Chapter 12: Welcome to Wakanda

"Captain Steven Rogers, Sergeant James Barnes, allow me to present to you the Queen Mother," T'Challa said as a woman, elegantly dressed in an ivory colored gown and matching headdress, met them on the landing bay.

"Welcome to Wakanda," Ramonda said with a gracious bow. "I wish we met under better circumstances, but you are both very welcome." She took both of their hands in her own warm palms and met the clear blue and warm green of their eyes, searching them. Then she released and fiercely embraced her son, throwing both her arms around his neck and burying her head into his tall shoulder.

"And you, T'Challa, may soon be King but you are still my son. Wewe, nitakuchapa! Do you have any idea how worried I've been for you? You so recklessly expose yourself on a needless revenge mission and I do not hear from you in nearly five days! Five!" she nearly shouted as she shook his arms and allowed the tears to freely stream down her caramel cheeks.

"I am sorry, mother," T'Challa said, bowing his forehead to touch hers and taking her into his arms where she broke down into sobs. "Nimerudi nyumbani. I am home now."

"Baba…"

"I know," he said, allowing his tears to intermingle with hers. Others gathered around to offer their own grief as a small condolence for their collective loss. Wet, sniffly embraces from elders, family members, council members, and friends circled the Prince (and soon-to-be-King) and Queen Mother. A dozen Dora Milaje stood at attention with a dozen of the King's Guard, each in uniform with their weapons at attention, and each with wet trails silently drifting down their faces.

Steve and Bucky averted their eyes in an effort to give the family privacy in their grief. Instead they turned to gaze upon the twinkling lights of the massive metropolis surrounding them in the humid, damp night air. Steve's thoughts wandered towards the recent funeral for Peggy, the long ago funeral for Bucky, and the even more ancient funeral for his own beloved parents. Bucky's thoughts turned towards wondering how many funerals like this he was responsible for. They were pulled out of their silent musings by the approach of a thin, waif-like Wakandan girl in jeans, braided pig tails, and a Bob Marley T-shirt.

"I am Shuri, sister of T'Challa," she told them, holding out her fist to fist bump each. "You are most welcome here in Wakanda. I wish I could say my brother has told me all about you, but he hasn't, so you will have to fill me in."

"I am Captain Steve Rogers and this is Sergeant Barnes. We are very grateful for your hospitality, ma'am," he said.

"Ah! You are American!"

"Yes. We were both born and raised in Brooklyn."

"Is that a state?"

"No, ma'am, it is a part of New York City."

"I see. It is very good. My brother, he promised me I can travel with him on one of his missions so I can see some of the other great cities of the world. I would like to see this New York, and the Old York, too, if I can. I would like to see everything!" she said, flailing both hands to emphasize her point. "Now, my brother does not so often bring home visitors like you into the capital. Forgive me if I am being too direct, but I am too curious for my own good. How did you manage to convince T'Challa to let you into Wakanda?"

"Well," Steve started, shifting awkwardly on both feet and looking down to meet the face of the much shorter teenage girl in front of him, "it's a long story. Let's just say, we found we had common enemies and when we had nowhere else to go, Prince T'Challa invited us here."

"Hmmmm. You are right. It does sound like a long story and one I need to learn all the details to, but I will not make you tell me. At least for tonight, you are still guests and I'm supposed to be polite so I do not scare you away. Now, I have someone else I want you to meet," Shuri said, standing on her tiptoes and beckoning towards one of the figures surrounding the mourning family. "Bella, Bella, kuja hapa!"

A woman walked towards them clothed in the reds, blacks and golds they saw replicated on the armor of all of the female guards around them, but her pale face and long hair set her apart from the other guards.

"Captain Rogers, Sergeant Barnes, I wanted to introduce you to the only other American we have here in Wakanda. This is Bella Swan. Though, I suppose," Shuri said turning to address Bella, "you aren't really American anymore since you are technically dead there. Anyhow, it's been awhile since she's seen any of her kind," Shuri said with a wink, pushing forward the reluctant dark-haired woman. Bella gave Shuri a scathing look before turning to formally greet Steve and Bucky with a handshake and polite words of welcome. She descended back into silence much too quickly to satisfy Shuri.

