Disclaimer: I don't own anything Phantom of the Opera (though I wish I did). Only original characters belong to me.

AN: Yes, here I am, back with another Phantom story! I know I promised a Pirates fic, but I was on a roll with Phantom, so I might as well keep it going. Sorry it took so long, but my muses were not being cooperative, hence the lateness.

Also, I should mention, that in this story, the characters Destiny and Fate are not exclusively mine: the main concept of them belong to a good friend of mine. She's a favorite authoress of mine called Emerald, the Lady Destiny, who is mainly located in the Labyrinth fan fiction section on this site. Please check out her fics; they're lots of fun!

In the meantime, I hope everyone enjoys themselves with this story, and will review. Thanks!

Chapter 1: Fate and Destiny's Movie Night:

Curled up on the couch, two sisters (twins, actually) sat in their living room, watching a film that had a lot of buzz around it. Granted, it had come out over five years ago, but with their busy schedules, it was hard to get a movie in. We all know how that goes.

The screen blared with the film's title soundtrack, the Phantom of the Opera, as Fate reached for the popcorn and Destiny popped the top of a soda can. Both women, seeming in their late-twenties, sighed in contentment and propped their feet up on the coffee table before them.

It might be best to mention that these weren't ordinary women, nor were they dubbed Fate and Destiny by an eccentric mother who loved unusual names. These ladies were the real deal, the anthropomorphic personification of Fate and Destiny, meaning they were (literally) the physical embodiments of these great powers that hovered over mankind.

It was relatively easy to tell them apart, despite the identical shapes of their face and eyes: Destiny tended to have blue, green or periwinkle hair (depending on how vibrantly happy or depressingly sad she was feeling), and Fate liked blazing colors, so her hair was either red, orange, or yellow (maybe even all three). Both sisters had the same gold-and-silver eyes that could see right into the heart of a human being. They were unusual, but lovely, in an unsettling way.

Like most anthropomorphic beings, the sisters lived in a house set a dimension outside of "normal" time and space. Presently, it had been expanded and furnished with every modern convenience available on the mortal market, though everything worked far better than it did in the mortal world. Ah, the benefits of possessing nearly cosmic powers!

Of course, those magical abilities weren't just for creating the most perfect microwave or refrigerator in the universe. The main function of their powers was to do their very trying jobs: to make sure that everyone's fate or destiny went exactly the way it's supposed to. A very large book kept in their library let the sisters know if someone was supposed to be set on a certain path; or to have certain things happen to them; or to do something special that could have an impact on others.

There were, of course, millions of mortals who led perfectly normal lives; after all, not everyone was destined to become a figure for the history books. Occasionally, there were a few thousand mortals who required an epiphany in order to change the course of their lives, but the ones that needed 'special attention' were rare. Still, it was Fate and Destiny's job to make sure that everyone walked a certain path of life, whether they were 'special' or not.

Once in a while, however, things tended to be overlooked. The sisters were only two beings, and in spite of the cosmic powers they possessed, they really couldn't be everywhere; very few of their kind could. But if they had to, the sisters could manipulate time and space to fix person's fate or destiny, making sure that things worked out correctly.

Today happened to be one of those "oops-we-messed-up-again" days. As the movie progressed, Destiny got a nagging feeling in the back of her head, something that only happened when she'd missed something in the Big Book sitting in the library. When the final credits began to roll and Fate (the softie!) was dabbing her eyes for the Phantom, Destiny got up and headed for the library.

The door opened on its own (with magic, not technology), and the scent of paper, ink, dust, leather, and everything that was the essence of books met her nose. In the center of the immense library stood a golden book stand and a huge tome that was glowing with power. At first glance, the pages were empty, but when asked, it would show the path of any mortal Fate and Destiny inquired of. Today, Destiny asked for the Phantom of the Opera. The pages glowed, and words began to quickly fade into view, listing everything there was to know about the Phantom.

Somehow, Destiny wasn't surprised to find out that he'd been an actual person. Mortals always loved writing stories, but the problem was some of their tales seemed so incredible, the books were always labeled as fiction. The Grimm Brothers and their fairy tales, for instance, and don't get her started on the Peter Pan story! Over a century later, and that little imp was still smug, always thrilled that someone had written a book about him and his Lost Boys (though there were now a few girls being added the group).

But, anyway, back to the matter at hand. Standing before The Book of Fates and Destinies, Destiny began reading the info that the Book provided on the Phantom.

Apparently Leroux had done his research on the Phantom, but what he hadn't liked, he changed to make the plot more to his (or his readers') liking. Andrew Lloyd Webber had recently done a rather "romanticized" version with his musical and movie, but as it turned out, Webber had been far more accurate. At least Leroux had gotten the Phantom's name right: Erik.

Honestly, the poor guy's life story was heartbreaking: parental issues, gypsies, killing an abusive gypsy, and that whole facial deformity thing were a bit much for a poor child to bear. Then, of course, there was that whole Christine episode…

"Oops."

