Heremakhet

 

Shifting and crawling through the Hellas Savannah is an intriguing predator, the Heremakhet. About the size of a larger monitor lizard, it and its close relatives are unique among the onychognaths for being functional tetrapods. Only the front- and hindlimb-pair are used for walking, while the one in the middle has adapted for purely raptorial purposes. The Heremakhet has rather weak, toothless jaws, so it uses these scythe-like weapons to impale and kill its prey.

Counted among its usual victims are a variety of smaller critters, ranging from trichordates to other onychognaths. Eggs of nothornithes are also on the menu. When raiding nests, two or more heremakhet have sometimes been observed teaming up, one distracting the mother while the other one tries to feed on the eggs, betraying at least some degree of intelligence.

Carrion is of course also not ignored, but in the fights over carcasses the heremakhet are usually handicapped compared to their periostracan competitors. Irsu, a type of pedicambulate, are much larger and active predators that can rip heremakhet apart with a single bite. The closely related citar is meanwhile able to drag its prey up scale- and tube-trees like a leopard. The beak of the heremakhet is also not as efficient compared to the flesh-rendering scolecodonts of some nothornithes and vhagators. Yet still, heremakhet can sometimes overcome these odds by simply outnumbering their rivals and swarming the carcass sites.

Size of the heremakhet compared to an astronaut.

Anatomically, the heremakhet is also interesting for possessing somewhat rectigrade hindlegs while still having archaically splayed forelimbs. This is a condition also found in some extinct tagmasaurs. This is merely a case of convergent evolution, but could offer some hints about the biomechanics of those long-gone creatures.