Disclaimer: I do not own Phantom of the Opera nor any piece of it, much to my regret…if I did, it certainly would have ended differently. I tip my hat to Mr. Andrew Lloyd Webber for creating a musical masterpiece and Mr. Gaston Leroux for imagining up one of the greatest love stories of all time.

Prologue: The Point of No Return…

Christine gazed back over her shoulder at Erik as Raoul navigated the gondola through the canals of the lair. Her heart longed for him, yet her mind could not accept the enormity of his love. Her spirit shattered at his devastated face. She was sure that she'd made the right choice, despite her wild and sensual aching. Turning her face to Raoul's shoulder, she cried for him silently.

"I don't know how you can feel remorse, or despair for that monster," Raoul said gruffly, and Christine stepped as far away from him as the small craft's confinement would allow.

"He is no monster. He is forced to live in the catacombs of this opera house, watching the outside world from his dank shadows. It's a fate awful enough to drive any man insane," she protested. He laughed harshly.

"Exactly, dear Christine. He is insane. You would not be safe with him. You would become a monster just as he has. What life could he give you?" The flickering light exuding from the torches mounted upon the dreary stone walls played tricks upon Raoul's face, making him look more disfigured than Erik could ever dream of being. She stared in horror upon the man that she had chosen, and felt regret and fear wash over her in cold, sickly waves. Bile rose in her throat and she lowered herself onto the bench that rested at the bow of the small boat. She glanced back once more to see that the curves of the channel had blocked Erik from her pining gaze. Inside her head, emotions raged in a furious battle. She could demand to be returned to her angel, but that would surely send Raoul into an uncontrollable fury. In Erik's destroyed state, he was no match for Raoul's temper. She could by no means endanger his life in such a way. Raoul would never stop in his pursuit of her. He would be certain that Erik had cast some deviant spell over her, forcing her to give in to his demands. It was safest if she was concrete in her decision. She would sacrifice her love and her life for her phantom, and would live out her days with the Vicomte if such was required of her to ensure Erik's security. Her heart sunk slowly into the pits of her stomach as she pondered her idiocy. She'd been concerned for Raoul at the time, frenzied with a need to protect him, but in hindsight, it was very obvious that of the two men, Raoul was the most dangerous. Upon kissing Erik, her heart had soared beyond even what his voice had coaxed from her. She had felt tiny explosions occurring all through-out her body, and their second embrace was even more earth-shaking. She'd felt her knees go weak, and had sensed no repulsion upon pressing a hand to his warped skin. In fact, his deformity had disappeared to her completely, and she had never seen a more beautiful face than the one that wept above her.

Christine was broken from her stupor at the sound of an approaching mob. Fear clutched her heart as she heard the shouted words they chanted.

"Track down this murderer, he must be found." She'd heard them before, but never guessed they could find the lair. Yet it seemed they grew closer. She turned and clutched the pant leg of Raoul's trousers.

"They'll find him," she exclaimed. "When they do, they'll kill him!" Raoul bit back a bitter response as he gazed down into his true love's haunted face. No matter the torture he'd endured at the hands of the infamous Phantom of the Opera, he could not bring himself to say another harsh word about the man that Christine obviously cared deeply for. He swallowed his rage and jealousy and focused instead on his love for the girl.

"We can't stop them. I'm sorry, Christine, but they want blood; his blood." Christine was chilled at his words but felt hope at his tone. Gone was the man who'd frightened her earlier with his coldness. In his place was the Raoul she'd known as a child, the caring, loving Raoul that had invoked within her a warm and steady affection and fondness. "He is the Phantom of the Opera…I'm sure he'll escape as always," he offered as a condolence. Christine doubted this, for she feared that in his desolation he would be too weak to flee. However, Raoul was right. They couldn't stop the horde; they were best to just get out and hope for his flight. Still, even having accepted this voice of reason, Christine shuddered inside, and a single glassy tear slipped down her porcelain cheek.

Erik stepped through the shattered mirror, thrown into darkness as the curtain slid back into place, hiding the portal. His tears were hot and fast in coming, falling from his chin like rain. His fury had cooled and was replaced by an acidic sickness, a waning of his spirit and mind. He'd lost all resilience as he watched Christine and her lover disappear around the corner and drift away from his life for good. He cursed himself and all his anger. He cursed the mistakes that had resulted from that anger and the reaction they had caused in the eyes of his beloved. He remembered painfully the fear and revulsion in her gaze when he had brought her down into his darkness for the second time. Instead of the love and adoration of before, she'd seen upon his deformed face only rage and resentment. He was so pained, so utterly destroyed at her final betrayal that he had launched into a frenzy of madness. He'd allowed his wrath to overcome him, and he'd taken it out on the only human being that Christine had ever seemed to care for aside from her father. Erik's hate for Raoul was overwhelming, but he'd tried so hard to control it, for Christine's sake. Not surprisingly, he'd lost that inner battle.

Erik walked blindly through the passage he'd traveled so many times before. He knew the walls and the turns by heart; he had, in fact, assisted in the design. He allowed himself to sink completely into thoughts of desolation. His only love, his only reason for living was gone, never to return to him. No rejection preceding this, not even his own mother's disgust had broken him as completely as that kiss…a moments hope and then the cataclysmic truth.

"Christine!" His anguished cry resounded off of the walls of the stone tunnel. He heard his voice echoed back to him in weak ripples and fell to his knees. His only thought was escaping the opera house for however long it took for his pain to waver. Perhaps he would return, in a month or a year. He wasn't thinking of specifics. He was driven by an animalistic urge to free himself of his suffocating trap.

Rising to his feet with new determination and a plan, he finished the trek through darkness. Each step was a jolt of heart-wrenching pain, but he forced his mind to concoct a plan, a new mission for life. He forced himself to think solely of beginning anew. He avoided the inevitability, the certainty that he would never recover from his loss of Christine and he was undoubtedly sure that he would never love again. However, as he'd learned, hate was much more effective than love. Hate made you strong, revenge made you stronger. As he felt his heart harden, he stepped from the portal into the light and darted from the Opera Populaire into the cold Parisian night.