Ainōryoku Sentai Nightmærangers #44 (Patreon)

The Nightmares That Came To Manila, Part 2

It was a short hop away from the house so that Magenta's family weren't outed as being related to a superhero. Or at the very least, related to an infamous public vigilante. While they had some positive regard from their actions against the Thorn Thicket, already the talking heads were speculating wildly, being alarmist, dealing in absolutes, and, in some cases, actually had a point, but those were rare. Some people were already making the leap they were somehow related to the monsters, the Nightmares, plaguing the city, though thankfully no one was blaming them for the existence of the rest. The perception was that the same thing that had happened to all the animals had happened to them—probably true—and they should come forward to reveal themselves so they could be…

What happened after that was always a point of contention. Cured? Yeah, even the talking heads admitted they had no idea how that would possibly work, though they did get some mileage talking about if 'curing' was needed. Work with the government? Be placed under government supervision? Submit to scientific testing and observation? The most the talking heads could say was they should come forward in the name of public safety, since apparently the five of them being secret presented some kind of existential safety risk to everyone else in the city… somehow.

Still, such lukewarm sentiment showed the public wasn't againstthem. The military and by extension the government all but called them terrorists, expressing (not unwarranted) concern about Red's plasma heat beam, that had been set off in Makati and had apparently been visible on weather satellites as a massive bloom of heat, before that same bloom of heat had disappeared.

That would probably all change after today. They needed to be out there so that the change wasn't completely against them, a despicable thought given how many people were suffering. It was probably a mark against Tammy being a very good leader she considered all that secondary to getting to her cousin's side and making sure she was all right. If she'd been a proper leader, she'd be doing so with the blessing of the rest of her team mates. But no, she just pushed the nepotism through and didn't comment on it, and neither did anyone else.

Magenta and Tammy didn't say anything after they separated from Red, walking through the wormholes of compressed space that the college student raised for them to enter. The brief moment inside the wormholes came with a burst of light that Magenta had once explained was from all the photons passing though the path of the space being compressed hitting their eyes all at once… or something like that. It was noticeably dimer this time, likely because of how many buildings and streetlights were dark.

The sudden burst of brilliant light as they were passing through a wormhole was a surprise that made them pause when they emerged out the other end. The brilliant light and stark shadows soon gave them an answer, and Tammy found her pseudo-eyes actually functioning as intended, even if the brightness was just a bit too intense to make out subtle colors.

"Wow. She's bright," Magenta said, impressed.

"Yeah," Tammy said, waving a hand that extruded young, fresh leaves. "Is she making it hotter? I can't tell."

The glowing, semi-crystalline material on Magenta's surface seemed to writhe for a moment, the way light passed through it changing. "No, not much infrared. Good for her. I hope she'll be confident enough to not be afraid to use her powers."

That was… probably a factor, but probably not all of it.

They kept moving, and Tammy was finally able to identify where they were passing through now that she had enough light to see. At every stop, her body seemed to shiver, the chlorophyll on her surface drinking in the light it. had been doing that a lot more ever since she had devour the Harvester Bee in Tagaytay. Now when it metabolized there was an added bias towards starches and sugars in addition to bigger and thicker limbs. The more prominent flower features on her body were another side effect of that.

Though she could have done without Yellow's snickered comments about being covered in plant genitalia.

The light began to dim as they got farther and farther away from where Red was presumably floating. Normally, Magenta would have been able to take them to their destination in one step, provided that destination was along EDSA, but with the flooding, the markers he used to bend space had all been moved or under water, so he needed to reorient the connections.

However, even with that delay, they made Pasig in a few minutes. It was darker there, since Red was so distant, but even then it was far brighter than what mere moonlight would have made it, not that there was any with the thick cloud cover above. The clouds were actually reflecting the light Red cast as she hovered just below them, making the sky look like it was on fire. The two of them stood on the roof of one of the newly-risen call center buildings across the currently-flooded river from Rosario church.

Across the river was devastation.

Tammy had passed through here before. Ortigas Avenue Extension was the major road towards Metro Manila from the bedroom communities where she and Willy lived. She'd passed and was generally familiar with the old buildings that had been mead in the eighties, the slums along the river, the barely-not-slums a little further away from it, the new developments that were rising where old industrial compounds had stood.

Now, it was… not gone. Most of the buildings where still there, the hollow block and rebar walls standing stubbornly, though many older walls were swaying crookedly, or even bent over, the rebar inside them barely keeping them in shape. Even with her bad pseudo-eyes, she could see shattered windows, and more buildings than not were lacking roofs. Along the rivers, there where whole blank spaces where many of the shanty houses that had been built along the river were just gone, with the rest leaning drunkenly, or were just so much stubborn debris. Cars, and other vehicles were stalled on the roads, from what she could see, and many were fallen on their side as if tipped over by a giant. She saw at least two places—one a storefront of some sort, the other a home—with a car through the front.