She didn't say it very loudly, but her twin could always tell whenever something was wrong. Fate entered the room, a concerned look on her face. When she saw her sister standing by the Book, she sighed. "Okay, who did we miss this time?" she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

"The Phantom of the Opera," Destiny replied in a small voice. "Turns out I, uh, missed him in the Book. He wasn't Destined to be alone and unloved; he should have had a wife and family, but the right woman hadn't come along. And no, I'm not talking about that silly little girl, Christine."

Having finished, she shut the book. "Such a waste," she complained, her hair turning a deep blue. "I can't believe I missed out on helping the actual Phantom! How could I let that slip through my fingers? What does that say about me and my job? How could I miss something that big?"

Fate tsked at her and tossed her red-orange-yellow hair over her shoulder. "Now, sweetie, don't blame yourself. After all, there are billions of people on earth, and you can't keep your attention focused on all of them and their futures, whether they're ordinary or unique. Our reach just isn't that widespread, no matter what mortals believe. We can only do the best we can, and take some time off in between."

She went to Destiny's side and wrapped her arms around her. "Besides, I'm your sister; I'm supposed to be helping you with seeing that everyone, both ordinary and important, do or experience what they're supposed to, and even I missed seeing him in the Book! Immortal and powerful we may be, but even we mess up sometimes. That's why we can reach back and forth through time: so we can fix our boo-boos and make things all better."

Destiny laughed, her dark blue hair turning lighter with her mood. "Okay, okay, so I guess we'd better do some time-travel stuff. But you do realize we have to pick a mortal to fix it, right? We're not allowed to interfere directly, thank you so much Cosmic Rule Book."

Yup, there was a Cosmic Rule Book, which was currently occupying a dusty shelf somewhere in the library. It was basically a whole text stating what was and wasn't allowed when it came to messing around with mortal lives. Among the most important rules was the one stating that the astoundingly powerful beings, ranging from gods and goddesses to the anthropomorphic personifications (Death, Fate, Destiny, etc), could not mess with Time.

Time, being the fussy person that she was, hated it when others kept trying to disturb her orderly flow of things, and would only allow it if it was strictly business, not for personal gain. Thus, the Rule: thou shall not mess with Time. That was why the Powers (divinities and personifications) kept their houses set outside of it; so that their powers didn't somehow get into the time stream.

Besides, if Time got pissed off, she tended to reached into the future or past and do a little "messing" of her own.

Destiny and Fate, being who and what they were, were part of the select few that could get around Time's Rule. After all, the Universe had an outline/schedule of what It wanted to happen to people; was it their fault if the occasional 'special person' slipped through the cracks in the system? Nobody's perfect.

Of course, it didn't help that Fate and Destiny weren't allowed to interfere directly when it came to mortal lives. Bad occurrences in the past involving the ancient Greek gods had forged that particular Rule in the Book: no more direct tampering with people's lives. So, as the Greek gods eventually did, Fate and Destiny had to recruit mortals to do the hard work, for only mortals could mess in other mortals' lives.

However, training these particular people before sending them off to get the job done wasn't easy. As mortals were wont to do, they tended to change their minds on how to handle things; or they changed sides; or worse, they gave up all together whenever things turned ugly. Most of the time, though, things worked out relatively well, and as long as the path was mostly followed, the Universe could forgive any little messes made along the way. Besides, seeing to everyone's fate or destiny was always a complicated and unpredictable job.

Needless to say, this was a hard and somewhat annoying way to do things, but most of the time it was effective, if the sisters chose the right person. Destiny tended to have a better sense in these things, so Fate let her sister choose whomever she thought was best. But who would be the one to carry out this particular task? Who could change the Phantom's ways and make him a better person, or at least make him decent enough to find a woman to marry him?

"Time for us to do a quick scan of Death's Files," Fate muttered.

Destiny groaned. She hated dealing with Death; he was too serious, and she always felt gloomy or depressed around him. He wasn't the hooded skeleton people imagined; he was a rather handsome guy, but his nice face didn't do much for his personality and aura (which were majorly in the negative zone).

Unfortunately, that was usually how their 'chosen ones' got picked. Taking a living person through time was not a good idea, especially since it might mess up the whole Space-Time continuum thing. The only people that qualified for time-travel jobs were: (a) those who had just died, (b) those who were this close to death, or (c) those in a permanent coma or vegetative state.

Snapping their fingers, the sisters vanished from their library and reappeared (literally) on Death's doorstep. A massive grey mansion made of stone, it was rather cold and unwelcoming in appearance. The skull-shaped doorknocker didn't brighten it up, either.

Luckily for them, Death wasn't in at that moment, so Destiny and Fate let themselves in, like they usually did, and avoided looking at the glum décor (Death was really into skulls and pale grey wallpaper). They went straight back to his office and headed for the files stacked on his desk. After a moment, they grabbed a few folders and flipped through them.

"Who'd have thought Death would be so organized," Destiny muttered, opening a file.

Her twin chuckled. "Well, unlike us, he can't afford to make mistakes." Fate paused. "Though, accidents do happen…"

Destiny muttered something in ancient Greek and kept flipping. Thanks to Death upgrading his system, there were now pictures with the names, ages, and personalities of those that were either already dead, or were going to die very soon. This was very helpful, since it allowed the sisters to pick the perfect person for the jobs they had in mind.

