Summary: The boss has to find new and interesting ways to cope with the lack of action aboard the ship. But thankfully her restlessness is quelled when another prison is finally located. Everyone on the ship is trying to find ways to cope with Earth's destruction and the fact that the people on the hijacked Zin vessel are the only humans currently "alive", for all intents and purposes.

a/n: Thanks to Jae and Chy for notes and giving some helpful suggestions.

Free to Be

02 Reunions

-1-

There was no way around it, CID was creepy-even creepier on the ship than he first had been in the simulation, Remy thought as she eyed the floating metal basketball that seemed to be stalking Kinzie. Any time she shifted, it-he-the boss had no idea what to call the thing-would move in an attempt to remain in the woman's line of sight.

At least it's Kinzie and not me, she thought and immediately felt a little guilty; almost as guilty as when she was powerfully thankful that Josh Birk had latched onto Shaundi. Kinzie and CID had found Matt Miller easily enough, and Remy had honestly expected that adding computer genius number two to the mix would have meant finding her crew would have gone much quicker than it was. The boss shook her head and trotted down the stairs. Her standing over them was not going to help, plus Keith had the looming handled.

All this-the waiting and fruitless searching-was driving her a little crazy. It was exacerbated by the fact that she was virtually useless when it came to all that code nonsense. She could not help them find her friends and to top it all off, it seemed her peak time in the machine only fell between four and six hours, still. McGinnis was beginning to worry that she proving quite useless, it irritated her and left her with much more downtime than she was used to. And it was much more free time than she felt like she could adequately fill-to keep her mind occupied and away from errant contemplation she wandered the ship more than she used to. Her boredom was starting to annoy Kinzie and the others, Remy knew, though Matt seemed to take it in stride, Keith tried to handle her increasing cabin fever too, but the redhead seemed to just sigh at the boss more than usual.

Remy stopped asking why the Zin had the things they did on this ship. It was almost like they were sampling human culture as well as abducting the citizenry of Earth. Maybe it was research for the simulations or maybe there was no reason for it at all and it was just what the Zin did when they set upon a planet. She did, however, take advantage of the things on the ship that would burn off her nervous energy-the weights, the heavy bag, the pool table, and the little device Kinzie had fashioned for her.

More often than not, Remy wound up at the heavy bag, not only because it would wear her out, but also because there were moments when she really just felt like hitting something in the real world and not that digital construct. Of course, that feeling was not just directed at the Zin, but just as often it was directed at herself. Those were the moments when her punches became especially brutal, when Zinyak's taunting seemed to ring in her ears.

Then came the moments she would recall that moment between the bike run and entering Matt's simulation. All those reminders of her mistakes. All those faces from the past, the ones she had failed: Lin, Carlos, Aisha, Johnny. All the ones that were probably left behind in the initial attacks: Oleg, Zimos, Viola. Hell, Josh, even if he was really only good for comic relief and driving Shaundi up a wall.

Remy hit the bag again, then grabbed it and hung onto it tightly. The empty feeling seemed to well within her and press against her very skin like it was trying to crack her open. Keep it together. You can handle this. You've gotten them back before. This isn't that bad. She tried to convince herself of this fact often; early on it worked, but this time she was not feeling it. It had been getting harder to believe her own pep talks, though they still seemed to work on the people around her, at least.

Peeling herself off the bag she ducked into the common area on the lower deck and huddled up in a chair, hoping that what had gotten her through her mother's death might work again. When she was a girl, and it all seemed overwhelming, she would curl up someplace enclosed and just literally try to hold herself together. With a wistful smile, she also recalled that a lot of the time her brother was there to help her hold it together. Later that job fell to Johnny.

Fuck! That was not something she needed to add to growing sense of desolation. Remy hugged her knees to her chest and rested her head on her knees, trying to remember that song her mother always played on the piano-that she would hum absently all the time.

-2-

The three of them clattered down the metal stairs and all stopped in the doorway, when they saw Remy curled up in one of the egg-shaped chairs, knees pulled to her chest with her head cradled awkwardly on an arm resting on her knees. Kinzie, Matt, and Keith all looked at each other as if mentally drawing straws to see who would wake the boss, though not one of them wanted that job someone was going to wind up with it.

"Shouldn't we tell the destructive one that we have located another prison?" CID inquired.

"Be my guest," Vice President David said with a welcoming gesture and a thickly sarcastic tone.

With no reservation the floating device hovered across the room. The verbal request went unheard, or so it seemed. The pinkish-purple eye focused on the trio in the door, then turned back to the blonde asleep in the chair. He bumped the chair slightly, which garnered a groan and a blind swat nowhere near the robot's location. The AI floated there a moment, as is trying to make a decision, then CID shocked the boss.

The scream caught them all off guard, including CID, who was suddenly eyeball-to-barrel with the boss' pistol.

