Silent Love, Silent Pain [Levi x OC]

111. Blood ties part II

"What happened?" Nat said right after entering Sophie and Levi's house, carrying a suitcase with her medical equipment in a hand. She was baffled to notice that everything seemed...completely normal. Nothing extraordinary except for one thing - their eyes were giving away some sort of pain that they were desperate to mask whenever they looked at Hope.

Hope . Levi mentioned that his phone call was about her, but she couldn't crack it yet what happened. Maybe it was because he was talking way faster than usual, making it hard for her to understand. "Let's talk," Sophie said. She decided to be the one to inform Nat about everything as Levi seems too broken to articulate himself. He kept on carrying her in his arms, caressing her back in the most gentle way. He acted like she was made out of glass - able to break too damn easily. "Hope had a bad cough and she choked on the air. She...she couldn't catch a breath and we didn't know what was going on," she shook her head as she whispered, making sure that Hope wouldn't hear it. They shouldn't let her know that they, as parents, are worried. They were afraid that it would break her trust in them and it was the last thing they wanted.

"Did she swallow something?" Eric frowned, trying to find the reason for this type of behaviour, but both women glared at him.

"No, we wouldn't call if that was the case. That's something we can deal with on our own," Sophie replied, her voice giving away that she was slightly offended by Eric's question.

"Alright, tell me what exactly happened. Second by second," Nathalie asked and hence Sophie told her every detail. There wasn't much to tell honestly, but Nat still paid attention to every single word, trying to get some hint of why it happened and most importantly - how to prevent it. Unfortunately, she wasn't able to detect the reason for Hope's reaction.

"I will have to check on her," she informed them. Then she approached her and Levi and kneeled in front of Hope, so she could be on her eye level. "Hope, I will check on you, okay?"

"Kay," she nodded, completely unaware of the seriousness of the situation. She already forgot about her attack thanks to her parents brushing it off. Nathalie giving her examination wasn't stressful for her either as she was regularly checking on her. "Daddy stay," she reached for Levi's hand and gripped it tightly. He smiled affectionately at her as he saw it. His daughter adored him completely, there was absolutely no doubt about it.

"I'll stay, darling. Mommy will stay too, right?" They looked at Sophie and she nodded as she joined them on the sofa when Nat began to check on her.

First she listened to how she breathed, trying to find out if there weren't any disturbing sounds and if her lungs were working properly. Then he checked her throat, but she didn't find anything helpful there either. "I have to take her blood sample," she finally said and both Levi and Sophie cringed as they heard that. Hope wasn't the biggest fan of needles. "Hope, I need to use a needle. You're going to feel a poke, but it won't hurt as bad as you think," Nathalie tried to reason with her, but Hope still cried and pouted her lips.

It was heartbreaking to see her like this, causing her parents to want to put an end to the examination. Alas, they knew it would be a dead end. "Darling, you're so brave," Sophie cooed to her ear which calmed her down immediately. She hated that their daughter was suffering, but it was for a greater good after all.

"She's fine," Levi whispered to her ear in his most soothing tone, the one that always managed to calm her down. His hands were on her shoulders now, rubbing them to give her a much needed comfort. She knew he was right, but it still hurt, especially that they both were thinking the same damn thing - what if Hope's odd coughing and choking was caused because of the genes they passed on her? Thinking about this, it was highly possible as they were told that their genes were conflicting and that Sophie wouldn't even be able to carry an Ackerman child if it wasn't for her substance abuse problem in the past. Hence the question - what if this was their fault? If it was, they should be held accountable for it, take responsibility for staining their daughter's health with issues that were yet to be understood as they've never heard in history about an Ackerman-Leitz hybrid, it was a whole new area. A grey area of medicine that probably needed time to be perfected.