France is training eagles to destroy terrorists' drones because it's 2017 and shit's weird

Greetings, denizens of 2005. This is a dispatch from the not-so-distant future: Donald Trump is president of the United States, wristwatches and cell phones are the same thing and France has trained four golden eagles to destroy enemy drones — because shit really is that weird out here.

The Washington Post reported that the eagles — named d'Artagnan, Athos, Porthos and Aramis after, naturally, a scene from Slumdog Millionaire — have been training since they were chicks to tackle drones out of the sky amid French concerns over airborne terrorist attacks.

According to the Agence France-Presse, drones that flew over the French presidential palace and a restricted military site in 2015 sparked talk among military officials over how to combat similar attacks in the future. But bullets can bring down more than drones when deployed in the midst of a large crowd, which prompted officials to seek out a more creative solution.

Their solution? To bring in the birds, whose "bone-crushing talons" and natural predatory instincts make them a natural choice to intercept and destroy rogue drones, the Post reported.

With initial signs pointing to a successful rollout of the avian program, the military has already commissioned a second round of hatchlings, and wearable tech is reportedly in the works for the tiny assassins in order to help them perform better on the job.

"The military is designing mittens of leather and Kevlar, an anti-blast material, to protect their talons," the AFP reported.

Weird stuff, to be sure, but the future isn't all bad: Leonardo DiCaprio also won an Oscar recently, if you care about that sort of thing.