The pirates had incredibly low morale.

Jerry knew they had low morale because when he entered the makeshift brig full of allegedly very bad women he didn't get cat called once. He didn't even get leered at. Mostly they just looked at him like they were wondering what fresh hell he had brought them.

Good.

He'd looked up their ships. Looked up their records. If he turned these women in he could get a decent total chunk of change for the bounty, but the price for hauling their asses to the nearest civilized system wasn't nearly break even. Nor did he want to kill them and just turn in their hides if he didn't have to.

They'd already dealt with the worst of them after all.

Jerry had forwarded the evidence of the three captains' demise and they had been worth a nice pay out. The money for the first had mostly gone to Masha and the kill claim for the second corvette had been so split up that Jerry had put the money into an entertainment lounge upgrade instead. The gunnery crew who'd scored the strike on the Darl'in'cha's starboard cargo bay had taken the third bounty.

It had been converted into a hangar for assault shuttles, and the Captain, a formerly extremely bad bitch by the name of Grelchin, had ended up dead with her top leg breakers after the successful hit by the No. 2 plasma turret crew.

Acting Captain Manila had rolled on her former boss all day.

She was chosen as First Officer mostly because she managed to keep the rest of the crew functional, but Grelchin otherwise ruled through fear and sadism. Another graduate of the Dark Cabal school of leadership it seemed. Nor was the billet of XO any safety for Manila, and she had the scars and other wounds to prove it. Including the loss of her ear.

Apparently Grelchin had taken strips off with her claws and eaten them until it was down to the stump she had... then she'd run her claw around inside, deafening the sensitive instrument.

Manila's supposed crime? Nothing. Not a damned thing.

While that could just be a story, Grelchin had kept a diary in full holo, as well as a punishment log that Commander Lawson had described as a ‘book of grudges', and inflicting that level of pain on someone for nothing was very much Grelchin's style. Random acts of cruelty were practically a religious commandment to her.

All the better she'd been spaced in Jerry's book. Ditto the even nastier literal bitch Masha had taken out like a bag of wet laundry. Her favorite victim, the Gravia girl Babydoll... who desperately needed a nickname of some kind, was spending many long hours with one of the counselors they'd brought aboard.

Jerry had gotten the cliff notes from Bones, and it included just about every nasty thing one could do to an entity that was made out of pure math and axiom. Including some fairly violent and regular rape. Because of course it had. The mechanics of it were beyond him, but Jerry could take a few wild guesses involving axiom and sheer ruthless spite.

It had left Babydoll with a reasonable fear of just about every woman that wasn't Masha, her savior and 'big sister'. Doubly so if that woman had any kind of muzzle. So without much in the way of options... and Babydoll quite literally begging him to let her stay and work on the ship, he'd billeted her as the only woman in the corner of the ship that held the Tear's mini nerd squad.

The nerds had asked for, and received, a shared living space off of the large conference room that served as their nerd squad HQ away from home. While it was technically their work space for nerdly duties, it was also an entertainment lounge piled with a wide variety of game systems, both human and alien. The 'nerd' exit of that conference room led to what amounted to a large communal living space, and then small individual rooms branched off from that. They had a billet spare for Babydoll and she'd taken to living among men with an almost desperate enthusiasm that had nothing to do with potentially getting laid.

Jerry was reasonably certain she'd end up married to one of the nerds. She was, somehow, stacked in ways that a math problem simply should not be, and that seemed like pure nerd bait to him. Probably Marvin, that guy did math for fun. So giving him the opportunity to literally take a math equation to bed and make little math equations with her certainly checked out in Jerry's book.

Over all, the boys were all being very respectful of Babydoll and doing their best to help her along in the healing process by treating her like the person she was. That said, when she did decide she was ready to try something like that, she'd probably have a fairly easy time finding a willing volunteer to see if a sentient math problem needed help keeping her bed warm at night.

Jerry continues to survey the pirates, not saying anything just yet. Despite their Captains being petty tyrants, this lot really weren't too terrible by pirate standards. Though Jerry suspected that wasn't from lack of trying. Their Admiral had kept their little fleet on a tight leash, and used her assets in big actions or sent individual ships out on direct assignments instead of her fleet being a roving problem waiting to happen. So being smart and operating in wild space had kept these crew's rap sheets fairly short... plus these were mostly the back line girls.

