A/N: Okay this chapter is gonna be from Erik's POV! Yayyy! BUT! That doesnt mean this chapter is gonna be all happy and cheery. Quite the contrary, my friend..:secretive smile: its fairly short, but it doesnt matter. anyways...read and

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Chapter 5: His Regret and the Unexpected Visitor

It was over. It was all over. His music, his passion, his life. Everything. He had truly lost Christine, forever. God, he should have just let her go on the night of Don Juan. In the three weeks she had been with him, it had done nothing but prolong her suffering as well as his own, and he had known that eventually he would have to let her go or she would die. Not in a mortal sense, but her soul would be gone forever. So he had released her, and she had once again taken part of his heart with her, leaving the rest of it in pieces.

He slowly stood from the crumpled heap he had been seconds before, crying for hours after Christine's sloshing footsteps had faded into the darkness of his lair. The candles had all died out, and the lair was getting incredibly damp and cold by the second. The tears were still rolling down his face, but he no longer wiped them away, knowing there was only more to come.

Walking in a slight stoop, as if actually weighed down by his sadness, he slowly made his way to Christine's bedroom, roughly kicking the door open with the heel of his boot. All he wanted to do now was die, to lay down and never wake up. The pain of his mother's beatings, and the white-hot sting of the whip that licked his back every night when he had been in that accursed freak show, was nothing compared to the pain of seeing Christine leave forever.

He looked around Christine's bedroom, fresh tears already stinging the corner of his eyes. The room was a mess, as if Christine had been in a hurry to get away from him and the life she had been living. "Who could blame her?" he thought bitterly as he slowly walked around the room, fingering Christine's white hair ribbons laying scattered across the dresser that he had made for her, the only things left laying on its gleaming hardwood surface.

He frowned as he picked up a black ribbon from the dresser, completely out of place from the white ribbons. As he rubbed the material between his fingers, his eyes widened as he realized where the ribbon had come from.

"My roses.." He whispered, his eyes softening and a faint smile playing across his lips. She had taken his roses with her. The memories of him and Christine embracing on his organ bench, her clutching onto him for dear life, came flooding back to him as he sank onto the swan bed behind him. He closed his eyes, reliving that one small intimate moment over and over in his head. Dear God it had been so...perfect. But that was over now. She was with her precious Vicomte.

The smile left his face and the hardness returned to his eyes as he crumpled the black ribbon in his hands, dropping it on the floor before crushing it with his shoe. The anger was rising inside him as he went into a heated rage, kicking things about and running from the room with burning tears streaming down his face. "She's taken everything from me! My music, my heart, my soul, and yet I can not think negative of her, cannot think ill of her in any manner possible. God what is wrong with me, why have you cursed me like this my whole life? What have I ever done?"

He was screaming at the top of his lungs, hardly knowing what he was saying, his words finally dissolving into sobs until he collapsed in front of his organ, and softly began to sing.

" 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...You alone can make my song take flight..."

He slowly stood from his position as he noticed the mirrors located right in front of him, mocking him, taunting the ugly creature reflected in its glassy surface. He quickly scanned the room, quickly finding what he was looking for. He picked up the cold brass candle holder in his hands, and taking a few seconds to get a firm grip, he took a deep breath and hurled the holder towards the first mirror he saw, screaming at the top of his lungs:

"ITS OVER NOW, THE MUSIC OF THE NIGHT!"

He broke every mirror in his lair, finally dropping the candle holder and stepping over the broken glass, sitting down at his organ after relighting two candles on top of it. He began playing harsh and crude melodies, his hands flying over the keys, the lair echoing with violent notes that ripped through the whole of Erik's labyrinth. Every passage, every river, every cavern, every cave echoed with the intensity and power of Erik's music.

It overpowered even Erik, he was no longer playing, it was his music. His music had overtaken his soul, and all the emotions he had been holding back were pouring through his fingers as he continued to play until the tips of his fingers were raw and inflamed. The music surrounded him, suffocated him, went through him, it was the most strange sensation he'd ever encountered, and he wanted it to stop.

But he couldn't, his emotions wouldn't let him, they wanted release. The notes only became louder and harsher as Erik became infuriated with the fact that he was no longer in control. Finally his music quieted somewhat as the tears started flowing down his cheeks. God, make it stop! It was torture, this had never happened before!

What had Christine done to him? Finally, Erik let out a shuddering sigh of relief as his fingers stopped moving, and the horrifying music finally ceased. He had been playing for probably twenty-four hours, and he was sweating and shaking terribly. He had a horrible headache and his stomach was growling incessantly.

