Paul led Hope to the stage, past the light box, and down into a now familiar hallway where the fuse box was. He flipped it open, hit the appropriate switches, and then pointed.

'I've discovered where most of these lead to. The stage, the dancer's wing, warm up rooms, costume storage, storage of all sorts… but this set right here…'

'Do the blueprints have any notation for it? Any indication of where they might lead?' She pulled out the worn pages, flipped through them quickly.

'… I think we're missing the lowest levels.' Paul grimaced, looking over her shoulder.

'What? How can we be? I thought there were only 7 underground floors!'

'I think there may be as many as 10, possibly more.'

'How could we have lost three pages? And the front view 'print doesn't even show the belowground levels…' With a muttered curse, she sat on the floor and set her head in her hands. This could set them back weeks, months even! Most of the electrical work was done, but it had to be perfect. This place… it had been in her dreams for years! She needed to see it as it once was.

'Hope, it's not a major setback. With the way we've found this place, we can probably just ignore the bottom half. It's not like we've got people living underneath us.'

Hope looked up wearily.

'This theatre… it was built exactly from the blueprints of …oh, some Opera house in Paris. The Opera Populaire. I read about it in a book once, when I was small. Some crazy lady with tons of money was upset because the old one was being torn down. So, she took the blueprints, some things from the original stage, props and such, and built this.' She sighed.

'Kristine Beaumont was her name, I believe.' Paul intoned, looking thoughtful.

The air seemed to take a breath around them.

A flash of her dream visited her… that sad, broken voice! Christine… Hope shook it away. None of that, she couldn't stand it.

Paul offered her his hand, and gratefully, she took it. He pulled her up, and suddenly, they were eye to eye, suddenly very close. Hope's stomach clenched, and she turned away, dusting herself off.

'Well, master electrician, what's your recommendation? Can we continue on with the restoration without messing with the lower floors?' She said, cursing her suddenly trembling voice.

'I believe so. You can have your mother fully restore the power tomorrow. But… Hope…I wanted to…'

But Hope was gone, the door slowly closing after her.

'Damn.'