"She sleeps with a pistol?" Matt murmured, eyes glued to the exchange.

"And a knife," Keith explained in a whisper.

"Always has," Kensington concluded, taking a step forward.

"I realize you might have been locked in that program for quite some time, but something tells me you're not that goddamn stupid, CID," the boss growled with each step as she walked the device backward.

"We have information that you need to see. I thought it best to wake you as expediently as possible. When you failed to respond to audible entreaties, I tried … alternative methods," the AI countered.

"Ever shock me again, and I'm going to show you some alternative methods." Remy poked CID in his electronic eye with the silly-looking little alien pistol, which took some of the menace out of the threat, in Kinzie's mind at least.

With a glance over her shoulder, Kensington could not help the little grin that started to curl her lips, when she noticed the wide-eyed hacker to her right. "Come on, I'll show you," Kensington called across the room, drawing the boss' attention away from their code-based companion.

When CID started to follow, Remy stopped and glared at the mechanical shell again, halting it before the boss continued back up to the bridge with the group. McGinnis was mumbling something that sounded like electronic piece of scrap when she stopped cold behind Kinzie's chair.

"It's an airplane," the boss said after a moment.

"It is also a signature."

"Whose?" There was tension underlying in the boss' tone and Kinzie glanced up at the other woman. "Whose prison is it?" Remy repeated a little more anxiously.

"I don't know."

"How do we know it is one of our people?" Remy's eyes were glued to the screen and her hand was holding the pistol so tightly her knuckles were starting to go white.

"Same way I knew it was you, or the same way CID found Matt's simulation. The signature's hidden in the code."

"There are fragments and pieces that link all your simulations, because you all have shared memories. I can find you all through the pieces of your encoding that are similar. This signature has several pieces that I've found in your own simulation," CID noted from the doorway.

McGinnis glared at the machine and it did not attempt to come any closer.

"Whose idea of hell is being trapped on an airplane?" Matt asked absently as he ogled the schematic on the console.

"Really, Matt?" Kinzie groaned.

Remy tapped the pistol against her open palm. "Me, Shaundi, Joh-on my God," she gasped, grabbing the back of Kinzie's chair and leaning toward the screen. "Johnny's alive!"

With a shake of her head, Kinzie's dread was realized. "Boss, Johnny's dead," she said calmly, hoping that Remy would let it go, but knowing that is was highly unlikely. There were some things Remy was extremely stubborn about-her friends were chief among those.

"Who else would be stuck in a plane?" McGinnis replied.

The former fed was very aware of the location of the pistol the boss had pulled on CID, and she eyed it warily. Her hope was that Remy would see reason rather than cling to a hope that was wholly unreasonable. "Shaundi. It was a life defining moment for her. It's the only thing that makes sense."

Remy let go of the chair and backed away from Kinzie. The look on the boss' face concerned the younger woman. This is not going to go well, Kensington surmised.

"Look, Boss, I get it I really do. But this is most likely where Zinyak is keeping Shaundi."

"You're wrong," Remy replied sharply.

"I think she's making a lot of se-," Matt started until the boss turned her determined icy gaze on him. It shut him up instantly, making Kinzie wish she had a glare of the same caliber.

"She's wrong. Find out where this is," Remy ordered, marching past the AI. "We're going to get my best friend back."

Kinzie muttered angrily at the screen while Keith tried to calm her down and suggest reasons for McGinnis' insistence that this simulation held a friend she lost in the plane crash. Kinzie knew why Remy was so insistent, anyone who had known her since the Saints arrival in Steelport would understand why the boss thought it could be Johnny, and why she would want it to be him. Hell, when Kensington first saw the plane even she had to wonder.

It cannot be possible, she reminded herself of the determination she had made earlier. It has to be Shaundi. That is the only thing that makes any kind of sense. But noticing the look on the boss' face when she saw the schematic on the screen-that painful mix of desperation and hope-made Kensington almost wish there was some way this could be Johnny Gat. Wishful thinking is not going to help her, the press secretary reminded herself. She felt badly that the boss was going to get to that plane and lose that fierce sense of hope; Kensington could not help but also worry about how Remy's broken expectation could affect Shaundi, if that was indeed who was on that plane.

-3-

"Are you all right?" Matt asked from a perch on some crates as he watched Remy pace. Well, pacing seemed like the wrong word. She looked more like one of those big cats who had spent so long at the zoo that now all it does is walk in front of the glass viewing areas looking at the visiting people and children like snack foods.

When she looked at him, he could see the warring emotions in her eyes. It still struck him how expressive her eyes were. But of course the time he remembered most visibly was the time she nearly killed him, and all he could see in those blue eyes during that encounter he knew to be tainted by his own fear in that moment. She had always intimidated him more than anyone else, even Killbane, but the difference is that when Remy should have killed him, she did not take the opportunity.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Remy replied after taking a deep breath. "Just thought we would be there by now."

