Disclaimer: I don't own anything Phantom of the Opera-ish; play, book, or movie. I only own my OCs, Celia, Kennedy, Kari, Tassy, and others that you don't know from the movie, book, or play.
Summary: After the Phantom flees through the broken mirror, he is sent to heaven, and is bestowed a task, in which he will have to be sent to 2005 to save a complete stranger from his fate. In such a task, he is given a guide; the Angel of Music.
Author's note: Okay, this is my first Phantom of the Opera fanfic. Yes, I know that most people don't like newbies, especially movie writers, but work with me here! Another pet peeve that I might notice is that most writers start at this point; post-Erik-entering-broken-mirror-passage.
Okay, that might be the only bad things I can think of (grins sheepishly).
History Repeats Itself
Chapter One
OoOoOoO
"Take him, forget me, forget all of this . . . Leave me alone—forget all you've seen. Go now—don't let them find you!" he spat through gritted teeth, putting his back to her, unable to face her anymore. "Take the boat; swear to me, never to tell the secret you know—of the angel in hell!" In a raging sorrow, he charged out of the water. He heard the splash of Christine's struggle toward her lover to free him. As she did so, he staggered into the curtained room where he had once laid her when she fainted. He couldn't remember what happened much after they left, until he found himself smashing mirrors, until he opened the passageway.
Erik staggered through the black secret halls of his solitary world, his legs barely supporting the horrendous weight of his grief. His face burned as his tears fell down his half-deformed face. He only faintly heard the angry mob splashing into his only home, ready to kill the murderer that had set fire to the famous and legendary L'Opéra Populaire. But no one will ever find him ever again. His life meant no more to him anymore.
Erik's soul was slowly draining out of his wretched, hated body.
Christine had been his only savior. She was his goddess, his pure, beautiful angel of music. The only human, dead or alive, that ever kissed him…let alone full on the lips. Christine was the only person that came even close to loving him. But she didn't love him. She could never love him. She loved that son-of-a-wench, Raoul.
A white-hot iron of hate scorched in his heart for a brief moment at the thought of the name, and then flickered into nothing. It didn't matter anymore. There was nothing he could do about it now. To bring revenge would bring grief to his beloved Christine. He could never do that. Not anymore. Even in his last attempt to capture the rapturous beauty, he could not wish any harm on the handsome young man if it would cause any kind of harm to her. It was like trying to catch the wind. Just as he thought he had successfully seized it, it would cleverly pull away and leave his hands empty.
"Say you'll share with me
One love, one lifetime . . .
Lead me,
Save me from my solitude.
Say you want me
With you here, beside you . . .
Christine . . . that's all I asked of you . . ."
He sang softly, half-moaning his love for his Christine. Erik hoped that, like Raoul, the music would once and for all entice her into loving him as he poured out his soul to her in the last minutes he saw her. For one moment, when she had kissed him, he thought that he had triumphed. But as he looked in her eyes, the only feeling he saw in them was pity. There was no love in those eyes. There would never be any love in anyone's eyes for anyone like him. Only pity.
"Christine…"
So many hopes and dreams shattered. Just like the mirrors he had demolished with the small golden candelabra. Despair finally overwhelmed him, and he fell and leaned against the damp, cold wall, just meters from his exit. Trembling hands supported his head as he put is face into them. Even his own hands unconsciously flinched from the frightening feeling of deformed, puffed flesh.
Erik then heard a muffled cry of triumph as someone obviously found the open passageway. Clicks and thumps of both lady's heels and men's heavy boots swiftly winded their way closer and closer toward him. He half-heartedly cursed himself when he remembered that he didn't close any of the endless labyrinths of hidden doors that led to where he sat, exhausted and mask-less. Finally, as faint torch-lights appeared around the corner, he gave up his life to whomsoever take it; Heaven, Hell, or to the ironic fate that would take his spirit and force it to truly become the Phantom of the Opera.
A bright flash of light and a rushing sensation filled his mind, body, and soul. Erik felt like he was blind, but instead of darkness, he only saw light. He unconsciously cringed from the intense whiteness.
PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, AS YOU SO CONDEMED THYSELF, a powerful, yet angelic voice rang in his mind. THOU HATH LIVED WITH DAMNATION FOR ALL THY EARTHLY LIFE. NOW COMES THE TIME FOR THEE TO FULFILL THY DESTINY. THROUGH THY TEACHING, ONE BEING SHALL BE SAVED FROM THY OWN EARTHLY FATE. THOU SHALL BE SENT INTO THE TIME THAT HAS NOT YET PASSED TO THEE. IF THOU SUCCEED IN THY TASK, THEN THOU SHALL LIVE FOR ETERNITY IN HEAVEN. THY SHALL HAVE AN ANGELIC GUIDE TO HELP THEE IN THY TASK. NOW GO!
With another rush, and a sudden darkness, Erik felt like he was falling through eternity. At last, he felt solid ground underneath his feet. Confused, dizzy, and his head sore for some reason, he sat down and tried to calm his racing heart. All he saw of his surroundings was a shadow of a staircase and a door beside him.
"What just happened?" he asked himself. Had he just been to Heaven? Was that God speaking to him?
No, a light, feminine voice said softly inside his head. That was the Archangel Michael. He is somewhat demanding. But, if you complete your task here, you will meet the Heavenly Father.
Erik uttered an exclamation of surprise as a young woman stepped out of the shadows and slowly, gracefully walked toward him. She had sleek black hair that just hit the small of her back, and dark green eyes. Her skin was a light tan color and, to him, it seemed as if she had a faint illumination emitting from within her. She was wearing a white blouse and a pair of strange blue trousers. As she stepped closer, he could see that the stranger was tall, almost as tall as he was if he was standing up. Erik's hand went instinctively to the right side of his face, to hide it. But when his had brushed molded, glazed wood, he realized that, somehow, his mask was in place. He also felt the comforting weight of his jacket and long black cloak around his shoulders. Feeling somewhat relieved, he asked the woman, "Who are you?"
I am the angel of music and your guide, she said in his mind. You may call me Celia.
"The angel of music?" he whispered, not daring to believe it. "But…it's just a myth."
Ah, but it is not…and neither am I, she told him, and the full power of her angelic voice filled his mind with a magical and musical lilt that could not be described. So I suppose that if we are to start and finish what you have been sent to do, I implore you to grasp that concept. She was now about two feet in front of him. She kneeled down so her eyes were level to his. It took him a few seconds to say something.
"Why do you not talk aloud?"
For a couple of reasons, she admitted, shrugging her shoulders. One, I'm an angel and therefore cannot talk to humans by their way of speaking. Secondly, to all humans, except for you, I am a deaf woman. Thirdly, I do not speak because the true beauty of music is in the heart. She touched the middle of her chest. She had an extraordinary talent of having all the expressions of a regular person who did speak. Not the mouth. You, Erik, the Phantom of the Opera, know this. Now... She held out a feminine, yet sturdy hand to help him up. What is it in your mind that is troubling you at the moment?
"What is my task?" he asked, as he got to his feet, pulling his cloak straight. "What year is it, and where am I?" Celia's eyes glittered with amusement.
For one so mysterious, you do ask a lot of questions, she told him, grinning. But to answer them, we will need to go upstairs. She took his hand and led him surely up a hidden staircase. As they winded upward after a while, faint whispers of a piano reached them.
"What is this place?" he murmured.
The Christine Opera HouseCelia said, sounding almost apologetic. As expected, Erik flinched as the huge grief sat once again on his heart. It is named after one of the greatest singers alive. A man named Raoul ordered one in France to be built after the death of his wife, and for it to be named after her. A few years later, the Americans decided to make a duplicate of the L'Opéra Christine. We are in that duplicate right now, the summer of the year 2005. A small community in New York City, to be specific.
"2005!" Erik exclaimed. "That's impossible!"
No, it's not. Look. . ."
Just as they stopped at a balcony not unlike the L'Opéra Populaire, Erik saw a scramble of older children, most in their late teens decorating the hauntingly familiar stage. Some adults helped onstage, mostly consulting with an elderly woman that looked like the director. There were also some kids scattered around the audience chairs, tuning instruments, singing, and dancing. They all wore the oddest assortment of clothing. Both the boys and the girls were mostly wearing the same odd blue trousers that Celia wore, and most the boys wore shirts that had bright colors and numbers on them.
Sport jerseys and jeans. The thought came so suddenly to his mind, Erik looked imploringly at Celia. She shook her head, showing that she knew his thoughts, but it wasn't her who spoke.
