Disclaimer: Not mine, don't own, don't sue

Summary: Post-movie, T'Challa reflects.

A/N: *points at self* Not African-American, not minority, not a POC. I've done my best to avoid any stereotyping or racial/cultural insensitivity, so if I slip up, please let me know.

Reflection

T'Challa, King by birthright and now again by conquest, gazed out over Wakanda, watching his home and his people and yet seeing none of it.

In theory, being a king was simple: do the right thing by your people and do not let your personal desires overcome your duty.

In practice, it was not so simple. To weigh up centuries of isolation and tradition against the need to be part of a rapidly-changing world, when so much was uncertain, was no easy task.

But Certainty was also a double-edged sword, as the recent fiasco with his cousin and W'Kabi had proven. His father had been certain that N'Jadaka was to 'Westernised' to bring back to Wakanda, that it was better to leave an orphaned boy alone in the world than to bring him home. T'Chaka had been wrong. Unwilling to speak of the possible rogue Wakandan warrior until he had answers to give his best friend, W'Kabi had felt betrayed and been left open to Erik's manipulation.

Many would think it more than understandable for T'Challa to think of his cousin with rage, but the Black Panther was more inclined to grief. Anger was there, yes, but more anger at the circumstances that had shaped Prince N'Jadaka into Erik Killmonger, teaching him to follow an ideal at all costs, to prize death over compromise and compassion, to destroy an entire culture, as long as it served his ends.

In the end, Erik - T'Challa would call his cousin by the name he chose and earned - had become the very thing he wanted to destroy. He disregarded and suppressed a culture he saw as wrong, instead of embracing their differences. He desired not peace and understanding, but to destroy and destabilise in the drive for revenge. He tried to strip Wakanda of their resources for his own gain, even as he decried those who had done so to the rest of Africa. To arm insugencies all over the world, in a direct copy of the failed policy that had caused so much suffering in the very third-world countries that he claimed to want to protect.

Yet, despite his methods, Erik had not been entirely wrong. Previous Black Panthers had been concerned first about their own people, unwilling to draw attention that would make the colonisers think of Wakanda as their next target, and reluctant to choose sides when the colonisers withdrew, leaving a power vacuum that inevitably resulted in the newly-freed countries tearing themselves apart in civil war. Wakanda should have done more, even if it was only to offer aid to refugees, or annonymously share the technology to turn land rendered barren by drought and disease back into thriving agriculture.

T'Challa would not become the power that invaded in the name of protection, claiming that only he could bring peace to those who constantly fought among themselves. Nor could he, as a good man or a good king, continue to support isolation. There must be a balance, but only a fool made wide-spread decisions and expected only a good outcome. A good king could not be a fool.

The War Dogs who followed N'Jadaka's orders to rain terror upon the world were recalled, to assess them before they became as radicalised as N'Jobu. Others had been sent out as spies, to keep an eye on the countries most likely to attempt to exploit Wakanda's willingness to re-join the wider world. The warriors who guarded Wakanda's borders had been re-inforced, as had those who patrolled their airspace. The Dora Milaje had deployed from guarding only the royal family, to also protecting key government figures. The Tribal Chiefs had turned their eyes to their own borders, also.

Wakanda was prepared to share theri wealth with those who needed it, and they were prepared for those who might have a different, historically proven and condemned, definition of 'Need'.

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A/N: I saw Black Panther the day it opened, and left the cinema with so many fanfic ideas that it isn't even funny anymore. I hope you enjoyed the first of many one-shots.

Constructive criticism, especially in the form of "this is stereotypical/racist" is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Nat