The Phantom's Daughter

1. New Directors

13 year old Elise leapt across the stage and into the arms of the lead male dancer who threw her into the air, before catching her again. The pair continued with their acrobatics until the tempo of the music changed, and they ran to the back of the stage to rejoin the rest of the ballet dancers.
Elise frowned, as she began to plièt alongside everyone else, since she disliked ballet, and prefered doing acrobatic tricks.
Luckily the rehearsal was cut short when Madame Giry stepped onto the stage, accompanied by 3 men. And Elise was happy for any excuse to stop dancing.
"That's enough for now. We have an annoucement to make" announced Madame Giry as she banged her cane on the stage.
The music stopped and the performers all began to gather around Madame Giry, who was the choreographer for all the shows, and was also Elise's guardian.
With her mother dead, and her father absent for most of her life, Madame Giry was the closest thing to a parent that Elise had ever had.

"It has been a pleasure working with you all, but now the time has come for me to retire" revealed monsieur Lefevre, the oldest man in the group.
Some of the people around Elise gasped at this news, but she didn't, as she had known for some time that the theatre was being sold.
"This is Gilles Andre and this is Richard Firmin, they are the new owners of the theatre" continued Lefevre.
Elise began to size up the 2 men, who were now her employers. The first man, Andre was very tall, and he had messy brown hair on top of his head. His associate Firmin on the other hand, was short and bald, and he seemed to have a perminant scowl etched on his face.

But before either of the managers could speak, Carlotta the opera singer made her way over to them to introduce herself.
Elise rolled her eyes as Carlotta charmed them both.
"She"ll have them both eating out the palm of her hand in no time" whispered the girl beside Elise.
Elise smiled and grinned back at her friend Meg Giry, the choreographers daughter.
"I'm sure it won't take them long to work out that it's all a facade" replied Elise.
"I don't know. They don't look too bright to me" admitted the girl on Elise's other side, named Christine Daae.
Elise stiffled a laugh and watched as the conductor ran back to his post so that the band could play a part of Carlotta's solo, as the new owners wanted her to sing for them.

"This should be interesting" mumbled Elise sarcastically, as she hated the sound of Carlotta's stupid voice.
Meg giggled but said nothing as they all turned their attention to Carlotta.
At first nothing special happened. Carlotta sang, and Andre and Firmin were entranced.
But before she could finish the chorus, one of the set backdrops suddenly fell behind them, causing a loud thud to echo through the theatre.
Several of the other ballet girls screamed, but despite the sound making her jump, Elise did not scream. Instead she looked up at where the lights and ropes hung from, and saw the tip of a black cloak fade into the distance.
Elise lowered her head and met Madame Giry's eyes, and she knew that her guardian had seen it too.

"He's here. The phantom of the opera" whispered Meg nervously.
Elise could tell that her friend was afraid, and she wished that she could reassure Meg and tell her that she didn't need to be afraid of the phantom.
But Elise was under strict instructions to not talk about the ghost of the opera house.
"Buquet, what was that all about?" Shouted Lefevre.
A few moments later a fat man appeared where Elise had seen the phantom only moments before.
"Don't look at me monsieur, I wasn't at my post" admitted Joseph Buquet.
"Then what happened?" Questioned Lefevre.
"I don't know. There's no one here now though" answered Buquet.

Elise smiled, it might have seemed like the phantom could appear out of thin air, but like him she knew that the opera house was filled with secret tunnels and trap doors.
Lefevre sighed and turned to face his replacements.
"Well gentlemen, good luck" he said, before exiting the stage, leaving the new managers quite confused.
Andre approached Carlotta, who was still distraught about having her solo interupted by the phantoms intics.
"Please, my lady, these things do happen" he said reassuringly.
Carlotta scoffed, "These things do happen. Ha. You've been here 5 minutes, and you think you know everything. Well, let me enlighten you. For the past three years, these things have happened. But no more I say! So until you stop these things from happening, this thing does not happen".
Carlotta then marched off the stage in a huff.

"Well that went well" grumbled Firmin.
Madame Giry stepped towards the 2 men with a strange look in her eye, that Elise recognised.
"I have a message from the opera ghost" she revealed.
"Good God, not you to. I would've thought you were above such childish notions" replied Firmin.
Madame Giry smiled, "He welcomes you to his opera house-".
"His!" Interupted Firmin.
"And would like to instruct you to leave box 5 open for his use. Oh, and he would like me to remind you that his salary is due"
"His salary?"
"Monsieur Lefevre used to give him 20,000 francs a month. But perhaps you can afford more, with the Vicomte De Chagney as your patron".

"I had hoped to make that information public at the performance tonight. But it seems like that won't happen now, as we have no leading lady" sighed Andre.
"Christine Daae can sing the part" suggested Madame Giry.
Elise and Meg's jaw's dropped as they looked to their friend who was stood beside them. Christine looked equally as shocked that Madame Giry had mentioned her.
"A chorus girl" scoffed Firmin.
"Let her sing for you, she has been well taught, I can assure you" replied Madame Giry reassuringly.

Elise felt as if someone had walked over her grave, and she felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She knew that feeling well. Elise had felt it when she was rehearsing earlier.
It was the feeling that the phantom was nearby. The feeling that her father was watching her.
But despite being his daughter, she knew that he wasn't there to watch her.
As Christine began to sing with such power and beauty, impressing everyone in the room, Elise knew that her father the phantom was there to hear Christine sing.