Disclaimer: POTO belongs to Lloyd Webber, Leroux and Kay, and a bunch of other people, so don't sue me.
A/N: I've been swamped with schoolwork lately, hence the infrequent updates, but hang in there, fans! I'll be back with another update soon!
A/N2: I dedicate Kent to marauder16.
Chapter 12
A dark hooded figure trudged slowly through the rubble of the ruined Opera House, avoiding puddles of mud and rocks with an air of distaste.
The drizzle of fine rain that was falling left the figure's cloak speckled with sparkling droplets caught in the coarse wool.
A weak shaft of sunlight slanted through the crumbling rafters, catching the figures' tousled blond hair. It paused, and a hand appeared beneath the dark material of the black sleeves, and pushed back the hood.
A man was revealed, but on closer inspection, he looked more like a young boy. In actual fact, he was twenty-eight, but retained his boyish features. His hair was blond, flecked with a sandy brown colour, and his eyes were almost inhumanely blue.
His features were fine; he had a fine nose, pouting lips and thin brows. He wasn't especially tall or muscular, but he exuded a physical strength one couldn't explain.
When he walked the streets of Paris, many young Mademoiselles peered at him from behind fans and beneath parasols, so figuring he was fairly attractive, he had a healthy ego.
Here though, in the shadows of large chunks of masonry, there were no pretty maidens to stare at him and giggle girlishly; here he was completely alone. Or so most would think.
This man knew of the Opera Ghost. He knew about him and his ways. Most importantly he knew the story of the Ghost and the little Chorus Girl-cum-Prima Donna.
In the Populaire's heyday, the man had been an usher. Only fifteen at the time, he had worked for pittance and loved his work. The dazzling beauty of the Operas and Ballets staged there had amazed him and captured his imagination.
The Masquerades at the Opera Populaire could only be described as spectacular, when the crème-de-la-crème of Parisian society had come to the Balls for a night of reckless, anonymous fun.
Many times he had longed to be out there, with a mask and a smart suit, twirling and dancing with the sweeping music and pretty girls.
He even remembered the fateful New Years Eve Ball that the Phantom had crashed in his impressive Red Death costume.
After that particular incident, the 'Phantom' drew his attention, and held it. As the Opera House burned to the ground, the boy had found Madame Giry and followed her home that night, as he had no place else to go. He ate and slept in the Opera, too poor to buy lodgings in a hostel or hotel.
In the early hours of the morning, following many strong wines on Madam Giry's behalf, she told him all. The whole story, to the night they sat amidst.
He had vowed to destroy the man who had brought down the Opera House, the place he had made his home and the place he had lived for much of his life. He had loved the place like a sibling, and it was gone, never to return the same as it once was. In the fire he had lost many friends and acquaintances, and what kind of man kidnapped a young girl twice?
He deserved to die.
Now he returned to France from his homeland England, an established stage actor. He had been gone for the better part of twelve years, working his way up in the dirty streets of London from lowly sweeper-boy in a theatre to its star actor.
Walking the halls he had walked as a boy brought back eerie and happy memories, as well as mixed feelings.
Given, the walls were mostly non-existent, the floors crumbled, but he still recalled every turn in the passages, every flight of stairs, every door.
He flicked his golden hair from his eyes, and ran a hand down one of the few remaining door-frames remembering the room it had lead to.
Beyond it had been an abandoned dormitory, the place he had smoked his first stolen cigar with the other young boys of the Opera, and the place he had had his first encounter with a girl.
He smiled as he recalled the dim light, the tossing sheets, and later, the jeers and wolf-whistles of the other boys.
He continued down the corridor, trailing gloved hands over the walls and banisters, touching wall-mounted candelabras (the parts of them that remained, at least) and cracked picture frames.
Coming out into an expanse of empty space, he recalled this was once the back-stage dressing room corridor.
A malicious smile crept slowly across his set lips.
"Erik- wait!" Leah cried haltingly as she followed him out of the black and silver gondola, hauling her white skirt along behind her, huffing angrily as it got caught on the embellishments on the bow of the small boat.
Erik rushed on ahead of her, moving silently and quickly with his ears still pricked to the roof of the underground passage. Clearly, he could still hear whoever or whatever was up there.
Leah heard a loud rrrrrrrip as she gave the skirt one last tug. She stood stock-still, eyes wide, waiting for the hurrying figure ahead of her to turn and rebuke her for the damage, and to lecture her on being more lady-like.
No such reprimand came, Leah giving a slight relief-sigh and at the same time realising that whatever was wrong must be serious to Erik.
She hoisted the hem up, and ran as best she could, skipping over small stones in her bare feet.
