3 HOURS LATER;

Robert headed back towards Andy's room. Meredith had found him in the canteen and they'd had a long chat. Meredith had told him he needed to give Andy space, that she was in a bad place but forcing her to open up to him wouldn't be good for either of them. He needed to give her space to breathe and to make decisions for herself. She's strong Meredith told him but even strong people break at times.

With her words ringing in his ears he was ready to face her and just offer his support, he wouldn't question her, he would wait for her to talk to him.

He arrived at the room full of hope but as he opened the door the silence struck him. Andy's bed was empty. The drip which had been attached to her arm was leaking a big patch of wet onto the bed mingling with a blood stain from where it had been yanked from her delicate skin.

And then the silence was broken and pandemonium began. Roberts shouts as to where his wife was. Meredith's soothing words as she tried to calm him down and at the same time inform security to set up a search. Andy wasn't well, she needed hospital care, she must be found.

And then just when Robert thought things couldn't get any worse, Maya and Vic came around the corner running towards him with a police officer in tow.

"Wheres Andy?" Maya shouted at him.

"She's taken off somewhere." Meredith said calmly, "We have people looking for her right now."

"We need to find her NOW." Maya shouted, "Chief, the police came to see us, they had CCTV from inside the fire; From the corridors, they thought it might help with the cause of the fire. I took a look just now. Robert it shows Andy. I mean it's not the best picture because of the smoke." Maya took a breath before continuing in a quieter voice. "Andy didn't get trapped Robert. She sat down and took her mask off and waited for the fire to trap her. She didn't try and get out, she wanted to stay there."

Robert wasn't sure what happened next but he suddenly became aware that he was sitting on the floor with his head between his bent knees while Meredith told him to just breathe. And all of a sudden everything came rushing back to him. He gently pushed Meredith from him and got to his feet.

"We need to find her and now." He announced, dialling Andy's cell from his own, groaning in frustration as it went straight to voicemail.

Maya placed her hands over his, stilling them,

"Listen Chief… Robert, you just need to calm down, it's going to be okay, we got this. The police are out looking and so are the whole of station 19, plus we can go now, take a drive round some places that me and Vic can come up with, yeah?"

Robert nodded, looking back at Meredith,

"I'll phone you the minute we hear anything here okay?"

Robert nodded in response and the 3 took off at speed down the corridor, desperate to get to Andy before Andy got to herself.

Andy meanwhile had somehow managed to get herself to her house. Her real house, the one where she had lived her whole childhood, the one which she had grew up in. The house with all the memories of her Mami and Papi. Memories of Ryan between every single wall. Except it wasn't her house anymore, nobody had answered the door when she rang the bell but that didn't matter, she knew how to get in to this house, she had done it many times when she had forgotten her key and sneaked in not wanting to alert her Dad to the time she was coming home at night.

And now she was here, standing in her house and everything had calmed within her. She stumbled to the sofa and sank down in to it. She was exhausted. The walk from the hospital had taken it out of her. She'd almost given up at one point and just lay down on the sidewalk where she was to wait for someone to find her. But she hadn't. She needed to be in her own house, so she had stumbled on. Stopping every few minutes to take some deep breaths, her injured arm pulsating so badly she could feel it hurting every part of her body.

She knew she wasn't being logical, deep down she knew she shouldn't be here. She was hurting and grieving and wanting something to make it all stop. She missed Robert. She wanted him to hold her and keep her safe. But that scared her too because when she was with him she couldn't help but worry that he would leave her too. He would either die like everyone else around her seemed to or he would leave her and find another woman who would take proper care of him. Why was everything such a mess? She lay her head back against the back of the sofa and let the tears consume her, no one could hear her cries here. No one could help.

Robert and Maya jumped back in to the car where Vic was waiting behind the wheel.

"Nothing?" She enquired?

Maya shook her head, "No, they havent seen her at all, no one has."

"She's hurting, she has to be in pain physically as well as mentally, she wouldn't go to Joe's. She wouldn't go somewhere as public."

Robert sank back in his seat and sighed. Maya turned round to face him.

"Where do you think then? We're out of ideas. We have checked all the places we can think of."

"I don't know. I just thought she would have gone home. I wanted that to be true. Somewhere she can feel safe. She told me I'm the only place she's ever felt safe so why has she run from me?"

"Robert, she's a mess, she's grieving. She's not thinking straight, what she did at that fire evidenced that. We've all let her down, I knew she was in a bad place but I just left her to it. I thought she'd pull herself out of it in a few days or weeks. Im the worst best friend ever. I have been more concerned about my Captain role than I have about how she actually was. I can't believe she would give up like that."

"I don't think she's given up," Vic interrupted. "I just think she's lost, all she can see around her is sadness and she doesn't know how to pull herself out of it. I felt a bit of that after I lost Ripley. Everything just seemed a bit pointless. If you think about Andy, first she had Ryan and lost him and now her Dad. The two things that have been constant in her life since she was a little girl and now she doesn't have either."

"I know where she is," Robert suddenly spoke from the back seat, "Hughes drive to Andy's old house."

"What. No." Maya said turning in her seat to give him a strange look. "Pruitt sold the house, someone else lives there now."

"Doesn't mean that Andy hasn't gone there, it's like Hughes just said, she has lost her childhood connection. That house was her connection as well, she grew up there with her dad and with Ryan next door."

"i think he might be right," Said Vic starting the engine.