A/N: I did not mean to be overtly grotesque with my description of Jack's surgery. I hope you all like who he turned out to be though!

~o~

Christine smiled at Raoul over breakfast, she cradled Gustave in her arms as she nibbled at the toast and eggs on her plate. Breakfast was always calmer when they took it at the small square table in the alcove of the chamber. The clear sunlight shining in through the windows.

She had learned that there was more to life than the darkness and the music she had once thought meant everything to her.

"We have a beautiful son."

"Because I have a beautiful wife." Raoul replied, giving her a charming smile. "I am the luckiest man in France."

"You can say that because your siblings are not here." Christine chuckled, "They would no doubt, still, chastise you about your decisions. When truly, how could you find a way out of this now? Not with such a family starting!"

"I would never dream of leaving you, child or not." Raoul reached across the table and offered her hand to his. She laid her fork down, reaching across to rest her petite hand in his palm. "I love you."

Christine beamed, she had found true stable happiness with Raoul. She couldn't dream of a better environment to raise a child in.

~o~

"Gangle," Erik started, "Your stitches are completely gone. You are perfect." Not all would say that if they looked at the man with a strange mechanical device protruding from his neck, or even if they saw the metal plating that coated the bottom of the chin, a second operation that Erik had devised to allow the sound to resonate clearer from his mouth.

"Perfection? Meg ran from me in fear when she first set eyes on me and I have not seen her sense and I am here, in their home."

"You will learn that those you love will often hide in fear. It's not that they fear you, they what they do not understand." Erik patted the man on the shoulder, pleased with every word Gangle spoke.

"You speak from experience?"

"That's why I am here."

"Meg mentioned your interests in forming a freak show on Coney?" Gangle questioned, glancing towards the bedroom door when he heard the main door open and Meg's distinct ballerina's scuttle across the floor.

"You will eventually find someone who will accept you for who you are."

"Mr. Y?" Meg called, knocking on the door and patiently waiting for him to let her in.

"What is it?" Erik asked, opening the door enough so that Meg could see Gangle.

"Oh." Meg glanced at Gangle before looking away. "This flyer," She flustered, producing a flyer that claimed incredible aerodynamics from the girls in the company. "I thought you my like to see a performance."

"Thank you." Erik took the flyer, rolling his eyes at such an American title. Sofie and the Chicks of Flight. "Gangle, we have a show to see." He pressed the flyer to the lanky man's chest.

~o~

"See anyone out there tonight?" Sofie questioned, pushing Amiee out of the way to look for herself. "Husbands or lovers?"

"Men who will make an influence on your life?" Amiee giggled girlishly, burying her face against her friend's shoulder.

"Perhaps one evening someone will be out there." Sofie dreamed, smiling goofily. "They love us, but they never show it! I just crave a little attention. I'm the star after all!"

"That could all change though." Louise commented as she passed, strutting as she owned the theatre they performed at.

Sofie shook her head, ignoring the woman's threat. She'd noticed a strange man in the audience tonight, one she'd never seen the likes of before. "Amiee, there's a man who is wearing a mask… How strange is that?"

"Is he with anyone?"

Sofie focused on the man seated beside the masked figure, she could barely see his face for a wide brimmed hat and the collar of his trench coat the hid his jaw. "I don't know."

Amiee shrugged, "Come on we need to get a little more glitter on!"

As Sofie and Amiee passed Louise, neither noticed the wrench in her hand or the scheming looks she wore. Neither knew that tonight would be Sofie's last.

~o~

Erik had been startled to find his first performance in America, marred with a disaster that surprisingly he did not cause. The woman, Sofie, he thought her name was, plummeted to the stage in a spiraling form of red silk and sparkling glitter. Her raven hair pillowed out behind her as she gracefully fell through the air. The grace ending as she crashed to the ground in a sudden shock of screams and panic.

There was no way that anyone could survive a fall and yet the petite woman made a vain attempt to save herself from the wreckage. Though from what Erik could see she was limited to the use of only her arms. Her legs seemed crippled and mangled beneath her screaming form.

"I can't believe my eyes!" Gangle gasped, "I must help her, I'm a doctor after all."

"Do what you must." Erik replied half-heartedly, waving Gangle away as he sought to make himself useful in the crisis. What use was he?

~o~

"Her legs are too badly damaged," Announced Gangle as he approached a patiently waiting Erik. "She will never perform again, much less walk."

"And her condition?"

"In and out of right mind. Perhaps you would like to look at her." He offered, gesturing towards his throat. "You seem to be the master of these things."

"You were a fluke."

Erik laughed coldly, "You expect me to hold some fleck of hope that I might be able to salvage a broken performers ruined legs?"

"Yes."

Reluctantly he rose from his seat, entering into the acrobat's dressing room. "It seems that our dear doctor has decided you a cripple. We aren't going to let him be right are we?"

"What are you?" Sofie asked through hazy eyes, looking up at the man with the mask that she had seen from the audience.

"A man."

"You can't fix me."

"I can." Erik insisted, searching the dressing room for the things he would need to form an apparatus to straighten out her legs. "You will soar once again high above the crowds. I promise."

"It won't happen." Sofie resigned, tears springing to her sore eyes.

"With a fleck of hope, anything is possible."

Anything is possible.

~o~

It was an arduous journey… From the first day when he place the constraining braces around her twisted legs, to when she began to learn to walk with crutches, to the day she found that one leg was capable of moving as it once had – while the other refused to obey.

He had given her a chance to live again. She was intrigued by his plans to extend his side show freak show into something massive and daunting. Something she readily agreed to participate in. She was also intrigued by the strange man who had given her the initial bad news. When she had first seen him he was hidden and when she saw him revealed – she found a beautiful display of human ingenuity and a passionate will to live.

"Gangle." She started, approaching the tall man hesitantly.

"Yes, Miss Fleck." He teased playfully.

"What would you think of a pair of freaks going somewhere nice for supper?" Fleck shied away, fearful of reject.

"I would like that." Gangle replied, feeling the liberation of exception sinking in through his pores. Did this fallen angel see him as a man and not a piece of machinery?

A/N: I hope you don't mind all of this formation of the freaks. I suddenly fine I want to bring them to life in this story! I hope you all don't hate me for it. Also, wtf, Raoul love? I love Raoul….