Revamped!

[! BONUS !]

[I'm pretty sure I'm the only person from the Marvel universe who lives in the T'Challa/Ororo trash can and, frankly, I'm okay with that. This will explain how the two of them met following this story/series. It's a slight or total AU from how the comics, depending on how you see it.

It's going to be a long one so enjoy!]

[Note - this chapter is in the third person and happens before Iqadi was born].

[Disclaimer - I got some of this from snippets of comics].

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Black Panther and His Wind-Rider

"No!" Prince T'Challa screams from the top of his lungs, stretching an arm out even though that won't do anything.

As a man on the brink of being an adult, he's already faced with the hardest emotion to ever impact anyone and at such a young age: grief. He already lost his mother but he was only an infant at the time and was completely ignorant of her passing because he never really knew her.

His father, King T'Chaka of Wakanda, murdered right before his eyes. The country breaks into chaos and disorder, needing a strong and confident leader to fall on but T'Challa couldn't do it. By default, he was the new Black Panther but couldn't lead a country with a mind that was deciding which emotion to display. He wants to cry, to yell, to rage, and to kill the murderer for vengeance - but none of those emotions were appropriate for the throne and a leader.

He was silent, barely speaking and eating, all becoming weaker mentally, emotionally, and physically. As he continues grieving, wondering what happens next, nobody could break the hard shell he formed around himself no matter how hard they tried to. The country is currently vulnerable, in desperate need of protection, but nobody could provide it.

Days after, Wakanda was attacked. T'Challa was too struck by the loss of his father to do anything. That caused him to get kidnapped.

-o-

Elsewhere, it's the middle of summer and she has been in the desert for almost a year. A sixteen-year-old girl, alone, making her way through the dry and humid land of Africa - some of the harshest, most desolate terrain on Earth. She's motivated to keep moving by visions and a soul-deep need that she didn't understand, but also couldn't deny. She's nearing Kenya and is about to cross the border until a sound stops her.

A gunshot. Fighting. Screaming. A battle.

Common sense and the will to survive tells her to head the other way as quickly as possible but her immature curiosity gets the best of her. She peeks through the bushes she hides behind and her eyes widen in horror. Set before her eyes is a young and weaponless boy, who couldn't be much older than her, being attacked by fully armed threats.

She knows she has to do something.

She rises from the bushes, opening her arms to call on her ability to control the weather - a mutation she developed and has helped her to survive up to this point in life. She summons the winds and strikes at the armed men like a storm, sending her hurricane-like forces towards everyone but the young man. Before they knew they were under attack, they were unconscious, dazed or dead.

"What?!" The young man, T'Challa, exclaims in shock at the sight of a young woman flying above her.

He has no words to describe the goddess who suddenly made an appearance to save him. For a moment, he thinks he already perished and is in the blessed afterlife but is brought back to reality when the woman, who iswas definitely a real person, approaches him.

"Do you speak English?!" She yells at him. "Are you alright?!"

"Yes," he replies scattered, "- to both. But - who are you?! How can you fly?!"

"I'm Ororo, I - behind you!"

Some aggressors fighting against them stand up again and load their weapons, pointing them right at the two young adolescents.

"Girl…" One of them mutters menacingly to her, getting more weapons out of his truck. "Your interference will cost you. Your wind powers are as strange as they're impressive but no breeze is strong enough to save Prince T'Challa."

As Ororo allows the word prince to roll on and off her tongue in a surprised daze, the fighter who just spoke punches T'Challa across the face. T'Challa screams but not out of pain, out of rage as he punches and fights back. His need to survive finally comes to him as he fights for his father's sake and brings mercy to him.

Ororo notes how he fights: he's skilled, with moves of grace and power, like the Panther he was raised to be. Now she knows who he is. Before the other fighters could shoot in response, Ororo's eyes turn white as she fires more lightning bolts at them. She turns around and summons the winds to fly again and on her way, she grabs T'Challa's hands and flies them both to safety.

-o-

The sky turns dark as Ororo lands on the ground, her and T'Challa now far from the danger. T'Challa takes a few steps around her. She's a striking young goddess who, underneath the dirt and sand on her body, has eyes as blue as the sky and hair as white as clouds - everything about her was above him nonetheless. What struck him the most was how her eyes would turn white and suddenly the elements were at the control of her fingertips. He doesn't know who she was except as a mystery he wants to solve. He finds it intriguing how when he needed help, destiny sent him a woman he never wanted to take his eyes off of. She walks the Earth graciously, expecting her to smile at him as he stares, but she tilts her head as if she was studying him.

