Speed Stinger

The Speed Stinger is a Sharp Class dragon that appeared in Defenders of Berk. They are flightless and hunt in packs and have a leader, the Lead Stinger. It appeared in the episode Frozen, and also appeared in School of Dragons, and the Race to the Edge episode, The Next Big Sting.

Dragon Appearance
The Speed Stinger is a swift, flightless dragon which resembles a theropod Raptor/dinosaur, but with sail-like appendages on its head, back and legs. Though the Speed Stinger does have wings, these are very small and useless. Its name is derived from the barbed stinger at the tip of its tail (rather like a stingray's). All of them have red stingers and red eyes. Their small pupils resemble those of Terrible Terrors. They also have muscular back legs with webbed feet. Average Speed Stingers are green, while the leader has red stripes and highlights, and is slightly bigger than the rest of the pack.



Behavior
The Speed Stinger is described as the Velociraptor of the Dragon World, being extremely intelligent and cunning. These dragons are ravenous scavengers, that will often steal from other dragons and Vikings but they probably also hunt. They live in packs, led by a Lead Stinger, and have a hive-like mindset. They hide under the shadows of the sun. The Lead Stinger decides everything, and the pack follows wherever he goes; without him or her, the pack becomes useless. Speed Stingers are nocturnal, spending the days in caverns in order to avoid predators. When attacking, they leap in the air and use their stinger to paralyze their victims. Any member of a Speed Stinger pack would be very loyal to their pack, and protect them at all costs, even from its own kind, or previous pack.

Abilities
The Speed Stinger lives up to its name. It is the fastest dragon on land, hunts in packs, and can't fly like all the other dragons. However, with its super speed, it can jump higher than any other dragon. It is also shown to be good at stealth and is a highly intelligent dragon. Speed Stingers are nocturnal dragons, but can still be awaken during the day, usually because of an injury. Speed Stingers lack any flame usage. This is because all the internal flame energy goes to its powerful legs, which give it its speed, agility, and the capacity to jump high. Because of their thick hides and large amount of internal energy, Speed Stingers have great stamina for use in an entire night.

Senses
Speed Stingers have excellent and powerful night vision where they can see perfectly at night and even through a minor snowstorm.

Adult
The sharp stinger on the end of its barbed tail contains a powerful venom that can paralyze a victim entirely in just one sting. The sting eventually wears off, some in hours, most in days.

Adolescent
An adolescent Speed Stinger's venom is not fully developed as it can't paralyze an entire victim on one sting. Instead, the venom only works around the area of the sting, leaving the rest of the body movable and operational.

Water Running
It is said by Fishlegs in Race to the Edge that the Speed Stingers living on an island near to Dragon's Edge had developed webbed feet. This implies that the trait was either undiscovered before now or is only intrinsic to that group of Speed Stingers, as Hiccup later says it's proof of dragon evolution, implying that the Speed Stingers in Defenders of Berk did not have this trait. This makes sense, as they only found Berk through use of an ice bridge, while the Speed Stingers in Race to the Edge had managed to track the riders all the way back to Dragon's Edge. Furthermore, the readiness of the Speed Stingers to cross the ice bridge implies that they knew there would be food upon crossing, meaning they could have known of Berk's existence for quite some time but had no access to it.

Lead Stinger
The Lead Speed Stinger is the largest Stinger is a pack, their red stripe, wings, and fins make them easy to identify. The leader is the strongest, largest, and overall dangerous. Although the riders don't know it, these Stingers are the most valuable dragons. As they are always in the front of the pack, it is not good if they are in a fight with five dragons and their trainers!

Skin
Due to the high energy of their running, Speed Stingers have highly calloused skin that can protect them from fire and make them impervious to arrows and spears.

Training
Speed Stingers were said to be too aggressive to be trained. However, in School of Dragons, it is revealed they can be trained, though only at a young age. During a quest, the Headmaster decides to train a Stinger since they can't fly. He is unable to do so, even the player does earn the trust of the pack from a previous quest. Another quest from Icestorm Island reveals that Speed Stingers will not be aggressive if one earns their trust, such as returning a lost juvenile of their kind. In The Next Big Sting, Hiccup trained an adolescent Speed Stinger, Speedy for a short while before he returned to his pack.

If trained, Speed Stingers would stay to protect, even if it means to leave its old pack. Any friend of its trainer would be considered as a pack member, and even when a trained Speed Stinger does not like an individual, for example Speedy to Snotlout, the Speed Stinger would remain to protect the individual if he/she is considered as a pack member.

Known Speed Stingers

 * The Lead Stinger (see Frozen and The Next Big Sting)
 * Speedy (see The Next Big Sting)

In How To Train Your Dragon
The Speed Stinger is found in the Dragon Manual when Hiccup was searching for information on Night Furies.

