Supergirl: Silver Horizon by Jade Gretz

https://www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai/art/Supergirl-Silver-Horizon-1274762266

Supergirl: Silver Horizon ANIMATION

The Verdigris Narcissus

The atmosphere inside the drifting hulk of the Argo Remnant did not obey the laws of physics, nor did it respect the sanctity of lungs. It tasted of ancient copper and the cold, ionizing sting of a dying star. Kara Zor-El, her cape a tattered banner of primary colors against the monochrome decay of the corridor, felt the first prickle of the fever. It wasn't the sharp, stabbing agony of a Kryptonite blade; it was something more insidious. It was a rhythmic pulse, a low-frequency hum that vibrated in her marrow, turning her blood into something thick and sluggish, like cooling wax.

She had come seeking the Black Box of the Council, a relic rumored to hold the final harmonies of a dead world. Instead, she found a gallery of glass. The walls were lined with crystalline sheets, each one humped and warped by the passage of eons. In the center of the rotunda, a pillar of raw, unrefined Kryptonite pulsed with a nauseating luminescence. It wasn't green. It was a color that sat just outside the human spectrum, a sickly, bioluminescent chartreuse that seemed to eat the shadows rather than cast them.

"You're late for the wake, Kara," a voice whispered. It didn't come from the air, but from the marrow of her own teeth.

Kara braced herself against a jagged outcrop of silicate, her super-strength flagging. Her vision swam. From the heart of the glowing pillar, a figure stepped forth. It was a silhouette carved from the same light, a shimmering recursion of gold and azure. As the light settled, Kara found herself staring into a face that was a cruel, perfected parody of her own. The woman before her wore the same crest, the same flowing cape, but her eyes were twin nebulae of swirling emerald radiation. Her skin was translucent, like fine porcelain lit from within by a guttering candle.

"I don't remember having a sister," Kara said, her voice a dry rasp. She tried to muster the heat in her eyes, but only a flicker of sparks danced across her retinas.

The doppelgänger smiled. It was a gesture of terrifying grace, the kind of smile a predator gives a mirror. "I am not your sister, little bird. I am the version of you that didn't leave. I am the girl who stayed to burn with the world. I am the Kara who was marinated in the marrow of our dying mother for thirty years while you slept in a tin can, dreaming of yellow suns and Kansas wheat."

The double moved with a fluid, predatory elegance, circling Kara. The radiation coming off her was a physical weight, a suffocating heat that smelled of ozone and scorched silk. She reached out a hand, her fingers trailing a hair’s breadth from Kara’s cheek. The proximity made Kara’s skin blister, yet there was a magnetic pull to the touch, a seductive promise of ending the struggle.

"You look so tired, Kara," the double murmured. "Being a god among insects is such a lonely performance. You spend your days catching planes and smiling for cameras, pretending that the lead in your heart isn't getting heavier every second. Wouldn't it be easier to simply... dissolve?"

"Is that what you did?" Kara spat, lunging forward. Her fist, capable of shattering mountains, met the double’s palm with the sound of a wet thud. The doppelgänger didn't move an inch. She simply absorbed the kinetic energy, her emerald eyes brightening.

"I didn't dissolve. I ascended," the double said, her voice dropping to a honeyed contralto. She gripped Kara’s hand, her touch searing. "The Kryptonite didn't kill me. It rewrote me. It turned me into a creature of pure, radioactive memory. I am the ghost of a civilization that refuses to stay buried. And you? You are a relic of a future that never should have happened."

The double leaned in, her breath smelling of wild mint and sulfur. "Tell me, do they still look at you with that mix of awe and terror? Do they still pray to you when the sky falls, only to whisper behind your back about how easily you could snap their world like a dry twig? It’s a burden, isn't it? The love of the fragile."

Kara felt her knees buckle. The radiation was stripping away her invulnerability layer by layer, peeling back her divinity to reveal the frightened girl underneath. "They... they have hope," Kara managed. "Something you wouldn't understand."

The doppelgänger laughed, a sound like breaking glass. "Hope is the anesthesia of the doomed. I offer you something better. I offer you truth. Stay here. Merge with the remnant. We can be the eternal guardians of this tomb. No more capes. No more saving
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