"Shaundi'll be okay."

"I know that, even if she doesn't know it herself. I've always known," the boss muttered at the still closed bay door.

Matt leaned forward and took a deep breath. "And you're okay with it not being … who you thought?"

She shrugged one shoulder, but didn't say anything initially. Then she her gaze met his stoically. "Look, Matt-"

"I mean I get it. I'd kill to see Asha again. Have someone around who was a friend, who knew me," he said looking down at the device in his hands. He dragged a finger over the display. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry you didn't find what you were looking for on that plane." His eyes met hers again.

In a matter of steps she was next to him. Remy set her hand on his shoulder and tried to smile, though it looked more like an uncomfortable grimace. "When we find her, we'll bring her back. But make no mistake you are a part of this crew. You're just new," the boss said, giving his shoulder a squeeze.

Neither of them really knew how to respond to her attempted inclusion and the silence stretched between them, engulfing everything like a black hole. Hands propped on her hips, she looked around the cargo bay for a moment. "What are you working on?" she asked finally, her eyes settling on the device in his hands.

"Just looking at some of the data Kinzie has gathered." He tipped his head at the device in his lap. "It is a little hard to do much with."

"Why's that?"

"Seeing it after the fact, when it is dormant doesn't do much with something like this." He leaned forward and she crossed her arms over her chest as she leaned on a stack of crates a few feet away. "This system is amazing. For lack of a more elegant phrase it is like a living entity, changing evolving, adjusting to the parasites within it."

Remy laughed lightly. "We would be the parasites, I take it?" she questioned, gesturing from him to her and back again with her finger.

"Indeed. In a way we are something it needs to survive."

He turned to face her completely and set the tablet out of the way. As he spoke, he gestured in an attempt to help better explain his theories about the simulation. To her credit she at least pretended she followed his train of thought. But when he saw the furrow in her brow he realized it was the same look Remy gave Kinzie when the former FBI agent had gone a few steps too far. As such, Matt tried to curve back toward something more akin to layman speak.

"And in most cases the beings it houses are consumed by it. But we are combating it. We take from the simulation what we need without providing it all the things it usually gets from its dependent beings. In breaking these normal rules of interaction, we are forcing it to react and change in response to our unique interaction with it and within it. And I can't see those reactions in the code after the fact."

"So this is your fancy way of asking if I'd break some things in the simulation for you some time?" Remy said with a mischievous grin on her face.

The uneasy laugh made her respond in kind. When he shrugged rather sheepishly, she said, "Load the list onto my hub, and next time I go in, I'll see if I can't get you what you're looking for."

"Thanks. I'll even make it worth your while," he added, trying to sound playful.

He realized his performance was pale when she took a step toward him and arched one eyebrow at him. Her voice was a low purr that made his spine tingle. "Oh, will you now?"

Never had four simple words muddled his brain so effectively. He stammered a minute searching for a reply, and his reaction amused her. "I… I'm writing a program that might be useful. Figure if you help me get the data, it might help me finish up the coding."

Her look faded to something more innocuous in response to his chaste reply, though the sultry gaze she had cast Matt had already worked on him too effectively. "It's okay Matt. I'll get you your data, program or not," she agreed with a much more friendly air.

"Hey boss! Good news. Shaundi's already on the platform," Kinzie announced over the intercom.

"Thank God," Remy sighed as she jogged across the deck, grabbing one of the Zin rifles as she went. "Miller, do me a solid and see if there is a blanket in one of those crates over there?"

He hopped off his perch and located what she asked for quickly. Luckily that part of the bay was blocked by rather high towers of crates, so the hacker did not have to worry about the weapons fire directed at Shaundi and the ship.

"Holy shit! It is good to see you Remy," Shaundi greeted as the bay doors closed.

"You too, Sweetie," the boss replied, hugging her friend back. "Miller," she called snapping her fingers above her head.

The throw was bad, but he had his back to them, and crates between him and the females. Recalling his own removal from the Zin control, he did not want it to seem like he was trying to ogle Shaundi. He did not want any of the Saints to think of him as the creepy kid who had tried to kill the boss, he much preferred anything to that sense of being on the outside.

Everyone on the ship had been fairly considerate, so far. Remy never mentioned the fact that he had been wandering around the Zin mothership naked. When Matt came aboard, she had merely stowed the power armor then found him tucked up under the stairs in the cargo bay, where she wrapped a blanket around him and tried to explain what was happening to him as best as she knew it. Miller realized when Shaundi arrived on the ship, that Remy had treated him like one of her crew-tucking the blanket around him tightly and sitting with him until he seemed calm.

