Rogue: Hands of the Hunted by Jade Gretz

https://www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai/art/Rogue-Hands-of-the-Hunted-1260246346

Rogue: Hands of the Hunted ANIMATION

The Collector of Breath and Shadow

The night air above New Orleans was heavy with the perfume of magnolia and rot. Streetlamps flickered, their halos bending oddly—as though the air itself grew uncertain. Rogue stood on the balcony of an old brick apartment she’d claimed as her refuge. The Mississippi crawled darkly beyond the rooftops, its surface reflecting no stars, though the sky was thick with them. She felt them whisper, somehow, beneath her skin.

It had been weeks since her last mission with the X-Men. She needed distance—from them, from herself. The voices in her head had grown louder lately: fragments of memories not her own, dreams not hers. Souls she had once brushed and never quite released. Jean had told her they were echoes, psychic afterimages. But Rogue knew better. They breathed. They dreamed. Sometimes, when she slept, they even wept.

Tonight, they murmured in panic.

“Somethin’s comin’,” she whispered to the night. Her accent was soft but threaded with warning.

A shape drifted down Royal Street below—tall, wrapped in shadow, moving without sound. The streetlight near it dimmed, then flared again, sickly orange. Cats fled, their cries sharp and unnatural. Rogue watched the figure pause, turn, and raise its head. Even from three stories up, she felt its gaze.

And it smiled.

A moment later, the balcony iron shuddered. The figure wasn’t below anymore—it was standing on the railing, perfectly balanced, its long coat whispering like silk smoke. Rogue stepped back, instinct coiling like a spring.

“You’ve been hard to find,” the creature said. Its voice was neither male nor female—it rippled, a chorus of tones layered like harmonics. Its eyes were black voids, pinpricked with pale lights, as though constellations had been drowned there.

“You got the wrong girl,” Rogue said, raising her gloved hands. “I ain’t takin’ visitors tonight.”

The thing’s head tilted. “Oh, I think you are. You carry so many within you, Anna Marie. You wear their fragments like pearls strung through your veins. Each one shines. Each one owes.”

Rogue froze. The name—her real name—hadn’t passed a stranger’s lips in years.

“What do you want?” she asked.

The creature’s smile deepened, though it had no mouth to move. “What is owed. Souls do not belong in mortal flesh. They must be collected.”

“Collected?”

“I am the Collector of Breath and Shadow. I gather the half-lived and the half-lost. When one takes what is not theirs to keep… I come to balance the scales.”

Rogue felt a tremor move through her—inside, the voices screamed, dozens of them, like birds trapped in a cage. “You mean them? The ones in my head? They ain’t prisoners—they’re just… echoes.”

“They were. Until you gave them form again.”

And then she felt it—the air tightening, a pull deep in her chest, as though something inside her were being drawn outward. She stumbled, gripping the balcony rail. A ghostly shimmer peeled from her—a spectral outline of Carol Danvers, her hair bright gold, her face twisted in silent pain. Rogue gasped.

“No—stop!” she shouted, lunging forward. Her gloved hand met the creature’s chest.

In an instant, the world exploded into black light.

Rogue saw everything: stars dying, rivers of souls flowing like molten glass, the inside of the creature’s mind—a cathedral of mirrors, each one reflecting her face, older, younger, broken, godlike.

She tore herself back, gasping, and the creature staggered as well. Its coat fluttered open like wings. “You still hunger,” it murmured. “Even now.”

“That wasn’t hunger,” Rogue said, panting. “That was survival.”

The Collector’s laughter was like glass raining down. “Then survive the reckoning.”

It leapt—not toward her but through her. A cold wind poured into her veins, flooding her skull with whispers. The voices within screamed, then fell silent one by one, extinguished.

Rogue dropped to her knees.

“Ah think…” she rasped, “…you made a mistake.”

The Collector turned, its shadow vast against the balcony. “And why is that?”

She raised her eyes—green fire gleaming there. “Because I ain’t lettin’ them go.”

The world cracked open.

When Rogue next moved, the city was gone. She stood in an endless gray expanse, like mist frozen in glass. Shattered remnants of streets, buildings, and bridges hung in the air, suspended like pieces
...(more at https://www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai).
For more supergirl, chun li, batgirl, tifa, lara croft, wonder woman, rogue and much more, please visit my page at www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai - Thanks for your support :)