Coral hummed and tapped her wheel in time with the radio, creating sparked lights on her hands. It was a very minor power, but still entertaining on the long drive to work. The traffic was light, her gender was female so she wouldn’t get misgendered today, and she’d had pancakes for breakfast. All in all, it was looking to be a great day.

Her mood soured as soon as she saw who was managing the shift and standing in the doorway. “Carol,” Nurse Robin Sergeant said. Coral had been very amused to find out that was her actual name, but not amused by pretty much anything else about her.

“Who?” Coral asked. “I don’t think we have any residents named Carol.”

“You,” Nurse Sergeant said. “We have a new resident coming in today. I want you to get her settled in.” Nurse Sergeant eyed Coral’s wrist, where a bright pink bracelet sat, and then turned to Prudence, who was tidying up the reception. “Make sure they get it done.”

“They who?” Prudence asked.

Nurse Sergeant sighed in disgust and walked off. “You know what to do,” she said over her shoulder before entering the office.

“You know,” Coral said, “she’s old enough that she could be a resident under us.”

Prudence looked gleeful at the thought, but only for a moment. “She’d just keep bossing us around as a resident.”

“But I’m sure we’d treat her just as well as she treats everyone else,” Coral said. Honestly, the woman was a truly impressive bigot. She managed to misgender Coral on purpose even when Coral was female. Not to mention calling her Carol, even though Carol wasn’t her birthname, just because she didn’t think Coral was enough of a name. The last time Coral had brought up a baby name website to show her that it was, Nurse Sergeant had confiscated her phone even though she’d brought it out after her shift was over.

“We can only dream,” Prudence said. “Anyway, new resident’s in room 315. She’s currently in the checkup room. Here’s the chart. I’ll do your first round for you so you can get her settled in.”

Coral took the chart and held it up to hide her grimace. Prudence was nice… to her fellow caretakers. Sure, Prudence always got her pronouns right and played the Who Game with Nurse Sergeant, but she was decidedly lax on resident safety. But there was something about the chart. “Lili Neuman,” Coral said slowly, turning the syllables over in her mouth. “Sounds familiar. Have you heard it before?”

Prudence shrugged. “Dunno. Can’t be too important if she ended up here.”

“That’s the truth,” Coral said. “Well, maybe I’ll recognize her when I see her. Later.”

An hour later, Coral watched the new resident, a very elderly woman with a large torso, shuffle in. Her power sense was going off, too. That was interesting, but didn’t solve the mystery of her name. Superheroes, after all, wouldn’t fight crime with a civilian name. “Hello,” Coral said with a wave. “My name is Coral and I’m here to settle you in.”

“Lovely to meet you,” Lili said. Her voice was strong, despite the careful way she lowered herself onto the bed. “I have to be honest, I feel quite settled already.”

“Bringing home with you so everywhere’s home, huh?” Coral said, smiling. “Me, I can’t call anywhere home until I have a remote and lost it once. Speaking of which…” She pulled up the bed remote. “This thing not only controls your TV, but it also controls your bed. And me, if you use the Call Nurse button.”

“Ooh, fancy,” Lili said.

“Wanna try it out?”

By the end of the orientation period, Lili had found the perfect angle for the head of her bed, found her desired lunch, found several activities to participate in, and found several channels she wanted to watch. Coral, on the other hand, had not found out where she heard the name before, and it was really bothering her. Well, there was one other thing she could do to figure it out.

“Last thing, visiting hours. As you can see in the brochure, they’re 7 AM to 9 PM, so plenty of time to hang out. We can bring board games to your room if you like, or we can let them come along to many of our scheduled activities. There’s no limit on how often you can have them over.”

“That’s wonderful!” Lili said. “I do hope they’ll visit soon.”

“I hope so, too!” Coral said. Hopefully she wouldn’t be abandoned. Too many of the residents here were left alone. Not that some of them didn’t deserve it – last time Mr. Wirth’s daughter had visited, he’d yelled and made her and her kids cry – but Lili was lovely so far. “Well, it was a pleasure meeting you, Ms. Neuman.” Coral held her hand out.

“And lovely to meet you, too, Coral.” Lili grasped Coral’s hand with both of hers, and Coral took the opportunity to swap out her colorful sparks with whatever Lili had. The sparks came from Polly and Polly was a hugger, so Coral could get those back at any time. But this power… this was a strong and varied one. There was the standard Flying Brick package, flight and strength and invulnerability, but then there was something else. Sonic powers? She poked at it a bit. Ability to absorb, redirect, and amplify sound waves. Something this strong had to belong to a superhero…

The Nightingale. Well, technically she was Nachtigall, but that was German for Nightingale. Nightingale was a local hero known for her powerful singing, which produced even more powerful sonic blasts. When Coral was ten, she’d seen a news report where Nightingale shattered every window in a druglord with wind power’s hideout while singing the Queen of the Night’s aria. What was the villain’s name… oh, right: the Abominable Blowman. Back in the 90s, she’d singlehandedly taken down X-Tremity, a foot-based villain who caused the Second Dancing Plague across half the continent. And, of course, she’d been key to taking down End Ringer and Endling. More impressively, she survived unscathed, even when other invulnerable heroes didn’t.

What was Nightingale doing here in a crappy retirement home? More importantly, why had Coral heard her civilian name before? Although there’d been speculation, mostly because of her singing prowess, that her civilian identity was an opera singer. Coral had heard a bit of opera before. “Before I leave, I have a question,” Coral said.