Engineers, cooks, mechanics, all the things needed to make a spaceship, never mind a warship function properly. In short, they were useful. The fighters had all pretty much died in the fighting, mostly in various boarding torpedoes or assault ships attacking a target that had not been weakened nearly enough for those tactics to be vaguely safe.

That left the sorry little mob that Jerry was watching now. Have-nots, ne'er-do-wells and assorted flotsam and jetsam. Their crimes, big and small, the suffering they themselves had endured, Babydoll's rescue, it all floated through his mind as he took a slow steady breath.

He could save these women. From themselves if no one else. So Jerry was going to make them an offer that they'd be absolute fools to refuse.

The pirates had been sitting on their hands for a week as they transitioned to Vucsa 5, now, a day's travel away, they were either going on with him, getting spaced, or being shuttled down to Vucsa 5 to be held for the next transport going corewards to be dealt with by the authorities... if Duchess Lilpaw didn't decide to string them all up and save everyone some transport costs.

He held all the cards, this should be relatively easy... but just in case he had an ace up his sleeve. He knew just the woman to make the perfect argument for a second chance, and she was waiting just outside.

Jerry signals one of his Marines nearby, and the woman snaps to the position of attention.

"Room! Attention!"

Some of the naval masters at arms playing the role of jailors are immediately in and among the pirates, acting almost like drill instructors, getting the mob on their feet and facing the appropriate direction. No physical force was required. Just some light guidance.

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The gaunt, hopless looks on their faces only fed his conviction. His confidence. He could save these women... and if he did they'd follow him into an actual hell, of that he was sure.

They'd gone from a life of cruelty and horror to a life awaiting the gallows. Now was time to prove that there was a third way... a better way. A way he had no small doubt some of them had been dreaming of.

The surviving Captain, one of these spider women that never failed to give him the heebie jeebies worked her way to the front. Her rap sheet was the shortest out of her entire fleet, and her crew was better taken care of than the others. They'd taken heavy losses when the Tear's torpedo had taken their now former corvette's drive core out.

"You ladies are extremely lucky."

Jerry begins to pace, letting his voice boom with all his drill field finest, meeting pirate's gazes and making them flinch left, right and center.

"My casualties were extremely light. Only injured. No dead. If you had managed to kill some of my people... well, as I told the former XO of my new corvette, my supply of mercy would have been critically short. I have reviewed all of your records... and I'm prepared to offer you all a deal.”

Jerry’s heels snap together with parade ground perfect motions as he turns an about face and begins to pace the other direction.

“There's some two hundred and fifty of you in this room, and another few dozen in the hospital under guard. You will stay here, be fed, have your wounds treated the traditional way... and then transfer to a planetside holding facility to await local justice or the next Undaunted transport going upspin and coreward... to be delivered into the hands of the galactic authorities. There are of course worse options. Or. You can take my deal."

He had their undivided attention, now it was time to really get them locked in.

"Ensign! If you could join us, please."

Pretty as a picture in her brand spanking new dress whites Ensign Manila Pawthorne, former pirate corvette XO, and fresh out of a healing coma comes into the bay with her heels clicking, squaring her corners just like the freshly promoted First Sergeant Isabella Ramos had taught her. They'd spent a whole day drilling Manila for this moment, and she was putting on a perfect show.

"Hey! Hey girls it's Manila! She got her ear back too!"

"Spiffy uniform, wonder who she ratted out for it. Traitor."

Bridger mentally notes the individual who said that, but her tone sounded more like jealousy than any actual anger or venom.

Manila comes to a halt and offers a sharp salute, and Jerry makes another mental note to give Top Ramos another commendation as he returns it. He turns on a heel back towards the pirates.

"Ensign, please tell your former shipmates the deal I offered you."

"Aye aye sir. Girls... please. Listen to me."

Manila spins on a heel, steps forward, then reaches up and pulls her peaked cap off. They hadn't coached her on this, it was pure Manila. One of the instincts that had noted her as good officer material by Commander Lawson.

"Captain Bridger is offering us an amnesty. Every crime we willingly confess to. There's a few limits... but not many, and even then if we confess and aren't accepted, for all but the most heinous crimes we won't be turned over to the core worlds. If you have fines or a bounty, the Captain is offering to pay it off personally. You just have to pay his price."

