Wheeling Gull Isle it's a hard-knock life

Driftwood spun about at the small chuff and hastily straightened up his pose upon spotting the authoritative bulk of fur wending his way toward the two of them. Oh, uh, no, I don't think so. The overseer's figure was a pretty distinct one, and one that Driftwood was certain he had seen before—not least because the male greeted everyone by name—but it took Drift's brain a moment to place him. The imposing air of authority clued him in as much as anything; Driftwood might have facepalmed if he was human, but as it was he settled for hastily changing his distracted stare into a respectful low bow of the head. He couldn't resist a quick peek in the youngster's direction to see how the smallest and most rufous member of the group was reacting, which might give Drift a little more of a clue as to how to handle this awkward meeting. He hardly knew the first thing about their alpha; perhaps the other—Droman?—might have at least heard a little more via rumors, even if the two of them hadn't spoken much either.

But Droman was already looking elsewhere. Driftwood followed the tilt of the smallest wolf's ear and jumped a little as the crab scuttled a few venturesome steps closer. Driftwood carefully moved a few steps further away, only half-hearing Droman's canceled swimming plans at first. Then: Wait, it swims? said Driftwood incredulously, peering down at the twitching eyestalks poking out from the sand-colored shell. He didn't see very many fishy parts on it, or even any paws for there to be webbing hidden in—how could such a thing possibly swim? Though it did have a lot of limbs, he had to admit; maybe one of them hid some sort of finny surprise. That's a crab, right? We didn't have them back where— Driftwood halted for a moment in confusion, having suprised himself with the sudden tidbit of knowledge that came out of his mouth. Then he picked up again in hopes of covering up the small stumble: I mean, it doesn't look big enough to be much of a threat to wolves. Is there some sort of territorial agreement the pack has with them, or something? Wolves shalt not swim whence the crabs hath claimed, right? Driftwood shot a puzzled look at Stockholm, who he'd hope ought to know. The notion that such a weird, tiny creature could determine if and where wolves could swim had him pretty baffled. He moved another half-step toward Droman and away from the small scuttling creature though just in case it revealed some sort of secret hidden power that Driftwood didn't know about, like shooting lasers from its freaky eyes or skunkscent out its butt, or summoning a sudden horde of its fellows and swarming the three innocent wolves who'd dared to unwittingly trespass. One never knew!