Breaking the Chain is a 2006 Supergirl storyline written by Joe Kelly, originally published in Supergirl (Volume 5).
Synopsis
Supergirl has returned to Earth after an ill-fated mission in Kandor II,[1] and looks forward to adapt to her new home. Nonetheless, her hallucinations where her father commands her to kill her cousin are getting worse. Frightened and confused, Kara decides to stay away from Superman for his own protection.
After a disastrous attempt at a secret identity, Kara joins the Outsiders in hopes of making new bonds and find a place where she can belong. Unfortunately she finds her new team doesn't trust her, and her first mission goes awry. Kara and her teammate Grace are badly injured as fighting meta-human pirates, and they're rescued by a new hero called Power Boy.
For the next few days, Power Boy finds excuses to get close to Supergirl. At the beginning, Kara is wary of Power Boy, but she can't help but find him charming. Meanwhile, a mysterious woman hires the League of Assassins to kill Supergirl.
Supergirl beats the League's assassins one by one, sometimes aided by Power Boy, who is romancing her actively. Cassandra Cain -who suspects their employer is looking to test Supergirl for some reason- decides to attempt a different tactic: she kidnaps and tortures Supergirl's ex-teammate Captain Boomerang and then she lets him call Supergirl for help. Unfortunately, Captain Boomerang's call reaches Power Boy and the boy turns a deaf ear.
Nevertheless, Supergirl has already figured out the League of Assassins is after her, and needing to know who wants her dead, storms her stronghold. Supergirl gets nearly murdered by Cassandra Cain's tricks, but she wins when crystal shards sprout from her body and injure Cassandra. Kara finds Captain Boomerang and takes him to a hospital, recalling how her father's experiments granted her the ability to grow Sunstones from her body.
Later, Kara is beaten unconscious by a jealous Power Boy when she's going to visit Boomerang in the hospital. Power Boy takes her to his barracks and reveals he's obsessed with her since he first saw her in Apokolips and he followed her everywhere until he dared to introduce himself. Power Boy claims he only wants to "fix" her and look after her and expresses regret for hitting her, but states it was her fault for not listening to him and doing what she's told. Outraged, Supergirl pummels him to the ground. Power Boy teleports in space via a Fatherbox, but Supergirl catches up with him, and having heard he intended to go on stalking her, tells him to leave her alone before crushing his Fatherbox. Unfortunately, the shattered Fatherbox starts leaking explosive energies. Kara attempts destroying it by throwing it into the Sun, but the Fatherbox explodes and the Sun turns red.
Frightened, Kara tries to fly back to Earth before losing her powers, but she's reached by the red flares. Right then, a figure looking like her father shows up. Keeping her alive somehow, Zor-El tells her memories are jumbled. Before its destruction, Krypton was being invaded by ghosts from the Phantom Zone who took over people and turned them against each other. Unfortunately, only Zor-El and his family could see them. Accidentally he found out the ghosts could be forced out of their hosts by stabbing them with a Sunstone, so he gave Kara the ability to produce them. Knowing the ghosts hated the House of El and would use Kal-El's body as a vessel to escape from Krypton and invade another planet, he tasked Kara with killing her cousin and so putting an end to the curse.
As Zor-El talks, he sends Supergirl back to Earth. It's been one month since the Sun turned red, and the Phantom Zone ghosts have already begun spreading and wreaking havoc. Supergirl looks for her cousin to try to find a way to stop the ghosts. Supergirl eventually finds Superman and tells him the whole story. Superman states if his death is the only way to stop the ghosts, she must go ahead with it. In spite of her father's words and her cousin's request, though, Supergirl can't bring herself to kill him.
All of sudden another Supergirl turns up, claiming to be the real Supergirl. Kara fights her doppelganger, who tortures Kara psychologically by throwing all her failures and regrets back in her face and declaring she's too messed up to be the real Supergirl, hence she must be eliminated. Kara refuses to yield, and her duplicate eventually transforms into her real self.
As fighting Supergirl, her enemy declares Kara will be tested and, upon failing, eradicated. Nevertheless, a Monitor shows up and stops the woman. The Monitor apologizes to Supergirl, explaining Dark Angel is an agent of the Monitors tasked with finding anomalies that must be eliminated in order to prevent a collapse of the timeline, and Dark Angel got obsessed with proving Kara was one of them. Dark Angel took advantage of the Fatherbox's explosion and forced another being to pose as Zor-El and create a phantom-plagued illusionary world to bring Kara to her knees. The Monitor states they'll not trouble her anymore and leaves.
Kara notes the Sun is back to normal and intends to go back to Earth. However, Pariah approaches her, explaining he's the one who was forced to pretend to be Zor-El, and she doesn't need to be afraid of hurting her cousin because she can avoid that outcome if she breaks the chain of events leading to it. He hints she already did that when she refused to kill her cousin.
Pariah leaves and Supergirl goes back to Earth, pondering ways to break the chain. She goes around, apologizing to people she wronged and checking on old friends. Finally she visits her cousin and apologizes for her behavior. Superman forgives Supergirl and both cousins race each other to the Fortress of Solitude.
Issues
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #11 (Fish Out of Water)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #13 (Love at First Fight)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #14 (Special)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #15 (Love the Ones We Hurt)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #16 (The Truth)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #17 (Bloodletting)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #18 (Little Miss Perfect)
- Supergirl (Volume 5) #19 (Goodbye, Hello)
Trivia
Despite the Monitor's claims that Pariah's tale was Kara's real past, next story arcs would prove those memories were fake and Kara suffered from Kryptonite poisoning which caused hallucinations and her blood crystallizing on contact with oxygen.
Recommended Reading
Links and References
Supergirl Storyline This event or storyline is specifically related to the character of Supergirl and/or her supporting cast. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the Supergirl Storylines category. |
Superman Family Storyline This event or storyline is specifically related to Superman, or to members of the Superman Family. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the Superman Storylines category. |