As Leah reached the last turn of the passage, she was just in time to notice the whip of black material around the bend, leaving the candle-flames flickering.
"Erik," She hissed, peering into the gloom below the trap door, seeing nothing.
"Here… I am here." He whispered back, and she saw a hand extended from the step just below the door.
She went and sat beside him, she could just see the glow of his white mask in the light shafting down from the gaps in the mouldering wood of the trapdoor.
"Who's up there?" She squeaked.
Erik unhooked the door's latch, and lifted it slightly, looking out into the drizzly day furtively.
He let the door close silently again, without a word, and beneath his cravat she saw his throat bob as he swallowed.
"It's a man." He murmured.
Leah rubbed her hands together in mock enthusiasm, "Are you gonna go crack him open a nice can of Opera Ghost?"
"I… I will." Erik knew the man's face, he was sure of it, and he could read in his stance that he was confident about himself. Something about the situation and the man's air made Erik's skin crawl with wrong.
Leah registered this reluctance and unwillingness in the Phantom, so different to his enthusiasm of mere hours ago.
"What is it?" She asked uncertainly.
Erik paused, thinking, before seeming to come to a decision. "Nothing. Nothing is wrong. Just promise me something," He said.
Leah nodded wordlessly.
"Promise me whatever happens out there, you will not come out." He placed a black-shrouded hand over hers.
"Sure, I'll let you have your moment." Leah said, examining his half covered-face closely.
"Thankyou," He murmured, and leant in for a kiss.
Leah's lips met half warm skin half cold mask, and she let her eyes slide closed.
He pulled away at last, and smiled at her through the darkness.
"Go get 'em tiger," She whispered to him, grinning. Erik's brow furrowed, but he passed it off a just another modern quirk.
He lifted the trap-door and eased his graceful way out. It was odd how Erik could make even the most menial and dirty gestures and actions seem so beautiful.
At the last moment, as he still held the door in his hand, Erik turned with the parody of a severe look on his face. His eyes twinkled playfully, "And Leah, I do not know how many times I've told you, but please be more careful with your attire." His eyes flickered to the rip in her skirt which the weak daylight had illuminated.
Erik let the door fall, and it clunked closed with a muffled thump.
Leah's stomach turned over at the peculiar finality of the moment, and sent out a silent prayer to follow Erik into the twilight.
The man came to a halt at a chipped marble column, reading the faded French script on a sign with trouble.
"Prima… Donna." The man looked to the left, noticing slight movement among the piles of rubble, slight but noticeable.
He came out from behind the column, standing in full view of the ruined room.
Psyching himself up to call out to 'The Ghost', the man took a deep breath, but the breath was halted in his windpipe as a figure seemed to rise from the ground in the sudden mist.
His gasp was audible even through the wiping wind, and Erik smiled, pleased at the sudden but inexplicable appearance of the fog.
The man quickly regained his composure, setting his stance and he called, "Come out of the shadows, Ghost. I know what you are."
Erik was slightly taken aback, but he could deal with the cockiness of a young Parisian. Though this boy didn't have a native accent… It was strange, sharp, jarring. Erik guessed at English.
"Who dares call the Opera Ghost from his eternal slumber?" Erik called out in his resonating voice.
The man could have stumbled from the power of that voice. It was everywhere, inside his head, in front of him, all around him. It was compelling yet forbidding, he felt as if he should run away, but he was drawn into that sound.
In his own voice that wavered much more than he would have liked it to, he shouted back, "I come for you; it has been my mission for many years to come and destroy the one who destroyed my life…" The words sounded hollow and stupid now he said the out loud in the presence of the commanding voice.
"But young man, your life has not been destroyed, you are an actor- and a good one," The voice purred.
The man watched the shadowy figure dart from where it had been standing to scale a pile of stones. How had it -he- known that? He asked it in a voice that still shook slightly.
"The Opera Ghost knows many things, Kent Surrige," Came his cryptic reply as the figure crouched on the rock-pile.
Kent was startled at the use of his name, even though he knew now he should expect anything from this spectre of a man. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, struggling to grasp the situation when the Ghost continued.
"You move like an actor should move on the stage, your hands are never completely still when you speak, and your diction is surprising, it far surpasses that of any Englishman I have ever had the pleasure of meeting."
Kent would have felt complimented had he not know that his acting ability paled beside that of the shadowy figure swirling around in front of him. Suddenly, for a fraction of a second as the mist between them thinned, he thought he saw the glint of a white mask adorning the figure's pallid, sunken face.
"I know that you are a man," Kent repeated.
"Ah, but can you be sure?" The ghost rumbled mysteriously, rising and leaping to the ground with barley a sound and catlike grace.
