But Rocky has a sideparty in Phasianidae Valhalla, to march in chains across the Rainbow Bridge, his servant in the afterlife.

Yesterday, while SWWBO and Right Girl were out making money at the Farmer's Market, Bug (Right Girl's gay chihuahua),  plus Kiki and Gunner were out keeping an eye out for interlopers, as the birds wended their easily-distracted ways to the coop for the night. 

The Predator usually strikes between 5:30 and 7:00PM.  Too early for the possums and raccoons - besides, all that's usually left is a few feathers.  This killer is big enough to take away the whole bird.

Me and my posse are all just sitting around the tree that overlooks the barn, coop, and paddock.  The goats are munching away, the horses are munching away, and the birds are... munching away.  Bug is being a chihuahua.  Kiki is sitting at my feet, Gunner has his head up, alert.

We're about to see who is made of what, this evening.

Suddenly Gunner pops upright, peering intently at the brush north of the barn - a site of several avian murders.  Coming to full alert, he takes off like a flash.

Kiki stands up, her bloodhound nose aquiver.

Bug?  Well, Bug... vibrates.

Suddenly wild yipping and barking breaks out from the grass where Gunner sped.  Kiki lets out a classic hound-like howl and bounds off into the brush.

Bug vibrates.

The birds... munch.  The goats... munch.  The horses... munch.  Because they know that rough men and rough dogs stand ready.  Well, dog, anyway.

I head for the house.

Bug follows me.  Vibrating.

The yipping, barking and howling continue down into the swale of the creek below the house, and then moves up-branch into the impact area laying directly behind the house, where many a criminal piece of paper has been executed by firing squad.

I go into the house.  Bug - runs off, vibrating like the chihuahua he is.

The sound of mortal combat intensifies.  That or a meeting of the Security Council.   I come out of the house.  Carrying the O.R.C., tapping the magazine to ensure it's seated, and flipping the filters up on the Tru-Glo sight.

I lock and load, safety on, trigger finger laying alongside the receiver, rifle cradled at the ready.

Kiki comes bounding back upslope, revealing her inner Frenchness.  She barks sternly at the fighting going on in the brush, like an impotent UN diplomat in front of a camera. 

And looks to me to do something.  Heh.  Typical.

Somewhere, off in the distance, Bug is vibrating.  I can just tell.  I just hope he's not vibrating near any coyotes.

The sound of the skirmishing has moved upstream and is now climbing up out of the rocky tree-lined valley into the old pasture to the west of the house - I can finally see the combatants.  Gunner is indeed harrying a coyote.

Kiki is demanding a cease fire, with peace keepers and condoms for everyone!

Bug is vibrating, somewhere.

The rifle comes up, I settle into a good cheek weld, both eyes open in the gathering red-tinged gloom of a cloudy Kansas dusk.

I switch to green dot from red cross.

There they are... safety off... tracking, tracking, tracking, - break contact little brother - tracking, lead, lead, lead, the green dot rests on the tip of the coyote's breast as he makes his break to crest the hill and escape...  squeeze, gentle buck, a reminder to next time remember the damn shooting muffs, and the interloper tumbles into the brush, Gunner following.

Kiki still bellows sternly at everyone, demanding that everyone return to pre-conflict borders.

The goats, startled by the shot, look up, and go back to munching.  The horses trot over to the far side of the paddock. The horses across the street, in the south pasture, given that the flow of battle was headed their way, break into a run for the low ground in the east by the dam.  The birds don't notice a thing.  They aren't deaf, but they sure don't give a hoot about gunfire.

Somewhere, Bug is vibrating.

Safety on, I trot laboriously into the overgrown grass of the as yet unmown pasture.  I marvel that I'm finally able to move at all, much less trot, given the damn gout.

Gunner stands guard over the body of his fallen foe.  The foe that he flushed, and ran to ground.  Gunner is a goofball, but he's a brave little bugger.  Once I'm there to secure the scene, the UN diplomat Kiki arrives to take questions from the press and credit for the cease-fire,  followed by a vibrating chihuahua named Bug.

I'm glad to see Bug.  I would hate to have had to tell Wendy I used him for bait and that it didn't quite go as planned.  There would have been weeping and wailing, and I would have been crushed with guilt over my part in the death of Bug. 

 The coyote?  Not so much.  Leave my tribe alone, canis latrans... 

And Gunner?  Gunner now knows what it sounds like, when the bullets are headed your way, sorta.  He's a combat veteran.