Author's Note: Mentions of cancer and character death. This story is set in Season Five of Glee eight months after the death of Finn Hudson where Rachel Berry begins a struggle of her own outside of her grief.

Chapter Two – Tilted Axis

Sixteen hours might as well have been sixteen years for Rachel, the wait was agonizing and there was no way that she could take her mind off of the possibility that she was really sick. When it was finally an appropriate time to be getting out of bed she got up, made breakfast for Kurt and Santana and sat down on the couch staring at her phone. All she needed to know was what was going on with her. Why was she so tired? Why was there inexplicable bruises on her body that she hadn't done anything to end up getting? What was going on?

As the minutes passed it seemed as though they were all lasting forever yet everything around her was a total blur. It was almost as if everything was moving in slow motion, there wasn't a thing that she could do to make it go back to normal until the waiting was over. By the time nine o'clock came around she felt like she was going to be sick from the nerves but at one past nine that morning her phone rang, it was the number of her doctors office and she immediately picked it up. What she heard wasn't what she had expected though. They had asked her to come in to discuss her results.

After hanging up she got dressed and headed back to her doctor's office. She really didn't want to hear what the doctor had to say because she knew that coming in meant something was wrong. The entire walk there she was yawning and shivering a little as the cold hit her tanned skin even though she had put a jacket on and was keeping herself warm. Entering the office the lady on reception gave her a sad look and pointed to the first door on the right. With a small nod she went down the hall and knocked once before walking in and sitting down across from her doctor similar to how she had the day before.

With a grim look on his face he passed the results over the top of the table to Rachel. "I'm sorry Miss Berry but your blood work shows that you have a leukemic syndrome known as Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. It's more common in children but adults do get it too. I sincerely wish that I had better news for you but I can refer you to one of the best oncologists in New York." He explained but to Rachel everything else he had said was nothing, she had lost the ability to process a thought properly the moment he told her what type of leukemia that she had. Everything else was just a confused blur as he handed her pamphlets and suggested she go in and make an appointment with the oncologist.

After everything was done at the doctors office she felt like she was about to fall to the ground, her legs felt like jelly and her hands wouldn't stop shaking. It was then that yet another symptom decided to strike her down, a nosebleed. Never in her life had she ever had a nosebleed and as she leaned against the nearest building with her head tilted she was waiting for it to pass and trying to ignore the fact that her head was throbbing and all she wanted to do was lay down and relax for the rest of the day and maybe even make a call to Noah in an attempt to distract herself.

When it had finally passed she sighed and continued her short journey to the oncologists office. In a world full of people, people who got similar diagnoses everyday she felt entirely alone. There wasn't a single person there for her when she had found out and even now she was struggling to realised that she could very well remain alone in it all. Sure her dads would be there but their entire lives were in Lima and she planned on staying in New York because there was no way that she could let her entire life shut down completely. She still had classes to attend at NYADA and she simply couldn't return to Lima and see the look of sadness in people's eyes, especially the eyes of one Carole Hudson. She just couldn't do it.

Within an hour she had schedule an appointment for the next day around lunch time and from there she knew that beyond that point her life and her battle was in the hands of the oncologist that she had been referred to. She wasn't sure what the course of treatment would be but she didn't want to worry about that until the next day. For the rest of the day she wanted to go home and forget that it existed, forget that she existed and that her body had the chance of losing it's own battle. When she finally arrived back at the loft she made the phone call to Noah and sighed when she didn't get an answer.

With tears in her eyes she left a voice mail for him. "Noah, it's me, Rachel. I um.. I just.. I really really need to talk to you." She said before hanging up. She was home alone, there wasn't anyone else around and as she went to sit outside on the fire escape that's when it really hit her while her eyes scanned over the piece of paper still in her hand. Before she knew it she was screaming, screaming so loudly that she got looks from people down on the street and that was it, that was the beginning of her breaking down as she tried to accept the fact that she had cancer. Sitting there she cried and cried, her eyes rimmed red and sore as the tears took over and eventually gave way to gut wrenching sobs. She needed Finn, needed Noah, she needed just one of them to be there holding her and reassuring her that everything was going to be alright.

The word kept replaying in her mind over and over again.

Cancer.

Cancer.

Cancer.

Rachel Berry had cancer, how was she ever meant to accept or deal with such a thing? Could she fight it? Would she lose her hair? Would she end up stuck in hospital for extended periods of time? Would anyone truly be there for her the entire time and not just there because they felt pity towards her? They were all questions that the shivering brunette simply didn't have answers to.