Sea Lion Shores i can not boast

Sandpiper was doing her damndest to antagonize him but he was not about to let her succeed on the eve of him showing her up. Raptor felt her at the tip of his tail and flicked it aside and out of the immediate reach of her mouth, keeping his focus on the gulls as descended. He supposed that, in a way, she was doing what he asked. No doubt the birds would take notice that her interest was in his tail and not in them.

One bird broke from the flock and started down. It landed on the rocks nearby, casting tentative looks around and calculating its safety. Seeing the disinterest of the predators, it picked its way closer. Raptor licked his lips but continued his charade as he groomed a foreleg. Step by step the gull approached the urchin until at last it stood over the delicacy and considered it.

"Wait for it," he murmured quietly. This was a ripe opportunity but it was not the opportunity.

The gull grasped the urchin in its bill and looked around. Then it lifted and ascended an appropriate height before letting the urchin fall and crack open on the ground. Raptor was ready, and as the gull descended to claim the urchin's sweet flesh, the sable pirate launched forward. With a squawk the bird hurried to gain altitude but Raptor sprang and caught a webbed foot in his teeth, hauling the gull back down and letting it hang upside down from his jaws — a noisy, flapping mess of a trophy.

"That's how ye get a gull," he teased through grinning teeth. The corsair whipped his head and slung the gull's skull into the rocks. It went limp and he let it drop unceremoniously. Beside his foot was the busted urchin. "And open an urchin too."