Their eyes penetrate me as if I had no skin at all. I can feel it permeating my flesh, red and tender after being banished here. For them, I am Hell. For me, they are misunderstood. I shield myself from the sun and wrap my taloned arms around my slender body, grown slimmer in the months with limited food. They told me if I acted up again, went out of line, they would banish me somewhere, away from the unit. I couldn’t have comprehended that it would be here …this hellscape of judgmental faces, grown old and stretched young.

I shiver when one tosses me some coins. I must look so feeble here, cowering. If only they knew who I was, and what I could do … what I was banished for. I suppose I could show them …