Deinonychus

*Deinonychus* is a dromeosaur originating from the Early Cretaceous of North America.

## Characteristics

*Deinonychus* are lithe, wolf sized animals, covered in a heavy coating of blue feathers on their entire body except the start of the neck and the ankle down, and their hands. These feathers are fur-like except at the wings and at the fan formed near the tip of the tail, which are flight feathers. The scales on the face are a bluish-green, while the ones on their limbs are a more dull grey. When viewed from the dark, their eyes seemingly glow yellow. The arms and legs of *Deinonychus* are quite muscular and have very large claws, reaching up to 2 inches on the forelimbs. These claws adaptions are used for climbing, as *Deinonychus* are arboreal animals, and use this to travel safely from ground based predators.

They are also quite social animals, usually living in packs of 12 individuals. These packs have a hierarchy of alphas, betas, and omegas, which is determined by their hunting prowess with no distinction between the sexes' roles. Omegas will typically sit out conflicts in order to rear young at the pack's nesting sites, which are normally on the ground. although all members there will take shelter in the canopy when a larger carnivore comes by. When the rest of the pack hunts, they use a unique way to hunt prey:

    When prey is spotted, half the pack moves onto the ground to begin panicking and shepherding the prey animals, typically *Stygimoloch* and Hypsilophodonts, to where the rest of the pack that are still in the trees and can jump down on and kill the prey either by ripping them apart with their claws or biting their throats and suffocating them.

When threatened by larger carnivores such as *Quetzalcoatlus* whilst the pack is present, *Deinonychus* will go for an all out attack, leading to what Andrei Wynn describes as "Some of the wildest, bloodiest brawls I've ever seen". In spite of this, they will actively avoid both of the valley's apex predators, the *Tyrannosaurus rex* and *Utahraptor*.

## History

### The Arrival of Vulture Squad

*Deinonychus* were one of the dinosaur species released from the failing of the USSR Particle Collider inton Vulture Valley in Vietnam. A year later when Vulture Squad was camped pit in the valley while searching for a missing platoon of Green Beret, Xavier Wise was stalked by a pack of *Deinonychus*, but they quickly retreated when a *Tyrannosaurus* known as The Father approached the area on a trail back to his nest.

The next day, another pack of *Deinonychus* attacked a herd of *Stygimoloch* that Vulture Squad had been sneaking past. Realizing they were exposed to the animals leaping down from the trees, Xavier ordered the group to move into the herd in order to provide more targets for the dromeosaurs. While working initially, one of the *Stygimoloch* knocked over Eli Taylor, forcing the rest of the squad to rescue him before he was trampled to death. Now exposed, the pack moved away from the herd and any corpses they'd made and gave chase to Vulture Squad. After a chase across the river, the pack caught up to Vulture Squad as they were catching their breath. Taking the opportunity, part of the pack grabbed Eli and dragged him away from the Squad while another jumped Xavier when he lagged behind. With the help of Charlie Miller, both managed to kill the four *Deinonychus* attacking them. While this was happening, Logan Stovall was attacked by another *Deinonychus*, which he managed to mortally wound with a rock before performing a mercy shot on it. Just afterwards, Gerald Keyes found Logan and mentioned he had shot two more of the dinosaurs, but was attacked by the remainders of the pack and dragged away. After being dragged quite far, Gerald killed two of his assailants, and the remaining two retreated into the canopy when they sensed the presence of a nearby *Utahraptor*.

## Trivia

* Unlike in the books of the Primitive War series, the real *Deinonychus* is no longer believed to hunt in packs, based on studies of its growth and the ecological niches the juveniles are believed to have maintained. In reality, adult *Deinonychus* is believed to have spent most of its time on the ground. Juvenile *Deinonychus* on the other hand, may have climbed trees to escape danger or to hunt Arboreal animals.
* in the book it say that Deinonychus grow only about 6 ft long and 150 lbs but in reality, they were also larger with adults growing up 10-11 feet long and possibly weighting about 220 lb.
* in the book it say that Deinonychus kill it prey by suffocating it with its jaws or ripping it apart with their claws but in reality, Deinonychus have very powerful jaws for its size on pare with a Jaguar to rivalry an alligator and would have use its claws, especially its sickle claws to dig in and restating struggle prey.