As I prepared myself to step out into the clearing and fight the Cerberous that was keeping watch for the sleeping Queen, I fingered the axes I had scavenged from one of the coffins I'd found in the last two weeks. Cai had told me they were throwing axes and I'd taken them to distract myself whenever I didn't want to practice with my sword. They were actually why I'd started trying to weave the grass together, I needed a target to hit and I'd gotten pretty good with them. These axes where what I was going to use to start my fight with the Cerberous and if I was lucky I'd hit the tail and take it out before it could hit me with it.

With one last deep breath, I let the axes start flying. The first I threw straight at the Cerberous' tail and the second I sent at the tentacle mane hoping to chop a few of the stingers off and make things easier. The last I threw at the head figuring if I was lucky then I'd end the fight before it even started and if not, then when the Cerberous sprang to its feet it would put its chest and shoulder where the head was now.

As all three axes flew through the air I drew my sword and stepped out into the clearing, almost ready for this fight. As I took my first step I heard two meaty thunks and the softer snick the axes make when they land blade first in dirt. The Cerberous hadn't even had time to react to the first axe hitting its tail, much less the second one cutting into its spine and paralyzing it for the last one to plant itself in its head and cleave open the brain.

"Damn, that worked better than I'd have thought," I told Cai.

"Indeed," he agreed. "I expected the first throwing axe to be the only one to injure it in a debilitating way. Was the second one on target?"

"Nope, and I'm okay with that honestly," I answered.

"Very well," he said. "If I may, before we begin planting these bombs, I have a request and a suggestion, Rickshaw."

"What's up?"

"Much as I wished with the previous Queen, do you believe that you could preserve this one's body for the Wardens to study more closely? The state it is in now, with no Guardian and no way to defend itself will allow you to kill it quite easily. Furthermore you can use the clearing as bait for the remaining Guardians and detonate the batteries so that they and the recently laid eggs are destroyed."

"You know what, things have gone better today than they should have, so sure I'll try to get the Queens body out of here in one or two pieces," I told him.

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"Thank you Rickshaw."

"Here's hoping that we can get out before anything else shows up," I said picking up the bombs and starting to lay them out. The four full bombs would go toward the edges of the clearing, so that they could do the most damage without interfering with each other. The other six would be set at five points with the last at the center of the clearing. When these went off they were going to absolutely destroy the area within a half-mile of the blast zone that Cai had carefully set out to cause the most damage to the area and destroy the most eggs and Guardians without overlapping.

It took me nearly fifteen minutes to set them all up and then another thirty to run the wires between them just so that if a Guardian pulled one wire they'd pull all of them. Just in case they didn't set off the trip wires, I had Cai tell me how to set up a bunch of rocks so that when the Guardians went by them, they'd tip the top ones over and set the bombs off anyway.

Once I had all that together I stepped up to the Queen and examined it one last time before I killed it. Like the other one I had killed, this one had a set of wings that had talons at certain points and its feet were like a birds with three toes forward and one toe backward, all with talons. Unlike the last Queen, this one had no armor covering its chest and stomach and the stomach was bulging like a pregnant woman's did when she was approaching her due date.

"Rickshaw, you must kill this Queen now and hurry back to your shelter," Cai told me. "I am detecting the lifesign of another Queen and if I am not mistaken then the second Queen is within the one before us."

"You mean that its pregnant?" I asked horrorified at the prospect of what I thought this might imply.

"Yes that is the typical term for the Queen's current condition," he confirmed. "I fear that when this Queen births the other one, it will send some sort of signal to the other Guardians and they will return with all haste to guard it as the young Queen is born. It must be killed now."

"I don't know if I can kill a baby," I whispered.

"It is not a child, Rickshaw," Cai urged me. "This is the only gendered member of its species, and from its efforts to expand its race, multiple habitable planets and star systems, entire galaxies, have been wiped of all life. If you do not kill this creature now and end both of their lives, then you will be condemning your entire species to die at their hands when they send their young to your world, and they will not hesitate to kill your children as you hesitate to kill theirs."

The cold delivery of the facts with Cai's monotone voice ate through my morals, but still I hesitated out of fear and shame.

"Do you still want me to take it back with us?" I asked quietly.

"It would greatly aid in the Warden's study of all Scourge but if you feel you are unable to then it is not neccessary," Cai told me. It did not help.

"Cai, I'll do this but please don't ever ask me to kill a Scourge Queen while its pregnant like this again," I said, raising my sword for the blow that would end two lives.

"I cannot promise this," Cai said, "but I will strive to not ask this of you again."

My blade fell and the Queen's head seperated from her body and the unborn Queen within her.