"What price is that?"

Calls out a wag in the crowd that Jerry couldn't spot. He suppresses a grin as he steps forward, that had sounded a bit like Diana Lawson. Well, every salesman needs a ringer in the audience.

"Six years. You'll owe me six years of making you a brand new woman after I finish training you up to standard. You'll be screened, and assigned to enlisted, warrant officer, or officer tracks. You will then go through training appropriate to your new rank band and, if you have applicable skills, a rating. Depending on your experience and how you do during testing, you will further be assigned a rank within your band. Ensign Pawthorne tested high enough to pick up full Lieutenant, but requested starting from the basic officer rank, a chance to learn how to do things the right way from the top. I'm quite pleased to have Manila as one of my new line officers, and believe she'll be an asset to my ship and my crew."

Manila hadn't been told that was coming, and beams brightly enough to light up the room. The healing coma had done a lot for the Feli woman. Put some pep in her step. Past that, she was so hungry for praise, for any form of positive emotion attributed to her that even a crumb of a compliment was like pure treasure, and respect?

Admiral Cistern had said it best, and said it often. Respect and courtesy were high value coin to those who received little of either, and that little taste of respect had clearly practically been a drug to the Feli officer. She craved it. The respect of her peers. The respect of her seniors. She'd work her ass off to get that respect and recognition, no torture required.

"You are not limited to a job you have previous experience in. If you're a mechanic and you desperately want to be a cook, and you have the aptitude, I have plenty of hungry mouths to feed so I'll gladly put you to work. If you're a chief engineer or pilot with an extensive background I'll be harder pressed to put you to work in a different field, but my staff will at least listen to your requests... all you have to do is be honest with us, and take the oath."

Jerry begins to pace again, and Manila takes a step back out of the way.

"For six years in addition to your pay, you'll be clothed, fed, sheltered, trained, and instructed in the philosophy of the Undaunted. The Undaunted is not just a new stellar power, it is a mindset. A way of life. Many of you have been living under a boot heel... even your most senior officers were being oppressed by the now past tense admiral of your former fleet. Never mind the now past tense captains. Of the four present at last week's engagement three are dead. Captain Charo was, near as I can tell, the only decent excuse for sapient life of the lot. If you're ready to say never again to that kind of treatment. To never let yourself be cowed or broken like you were... to fight. Then I have a billet for you. A second chance. A new life. You can even request a healing coma as soon as possible... you might have to wait a few days if we have enough applicants for that. Medical care takes priority obviously, but if that's what you want, and you're one of mine, I will always try and do what's best for my crew."

Jerry comes to a stop right in front of Captain Cora Charo, heels clicking smartly.

"So. What say you?"

Charo offers him a weak smile. The question had been for the room, but as the ranking pirate officer left, it was also predominantly for her. If she went, a lot of the girls would follow her. They were raw material, ready to be shaped and molded, but they weren't Undaunted yet. Not even close.

"I suppose I won't be able to retain my rank of Captain."

"Not as a line officer, assuming you want to stay on the command track and have a shot at commanding a ship again."

"The Undaunted would afford me such an opportunity?"

"You'd have to stick around longer than six years, but yes. I have no doubt you'll test out quite highly, probably the max I can offer you, which is full Lieutenant, with an expedited promotion to Lieutenant Commander on completion of a year of service after your training. All the interviews with your crew clearly indicated they held you in very high regard. Cora... I want you to keep doing what you do best. But for the good guys this time."

"We weren't so bad."

"You weren't. You know the rest of the fleet was or is. Or was a girl getting raped multiple times a day from childhood to her young adulthood after having her family butchered in front of her count as not so bad to you?"

Cora winces. Hard. Jerry probably would have gotten less of a reaction if he'd slapped her clean across the mouth.

"I didn't... if I'd known..."

"You didn't. So it really doesn't matter what you did or didn't do then. I can't offer you absolution for your sins, nor can I change the past... but I can offer you a chance to make the galaxy a better place."

Cora considers things for a moment, then reaches out her hand, firmly shaking Jerry's hand in turn.

"I don't know if you, or anyone can really make an impact on the galaxy, but I'm willing to try."

"That's all I ask from you... and considering I'm hopefully making an impact on lots of lives today... well. Let's see about that galactic change. I have no doubt you'll be surprised at just what you can do."