Standing there in the cargo bay, watching the same type of exchange play out with Shaundi, he realized that in that moment Remy had claimed him as one of her own, one of her crew. The hacker leaned there against the crates, rubbing his temples. She was one of the most shocking women he had ever met. After gathering mountains of information about her for the Syndicate in Steelport, Miller had thought he knew her, but then and now she still managed to surprise him.

What caught him off guard the most in that moment was not just her behavior, but the thoughts running through his head. It was not the first time he had thought about her in that way, that unprofessional, bordering on the romantic way. Even now the same old discouraging arguments played in his head.

Every other time he considered asking her for coffee or tea or anything, he remembered conversations and statements he had caught over various wiretaps of his own and others. She had told Shaundi, and several others at different points, that she "didn't do relationships." Her administration had made numerous attempts just get her into a serious, steady romantic dating scenario, though they had been pushing since the start of her campaign to get her married off to make her seem more stable. Her admission tied to her refusal to pair off in any way always kept Matt's interest at bay, well not his interest, but at least any action on it.

Rolling his head to the left he watched the President guide her friend out of the cargo bay, snugly wrapped up in a blanket like she had done with him when he was over the shock of it all. Remy's hands rubbed at Shaundi's shoulder as they spoke quietly, heads bent in collusion.

The tightness in his jaw made him press his head back against the crate as he stared at the ceiling. It was a stupid thought, errantly dashing through a mind that should be preoccupied with anything but Remy McGinnis at that moment. But the worry prickled at him even though he knew he had no right to claim it. Since he had arrived on the ship Matt had started to get used to her presence, to seeing her, talking to her. It comforted him, made the loneliness and the enormity of the loss a little more bearable. And in that moment, it felt like it was fleeting.

-4-

Shaundi hugged Remy again. They did not usually do this. But after days spent reliving Johnny's death over and over again, she needed it. And Remy seemed to hang onto her lieutenant as tightly as Shaundi clung to the boss.

"What the hell is going on?" Shaundi finally muttered as she sat back on the sofa.

Remy scrapped her hand across her forehead then finally looked up at her friend. "Earth is gone."

The brunette gaped at her.

"It's my fault. That alien bastard said he'd destroy it if I broke out of his box again."

"You couldn't have gotten out of there without my help," Kinzie added from the doorway.

They all knew what Kensington was trying to do. Remy took responsibility for the Saints and their actions, she always had. Whatever the gang did, she did-at least as far as failures and screw ups were concerned. Successes she allowed to be claimed by the party that achieved them. Kensington was stealing some of the blame from the boss, rather than allowing the shorter blonde to carry it all on her own.

"Kinzie, be that as it may-" Remy began.

"No," the computer whiz argued, interrupting the boss. "You always stand with us when we screw up. Even if you didn't have anything to do with it, you take the heat. This was my idea. I found you. I showed you the way out. Hell, I programmed the way out and practically dragged you out of it. So, this time-it's my fault. Not yours."

Shaundi smiled at her. Some days she loved Kinzie more than shoes. "If that's how it played out, then she's right, boss."

Remy's eyes moved from one to the other of them. "It's not just on you, Kinzie. Come on," the boss said patting the sofa.

This type of thing was fairly rare for all of them. Girls nights were never really Remy's kind of thing, but Shaundi did arrange them from time to time, and that was kind of what it felt like to all three of them. Kinzie seemed glad to have her friend back on the ship. The brunette who had been heading the Secret Service before the attack was really just glad to be out of that nightmare; her relief at being with at least part of the crew again was indescribable.

In her head, Shaundi knew it had only been a handful of days, but it felt like so much longer. And she was just glad to be out of the loop, glad to have other people around again.

"I think CID is getting close," Kinzie noted as she perched on the sofa between the other two women. "He was gibbering earlier about his tailor and alligator shoes."

"Pierce," the boss and Shaundi groaned in unison before the three of them fell into laughter.

"What do you think his nightmare is?" Shaundi chuckled.

"His tailor hemming his slacks too short," Remy chided.

"Oleg beating him in chess," Kinzie quipped with a hint of wistfulness.

"Actually that could be likely," the boss replied. "Ugh! But I hope not. I would hate to see what Zinyak would do with that."

"Me, too," the petite redhead agreed quietly and Shaundi put her arm around Kensington's shoulders.

Remy took Kinzie's hand and held it in both of hers looking at it for a long time before her eyes sought the younger woman's. Shaundi could see it in Remy's gaze, but knowing the boss as long as she had, she also knew that the words would not make it all the way out, no matter how badly she might want to say them.

Kinzie knew it too. She knew the boss was sorry about it all. She knew the boss felt badly about Oleg and everyone else. But none of them needed the boss to be sorry or sad or consoling right now. They needed Remy McGinnis pissed off and out for blood. They needed her in control of the emotions she did not know how to manipulate to her own ends. They needed her to be the intimidating and capable leader that kept the Saints on top even when they were outmanned and outgunned.