In Dragons: Defenders of Berk
In the episode Frozen, the Speed Stinger made its first physical appearance. While Hiccup and Toothless were searching for Trader Johann, they could see a pack of these dragons running beneath them, on the frozen sea. It later turned out the Pack had taken over Berk, and paralyzed most of its citizens, including Stoick, Snotlout, and Meatlug. Ultimately, Toothless and Hiccup managed to lure the Stingers away from Berk, by capturing their leader, the Lead Stinger, luring it back along the path and forcing the other Speed Stingers to follow until Hookfang- ridden by Snotlout with Gustav Larson acting as his arms due to his paralysis- was able to melt the path and leave them trapped.

In Race to the Edge
In the episode The Next Big Sting, the gang found an injured adolescent Speed Stinger. After much consideration, the gang decided to bring it back to Dragon's Edge. After Fishlegs nursed it back to health and trained it, the Speed Stinger grew close to the gang, except for Snotlout and Ruffnut. The riders named the Speed Stinger 'Speedy'. Fishlegs then learnt that Speed Stingers evolved webbed feet to travel from island to island. Meanwhile, Speedy's pack hopped from island to island in search of him. Ruffnut and Snotlout, enraged by Speedy's aggressive behaviour towards them and stinging their dragons, decide to kidnap and abandon him. Fortunately, the rest of the gang caught up, only to see that Speedy's pack had arrived. After defeating them, Speedy grew closer to the entire gang. He reluctantly left the riders and joined his pack after some persuasion.

Trivia

 * The Speed Stinger strongly resembles the Stinger Dragons from the How To Train Your Dragon Arena Spectacular. The resemblance and name similarities are notable enough to hint that the dragons may be the same species just in different forms of telling the story of the How To Train Your Dragon Universe.
 * The Speed Stinger's tail resembles a scorpion's stinger, or to be more accurate, a stingray's tail.
 * Although it did appear in the dragon manual in the movie, it did not appear in the short Book of Dragons. The image may have been put in the book to fill in space, but was later embraced in Defenders of Berk.
 * The Speed Stinger is one of the very few dragons that does not have a horn on its nose or a horn-shaped nose.
 * Speed Stingers are the only dragons that do not have a fire type, however, in School of Dragons, they shoot a type of acid. This is most likely due to many feature in the game require a dragon's firepower. This is also a reason to the fact that Speed Stingers use internal energy for their leg muscles, while fire breath requires a lot of energy, acids do not.
 * The Speed Stinger is the first dragon in the series to be flightless. The second being the Bewilderbeast.
 * Despite Fishlegs saying one drop of their venom can freeze a human or dragon in an instant, it took six Stingers to paralyze Stoick. This could mean their poison can be counteracted by either sheer adrenaline, body size or both, although this might just mean it took six dragons before one of them could sting him. The latter is most likely the right one. This dragon's venom may act a bit more slowly the bigger the animal or person its acted upon. Such as when Stormfly received a single sting, it took a few seconds to paralyze her completely. Also when the first Speed Stinger attack happened, it took four Speed Stingers to instantly paralyze Flystorm, a Deadly Nadder that they had cornered.
 * They are nocturnal because they sleep during the day and hunt at night.
 * They are one of the fastest dragons in terms of their overall speed, 13, and are also excellent at stealth.
 * The Speed Stinger's roar uses the same sound effects as the Velociraptors in the Jurassic Park movies. This is most likely due to their resemblances.
 * Although this dragon is not the first dragon unable to breath fire, it is the first to have no ranged attack.
 * It looks like a combination between a Velociraptor, a shark, and a scorpion.
 * Like the Stormcutter and Night Fury, Speed Stingers are able to hang themselves or sleep upside down like a bat.
 * Their teeth reach further back when compared to other dragons.
 * Speed Stingers are the fastest dragons on land.
 * The Speed Stinger resembles the fictional dinosaur species Acceraptor from the TV Show Terra Nova, since they both have sharp weapons at the edge of their tails.
 * While Speed Stingers are untrainable full grown, they can be trained at a young age.
 * While clearly based on Raptors, the Stingers forearms resemble those of a T-Rex.
 * The official stats for the Speed Stinger are most likely inaccurate, such as its speed 30, which most likely means the speed on land (since it only moves on land), although this has never been seen before, it is not as fast as a Night Fury and a few other dragons. Meaning that the speed 13 from the Cartoon Network stats would be its overall speed.
 * The stealth 30 is also another issue. Even though it has excellent stealth, they have not yet been proven to be better at stealth than a Changewing.
 * Speed Stingers can adapt to live in cold environments such as the Arctic. A pack of Speed Stingers were encountered in Icestorm Island.
 * Speed Stingers are very similar to Night Terrors.
 * Both hunt in packs.
 * Both are led by a leader.
 * Only the lead dragon has a distinct appearance.
 * They are both nocturnal.
 * Both don't know what to do without the leader.
 * The Speed Stinger egg looks very similar to a snail shell. They could also be based on ammonite fossils.