

Not just any random escalation, though.
The narcissist has a plan they are following their game. If that escalation is part of their plan, that’s is absolutely not how you deal with them. Escalate, by all means. But only in a way that benefits your situation.

I think I saw her once, actually! A crow was harassing one of the small ones – it looked like it was trying to catch it to eat, probably?
A seagull saw what’s going on and went full-blown “I’m a parent as well, you absolute damn fucker!”, and chased the crow away. And really not just a few tens of metres away or so, but really chased them away from the whole general area where the mom with really cool hair was swimming with her family!
When the seagull came back, I gave it something nice to eat, because, damn, flying rat or not, that was a cool move! And I happened to have something seagull compatible, not just some bread that will do more harm than good.