Chapter Thirty-Seven

Though her men were reeling at the setback caused by Seth being injured and the forty soldiers being killed, Morgause kept her head high and mighty. In fact, when Seth arrived, Morgause's first order of business was to have him finished off for failing his mistress. Then he was left where he fell without hope of burial or any funeral rites of any kind. "It would seem my father still has more fight left within him than I originally expected. No worries, this will just make this all the more fun for us than it originally was going to be," Morgause assured her remaining colleagues.

"How do you intend to recover from this damage, milady? You've had fifty mercenaries on your payroll and you just lost forty of them in a single go," said one mercenary.

"And we don't even have the equipment to survive going toe to toe with one such as him. How are we going to recover from that kind of loss?" said another. I needed to clean out my payroll anyway, those forty dead will allow for more opportunities to expand my assets a little bit more. Too bad the lot of you will never find out how expendable you really were to me Morgause thought quietly. Aloud, however, she assured them that she already had a plan set in motion for fighting Hyperion once more.

"I have some contacts on Mustafar who could use the challenge. They have similar equipment to what your colleagues wielded but have a lot more experience than you. Killed Jedi and Sith alike in their prime time and will love the challenge," Morgause replied. At first, the mercs around her wondered what it was that she could be talking about. Mercenaries, Mustafar, then the pieces clicked and they paled all at once with fright.

"You're not seriously considering recruiting the Devils of Mustafar! Those people are savages who are just as apt to kill you as to kill whoever you pay them to attack," said the Captain of her remaining mercenaries. Morgause nodded, admitting that it was possible but she had a counter ready for just that.

"I know of the Devils' reputation and made the offer almost as soon as the forty soldiers set out. When they were destroyed, I got a response to the offer and they're interested in helping us. Their liaison is interested in meeting me to make sure that the money is cleaner than the pistols of his warriors," Morgause told them.

"And where do you intend to meet this liaison, milady?" asked the Captain of her remaining mercenaries. Morgause chuckled briefly and then replied to what it was that she had been asked by her Captain.

"I'm meeting him on Eriadu to discuss payment and make sure the credits are good to go. The Devils prefer unmarked credits since they tend to traverse across Republic and Hutt Space numerous times on their missions. Once we've settled a deal, the Devils will chase Hyperion across the galaxy and bring him to me alive for a greater pay than if he was dead," Morgause explained. The Captain scoffed at the idea that the liaison would accept such a payment out of hand and with good reason too. In making this deal, Morgause was approaching the most disreputable mercenaries in the galaxy whose only arguable mark of effectiveness was that once they took a job, they were thorough in getting it done.

Once, long before, the Devils had had a contract put out on Morgause's aunt Morgana and had very nearly succeeded. But when she managed to destroy the client, they disappeared into the unknown until she found need of them. Their abilities against Force-sensitives had not gone unnoticed by her and she even hired them for a few similar enemies of her own. She also taught her niece the value of keeping the likes of them in the back of her mind in case she had need of them. "It's always important to keep powerful groups like that in mind to understand why the Jedi are flawed in their approach to keeping peace and justice intact," Morgana had once told her niece.

Now, as her ship took off, she pondered whether or not she wanted anything done about that Jedi who'd aided Hyperion. Did she waste time and resources calling out a hit on him for his aid or did she let him live in the hopes that another ally of hers might kill him instead? Her network ran deep and she found herself admittedly debating whether to put a separate contract out on the Nautolan for his interference as well. Perhaps another ally of hers within the Republic could deal with him on her behalf as well and she knew plenty of assassins and bounty hunters who chose to operate there. And some of them were looking for work in any case which meant she'd have plenty more opportunities to take revenge against the Nautolan when she was ready to take it.

"Then may the Force save our souls when the Devils of Mustafar take more casualties than they need to for killing Hyperion. That's gonna be a truly costly day for all of us when they do it," said the Captain. Morgause knew what he was talking about but paid it no mind, the Devils needed only do their job and she would take care of costs. Once they had Hyperion or could confirm that he was dead, they'd have their deposit and then she would wait until another time to call upon them again.

Eriadu was as close to a midpoint between Mustafar and Ando as she could get without having to worry about fuel. It was also largely a straight shot back home from there where she could wait until the job was done as well. Duro was a good world to her and since Eriadu was along the route, it was largely a smooth ride back home even if it would be long. More, the Devils of Mustafar would have no interference in travel from her when they used the trade routes to try and find their quarry.

The Captain who spoke of collateral was referring, however, to the fact that whenever the Devils took a mission they usually tended not to care who they destroyed along the way. Women, children, it didn't matter as long as it meant they would get to their targets faster than they would if they spared them. They also tended to bring down entire buildings without regard to whether there were people still inside of them or not. This made it dangerous for client and target alike to hire them and usually marked the client as insanely desperate to be attempting such a feat.

But Morgause was like the Devils in that she didn't care about collateral either as long as she got what she ultimately wanted out of them. In this case, it meant either the successful capture or death of her father for the rape which resulted in Morgause existing today. It meant making him know the pain he caused her when she killed herself and the pain that he caused Morgause for making her an orphan. She would destroy half the galaxy if it meant succeeding in that mission and besides, most of the galaxy was rubbish anyway. Those who scrounged and scraped for food would not be missed when they were gone and most certainly weren't missed now by people of substance such as herself.

The Jedi pretended to care for their misfortune, pretended that they were there to better their lives and waved their lightsabers around at anyone who opposed that view. But in the end, the fact they were bound to Republic law meant they couldn't wrench the bulk of credits out of the wealthy such as Morgause and truly save those more decrepit souls they sought to help. Would letting them be killed by the Devils of Mustafar along the way to finding Hyperion truly be murder or would it be charity that the Jedi couldn't give? Least of all when it would be a permanent end to their wretched lives where the Jedi would have them perpetuate and procreate, dooming their spawn to the same cyclical existence as their predecessors.

As she plugged in the coordinates for the first of several jumps she would need to reach Eriadu, she thought carefully to her situation. She had barely more than her crew, operating her transport now and that meant the possibility that she may have to look into hiring the Devils more indefinitely. Whether or not they accepted her offer was entirely up to their liaison but she was convinced that if she could smooth talk him with the money she intended to offer, she could earn their alliance. Besides, by the same legalities that had allowed her to employ the previous batch of mercenaries, a cut out of all jobs the Devils did from there on would have to go to her and her funds weren't infinite.

Granted she still had more than she could ever need in this lifetime but it was not impossible for that scenario to change. She had, after all, liquidated all of Morgana's assets when she died and took their worth to combine it with her parents and her mother's. As long as she had only the well she created in doing it, the risk was there even if it was minimal that she would lose everything. She also invested in stocks with high risks which meant that even if the profits were greater than the losses, the losses would still pack enough punch over time.

Or rather, she should correct herself, it had the potential to pack enough punch to where she could lose everything. She had to wrap up this business with her father quickly and decisively in order to gain the freedom she needed to pursue her other enterprises with impunity. Once she was done with him, she'd also need to sell all the gear she had obtained for such purposes as she had in mind for him when he was captured. This way, she could cover her tracks and claim innocence even if a Jedi came to investigate the scene of any crimes she was alleged to commit.

All in all, she seemed like a genius but she was realizing the holes in her plans now more than ever before. Worst of all, she realized time was running out to either complete her plans or fix the loopholes in it. But what did it matter as long as the risk was worth it in the end and she had her revenge? That thought comforted her as they made the journey across the stars to her destination of Eriadu.