Power Girl: Shield of Earth by Jade Gretz

https://www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai/art/Power-Girl-Shield-of-Earth-1252714840#image-1

Power Girl: Shield of Earth ANIMATION

Crimson Tears on a Blue World

The rage came first as a whisper, a fever dream leaking into the waking world. It manifested in the mundane: a commuter’s sudden, incandescent fury over a spilled coffee, a playground squabble escalating into a maelstrom of tiny, gnashing teeth, a politician’s debate dissolving into a frothing, spittle-flecked brawl on live television. To the billions living their lives, it was a sudden, inexplicable madness, a global spike in frayed nerves and shortened tempers. But to Kara Zor-L, Power Girl, it was a symphony of psychic screams, a discordant chorus that grated against the very fiber of her Kryptonian senses.

She hovered high above the earth, a solitary figure of white and gold against the encroaching twilight, the planet below a marble of swirling blue and white now streaked with an ugly, burgeoning crimson. It was more than just a color; it was an emotion, raw and undiluted, and it was bleeding into her world. She could feel it pressing in on her, a physical weight of pure, unadulterated anger that sought to find purchase in her own heart. She felt a flicker of annoyance at the disruption, a flash of anger at the violation of her adopted home, and she clamped down on it, hard. This was a battle that would be fought not just with fists, but with will.

Her investigation had begun with the whispers, the reports of inexplicable violence, but it was the dreams that had led her here, to the desolate, windswept plains of the Gobi Desert. For three nights, she had dreamt of a red rain, of a sky weeping blood, and of a voice that promised a terrible, beautiful release in the sweet surrender to rage. She had followed the psychic echo of that voice, a trail of breadcrumbs for her super-hearing, to this desolate place.

Below her, the sand began to glow, a malevolent, pulsating crimson. It was not a reflection, but an illumination from within, as if the very desert floor was a vast, beating heart. With a sound like tearing silk, the sand swirled into a vortex, and from its depths, a figure rose.

He was tall and gaunt, his skin the color of dried blood, his eyes burning with the light of dying stars. A red ring, impossibly bright, adorned his finger, and from his mouth, a stream of molten, incandescent rage flowed, not as a liquid, but as a tangible, corrupting energy. He was a Red Lantern, but unlike the brutish, mindless berserkers she had encountered before, this one carried himself with an unnerving grace, a chilling, intellectual malevolence.

“You are… unexpected,” he said, his voice a sibilant hiss that slithered into her mind. “A Kryptonian. So much potential for rage, simmering just beneath that pristine surface.”

“I’m here to ask you to leave,” Power Girl said, her voice calm, a stark contrast to the maelstrom of fury radiating from the being before her. “You and your… emotional pollution.”

The Red Lantern laughed, a dry, rasping sound like sandpaper on bone. “You call it pollution. I call it liberation. I am Atrocitus’s will made manifest, his chosen prophet. And I am here to offer your world a gift.”

He extended a hand, and from the swirling red energy at his feet, another figure began to coalesce. It was a woman, her form sculpted from the crimson light, her features a perfect, beautiful mirror of Power Girl’s own. The only difference was the eyes. They were not the clear, determined blue of Kara Zor-L, but swirling vortexes of pure, unadulterated rage.

“What is that?” Power Girl demanded, a genuine knot of unease tightening in her stomach.

“A taste of what you could be,” the Red Lantern whispered, his voice dripping with seductive poison. “Imagine it, Kryptonian. All your power, untethered from the chains of restraint. All your frustrations, all your grief, all your righteous anger, given form and purpose. You could be a god, not just a guardian.”

The crimson doppelganger smiled, and it was a terrible, beautiful thing. It was her smile, but stripped of all warmth, all compassion. It was the smile of a predator, a wolf baring its teeth.

“Join us, Kara Zor-L,” the double purred, her voice a perfect echo of Power Girl’s own, but laced with a venomous undertone. “Let go of the pretense. You know you want to.”

Power Girl felt a flicker of something dark and ancient stir within her. The rage that had been a whisper was now a roar, a tempting siren song that promised a terrible, exhilarating freedom. She thought of all the times she had held back, all the times she had swallowed her anger, all the t
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