I am honestly horrible! I'm so sorry, every time I post a new chapter it ends up short and way later than I expected it to be, and for that I'm so sorry ahhh! But anyway, I really hope you like this chapter, it's kind of just a filler, to carry the plot from one point to the next, so it won't be as interesting as some chapters unfortunately :(( I hope you enjoy it anyway, and I'm so sorry if you don't. I haven't been in the best headspace about my writing recently, so it's hard to sit down for long periods of time and write. But I promise you, one way or another, this story will have an ending! Enjoy xx

Left on his own, Hotch found his desperation grew to twice the size. He'd watched JJ walk away with a sense of relief, and a feeling that everything was going to – eventually – be all right. But now that she was gone, and the space was filled with his empty calls and the cries of the entire city. His fingers were torn, strips of skin dangled from each one, and the flesh underneath was red and raw. Under any normal circumstance, picking up jagged bricks would have been agony. However, the need to find Rossi had been amplified by the loneliness that had struck Hotch upon JJ's departure. His head was spinning, and Hotch had assumed it was just because of the mild concussion he thought he'd picked up during the initial quake, but now something he saw changed his mind.

Smoke. Clouds of it, thick and putrid, were billowing from the pile of rubble he was climbing all over. He remembered the paramedics' words, in the soft and calm state between earthquakes.

" The fire department just sent word that the gas leak in the building is gonna go up if we don't get to it in time, and we've still got civilians down there."

"Oh God," Hotch said out loud, into the empty air. Tears of fear and frustration rolled down his face as he scraped every rock and beam out of his path. "Oh fuck, no, shit, no," he gasped, clearly not caring about profanity, as he dug, furiously, frantically, in search of his oldest friend.

Reid's words echoed around the small space of the medical tent. JJ was the first to move, swaying forward and then back. Frantically, Emily moved to catch her before she hit the knuckled concrete.

Garcia knelt beside Reid slowly, her hands shaking slightly as she tried to keep herself calm. "T-that could be normal, r-right?" She looked from Reid to Emily, who was supporting JJ against a wall, and then back to Reid. Had the situation not been so dire, Emily could have almost laughed. It was hard to tell which of the two agents was the injured one. "Well, you're the genius, right? Aren't you going to tell us all about h-how, after earthquakes there's some mental stimulant that makes you think that- that…" Garcia trailed off, her eyes trained on Reid's face. The young agent shook his head in defeat, blinking his tears out of existence before the shell-shocked analyst could see them. He ran through counselling programmes in his head – things that they say to cripples and amputees to help them overcome what has happened to them, countless exercises and rehabilitation regimes to help them learn to live all over again. Statistics floated idly in his thoughts, about depression rates of disabled or handicapped people, about handicapped lifestyles…

And one thought. One thought echoed constantly around his brain, plaguing him, and breaking his heart every time it pushed itself to the forefront of his thoughts.

'How can I be in the FBI if I can't even walk?'

Every time Morgan removed a beam or a brick, his whole world would stop, and it felt like the entire structure that trapped him was swaying. Every time he got closer to perhaps the only person he had, he could feel impending death weighing down from all sides. The threat of failure motivated him. If he didn't save Angie, she would die. Actually, upon further thought, if he didn't save Angie, Morgan would probably die too.

He was going mad. Alone, exhausted and terrified, Morgan was going mad. Listening to the sounds of creaking buildings, smelling the smog in the air… He didn't think he could handle it on his own. But if he could just get to her… He wouldn't be alone, and better yet, she might just give him the strength he needed to get himself out of there, and back to his team.

His team… Did they know yet? Were they together? He'd never found Hotch and the others before the building went down. Morgan didn't even know if they were alive. Anything could have happened… The medical tent could have been crushed by debris… Garcia and Emily…

How could he have been so stupid? He left them alone. And now he was alone.

Just as the thought crossed Morgan's mind, he felt something that, had his environments been allowing, would have made him jump three feet in the air. Fingers. Weak fingers curling around his wrist. Living fingers.

He wasn't alone anymore.

SORRY it wasn't as interesting as it could have been, especially after such a long wait, but it's all necessary. I'm not sure where I'm gonna take the plot from here... Obviously the situations with Reid and Morgan can be expanded, but I feel like there needs to be a plot to carry it on afterwards, unless it ends right after the initial impact of the earthquake... I'm not sure, but let me know if you have any suggestions, or if you wouldn't mind another plot line (I have one in mind, but it's a bit different from the way the story started out, and it goes down a whole different path). Anyway, I'm not sure how long it's gonna take for me to upload again, because like I said, I haven't been very confident in my writing recently, and I don't want to make you all any promises that I can't keep, but I do promise that I will upload as soon as I can! Endlessly thankful for all of your support and kind words, so please don't forget to review xxx