"Leave me alone!" a young gryphon shrieked at the five burly male wolves
advancing on her, backing her into a blind alley.
  "What's wrong, little girl?" the leader sneered. "Don'tcha like big guys like
us?"
  "She's probably never had one," one of his buddies grinned.
  "Gonna be nice and [i]tight,[/i]" another added, licking his chops.
  The fourth opened his mouth to say something, but all that came out was a
gurgling half-scream as his eyes rolled back in his head, blood pouring from his
throat where a serrated blade had been driven through the artery from behind.
  The others turned to face the assailant as the bit of metal withdrew, and saw
a tall seagull with metal covering her entire body. "Afternoon, boys," she said
pleasantly, casually flicking a bit of blood and fur off her hand.
  "Robi?" the gryphon asked, blinking.
  "How many times do I have to tell you not to run around by the docks, Izzy?"
the bird chided. "Your mom's gonna kill me!"
  "Not if we have anything to say about it, bitch!" the alpha wolf snapped,
pulling a cattle prod out of his coat. His remaining cohorts followed suit.
"See, bitch, we heard o' you, and we know just how to make you scream."
  "I bet you say that to all the girls," she quipped, crouching and drawing back
her right fist, as though to punch the nearest one. Tiny spikes grew from the
metal on that forearm, while it fused at the elbow and shoulder joints. Her arm
began to shake as wind started blowing into the alley. "I could take all of you
out quite easily right now, you know," she chirred. "Like popping balloons with
a shotgun."
  "Yer bluffin'!" the one nearest Robian snarled, charging at her. He managed
to take one step before he was knocked off his feet, bleeding from a dozen
wounds on his chest and sporting a ragged stump where his head used to be. The
bird, meanwhile, had shifted her stance a bit so that her other fist was drawn
back, while the metal on her right arm regenerated itself.
  "Yeah! Go Robi!" Izzy cheered.
  "See? Just like a shotgun," she chuckled. "Of course, if I killed all three of
you at once, I might hit Izzy. On the other hand, even if you all rushed me,
there's no guarantee you'd win. After all," the gull smirked, gesturing to the
barrels along one wall and the dumpster along the other, "you've gotten
yourselves into a nice little bottleneck here. Of course, as you can all see,
even as drunk as you are, I have the advantage."
  "What if I just grab 'er!?" Alpha snorted.
  "Ohoho, you [i]don't[/i] wanna do [i]that.[/i] You'd make a great meatshield
for her.
  "Now, I'm sure you'd prefer to live, and I'm willing to give you a chance to,
so let's play a game, shall we?" Robian crooned.
  "W-what do you have in mind?" the leader stammered.
  "Well, we're not too far from the local bar," she replied coyly, "and you
all smell like you're pretty familiar with that place, so tell me--are you
also familiar with the game Ten Fingers?"
  "Is this bitch nuts? She only has eight!" one of the cronies guffawed.
  "I like these odds!" the other laughed.
  Even the leader grinned. "Sure, bitch, let's go. Ten Fingers it is."
  
  (For the benefit of any reader not already aware of them, I'll now explain the
rules. All the players start off holding up ten fingers. The first one says
something he or she has never done; anybody who [i]has[/i] done it must put a
finger down. The next player follows suit, and whoever puts all his or her
fingers down has lost. There's also an unspoken rule of sorts that listing
visible things such as "I've never been a girl" or "I've never worn glasses" is
bad form. We now return to the crappy story already in progress.)

  "Hey, Izzy, mind putting an honesty seal here?" Robian called. The
six-year-old nodded in reply and hummed for a moment. A glowing symbol appeared
on the pavement under the players. "As you know, this seal prevents any of us
from lying as long as we're within the affected area," the gull stated.
  "She--that kid can use those?!" the alpha gasped.
  "She just did, didn't she?" was the reply. "So, here's the deal: Whoever
loses, dies. Simple, right?"
  "Yeah, yeah, let's just get started already!"
  "I'll go first, then. I am a lady, after all," Robian chuckled, holding up her
four-fingered hands. "I've never gotten drunk."
  All three wolves put a finger down. "I've never worn a bra!" the leader
growled.
  Robian lowered a finger. So did the second cohort, blushing purple, though
none of his friends even saw. "I've never fucked a guy!" the first added.
Another of the gull's fingers went down, as well as the blushing wolf's. "I've
never been g-g-g-g-g-straight!" the remaining lupine blurted out. Robian cocked
an eyebrow in amusement, her six remaining fingers staying up as the other two
glared at him, lowering one finger each.
  Robian's turn again. "I've never smoked a cigar." This time, everybody but the
second crony put a finger down.
  "I've never worn a skirt!" the leader called, followed by the first lackey
announcing "I've never worn panties!" 
  "Goddammit!!" the second one growled, now down to five fingers. "I've never
had sex with a woman!!" he snapped. The other two snarled at him, lowering a
finger each, while all of Robian's stayed up.
  "Hey, you're cheating!" the leader accused. "You already said you weren't
straight! You must have--"
  "Not true," the bird admonished. "I might still be a virgin, I might have only
ever slept with men, or"--here she trilled slightly--"I might not even be a
woman to begin with." She laughed at the appalled looks on the alpha and beta
wolves' faces and the vaguely jealous one on the gamma's. "In any case, [i]I've[/i]
certainly never made such a boneheaded assumption," she quipped, causing the two
straight wolves to lower a finger.
  "I've never lost a game of cards!" the leader said, without thinking. His
first lackey lowered a finger. Nobody else did. "I've never, uh...I've never won
a game of cards!" he said. The leader put a finger down. "I've never been to
Vegas," the second henchman shrugged. Nobody lowered a finger, to his surprise.
  "I've never played cards," Robian grinned, causing the boss and his right-hand
man to lower their fingers, swearing loudly.
  "I've never been on the bottom!" the leader grumbled. Only the second crony
put a finger down, followed by another when "I've never taken it up the ass!"
was called. Robian had to put one down, too.
  "I've never picked up a whore," the gay one sneered. The straight wolves were
down to one finger each.
  "I've never been gay," Robian said, nearly causing the gay wolf's eyes to bug
out of his head as he dropped a finger. "I've never been a traitor!" the leader
added, causing both the wolf and Robian to put a finger down. "And I've never
sucked a cock," the henchman added, bringing Robian down to one finger--one
finger more than the gay one had left to play with. Izzy covered her eyes; the
first loser swallowed hard and whimpered as the metal-clad gull turned looked at
him, then reached back, pulled a large knife from her feathers, and threw it
at him. It impaled him through the skull with a loud crunch, and he went down.
  "Say, boys," Robian chirred, turning back to face the remaining competitors,
"since you've all played this game before, is it safe to say you've each lost at
least once?"
  "Eh?" the lackey asked.
  "Yeah, why?" the leader stammered.
  The bird let out a low, happy, and dangerous croon. "Because I never have."