Everything was flooded, and from what she could see, the water rose up to people's waists. She could see children being carried, saw other sitting on top of cars on the road.

Even from this distance, she could hear the crying. They were loud, full-voiced wails, the kind people probably thought were genuine from watching too many bad actors in too many decades of cheap daytime dramas. She'd seen people on the news crying like that, and she'd always thought they were just playing up to the cameras.

Here and now, she felt small and stupid for ever having thought that.

"We should do something…" Magenta said, his vibrations quiet, making him sound small.

Tammy nodded. "Go. Do what you can. I need to go find my cousin."

Magenta nodded, and Tammy felt a twinge as she essentially told him to go to work while she did her own thing. He patted her on the shoulder, the rough texture of planes and angles on his palm scrapping off an inconsequential layer of wood that probably left a stain on him. "I can keep making wormholes for you to gt to her, if you need it."

Tammy shook her head. "No. you'd probably have nothing spread here, and besides, there's probably not anywhere we can appear without knocking someone aside." She gestured. "Besides, it's not like it would be safe to stand on any of the roofs."

"Then how are you going to get around?"

"I'll think of something."

Magenta accepted that. "Good luck, Green. Remember, you can call me if you need me."

She nodded, and with a twist in the air he was gone, and she spotted his glowing totally-not-pink form some distance away. Others with better eyes than her saw him too, and there was the predictable pointing and wariness and… yes, someone in a torn shirt who was so thin he looked like he lived a hand-to-mouth existence pulled out a phone and pointed it towards her teammate.

Tammy looked away. She wasn't sure what her teammate would do, but he was determined to help. She, however, had her mission.

She stepped off the building, and there was a moment of freefall that she didn't really feel before she slammed into the ground and bounced, her now-hollow, bamboo-like limbs vibrating but didn't break as she hit the pavement. She should probably have tried hitting the tree not far away, but it was too close to some long-hanging power lines that she didn't want her limbs to catch on.

Fortunately, there weren't many people near where she landed. The homeless people huddled under the overpass in the middle of the road barely glanced up, probably startled by the sound she made, but they didn't rouse as she picked herself up and walked to the river. It occurred to her that maybeshe should have asked him to let her down first.

She opened up her forearm and was relieved to find Willy's drone there, still intact and, more importantly, not pierced through by internally-growing roots and being sucked up for water. Nice to know she was getting better at controlling that. Tammy concentrated on the piece of her she'd left back at Magenta's house, making it speak. "Willy? Are you there?"

Off to the side, there was a clatter as Loretta jerked in surprise.

"I'm here, Tammy," Willy said, the piece of her still resting on the bowl vibrating.

"I'm on the other side of the bride from Rosario, near the fly-over," Tammy said. "Tell me how to get to you."

––––––––––––––––––

Tammy couldn't just walk down the streets looking for her cousin. For one thing, they were now full of people who were dealing with their own issues. For another, she was a humanoid plant right them, and she had to reluctantly admit that for all her efforts to accessories with flowers and petals, while she looked humanoid, she was very unlikely to be mistaken for being actually human even with the limited light people had to see. She didn't want to risk a mob forming to vent their misplaced aggression on her.

Fortunately, Willy had paralleled the Marikina River as it passed though Pasig for most of her search for the Rainmaker, and even more fortunately, she'd been going in a downriver-ly direction. So Tammy only needed to follow the river for a little bit, going with the flow instead of against it. Simply throwing herself into the river wasn't a good idea. Even though her body would float, doing that would subject her to the uncontrollable currents of the river, and it would make it hard for her to see what landmarks were left, so she might flow past where her cousin was.

Body shape, however, was more of a suggestion than something really constraining her. Unlike Yellow, whose body probably had to take things like joints and muscle placement and flexibility of tissues into account for the bodies she made, Tammy's body moved because she willed the wood to change shape. So having more long segments of bamboo suddenly erupt from her torso was no problem except for how much the distribution of weight unbalanced her. Now she used those segments to walk along the river, the tips of the of the pseudo-legs digging into the mud of the river bed to keep her from being swept away from the current. While she'd started with four limbs, thinking that was all she needed to maintain her equilibrium, but after she'd been swept off her 'feet' twice by the current and fell into the river, she'd grown as lengths of bamboo as it took to anchor herself securely between steps, and then some more.

The result was a mound-like cluster, like a bamboo plant that had been turned upside-down so its roots stuck in the air, stepping gingerly down through the middle of the Marikina river like a senior citizen trying to negotiate a wet bathroom floor. At its peak was Tammy, the long stems erupting from her body with no sense of order or symmetry, what had once been her body simply a knot of wood that was topped by incongruously blooming flowers, having sacrificed aesthetics for mobility. Only her head and right arm with the piece of Willy in it remained unchanged, letting her navigate the dark and giving her cousin a way to see where she was so they could guide her.

