As her daughters remember it, she winged it but quickly became a bespoke tailor to elites.

Rays of golden light beam down from a winged celestial being to pierce the humble saint’s hands, feet and side, echoing the mortal wounds suffered during Christ’s crucifixion.

Designed based on perching birds like ravens and crows that frequently switch between air and land, the multifunctional robotic legs allow it to take off autonomously in environments previously inaccessible to winged drones.

Like winged creatures of the sky it draws its nickname from, the bird of paradise seems always ready for takeoff, angling itself toward the light of better tomorrows, or at least the possibility of them.

Vaccinations could improve the winged creatures’ chances of surviving the onset of white-nose syndrome, according to Smith, but injecting individual bats is laborious.