A few of the pirates stare at each other in confusion. Then the captain, a bit more lucid now, asks, "Why? We're pirates. Marauders. Scum of the sky."

"Because I want absolutely everyone to get to be okay." 

"Impossible."

"Can always try," the navigator mutters.

"Damn straight. And even if I can't get everyone, anyone I can get is good."

"So, the plan is to tow us to the Tackety engine, recover the bodies, recover enough to rebuild this engine enough to disguise her, then tow us to the Nature Reserve? I figure it's... Ah, six hundred miles to the Reserve."

"I'm fast!" she chirps. "Yes, I believe that's the plan." 

"Right. Since our previous captain has proven himself unfit for duty, I propose myself as the new one, and we'll... Disarm and entrust Beau to his cousin, for now. Anyone else want to put their name forward? No? Ayes for me as captain?" A rough chorus. "Nays? Beau Bloodletter votes Nay. The Ayes have it. Miss Mountain's Daughter, you'll want to, ah, perhaps, comfort the girl in his cabin." He looks ashamed. He fishes in Beau's coat pocket for the key and holds it out to her.

"For crying out loud," she mutters, but she takes the key and heads for the door. She pauses in the doorway. 

"For the record, my name is Lucy Whitman. My mum's human and she gave it to me." 

"I'm Samwell Goodman. I've been uncomfortably aware of the failure in my name for a while now."

In the former captain's cabin is a dark-skinned woman in overalls. Late teens. She glares at everyone except Lucy. (She's terrified.) "I was listenin' in. He didn't touch me, but he's insane." She holds out her left arm challengingly. Bruises and bandages.

"Well, I'm glad he didn't touch you. I may or may not have cured his crazy, but either way he can't hurt you again." 

She shakes as she peels off one of her bandages and continues holding her arm out. "Can you really do what they're saying? Unkill my dad?"

"Yes! Is your dad one of the Tacketies or are we going to have to make a separate trip." 

"He's Chief Engineer of the Lucky Strike, yeah. I'm 'prenticing. That engine was valued at five thousand eight hundred Sovereigns. It cost blood and sweat and years of toilin'. I hate them."

"Hm. What's it like?" 

"What's what like? Engine-work? Being a Tackety? Hate?"

"Hate. I've been frustrated at people plenty, I could even say I've been angry, but feeling like it's just better if someone suffers--I've never felt it and I find it difficult to imagine and I--if I want to do right by people I have to understand them. So what's it like?" 

"It's hot anger. Anger at the - wrongness that people who've gone murdering and plundering for probably years, killed who knows how many people, ruined lives, end up... Okay. It's the feeling that they need to be punished and tormented because of what they did to ma friends and family. They need to hurt like they hurt others. They need to suffer for hurting me, for inflicting fear on everyone who looks up at the sky and thinks - even if none of the other horrors get me, there's bastard pirates up there. It's not a justice thing, not a logic thing. It's just... Anger. I'm not very happy with you neither right now, not like I'm gonna turn down your miracles 'tho. If you actually have any." She gestures pointedly with her injured arm.

She glows on the arm, which ceases to be injured.

"I mean, you make a really good point about the wrecked train belonging to you guys, I'm not going to hurt them but I'm not so thin-skinned that I won't go back in there and say 'change of plans, you guys don't get the train' because it's embarrassing." 

She turns her arm over and over. "It's really fuckin' wrecked. Never gonna fly again. More trouble fixin' it than building a whole new one from scratch. My sister's first words were spoken on that engine. I spent most of my childhood on it. It's stupid to be attached to a thing when dad's dead, but I am." Sigh. "I'd say we need some Bronzewood, some choice bits from the wreckage, and one thousand Sovereigns to rebuild her. To build a replacement."

"...Can you give me the value of the Sovereign in terms that would make sense to an old Londoner." 

"...Ah, number three gasket is eight shillings- No that's engineer stuff. Mm. Big ol' barrel of top-quality coal goes for twenty Sovereigns? A used Leadbeater and Stainrod blunderbuss can be got as cheap as two Sovereigns?"

"Hmm, so that's...okay, I think I get it. Okay. I think I can probably make that fairly easily, pull a few teeth if I have to." 

She bows her head and takes a deep breath. "Yeah, prob'ly can. Just glow on some fat cat and charge for the privilege. You don't have to though. We've got savings to draw on, once nobody's dead anymore. Tacketies are used to getting things done themselves. If you're as lost you sounded you prob'ly wanna know some important stuff?"

"Yeah. And--I think there's a sense in which--it's not wrong that you have the right to demand justice, so if I'm going to take justice away from you, then I owe it to you to do everything I can to fix the thing the justice would be for." 

"I don't know what-all is new from Fallen London so I'm just going by my pa's stories. Uh... Hours are new. They're crystallized time, we mine them and sell them, and there's whole industries devoted to weaving time. They accelerate construction sites and factories and the like, or slow down wounds until doctors can come help. Stuff like that. And London uses them by the engineload, for lots of stuff. That's the biggest thing, I think. Crystallized Hours. Prisoner's Honey isn't a thing anymore, but Red Honey still is. They say the Queen killed a star with something called the 'unclear bomb' but pa says that's impossible. It's a lot easier to die for good out here. Electricity's gotten better at doing actually useful stuff. Rattus faber aren't officially menaces anymore, but devils still hate them. Ah... Books without Ministry stamps are illegal. Too much exposure to starlight away from islands makes you go crazy, but stained glass holds it back."