CHAPTER 7

"Great job, Gerry!"

"Good work!"

"You did wonderfully!"

Erik had never been praised half this much in his life. After only taking one day to film the final lair scene (which would have taken even less time if Joel didn't need to direct Emmy and Patrick in the right direction) actors and crew alike kept complimenting Erik on his acting skills. These skills, of course, were nonexistent since he was simply being his own insane self, but he was flattered nonetheless.

"Aside from the few blunders at the beginning, you passed the test with flying colors," Emmy said as she walked him to the makeup room, where some woman got to work on removing the prosthetic. Erik had no idea what 'passing a test with flying colors' meant, but it sounded good. Almost as good as removing that damn fake deformity from his face.

It took a lot less time to remove it than put it on, and within minutes, Erik was back to being as normal as any 19th century man stuck in a 21st century movie star's body could be.

"Oh that is MUCH better…" he sighed, feeling the now smooth side of his face. Emmy smiled at his relief, still amused by him.

"So you have the rest of the night. What do you want to do?"

He turned around with an excited expression. "Can I spend more time on that device you showed me yesterday? The one with the Google?"

"My laptop? Um…sure. What do you want to use it for?" she asked.

"To search information about myself on it, of course. Or strange, fictional versions of myself in books and movies anyway."

"And T.V shows, and musicals…" Emmy added absentmindedly. Erik gave her an impatient look and she sighed. "Fine, follow me."

Once at Emmy's acting trailer, Erik spent all night finding every version of his story ever made, with the help of a single YouTube channel. Emmy was getting rather bored, but Erik insisted she watch the videos with him.

After laughing uncharacteristically at another modern joke in a review for the Charles Dance version of Phantom of the Opera, Erik told Emmy, "Whoever is behind the Phantom Reviewer may not have a life, but he's certainly saved mine."

/

"What do we do?" Gerry said in a panicked whisper after the group of Phantom-hunters left.

"Move."

At this point, he almost started hyperventilating. "I can't just move! I have no idea where I am! I mean, I know where I am, but I don't know how this world even works! I don't know where I would go to hide or how to know where they'd be looking or what! And I know you're not going to be running all over the world with me, you don't even know me! I can't be on the run for the rest of my life for things I didn't do in a dimension that doesn't even ex—"

"GERRY. CALM YOURSELF," Christine snapped, gripping his shoulders and giving him a shake. He stared at her, blue eyes wide, holding his breath. She let go of him quickly and backed off a few inches, looking down awkwardly. After a moment, she looked back up at him, pointing a finger at him.

"You are going to be ALRIGHT. I am going to help you. I realize you are in distress but you must control your emotions. Panicking is not productive. If you wish, we will stay here. The lair is blocked off and Madame Giry will not reveal the secret entrance."

"How do you know that?"

"Because she is my only maternal figure and she was Erik's second closest friend."

"Second closest? What?" Gerry scoffed. "Ok, when I was playing his role, I HAD no friends. Madame Giry was sort of an assistant, I guess, but the Phantom was supposed to be the most forever alone guy in the world…"

"Have you heard of the Persian?" Christine asked, a small smile at the corners of her mouth. Gerry blinked.

"The Persian?"

"His name is Nadir Khan, but we all call him the Persian. Erik referred to him as daroga when he was telling me the story. The Persian is an undercover policeman and while investigating the strange occurrences here at the opera—during the time Lefevre was manager—he found the Opera Ghost himself. At first, Erik was going to kill him, but Monsieur Khan somehow convinced him not to. Erik tells me he is very good at bringing him sense—well, what he actually said was 'worming his pathetic morality into my mind and making me weak'," Christine said, rolling her eyes at the thought.

Gerry listened intently, leaning forward as if he would absorb more information. Clearing her throat, Christine continued. "Erik is a very lonely person, even if he does not admit to needing the company of others, and so it was easy for the Persian to befriend him, especially after he agreed to not reveal Erik to authorities. Now he is a regular visitor to the opera, partially for entertainment, but mostly to make sure Erik isn't being too much of a tyrant."

"I never knew any of this…maybe the Persian was a character in another version, but Joel told us not to watch or read any other versions so we wouldn't copy anyone in our acting…" said Gerry, scratching his neck thoughtfully. Then, they both turned their heads as they heard footsteps down below. Someone was walking onto the stage.

"Speak of the devil. Is that him?" Gerry asked eagerly, looking over the dark man who stood several feet below them, slowly scanning the stage. He was wearing normal evening clothes as well as a short astrakhan cap.

"Yes. He often wanders on and around the stage. No one really knows what he's doing, but I can assume he's looking for you—well, Erik, rather," Christine explained. Below, the Persian heard her whisper and looked up into the darkness of the catwalks.

"Is someone there?"

"Are we going to tell him?" Gerry asked Christine, quietly as possible. She bit her lip.

"No one else seems to be present. We can try…" she said before calling out to the Persian. "Hello, monsieur."

"Who's there? Is that you, Christine? What on earth are you doing up there?", Nadir said, shuffling around the stage to try and get a view of her.

"She's with me," Gerry hesitantly said. Immediately, Nadir's face looked disapproving.

"Erik…"

"Come up and we'll explain. There IS a lot to explain," Christine said quickly. Shaking his head, the Persian reluctantly walked to the nearest ladder up to the catwalks, muttering to himself. Christine smiled amusedly at the annoyed man and Gerry anxiously wondered how this all was going to turn out.

"Alright, what is it?" Nadir asked, slightly out of breath as he approached the two. Christine was standing in front of Gerry as if to protect him from any bad reactions Nadir might have.

"We have…a dilemma. This is not Erik."

"Excuse me?"

"I could hardly believe it either, but the way he speaks and acts…it simply can't be Erik. He told me he was playing the role of Erik in some sort of play in the future—"

"A movie. Not a play. It's a moving picture," Gerry chimed in, making the daroga's eyes widen more than they already were at his words and strange accent.

"It is very complex you see. It all happened after I agreed to stay with Erik so he would not kill Raoul…"

At this, the daroga groaned and threw his hands up. "Of course!"

"But after I kissed him, he acted like he had no idea where he was or what was going on. And after the kiss in the play—movie, I mean, Gerry claims that he found himself in Erik's body."

"Well, Erik's never been touched by a woman, much less kissed by one! I can assume he would act very strangely afterwards…" the Persian rationalized, looking at Gerry skeptically, who avoided eye contact—unlike Erik, who would have stared back coldly.

"It has been over a day now, sir. I am quite certain that something unexplainable has happened and that through the kiss, for whatever reason, Erik is now in this actor's body, in the future."

"2004," Gerry added, then gestured to his mask. "I bet he's having a field day not having to deal with this anymore."

Nadir was going to question what a 'field day' was, but had other things to worry about. He was still skeptical of the body-swap to the future idea, but he no longer believed that Erik was simply being more insane than usual. And in his usual nosy policeman-like way, he would get to the bottom of it.