Seaside Moors and when the MC rhyme and the DJ spin

a crab scuttled along the hardpack of sand, its claws raised and pace quick. behind it came a clumsy shadow with his nose low and eyes trained in fascination on the strange creature.

valravn had seen (and failed to catch) these things a few times, but they always slipped off into the foamy water where he would not go, and where he was not allowed to. sometimes, they plain disappeared under the sand, and no matter how much he dug, he could never find them.

once or twice, he had found a dead one along the water -- but any time he got close enough to the swashline, a wave came roaring out to greet him and sent him scampering timidly back to dry land.

valravn could not articulate just what about the sea terrified him, but while his siblings played and frolicked in the water, valravn stuck to the sand. not even the coaxing of his mothers encouraged him to dip his feet in the harmless tidepools; if it was water near the beach, he was not having anything to do with it.

wary as he was of the waves which lapped lazily along the shore, valravn had very few reservations about playing in the stones and sands adjacent. he had woken up today with the determined goal to catch one of those scuttlebugs (crabs), and had marched his pudgy butt out of the den down to the shore-line, where he spent the next half hour clumsily chasing after crabs who easily eluded him.

but not this time.

valravn had learned that sometimes, in the weird plants the water spat up along the shoreline, there were interesting things to smell and sometimes eat. as he nibbled at a stalk of seaweed, he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. tracing the movement curiously, valravn watched in interest as a crab walked sideways with its claws raised in the air.

"SCUTTLEBUG!" crowed the little ruffian -- at last, victory!

unfortunately, he had no concept of what those claws were, or why they were raised. he thrust his nose down to eat it just like he ate the milipedes and centipedes that wandered into their den sometimes. only, this was no scaly bug -- but an angry creature with pinchers attached. valravn soon learned just why crabby existed in the dictionary -- for no sooner had he tried to chow down on the crab, did he realize the crab was chowing down on him.

he felt a piercing pain in his left nostril, a tightening grip with barbed edges. valravn pulled back with a loud scream, while the crab held on his nostrils like the world's most painful bull-ring.

not even profuse shaking of his head, or crying, or clawing at his face seemed to get the scuttlebug off. valravn was besides himself, and ran yelping all the way back to his mamas with crab cargo still determinedly hooked to his smarting snout.