Erik was enjoying this, but he had to give the boy credit, he was brave and persistent.
He threw out his arms as he walked forward as if to embrace the boy, making his cape billow impressively.
The man, or Kent, actually took a step back as Erik came towards him, with fear in his bright blue eyes.
Kent took in the advancing figure, the mist clearing enough that he could see the Ghost in all his glory. He was tall, six-and-a-half feet at least, with dark clothing, a formal suit and neatly tied cravat. His imposing outfit was finished with a long cape, made of some light material.
Kent was dwarfed by the Opera Ghost, and now he was all too ready to doubt the words of the intoxicated Box Keeper. Maybe it really was a ghost standing only meters from him; maybe he really had perished in the great fire like so many others.
"You are flesh and blood, just like me, and you will bleed…" Kent said quietly, more to reassure himself of this fact than to inform the 'Ghost' of it.
Kent dipped his hand into the dark wool of his cloak and drew out a pistol, its barrel shining silver in the weak light.
Erik saw the pistol and had to hold himself from baulking. He was not close enough to grab the weapon, but he was still close enough to know it was real and loaded.
He made and exaggeratedly elegant stage gesture with his hands, as if to show he had nothing to hide. "What is the use of killing one who is already dead? Do not waste your bullets, Kent." Erik looked into the sky as light rain again started to sprinkle.
"I can still make sure…" Kent said uncertainly.
Erik faced the boy squarely, staring at him with what he hoped were expressionless, dead eyes. "Do you really want to kill someone though, boy? Why waste such handsome youth and what could be an excellent life rotting in a dirty French prison?"
Kent didn't know if the Ghost was speaking reason, trying to save him, or using manipulative skills to save his own life. Why did a Ghost need to reason though?
What the Opera Ghost said was the truth. If Kent was right, if the Ghost was really human, he did not want a murder pinned on him. But if there was not bullet wound…
Erik watched the boy with apathy, standing perfectly still. The boy seemed to come to a decision, and looked up from the gun in his had with uncertainty.
Then Kurt levelled the pistol at Erik's chest, "You are just a man in a costume," He said with more confidence than he felt.
From somewhere behind Erik there came a gasp, a strangled sob, and Erik prayed that Leah would stay hidden. The Phantom had never dreamed it would come to this, but deep down he knew that he had known it would all along.
Kurt cocked the pistol, and at last the emotionless face behind the white half-mask cracked, fear and regret entered its eyes.
Erik had no time to wonder about the regret, and at the last moment Kent moved his aim from the 'Ghost's' chest to a piece of the room's masonry that still stood.
Before Erik even had a chance to pull the Punjab from his side, the piercing and deafening sound of the gun-shot echoed around the partly closed space.
The shot jarred Kent's pistol arm, and sent him reeling.
The whole scene seemed to slow down. The heavy ceiling stonework fell slowly with a sound like the sky ripping open, Kent righted himself slowly, his pistol-arm lowered slowly. Erik looked up slowly.
The stone crashed down, shrouding the entire area in brick dust and filling it with the sound of crumbling rocks.
Then there was silence.
Kurt coughed, breaking the hush as the dust cleared sluggishly in the misty air.
He waited a long moment before the dust truly cleared, that moment was punctuated by crumbling rocks and sounds of falling debris. When he could, he saw carnage, and this was saying something when he was sitting amidst the ruins of a building.
The ceiling had collapsed as he thought it would, piling itself on the spot where the Ghost had been standing. Dust blanketed everything; Kent wiped it from his eyes and squinted at the rock-pile. There was no movement.
Then he though he heard something. He whirled around, trying to find the source of the sound… It had sounded like a moan…
There wan nothing and nobody about, but he knew there soon would be. Someone had to have heard that gunshot…
He pulled a small silver crucifix from beneath his clothes, kissed it then crossed himself.
"Au Revouir, Monsieur Opera Ghost," He whispered as he turned on his heel and walked quickly away.
Leah was numb. She wanted to cry, she did, but it seemed beyond her abilities.
She wanted to sob at the pain of having her heart ripped from her breast, but she couldn't make a sound.
She had dropped the Trapdoor when the thunderous sound of the ceiling falling had scared the hell out of her, so she had not seen the entire event. But when she opened it again to see the dust clearing, she could see unmistakably what had happened.
Now she sat in the dark rocking back and forth, her arms hugging her knees to her chest and a long, low moan escaped her lips. It was almost inhuman, and she stopped it short as she remembered the man outside.