After twenty minutes, each sister had found a few candidates who looked promising. Destiny skimmed through them, weeding out the ones who might give up too easily, or who probably wouldn't be up to the task.

Finally, she narrowed it down to two young women, one of whom had just passed, the other a comatose patient. The dead person's spirit would be easy to access, if she hadn't been shipped off to The Afterlife already. The comatose patient, however, was another story, since they were sometimes still "there," but barely. Most of the time, the patient's mind resided in the body until it died, but in other situations, the mind and the spirit had "moved on," and all that was left was for the body to die. It was always depressing, since the families never knew if their loved ones were able to hear their words or know what was going on around them.

In this case, the young lady in question was sort of in between the two. Her mind and spirit were holding on by a thread, and once she finished her task, she could either 'pass on,' or be rewarded for her hard work. No one, not even Fate or Destiny, knew what kind of reward would be handed out, but the perk of being Fate or Destiny meant they could reward their workers based on how well things turned out. In the case of this girl, she might be brought back to complete consciousness and given her life back…depending on how well she did her job.

After a quick conversation with the dead woman's spirit, Destiny decided to go with the coma patient. Apparently the ghost was happy to move on, and the sisters were content to leave it at that.

"What does the file say about this one?" Fate whispered as they teleported themselves into the hospital room. Since this particular girl's file had come from Destiny's list of possibilities, Fate had no idea what this young woman was like.

Her sister flipped open the spotless manila folder. "Her name is Amelia Richards, victim of a hit-and-run accident," Destiny replied. "She's in her late twenties, single, with brown hair and deep brown eyes. The file says she's a good-hearted, relatively patient person, though somewhat timid. Apparently she also has a temper, but it doesn't come out too often."

Fate grinned, gold-and-silver eyes glinting. "Perfect," she commented. "We need someone with attitude, and if she's a patient person, I think we've got ourselves a winner!"

Ignoring her sister's enthusiasm, Destiny took a closer look at the girl, this time with a bit of magic over her eyes. For some reason, it didn't surprise her that the girl's soul glinted like dusty gold instead of bright sunlight. This one was of the rare few who longed for a simple, contented life; a person who was happiest when wrapped up in a warm blanket with a book, rather than connected to modern technology. She didn't even have a cell phone! No doubt she'd be happy with the 19th Century lifestyle.

Using their combined powers, the sisters carefully pulled Amelia's spirit out of her body. A wisp of swirling blue-and-white light soon floated before them, slowly taking the shape of the woman lying in the bed. Confused and surprised eyes stared at them for a moment, right before her head turned towards the bed.

"Oh, my God," Amelia whispered. "Am I dead?"

She turned and looked at the twins, who stared at her with identical silver-gold eyes. Fate quickly decided to let her sister take the reigns on this.

"Hi," Destiny said, her voice light and chipper. "I'm Destiny. This is my twin sister, Fate."

Amelia stared. "Uh, okay…I was kind of expecting the Grim Reaper, but I'll play along. What do you want with me?"

Fate sensed her sister's telepathic 'nudge,' and stepped forward. "Okay, we'll get right to the point. The two of us are responsible for making sure that everyone's destiny or fate goes exactly the way its supposed to. Most of the time, people manage to follow their paths without trouble, but some need a bit of help, or a push in the right direction."

Destiny took over. "And then there are the ones who manage to slip through the cracks. To fix those little mistakes, we need to choose a mortal who is willing to help us, mainly by acting in our stead. We aren't allowed to interfere directly, so we have to get hired help."

"Okay," Amelia drawled out, "so, what, you want me to help you? How? I'm dead or dying!" She jerked her head towards the bed, where her body lay hooked up to a dozen machines.

The sisters gave identical waves of dismissal. "No problem," Fate said. "We'll tell you what you need to do, give you a few tips, then send you back in time in a brand new body. Easy as pie!"

Amelia's jaw dropped. "Wait, did you mention time travel? And a new body? Can you do that?"

"Well, it won't be a new body, exactly," Destiny confessed, glaring at her twin. "In the time period we're sending you to, the original owner of the body, who happens to be a baby, barely a toddler, is on the brink of death. We'll swap your two souls (or consciousnesses, if you like) at the right moment, right before the baby's body dies. No, don't look so freaked out; Fate and I will make sure you survive in the body."

"And we promise that the baby will be reborn in a century or so, and lead a full life, so you don't have to worry about her," Fate assured her.

"Great," Amelia muttered. "So I get a new body that was someone else's, and then what? What happens after I do whatever it is you have in mind?"

"You get a reward," Fate commented nonchalantly. "Not sure what it is yet, but I promise it'll be really good. We could even give you your old life back, if that's what you want."

The twins were quiet as Amelia considered the offer. The clock on the wall ticked loudly, the seconds flowing by until Amelia's ghostly head looked at them and nodded.

"Before I answer, could you at least tell me who I'll be helping?"

"You will be helping the Phantom of the Opera."

AN: There's the first chapter! Please let me know what you think by reviewing! Thanks!