As you do your task, Celia said. You will unconsciously have the knowledge of this future world.
"Not again! Kari, come here!" the old, stingy-looking director demanded. The girl named Kari turned from where she was helping tape some obscure words to the stage. She was a beautiful child with a fair complexion and a thick ponytail of long, dark, curled hair. She wore a white, long-sleeved shirt with a red flame design and tight dark blue jeans. She had a calm and innocent aura about her. With a wrench to his heart, Erik was reminded painfully of Christine.
"Yeah?" she asked.
"Go find Kennedy. He has run off again!"
An expression of pity crossed the girl's face, but quickly disappeared. She then went in search of this Kennedy person.
"My goodness, with this whole audition, I need all the help I can get!" the director said exasperatedly. "Where is that boy? The audition is starting in fifteen minutes!"
She then started to mutter to herself and scold a couple teens that just happened to drop a very large sandbag from the rafters above the stage as a joke.
"I don't know why Mrs. Harrison is making us work on a Saturday," a light- haired boy muttered to a girl from below as they joined the cluster of others around the fallen bag.
"Whatever," the girl said. "Might as well get it over with."
Brian and Tacita, or Tassy, as most people call her, Celia told Erik mildly.
Tassy had a commonly pale skin tone, and dark, ashy-brunette hair that was cropped crudely to her shoulder blades. She was sturdily built, with broad, almost masculine, shoulders and was a little on the curvy side. She wore a tight black shirt with a strange, green "A" symbol on it and baggy black pants. Her dull, hazel eyes had been thickly bordered by some black kohl and she had spiky green and black earrings. On her wrist was a black bracelet with short metal studs protruding out of it. She had a strange air of jealousy and bitterness about her. Erik could sympathize with her.
"Well, at least we have nothing better to do, don't we?" Brian told her sardonically. Tassy rolled her eyes.
Come, Celia said, taking Erik's arm. He blindly followed her out of the balcony and into a secret passageway. In fact, the passageway was almost exactly like the L'Opéra Populaire.
They did quite a good job duplicating it, didn't they? Erik said more to Celia then to just himself.
The contractors went through a lot to get the exact blueprints of the L'Opéra Populaire. Raoul wanted Christine's opera house to be exactly like it. However they couldn't make it as big here in America, so now this opera house is only a fourth of the original's glory, Celia replied. It is used mostly for the annual play each summer…Here we are. Erik, stay out here. They stood in front of a door. Erik could tell that it was a hidden one because of the way it was hinged.
Celia then did a very strange thing; she covered both her ears with her hands. After about a second or two, she removed them and revealed a pair of flesh colored devices that wrapped around her ears.
Hearing aids, Erik's conscious registered immediately.
Stay out here. I'll be right back, she told him. She then opened the door and stepped inside the room. Erik pressed close to the door to listen to the conversation on the other side.
"Celia!" a young man's voice exclaimed. The boy's voice had a soft, richly melodic, baritone sound…and it was oddly familiar. "I didn't hear you coming." There was a pause.
"She is?" this time his voice sounded stressed, hurried. "Celia, I can't…" Another pause. The boy sighed. "Alright, I'll go. But if they start…well…you know; then I'm out." An even longer pause.
"Thanks, Celia. I'll try."
A few seconds later, Celia quietly opened the door and closed it behind her.
Who was that boy? Do you also speak to him with your mind? Erik asked her. Celia shook her head.
No, I used sign language, she told him. Again Erik understood what she said. It was truly the oddest feeling in the world, knowing something, but then…not. And that boy is Kennedy. He just needed some encouragement.
Now, her voice sounded businesslike. You must go, and then I'll be off.
"Go where?" he asked.
This Opera house, even though it is now being used as a community theatre, like I said, is entirely based on the L'Opéra Populaire she told him seriously. You know your way. I will meet you soon. We have a couple things to discuss. She then swiftly disappeared into the shadows.