The tips of the bamboo stems speared into the water, bending slightly from the strength of the current before sinking into the cold mud beneath. They sank down deep, roots erupting to anchor them in place instead of being dragged by the water as stems moved, propelling Tammy as the rear-most stems breaking off as new stems grew to take more steps forward. She could taste the pollutants that had soaked into the mud over the decades, the sulfuric and other chemical compounds hidden by the water that still stained the river dark when it was allowed to settle. Even with the rain and the flood, they clung on, and she could feel them creeping up her vessels with every step before the limbs were broken off. She didn't want those in her body! Plant or not, they were unlikely to do her any good.

Sometimes she'd see them to either side of her. Soaked and limp bodies tangled in the trees, among roots , or trapped among wooden debris. She'd check every body, taking control of the plants around them trying to sense breath, heartbeats, some indication they were alive and just needed to be rescued.

She had yet to find anyone.

She'd occasionally get see glances of the road she was walking alongside through breaks in the trees and buildings and slums. Despite the fact there was still flooding, some people seemed to be watching her, following her. Tammy was too far away to make out details. Were they scared? Angry? Or was it just the social media impulse to film?

Eventually, she saw it ahead of her. Muddy floodwater, rushing out into the river at a seemingly random spot. Small debris floated on the churning, flowing water, as if a pipe was being drained.

"I think I see you," she told Willy through the communications drone. "Stay where you are, all right?"

"Yes, Green," Willy said in the same cadence she always used.

Tammy turned, her limbs spearing down into the banks of the river hidden under the floodwater, which were slightly less polluted than the river itself. In front of her, large old trees stood, but between them were gaps where flimsy slums and only slightly less flimsy old wooden buildings had probably used to be. Only a single lone, tower-like house of three floors on a footprint of probably ten square meters stood, several of the small glass panes of its windows shattered.

Beyond was like something out of a news report.

What had once been a thickly populated, thriving area of people's homes and small businesses was just… gone. The ragged stubs marking what had once been walls made chillingly square outlines packed next to each other, interspersed with the skeletons of a houses that was only bare unpainted walls of cement blocks and mortar with holes where windows should be, the roofs all ripped off. There were a few cars on some of the squares, as if a child had dropped their toys on the soft foam squares of their playroom.

Tammy looked to the side. Beyond the water rushing towards the river, there was what seemed like a ruin-filled lake, corrugated metal roofs, random wooden debris and bodies wearing soaked clothing floating on the water, some slowly drifting down towards the unnatural wall of water around the cleared, devastated neighborhood…

"I think I see you," her cousin said. "I'm going towards you."

One leg speared down into the ground taking root in some mud to the side of the road, and Tammy began to grow a new body from it, abandoning the flowery knot. The rooted stem bulged, distending and ripping open to release Tammy's new body, smooth and shining like new growth as flower petals began to grow at her wrists and neck. She stopped them before they formed seeds and fruit as she looked around, trying to spot Willy.

When she saw the tall suggestion of movement, she didn't hesitate. She just ran, her wooden slapping hard and heavy on the ground, vibrations rippling through her bod with every footfall. She slipped, fell, and scrambled on all four limbs until she was able to push herself up again, not stopping. Tammy didn't let the cars and furniture and debris and dead get in her way as she splashed hurried towards her cousin.

The two slammed into each other with a bone-jarring impact, if they'd had bones. chips of ice actually went from her cousin's body, but Willy didn't seem to care as Tammy wrapped wooden arms around her, the wood bending like clay so they could go all the way around her cousin, squeezing around the hard, icy torso as Willy placed cold, stiff hand on her back. It was so wrong and unnatural and didn't feel anything at all like hugging her tall, special cousin, but Tammy didn't care.

"Are you all right?" Tammy demanded, speaking from her own head so only her cousin could hear her. She knew her tone sounded angry, and tried to moderate it, but the worry that had been filling her since she had woken up and realized her cousin hadn't really been by her side all came rushing out. "Are you hurt? What happened?" Angry questions. Stupid questions. Of course Willy wasn't hurt, she had better control of her powers than Tammy did, and nothing could hurt water.

Against her, Willy vibrated, the ice rattling against wood. "I'm all right. I'm not hurt. You went to sleep and wouldn't wake up, so I had to do something."

All sorts of things wanted to come out of Tammy's mouth. Stupid things. 'Why did you go alone?'. 'Why didn't you bring someone with you?'. 'Why didn't you wait?'. She kept them inside her. If Tammy said those things, Willy would think what she had done was wrong, that she hadn't been supposed to, that she'd been a Bad Girl.