Pulling her long hair away from her face, she refused to let herself think He was dead. He wasn't, He was the Phantom, with reflexes like a cat, and perceptiveness that was unmatched. How could he have been crushed by a pile of stone and mortar? The materials he had devoted so much of his life to?
She couldn't go out there though, even when she heard the man leave, she couldn't bring herself to face the final demise of the one she loved so much, the one she had lost.
But he wasn't dead, was he? No, he was hiding out in the building site somewhere, making sure the man was well and truly gone.
Then there were numerous sets of running footsteps echoing above her and she froze, barley breathing. There was a jumble of voices, and feet pacing around the room over her. A loud voice suddenly cried, "Clear off, no one should be here in this Death Trap of a place. A part of the roof collapsed, that is all. Now get back to work."
The footsteps retreated in a series of huffs and grumbles, and Leah looked up silently, her eyes still somewhere between denial and overwhelming grief.
When she was sure they were all gone, she gathered together all the scattered shreds of courage she still had left, and lifted the door.
She scrambled out of the gap, and did not stop to pull it out gently when the trailing tatter of her skirt snagged in the closed Trapdoor. She no longer cared.
All she could think about was getting to the fallen rock, and proving to herself he was not there.
She put her hands on the cold hard stone, and tried to shift it. "Erik?" She whispered, her voice sounding weak and empty.
There was no answer, and Leah threw her back against the largest of the rocks on top of the pile. It was heavy and unmoving. Leah picked up a small rock and hefted it against the closest column with a furious cry. Hard.
The rock shattered into a million pieces on impact, and Leah slumped down to the ground, letting her back slide down the cold, harsh stone.
She was angry at her pathetic weakness and inability to do anything. When she thought that it was possible the one she loved might be lying entombed in stone only a foot from her back, she almost vomited.
Leah leaned over and wretched and she banished the thoughts almost as quickly as they had materialised.
She looked up into the sprinkling rain, letting it soak slowly into her hot face. The water of the rain replaced what should have been tears.
It felt as if she was cursed that whoever she loved would die. Her mother had been ripped from her, albeit not suddenly and now -she swallowed- Erik was gone.
The words were bitter, final, like three stones dropping into her gut. She felt weighed down, as if she could never get up.
She could sit here forever in the soft rain, inches from him yet miles away, and in time, she told herself, in time the pain would fade.
Then a saline drop joined the pure rainwater on her face. She cried.
Long heavy sobs shaking her body, the tears finally came. For the Opera, for her mother, for her life in the Modern World, for Erik.
Leah struggled blindly to her feet, her sopping hair sticking to her face, and stumbled in the direction she hoped the Trapdoor was.
She tripped on rocks and nothing, she was not with the world enough to notice or worry. At last Leah tripped and fell, and landed on what felt like wet wood. She scrabbled in her personal darkness for the latch, and collapsed wet and dripping into the true darkness of the doorway.
Her lungs ached from breathing deep the cold air, and her clothes were dirty and torn. No Erik to tell her off now. Never again.
Fresh tears flowed, and she did nothing to stop them. He deserved them. She owed them to him.
It was her fault Erik was gone; she should have stopped him, she should have asked him about the man. She should have asked him, begged and pleaded him to stay.
Now she knew what would happen to her love if he went into the world above, she would have gotten on her knees and beseeched him to stay in the Lair. She would have tied him down with his own rope, and covered him with kisses if he had refused.
Leah picked herself up again, and almost crawled to the underground lake.
It was beyond her how she mustered up the strength and coordination to punt the gondola all the way to the shores of the Lair. But all she could think was what if… What if she had pleaded? What if Erik had stayed and the man had come down to the Lair to murder them both?
It was her fault he was gone, she was the only on who could have saved him, and she had failed. What if she could go back in time?
Now Leah's thoughts were jumbled and didn't make sense. Not even she could comprehend or translate them anymore. She screwed up her eyes to clear her fuzzy vision, and peered closely at a sheet of music propped up on top of the organ.
It was freshly written, the black and red ink glistening on the yellowed parchment. The first few words on the page under the music were 'I love you', written in Erik's curling hand.
The music written there had been crossed out many times, but finally a relatively simple looking tune had been inscribed.
Then she found a familiar looking name on the corner of the sheet. 'Listen to the Music of the Night, Leah. Listen…' was written in the same elegant cursive script.
Leah's lip quivered and more salty drops coarse their way down her cheeks as she listened, and caught the quiet echo of music in the cave. It wound its way down from the roof, settling around her as in her sadness she was engulfed by the simple, happy, tinkling tune. The last tune he had played before leaving her…
Leah stumbled up more stairs, God, did they ever end? And fell onto the red-silk swan bed. She was so tired… so exhausted.