As he looked about his surroundings, he recognized a familiar hidden doorway that he knew led to the most discreet escape to the outside. As he opened it and started down the dark passageway, he found that the corridor was drastically shortened. Instead of the usual five minutes of endless shadow, he found the familiar window in less then a minute. The sun was frighteningly small compared to the freakishly huge steel buildings that half-covered it. He guessed that is was close to noon. Chilled by the sight of this eerie future world, Erik quickly ran down the rest of the steps to the door that led outside. As he did, he silently descended another set of narrow steps down to what he remembered of the waterway that led to his hidden lair. But, instead of the sound of the steady flow of the river below, it was silent. Not even a comforting drop of water to disturb the silence. Only a river of stone stretched headed of him. But his intuition pulled him to keep walking, heading to only a faint of idea of what lay ahead.
As his boots thunked on the cold, hard rock beneath his feet, and as the shadowy, warm light from torches wrapped around him, comforting him, his heart slowed to an easier pace. However, it still ached excruciatingly and his stomach was still twisted in a knot. Over and over, as hard as he tried not to think of it, the image of his last moments with Christine played in his mind like a film.
As he was about to cry out in his frustration, he turned a corner to a wooden door. Slowly opening it, the doorway revealed a chamber. His chamber…his home. And to his complete surprise, everything was in place; the piano, the curtains, the candles, even the mirrors…everything. It was as if he had come back to his home just as he left it only days before…or was it now over a hundred years ago?
As he slowly walked around, inspecting all his belongings, his mind was bewildered by this show of extraordinary magic. No…it can't be magic. He has seen magic. Magic was slight of hand; an illusion. Now this…this could not be an illusion. How could this future world be explained? Perhaps he was going crazy. Yes. That must be the only solution. In his grief, he had completely lost his mind.
Oh, come now. Is that the best you got? Celia's mystical voice rang in his mind. She sounded amused, but then again, annoyed. Personally, I think that's an insult to be called an illusion of an insane person.
Erik just stared at her, his mind blank of any reply. She walked up to face him. He was right; she was just about as tall as him. Their eyes were just about level as she stopped just short of him.
We need to talk, she said in a serious tone. A little awed by this bold behavior by a woman, Erik followed her to the swan-bed room. Two armchairs were facing each other, set very close. Celia sat down in one and motioned him to sit. She gazed at him intently in the soft candlelight as he did so, hands folded gracefully in her lap. It made her look as mysterious as Erik appeared to be most of the time.
"You never answered my question to what my task is here," Erik pointed out.
I was saving it for after you've had a taste of your surroundings, Celia said calmly. But even now I can't tell you the entirety of it.
"So what is my task?" he replied, sounding a little impatient.
Michael told you that "through your teaching, one being shall be saved from your fate."
"What fate?"
The one you experienced before you were told of your task and was sent here. He stared at her, still not comprehending.
The fate of your love-life.
Christine's tear-streaked face plastered itself to his mind's eye.
"How will my teaching help? You do mean music, right?"
Celia nodded.
Yes, and tomorrow you shall meet your students.
"'Students'? I thought that angel said that only one being will be saved from my fate," Erik said.
He's right. You'll understand in time. And after we're done speaking, we'll go down to see the audition. Now, Celia looked very stern. About you impersonating me…She raised an eyebrow. He hesitated for a few seconds, but he kept eye contact.
"It's complicated…" Erik muttered. He felt awful, with him feeling so intimidated by this woman…
In case you still haven't realized, Celia told him, sitting in a way that her posture and her voice suggested, not anger, but authority. I am an angel. I am no mere mortal woman. But, if you insist, I will become less menacing.
However, she continued, her voice and face still solemn. Let me get something straight; you are not the angel of music. Erik, again, felt guilty, and he cast his gaze downward.
And neither…He felt a warm hand on his, and looked up. He saw that Celia's eyes had grown soft, and her musical voice, which had escaped her when it was stern, returned. …are you an angel in Hell. Believe me, I've heard of Hell from a very reliable source. What happened to you is NOTHING compared to it. Do you understand?
Yes," he murmured.
Good, she said. She lifted her hand and lightly touched his non-deformed cheek. Erik instinctively flinched away. She then took hold of his chin and gently, but firmly raised his face so when he looked into her eyes, he saw an unspeakably soothing compassion. There was also something else hidden in those deep emerald eyes; something ancient and beyond human comprehension. You are not alone.
OoOoOoO
Author's Closing Note: (sniffs) Yes, so very touching, I know. It'll get even more dramatic afterwards, too. Haha. (evil grin)
Please, review, but only constructive criticism, if need be.