Despite herself, despite her knee-jerk protective response to Willy getting herself in trouble, Tammy forced herself to think before she spoke, instead of just telling Willy positive things. Her cousin needed her to tell them true things. "I'm glad you took the initiative to do something on your own," she said, pulling back slightly so she could look her cousin in the eye. Well… pseudo-eye blotches to the part of Willy's head that would have contained her eyes if it weren't for the fact her cousin saw with her entire body. "I'm glad you did something to help instead of just waiting for me to tell you what to do." Tammy reached up and stroke the top of Willy's head in a familiar gesture before hugging her again. "That must have been very hard for you, but you managed to do it. I'm proud of you for that. You realized something had to be done, and even though you probably didn't want to, you still did so on your own initiative. You're a good girl, Willy."

Don't give blanket approval. State exactly what actions of her you approve of and positively enforce it. In a complicated issue, separate the good actions from the bad actions and identify both to her, then explain why it's good and why it's bad. Consistent repetition is the key to conditioning. The familiar advise, both things that she'd read and things all the doctors she'd had talked to while trying to find ways to help her difficult, special cousin came to her mind as easily as breathing. She'd long taught herself to think in those terms when explaining things to her cousin. Equally insidious was the sneering whisper in her ear that is was all brainwashing, programming Willy, making her into someone normal—

Her cousin didn't move, still and hard as the ice statue resembled. "I don't know if I did the right thing, Tammy," her cousin said, vibrating so softly Tammy barely heard her. "I think… I think I… I did something bad, Tammy."

Tammy didn't have a heart to clench, so why did it feel like a fist was squeezing the inside of her chest? No… no, no, no, no…!

"We'll talk about it later," Tammy said. "When we… later. Right not, there's something we need to do."

Willy, bless her special, innocent heart, nodded immediately. "Yes, Tammy."

Tammy nodded, then winced. "Sorry. We're in costume right now. Remember, you should call me Green and I'll call you Blue, all right? Be sure to remind me if I forget."

"Yes, Green."

The words were said like a child's prayer, full of trust and sincerity and belief in a higher, perfect power that could do no wrong. An article of faith said so many times the words had lost meaning, because their meaning had gone beyond the words themselves. Even with her real name removed, it still sounded the same to Tammy's ears, the simple acceptance that anything she told her cousin would be believed and internalized without question.

Only in the last few years had that notion begun to terrify her. That she essentially had complete and utter control of her cousin's ethics, morals, thoughts…

She remembered crying in her mother's lap from the crushing weight of the responsibility of it, the night she'd finally confronted her parents with the revelation. How she'd been so, so glad they'd raised her well, so that she'd never considered telling her cousin anything her parent's hadn't taught her. Because if she'd thought for even one second to tell her cousin something, like the taller girl should always give Tammy all of her dessert, or do all her chores for her… Tammy suspected her cousin would have. Forever.

If her cousin thought she'd done something bad…

A part of her wanted to be proud that her cousin had been able to tell the difference on her own, even if she seemed doubtful.

The rest of her could only feel cold, creeping dread.

She might not have known what she was doing, Tammy reminded herself. If she didn't know, that's on you. It's not Willy's fault. She couldn't have known. It's your fault for not teaching her better.

No one—not her parents, not any of the doctors she'd spoken to, not her aunt and uncle—had ever spoken those words to her. The only one who'd ever said them had been the girl in the mirror.

Gently, Tammy disentangled herself from her cousin. "All right. We need to get to work. Do you think you can do something about the flooding? Not just here, but all across the city? If we can get rid of the flooding and clear the roads, that will open the way for emergency services and first responders to get around."

The only sign Willy was thinking was the slight tilt of her head. "I don't know how much of the water I can control," Willy said, "so I can't be sure I can be able to deal with the flooding across the whole city at once."

"Well… just here to start with, then," Tammy said, looking around. "How about if you turn all the water in range that's flooding the roads into water vapor? What will happen then?"

"If I turn all the floodwater into vapor, it will result in the water molecules leeching thermal energy from surrounding area as they make the phase transition from liquid to gas," Tammy said succinctly.

Tammy took a moment to translate that. "All right, not that. It's already cold because of the all-day rain, anymore and we're going to get ice." She thought some more. "How about if you just pull all the water to the river and push it out into sea?"

"I could do that," Willy nodded. "But I'll need to see what I'm doing. The floodwater doesn't have very good visibility. "

And the light they had now probably didn't help. "Let's meet u with Magenta," Tammy said. "Maybe they have some ideas. In the meantime, pulling the floodwater into the river and keeping it there will probably still help people recover."

As Tammy began to contact Magenta, she wondered where Yellow was. She hoped the woman was all right.

In the distance, the sky flashed with lightning, and thunder cracked, reverberating across the sky like a roar.

…

That probably had nothing to do with Yellow at all! Totally just coincidence! Yup.

Yup.

Yup…

…

Tammy decided to stop thinking about it before she jinxed the woman even further.