"Eeeee. Bella, you are too quiet," Shuri said, clicking her tongue and taking Bella's hand to draw her closer. "As she should have told you herself, she came to us from Washington, the state not the city…Americans…can't you come up with more creative names? Anyhow, Bella came to us nine years ago and she has been my personal bodyguard for eight years now. Baba likes to say she is his favorite daughter since I'm the one who is always causing problems and she's the one who's always getting us out of it again…oh!"

Shuri stopped her monologue suddenly as her face crumpled from her cheery tirade into shattered grief. "I should say, Baba liked to say…he can't say it anymore…," she said as her eyes teared up and she threw herself into Bella's arms.

"Well, now you know Shuri and me," Bella said as she cradled the weeping teenager and attempted a tight smile towards the visitors. "You are very welcome here. I'm sorry you find us such a mess right now."

"Ma'am, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance," Steve said, nodding politely towards her. "And we understand our timing is not the best."

Bucky gave a half-hearted smile, but said nothing. He barely registered the conversation around him other than to laugh at the idea of the petite woman in front of him as a bodyguard.

Probably a pity position, he thought to himself. They found a fugitive who got in trouble back home and gave her some farce of a position to make her look and feel useful while she's really just a charity case. Like what will most likely happen to me until I cause chaos here too.

Bucky was pulled from his inward mulling by the approach of a short, stocky man in dark-rimmed glasses.

"Captain Rogers, Sergeant Barnes, it is a great honor," the man began with a solemn nod and he held out his hands to greet them. "I am Secretary Chuck Norris, Director of Technology and Innovation for the Kingdom of Wakanda. I will be responsible for arranging for your specialized treatments and care for the duration of your stay. For tonight, I will simply take you to your guest quarters and acquaint you with the necessary facilities to assure your needs are adequately met. Tomorrow afternoon, we can begin discussing your medical situation."

"We'd appreciate that," Steve answered. "We are both pretty tuckered out."

Secretary Norris nodded and took them through the elaborate passageways of the palace to their own adjoining guest suites. Steve and Bucky each locked their doors and slept till they could sleep no longer, finally at rest, no matter how short that rest would last.

Ooooooooooooooooooo

Bucky was uneasy. He understood that all regular life in the small kingdom was on hold as they grieved for the dead king and prepared for the coronation of the new king. But he could not feel at peace as long as he stayed awake. Any noise, any stranger who approached him, he felt his skin crawl as he anticipated hearing those lethal words again.

Every night, he dreamed of blood and death. He dreamed of that moment in the Shield Headquarters where Colonel Helmut Zemo pulled out that book and began to recite the worst of all words. Those words that cast an unbreakable spell over his mind and will, enslaving him back to the world of blood and the death.

He woke up screaming again and again.

He had tried to escape his fate so many times before. Unfortunately, the combination of nearly constant supervision and his enhanced body made suicide impossible. He'd lost hope of regaining permanent control of his mind until T'Challa spoke of its possibility. Seeing the advanced technology and facilities hidden within the illusory forest of Wakanda, he knew if any place could heal him, it would be this one.

But he feared lest his new home would reject him in the same his old would. He feared how much his new home would pay for his redemption once he was discovered and recaptured. He feared he would unwillingly betray new friends in the same way he had betrayed his old.

He still feared to hope.

Ooooooooooooo

The small team of Wakandan doctors and experts worked tirelessly preparing for the first stage of Bucky's treatment. Shuri happily jumped in where she could, coming up with her own theories to test. She continued to spend most of her days in her lab, content to dream up new ways to change to the world, one gadget at a time.

"Brother, will I get to keep this one too?" Shuri asked with a grin as she projected a photograph of Bucky from his file.

"What do you mean?" asked T'Challa, responding with an indulgent smile.

"Well, the last mzungu you brought home, I got to keep. Do I get to keep this one as a pet as well?"

"Wewe, most children when they ask for a pet bring home a monkey or a cat or a tortoise."

"That's no fun. I prefer potentially lethal genetically modified humans," she said with a wink and a dimpled smile. She went back to swiping through holograph computer screens to read through the latest smattering of neurological scans. She paused again to glance at her brother.

"Now, tell me, brother, you brought Nakia home from Nigeria for your coronation. Is she going to stay? Has she agreed to marry you yet?"

"Eeeee! I do not have to answer any of these questions," he said shortly, attempting to turn away.

Shuri turned and pulled him towards her by his shirt buttons.

"Yes you do. Because I'm annoying…and persistent. Tell me!"

