A/N: Okay, this isn't very Easterly, but I've taken a few days off of writing to read other people's work, but I found out something that I was disappointed with. The whole child birth thing of Erik's baby - why is Erik never involved in that? Why is he still rotting in his lair at that point? He can sense everything else, is always there for her in all the other important scenes. I just thought he deserved to at least look through a window. It's a different take that blends in with the movie's ending. Please R&R!

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters, nor the POTO storyline. Just my little plot. :)

Erik felt his chest constrict more and more as the seconds ticked on. Such great pain his heart could not hold. For yes, despite the popular belief of all but one, he did have a heart. A sensitive heart that was in the process of currently being shattered forever.

He raised his hand and clutched his chest as his heart lurched hard, as if it was trying desperately to keep two alive, when it was suffering enough to do the duty for one.

He figured it was another attack coming on from such great stress upon it, but he willed it away. Of all the times he wanted death, this was not one of them. Or perhaps he did. Perhaps he was secretly begging for death more than ever.

For as he glanced through the window, he sure felt like he'd die in an instance if it could only change what he was seeing.

Oh God...what had he done?

He had ruined her. Because of his selfish wants, he had destroyed her. He had lured her in to deception, driven her mad, was forced in the middle of a feud that made her lose herself completely, and now this. This...it was worse than everything before it combined. Because he was selfish, because of his foolish need, he had brought this to her.

...What had he done...?

He had murdered countless people. Haunted the wits out of others. Done unspeakable things and never thought twice, never regretted. But this...this he hated. Hated himself for. Hated the world for. Hated everything but her. Because all this time before he found out, he had tried to hate her. He had failed miserably. It was just something that wasn't in him. Something he couldn't do.

He looked through the window again, his heart leaping once more as he watched Christine grow paler and paler. She writhed and squirmed as the good Vicomte tried to calm her, saying soothing things but more likely thinking murderous thoughts, viscious and full of malice. And if he was, who could blame him? Certainly not Erik. In fact, Erik would have thought him less than a man if he didn't.

Christine stilled, her eyes going wide. Erik's face quickly moved closer to the glass in fright, desperately wanting to be by her side. A high pitch scream filled the air, but it didn't belong to her. Erik glanced over quickly to ensure his thoughts - a pinkish, small baby was tucked in to the midwife's arms as it cried.

"Congratulations, Monseiur. You have a son."

Erik shook his head. No, no Raoul bore no son. He had no blood heir. And he knew it. It was easy to see in the boy's eyes that he was struggling with this knowledge and also the knowlege that the baby was just that - an innocent, sweet baby that knew nothing of the pasts of the three important people that surrounded him.

Erik strained his neck, trying to look at the baby that was a distraction to his main purpose. In vain, he tried to see the new child's face, yet everyone's back was turned towards him. Suddenly, Raoul looked over at Christine and let out a cry of pure shock and misery. The midwife, along with the Phantom, followed his gaze to the pale skinned looking Christine with the shallow breaths. The midwife quickly put the baby in the Raoul's arms and hurried to try and save Christine, to find out what had gone wrong. Erik's knuckles went an odd shade of white as he gripped the window ledge, barely restraining his own cries. How badly he wanted in there! He would have given anything to be the one next to her. At least holding her hand, trying to comfort her would have been better than this sense of helplessness that he was experiencing. Rarely had he ever experienced helplessness before. This was new to him, and it was tearing him inside anew. As Christine's breaths became less, his grew more, as if her air was being transferred in to him. After a few minutes of working, the midwife looked up at Raoul and spoke her great apologizes. Erik couldn't hear any of this, but understood. Looking at his poor Christine, he found that his heart was no longer paining him. It was stilled. It was as if it was gone. Nothing left without Christine...

Suddenly he felt as if he had eyes upon him, and he looked instintively over at the Vicomte, who was indeed staring at him. Erik didn't look at him with anger, but with great grief, the pain inside showing clearing through. To his surprise, the Vicomte couldn't muster his fury for him at the moment. Instead, his eyes reflected Erik's as he held the baby still. He looked over at Christine, at the baby, then at Erik again.

Erik bowed his head, looking away with the sudden feeling he was imposing upon something very private, as if it didn't involve him after all. Perhaps this wasn't his place. He looked up briefly enough to see Raoul place a small kiss upon the baby's forehead, then looked away, vanishing. It was the Vicomte's way of telling him that he knew what the origins of this baby was, yet he'd ignore it and treat the baby as his own. Raise the boy in a proper home with a respectable name. He'd be a father to him, even ever knowing that it was not his blood that flowed through his son's veins, but Christine's, mingled with a certain ghost's.

Erik left the de Changy estate. No, this was no longer his place to see in to. But there was another that was not the Vicomte's. It was his own, though Raoul would go to it and tred upon it every now and then.

XXXXXXX

Raoul came to the gravesite a few days after the funeral. This time, he had left his son of six days with a nanny to visit his love's final resting place alone. But when he got to her headstone, he looked upon it in surprise. Instead of all the flower furnishings there had been a few days ago, it was all gone. Everything had been cleared but a single red rose with a diamond ring around it.

And then Raoul understood Erik's quick departure that night. He looked up, knowing somewhere Erik lurked. For though Christine may have belonged to him in life, he knew that she belonged to Erik now in death. This was not his territory. This belonged to another man's.

And it was with this knowledge that he placed the small monkey music box upon his beloved's grave and walked away with a heavy heart.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

--Fin--