Robert Bakker - RAPTOR RED

A deinonych bumps into her tail, catching the tip of his killing claw into Raptor Red’s skin. A tiny message of pain travels from tail to Raptor Red’s brain. It wakes her up for a second. Her right eye opens involuntarily. The deinonych stares at her for a second, decides that she’s no danger, and saunters over to her sister’s body. Raptor Red’s eye follows his movement, but the images sent to her brain elicit no response.

The deinonych stops to sniff at her sister. He approaches her hind foot cautiously, turning his head one way and then the other, examining the deadly claw that in life had killed scores of dinosaurs far larger than he is. He reaches out with his own hind foot, pushing on the massive calf muscle.

Raptor Red’s mind wakes up just a little bit.

The deinonych crouches down and extends his neck toward her sister’s shoulder. Suddenly he gets bold and tries a quick bite at her lifeless neck. Raptor Red’s other eye snaps open.

Curiosity and revenge overcome the deinonych’s inborn horror of all Utahraptor. He remembers being chased by the great raptors many times in the six years he’s been alive. He remembers going hungry because this particular Utahraptor pack stole carcasses from his own family.

He growls and grabs Raptor Red’s sister by the neck, his head twitching and jerking in vicious spasms. He’s so absorbed in venting his anger that he doesn’t notice Raptor Red’s head rising from the snow, her arms pushing her torso up from the ground.

Raptor Red’s brain sends messages to her limbs and body. Waves of muscle contractions pass up and down her hindlegs, warming the tissue. The pain from her injured limb starts to glow again, but her brain overrides those signals. A very terrible emotion is welling up inside her, something irrational, something that makes her oblivious to the throbbing in her knee and thigh.

She pushes her body backward a few feet so her shoulders are braced against the rough bark of a pine tree. Then she drags her body into an upright position, half sitting, half standing, her hand claws digging into the tree trunk.

The deinonych sees the movement. Overcome with fear, he backs up and opens his mouth, and his fingers start to tremble. His eyes fix on Raptor Red’s - her pupils dilate, contract, dilate again.

Five other deinonychs see her now, and they shift their weight back and forth from one leg to another, uneasy, unsure of what to do with this Utahraptor who seems to be rising from the dead.

Raptor Red staggers forward and rests her torso on her sister’s body. Then she raises her neck and shoulders as far as she can, bringing her head eight feet above the ground. She clenches and unclenches her hand claws.

The entire deinonych pack watches her every move from a safe distance, beyond the reach of her still-dangerous forepaws. They want to start tearing apart the two Utahraptors but they’re smart enough to know when to wait. The pack is used to waiting for hours while large victims collapse from their wounds. They’ve watched for as long as two days until a two-ton iguanodont at last sank down on knees and elbows, unable to get up again. The deinonych pack members are experts in waiting and watching.

Raptor Red has been operating on pure instinct for the last few minutes. But now she’s aware of what she’s doing. She knows she can’t reach her tormentors. And yet she wants to prolong the time her sister’s body is protected from those hateful deinonychs.

She decides to use her last weapon - sound. She fills her lungs deliberately. Her chest swells. Then she exhales, channeling the air through the echo chamber built into her nostrils. A powerful threat-noise, louder than she’s ever produced before, rips through the cold air, tumbling snow from the pine branches.

The deinonychs crouch low and retreat another few yards. But they’re not fooled by the threat-sound. They now know Raptor Red is incapable of charging.

And Raptor Red realizes that the deinonych pack will wait to come close until she dies. That’s what she wants. She has satisfaction knowing that her sister’s body will be safe as long as she herself is breathing. She makes another threat-sound, less loud this time. The deinonychs flinch.

The echo of her threat comes back from the snowy cliff face a mile away. The deinonychs turn to look at the source of the sound, but they don’t retreat any farther.

Then another echo comes from the opposite direction, another Utahraptor threat-noise. The deinonychs bob their heads, look around and make chirping calls to each other. They’re confused - the second echo wasn’t like the first and it was louder.

Raptor Red’s eyelids open very wide and she aims both her ears toward the new sound. She cries again, a strange combination of threat and greeting. Her call is answered immediately by a Utahraptor voice from upslope on the edge of the plateau.

It’s a male voice.

The deinonychs crouch very low and stare intently up through the trees.

Raptor Red issues a long, low, rumbling growl. She swishes her tail explosively, sending snow into the air in a crystalline shower of white. Two young deinonychs turn and run away toward their nest near the streambed.

The deinonych pack leader stands firm, gnashing his teeth together. Six other adults come up to him " and stomp on the snow, side by side.

A moan, very deep and barely audible, comes from the trees upslope. The noise is getting closer.

The deinonychs look upslope where a savage form gradually becomes visible in the darkness. The male Utahraptor is standing absolutely still, with his eyes fixed on the deinonych pack leader.

Raptor Red gives a low, throaty greeting. The male responds, and the two begin a duetted battle-call. The calls become faster and louder with each cycle of response and counter-response. The deinonychs swing their heads back and forth, from Raptor Red to the male. Three of their pack lose their nerve and flee.

The battle duet stops abruptly. Raptor Red watches her male consort for a half minute. He slowly flexes knees and ankles, pauses, then charges. A pine sapling breaks into a dozen pieces as his five-hundred-pound body smashes the line of small trees between him and the deinonychs. Raptor Red’s nostrils are overwhelmed by the pungent scent released from the male Utahmptor’s throat glands.

The deinonych pack leader jumps seven feet into the air, his head banging into conifer branches. He comes down running, his feet skidding on the snow-slickened soil. He dodges the male Utah-raptor’s hand claws by diving over toward Raptor Red.

She reaches far out with her thumb claws and snags the deinonych by the base of the tail. He fights back, swinging his hands over her face. Raptor Red closes her armored upper eyelid tight and bites the deinonych under his left shoulder. She can’t reach his body with her one good hindclaw.

She lifts the deinonych up in her jaws and slams his head against the ground, throwing all the force of her neck and upper body into the blow. His hands grab at her face frantically.

She lifts him again and brings his head down onto the earth even harder. The deinonych goes limp.

Raptor Red opens her eyes and sees her male consort picking up another deinonych in his hand-claws. The deinonych body goes sailing over her head, upside down. Then she sees her consort just behind her, standing very tall.

The battle is over in just a few seconds. Raptor Red can hear the whimpering defeat-calls of the deinonych pack as they gather together and mourn their dead several hundred yards away.

Suddenly, Raptor Red feels dizzy - her head becomes light, her vision blurred. She sinks down on her knees, clutching her sister’s body. The exertion of the fight has used up all her reserves of strength. She wants to sleep. But she hears a soft cooing a few feet away. A wonderful sound. She answers.