T'Challa sighed and rubbed his hands across his forehead. "I do not know. She still says she does not want to be queen. She loves her work too much and she does not want to be caged inside the politics and bureaucracy of the crown."

"So, she would marry you but not your job?"

"It is more complicated than that. We do not agree on so many things…"

"Including whether you should stay together or stay apart."

"That is one of many disagreements."

"So, what you are saying is that it will be my duty to the crown to make sure there is an heir. I am very willing. I appoint both of these wazungu soldiers has co-husbands and we can begin at once."

"That is not what I am saying…as your king or your brother," he said with a mock glare. "You are too young."

Shuri laughed. "You know that is what the elders and Mama talk of when they think I am not listening. Well, not all of it… I mean the part where they worry over who will produce an heir to carry on the names of our ancestors. They do not think I am so young, but they do think you are so old."

"I know."

"Do not be surprised if they start to put pressure on you to choose a wife soon."

"I do not need you to pressure me as well."

"Fine. I'll leave you alone…Nakia on the other hand..."

"Eeeee! Do not even think of discussing this with Nakia. If you do, I will hunt you down and cane you myself!"

"You will not! That is why I am so very spoiled," Shuri said with a smile that engulfed her entire face. T'Challa sighed.

Oooooooooooooooooo

"You're sure about this?" Steve said to Bucky as he sat on the exam table in the high tech lab, glowing orange with screens and buttons. A lab assistant moved busily between screens setting up the soon-to-be-occupied cryogenic stasis machine.

"My mind is not my own. Until it is, I am a danger to everyone," he replied, his voice tinged with sadness.

Steve nodded, attempting to keep the impassive expression of a soldier as he watched his oldest friend prepare to once again disappear from time and space.

"What will you do now?" Bucky asked Steve as a doctor worked on testing his vital signs.

"I've gotta go get our friends out of that Raft they've been imprisoned in," Steve said. "I can't leave them there like that after all they did to help us escape."

Bucky whistled. "Good luck, Steve. You're gonna need it."

"I'll be right here when you wake up, though. I told T'Challa that at the first sign of you being ready to come to, to give me a holler and I'd come in a jiffy."

Bucky gave a half-hearted smile. Life experiences had taught him how much could change within his time of ice and darkness. Steve gave him a final hug and held his hand. The doctor injected a sedative into his arm in preparation for the freezing to begin. As he lay on the long, cold table, the dark creeping in on his senses, he heard two voices whispering quietly behind his head.

"Isn't he the one T'Challa said killed…?"

"Yes."

"But why?"

"The King offered him asylum after he found out he had been framed and was innocent. They also said Nakia had a dream."

Bucky struggled against the weight of his eyes. He pried them open and turned his head towards the voices. Two women stood. He recognized them both, but had not interacted with them. He had not interacted with much of anyone the past fortnight since they arrived. Beyond conversations with Steve, T'Challa, and a small team of doctors, he had avoided social interactions except those forced upon him as social politeness.

One woman, a Wakandan, still wore the fresh appearance of youth in her slight figure and rounded cheeks. He recognized her as the young sister of the king who often joined the medical team in his exam sessions. She carefully looked at charts and data spewing from various machines as her fingers flew through the keys like hummingbird wings.

The other woman wore the garb of the Dora Milaje and carried a spear in her hand, but she was no child and no Wakandan. He recognized her as the random American, the so-called bodyguard of the princess, who went everywhere the princess went, usually as silent as a shadow. He had seen her during T'Chaka's funeral ceremonies, weeping as if her heart was broken and being buried with the old king. She stood beside the royal family during the coronation ceremonies for T'Challa, hand-in-hand with Shuri and the Queen, all three gazing upon their new King with a maternal and sisterly pride.

But Bucky had never stopped to actually notice her. In the dazed lethargy of his half-sleeping, half-waking state, his eyes fell on the woman. And to his surprise, there they stayed. Her face burned with a pale, unearthly beauty that drew him in like the pull of the moon on the ocean's tide. He stared, fixed, until she turned to face him and her eyes fell upon him, washing him with the warm sunlight of her gaze.

The sun set, darkness enveloped him, and he knew no more.

ooooooooooooooooooo

Note: It's now 2016. Shuri is 16.

Translations:

Mzungu (singular)/wazungu (plural): foreigner, someone of European descent.

Wewe, nitakuchapa: You! I will cane you or I will punish you!

Nimerudi nyumbani: I have returned home.

kuja hapa: come here