He jumped up from the organ bench, dashing as far away from the organ as he could get. He ran into his bedroom, slamming the door behind him. He closed his eyes, leaning against the door as he tried to calm his breathing. He slid onto the floor, dragging his knees to his chest so he'd have somewhere to rest his head.

He had almost drifted into unconsciousness when he heard a small splash from one of his passages. He was up in a flash, grabbing the Punjab from underneath his bureau and slowly slinking out of his door and into the shadows of his lair. He stalked along the wall, never stepping away from the shadows. As he reached the hidden passageway along the right side of his lair, he heard another splash coming up the passage.

He stood stock-still as the figure continued to slosh through the water, and Erik could tell by his ragged breathing that the man had been either running for a long time, or been drinking. "Probably one of those damn police" he thought with a smirk. Wouldn't this be entertaining. He fingered the frays of the rope in his hands, the memories flooding through him of all the unsuspecting (yet not quite undeserving) victims of Erik's Punjab.

Although it gave him a thrill to think he would get to kill another person who no doubt deserved it, he could not help but think of Christine's face as she tied Raoul's throat with his lasso, and his grip on the rope weakened slightly before Erik pushed her out of his mind and focused on his prey. Christine was out of his life now. He had to move on. He had to, as impossible as he knew that was.

Finally, the idiot was not two feet away from him, sloshing up enough water to soak Erik's cloak, and he resisted the urge to kill him and get it over with. He must be patient, he wanted to wait until he got into the light of his lair, so he could see his face. He always loved seeing the face of his victims as he killed them, such unsuspecting fools.

Finally, when Erik's impatience was finally at its peak, the stumbling man sloshed into the light of Erik's lair, and Erik's mouth fell open in surprise as Raoul ran up the steps leading to Christine's bedroom, running all about the lair, mumbling incoherent phrases to no one in particular.

He ran around the room, back and forth, getting on his hands and knees, feeling along the wall, flipping through paper and stray pieces of music. Erik watched the boy silently, ten thousand questions flying through his mind at once.

He studied the boy, who was quite obviously drunk out of his mind, covered in scratches and bloody bruises, and his clothes were soaked and almost black with dirt and mud. His hair was straggly and had bits of cobwebs and soot. He saw that his pants were torn at the knees, as if he had been doing a lot of crawling recently. His hands were red and swollen, and Erik felt his heart go cold as he spotted the ring on Raoul's left hand, identical to Christine's. His eyes were wild and crazed, and Erik felt slight pity despite himself for this poor man that he knew was slowly losing his mind. Had Raoul been searching, living in his lair for three weeks, looking for him? Is that what had caused this boy to lose his mind?

"Well, what a delightful honor, to be the cause of such a fool's insanity" he thought with an ever-growing smirk. There was no pity left in his eyes as he slunk away from his hiding place in the shadows, fearlessly stepping into the dim candle light of his lair. This boy would not hurt him, he knew, he probably would not even recognize him.

Raoul finally gave up and collapsed onto the organ bench, burying his head in his hands, and Erik froze as he watched Raoul's shoulders begin to shake unmercifully as he cried silent tears of defeat. Erik couldn't help but give a light snort at the absurd notion that this was the Vicomte de Chagny , Mr. High and Mighty, crying like a small child at Erik's organ.

But Erik's smirk vanished as he remembered he had been doing the same thing only minutes before, and felt heat rush to his cheeks as he slipped back into the shadows. He wanted to find out what the boy's purpose was for being there first, then he would kill him. He swallowed a few times, before opening his mouth to once again become the Opera Ghost.

"Who dares enter my lair, uninvited? What is it that you want from me?" he boomed, his voice echoing across the walls of the lair. He tried to stifle the snicker that threatened to surface as Raoul raised his head in shock, staring open-mouthed at the ceiling. Such an imbecile. What in the God's name does Christine see in him? His heart ached at this thought and he pushed it from his mind as he focused on controlling Raoul. "ANSWER!" he boomed, putting all the anger into his voice he could muster.

Raoul looked frightened, and his eyes widened in fear like a small child afraid of the dark. He looked down at his hands, as if he didn't quite know the answer himself. Then finally, a dawning look fell on Raoul's expression, and his face darkened as he no longer looked at the ceiling, but searched the shadows as if sensing Erik's presence.

"I've come for Christine." he muttered quietly.

XX

A/N: SOOOO... you like? Review pleaseeee! I'll give u all a big cookie if you do!