as a vein on his temple flickered briefly.

"You look charming," said Cosette in an attempt to be amiable.

"Charming in a clown convention," muttered Nadir.

"I hate clowns," Erik whispered, highly offended, "But that's beside the point, isn't it?" Nadir gave him an anomalous look.

"Well," said Erik, sitting down on an austere, straight-backed chair (which could explain his excellent posture) and surveying the radiant Cosette through iridescent golden eyes, "What brings you here with your marital status, mademoiselle?"

Cosette watched him carefully.

"You know," she said, "There's a lot to explain."

"I understand," said Erik, nodding. "Please begin."

And she did.

Well, to say she did begin straight away would be a blatant lie. Cosette Pontmercy insisted on a plate of fresh coconut macaroons that Nadir was forced to steal (as stealthily as he could) from Ubaldo Piangi's dressing-room. Then she topped it off with a bottle of fine brandy straight from Erik's cellar and private collection (the gunpowder, he eventually decided, was leaving behind an appalling stench). Finally, when all the men were fully convinced that she was completely sloshed, Cosette began her explanation. She reached into her purse and pulled out a long piece of paper. She unrolled it on the lamp-table beside her, and Erik peered over her shoulder to have a look.

It was the strangest thing list he had ever seen in his life. In fancy, curly script on the top were the letters: "WWNMTBBSRPF".

"What on earth—"
"Shh," said Cosette. "Have a look."

Erik looked. Listed, into what seemed like infinity, were names of famous literary and musical characters. He gave a slight start when he saw his own name in the first column, across from which, in a second column, his name was connected to Christine's by a spindly little bar (he saw this and was instantly intrigued).

"Please explain this," he said. "What do the letters stand for?"
"WWNMTBBSRPF: What Was Never Meant To Be But Still Remains a Pleasant Fantasy," said Cosette.

"Ohhh..."

"This list," said the girl indicating List One with an elegant finger, "Shows the pairings that the insufferable composers and writers of great literary works have subject us, great literary characters, to."

Erik stared morosely at the blank space beside his own name in List One.

"But, cheer up," she said, "Do you really think fans would have it?"
"No," agreed Erik, "you should see the amount of emails I get daily informing me that I should go out with women, ranging from Christine all the way to Liv Tyler."

"Precisely. That brings me to the second column. These are the pairs most popular according to most fans."

Erik beamed at Christine's conjoined name.

"So what does this all mean?" he asked.

Cosette made him a cantankerous face that didn't look right with her elegant features. She pointed to a name, her name, in List One. It was conjoined with "Marius Pontmercy"."

"The literary pairing," she said with a sigh. Erik watched her finger move to the complimentary space on the next column. It was Marius' name again, but this time, it was attached (via spindly little bar) to the name, "Eponine Thernadier". Cosette scowled and showed Erik the picture of a very attractive young lady with lovely dewy eyes and delicate tendrils of chocolate brown hair. Her arms were linked with a gorgeous young man who, despite looking very handsome, had a slightly vacant expression on his face. Erik was strongly reminded of someone, but he couldn't recall whom exactly. The lady in the picture was smirking widely.

"Pretty little thing, isn't she?" demanded Cosette spitefully.

"She's quite stunning, I'll admit," Erik observed the fine-looking specimen in awe. "I say, have you any other girls in Les Miserables that I should know about?"

"Eponine Thernadier," spat Cosette, ignoring Erik, "She didn't really die, of course (I often fantasize, you might imagine), she exists still just as you do. And, for some reason, most the Les Miz fans insist that she and Marius are the dream couple. But Marius was mine!" she slammed a fist down on the coffee table with a surprising surge of strength, rattling the teacups and macaroons.

"Wow, angst," remarked Erik, "Something I've always admired. Good for you!"

Cosette turned her enormous eyes to Erik, gave a dramatic sob, and collapsed onto the sofa in a heap.

"Why, why God? What have I done wrong?" she wailed with in surprisingly good pitch.

Erik eyed his phan sympathetically. She was oddball in her story. Something he commonly associated with Raoul (although the latter did not earn his sympathy because he did not have a) a superb vocal range and b) an excellent body, like Cosette).

"Cherie, please go on," he said in his best nice-person voice (he was working on it). He sat down beside her and dared to pat her on a woebegone but manicured hand.

"And so," continued Cosette with a loud sniff (Erik motioned for Nadir to hand him a silken hanky) "Technically I'm married to Marius, but I think he prefers...you know..." she cast a dark look at the photograph "her..."

"Wait," said Erik, confused. "I do not usually doubt my reading comprehension, but in a situation where an actual character from a literary work comes and refutes my theory...well..."
"What?"

"Aren't you the one he's supposed to be madly in love with?"
Cosette drew a shuddering breath.

"I was," she said, "And it was like that before. He was all over me!" She winked knowingly at Erik, who blushed, "and of course, the perfect, pretty little happy ending. But then she had to get herself all shot and banged up, and all of those fans jumped on the bandwagon. Oh, no more lovely soprano! Oho! Now they move down one step lower...to that...that...alto! You'd think they'd remember that it was me who scrubbed all of those floors in her house!"

"I understand the fan part," said Erik, "but I don't understand Marius."

"Marius simply adored me for a while, little fool," said Cosette snippily, "and then she came waltzing along, ruining my perfect magical life—"
"So she didn't die?"
"Die? DIE? Heavens, of course not! Things worked out for her. Some of her biggest fans were people who worked in the American Red Cross. Saved her life they did, didn't get a word of thanks out of her! And some of those idiots still drool all over her even though she's alive!"

"So eez ze Pope," remarked Julio quite randomly, "after I saved 'im from Dan Brown—"

Everyone paused from the proceedings to give Julio a highly strange look.

"Right," said Erik to Cosette, "So what's your point?"

"My point is" said Cosette in a businesslike manner, "I need you to do a favor for me."
"What?" demanded Erik, slightly aghast, "A favor? I thought you wanted to date me!"

"That too," said Cosette, "But it's more of a one-time thing."
Erik didn't like the sound of that.

"What I mean is," she said "If you do something for me, I can help you find and win your lady-love."

"Christine?"
"Yes."

"But...you're my phan—"
"And me going out with you and forging a successful relationship with you would go against all the clairvoyant forces of Phandom."

It sounded logical to Erik.

"Right. But why did you enter the contest then?"

Cosette sighed. She put a hand on Erik's.

"I like you, Erik. But things would have never worked between us, darling." She sighed. "I'll go on a date with you, for good politics. It shows that we literary characters like a sense of adventure. Our phans would be pleased; we're creating new territory that even phanphics haven't ventured into. Now, do be honest. Do you plan to have a relationship with me?"

Women were so damned confusing.

"And what is the exact nature of this favor?" he wanted to know.

Cosette slipped an ivory hand into her purse and pulled out a small green bottle upon which the words "Green Elixir" were engraved.

"This nature," she said, and put the bottle into his hands. "A certain someone's skin pigments are going on vacation for good."

Things were definitely getting shifty.

AN: I WILL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING IN THE NEXT CHAPTER! I PROMISE!!! PLEASE KEEP READING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!