"I've heard stories of what happened in Wakanda while passing through some towns," Ororo says to him solemnly. "Prince T'Challa, I'm so, very sorry for your loss. The loss of a king devastates his kingdom but nobody could ever feel the same pain the prince would."

T'Challa looks at the ground for a bit, avoiding her beautiful eyes. When he looks back up at her, he sees that she's a few steps closer to him and she curtsies for him out of respect. He waves her gesture off because he should be the one bowing to her.

"My father wouldn't be proud of the man I am now," T'Challa tells her, sitting at the bottom of a tree. "My country needed me and I allowed emotion and vengeance to overpower me. I'm now done letting it consume me alive. Seeing you promoted that in me."

"Grief is natural," she replies, standing above him. "You need that angst to win your country back. Believe me, T'Challa, I have lost people in my life, including myself. Even if it's little, the will and need to survive overpowers any other emotion."

T'Challa stands up again and hugs her tightly. Taken by surprise at the gesture, Ororo nestles her head on his shoulder, feeling his strength and love make its way into her body. He lost his father and his home and here he was, hugging a lost girl who had nothing and nobody. She begins to cry a little in the crook of his neck and he holds her close to him. Oddly enchanted by this, Ororo parts only a little and looks up at him to see that he's already looking at her. T'Challa slowly pulls her and her teary eyes into a kiss. From the moment she swooped in to save him, he knew he was going to get himself in trouble for falling in love with her but that didn't stop him.

"Beautiful, Wind-Rider," he calls her, making her smile a little. "How could I ever thank you for saving me?"

"You just did," she replies softly.

-o-

The two of them walk back to Wakanda where they learned more about each other. He found out she was a mutant with the ability to control the weather and was awestruck. They shared stories and laughs, also teaching each other new combat moves and defence mechanisms. They trekked through Africa together, thinking of ways for T'Challa to win back Wakanda and properly earn his rightful title. They ran through several strategies and tactics but there was one other important factor T'Challa had to discuss with her.

"What will happen to you after I return to Wakanda?" T'Challa asks her.

Ororo looks at him and shrugs. "I don't know. I have no current plans nor a destination if that's what you're asking. Why?"

"You saved my life and you're helping me get my country back. It's unfair that I let you go unattended after you have changed my life. I want you to stay with me."

"Stay?"

Ororo raises an eyebrow at him with a playful smirk on her face. T'Challa looks at her with everlasting passion at the woman he fell in love with so quickly. Despite the haste, he would call her the one and with a heart that suddenly stopped beating, she caught on to what he was asking for.

"Prince T'Challa, are you proposing?" She asks cheekily.

"Technically, I'm the King."

Ororo's mouth shapes itself into an o as T'Challa grins playfully. He holds her close again and runs a hand through her long, white hair despite its knots and tangles.

"I can't be a queen," Ororo says. "I come from nothing. I have no background, no experience - nothing."

"Oh, Ororo…" he whispers to her. "I don't care about your past. I find it wonderful that you only come with yourself because that means that I can't steal or take anything away from you forever."

Ororo smiles a little, putting her hand on his cheek. Materialistic wise, he did not steal anything. If she had to be metaphorical, she would say that he stole her heart.

-o-

After T'Challa returned to Wakanda, he won back his country to restore the legacy his father started. He's now the King and The Black Panther. The country flourished and restored itself to the way it was before King T'Chaka was assassinated.

After that, T'Challa approached his advisors, announcing his love for Ororo and saying that he will marry her. His advisors were not on the same page.

"But, your Majesty," an advisor argues, "she isn't from Wakanda. This is breaking tradition."

"I don't care," T'Challa replies honestly. "I love her and she will be my wife."

"She's a mutant, T'Challa," another says, using his name instead of title to get him to understand their point better. "Her genetics will only disrupt future successors. We're training her, as you ordered us to, and she's unable to complete the tasks properly. We're aware that she saved you and brought you back alive. But you're only infatuated with the idea of her."

T'Challa feels himself getting angry. He knows that he would have had to pick a wife from a selection of the Dora Milaje if his father never died. But after seeing and spending time with Ororo, he knew he loved her. Even in the short time that they spent together and his inexperience in love, he knew exactly how he felt about her. No other woman would ever compare to the one who literally swept him off his feet. And she would only bless the future generations.

"You are dismissed," T'Challa sharply tells his advisors.

-o-

Ororo, now married and Queen of Wakanda for six months, sits in the middle of her bed. Her legs are crossed as her long white hair falls over her face, covering her crestfallen face. The rain falls outside, matching the tears that fall so subtly down her cheeks. Whether she was the cause of the rainfall or not, both her and the sky were not in the mood for smiling.

Everyone in Wakanda expected so much more from her as their queen, especially since T'Challa loved her so much. They admired his great and loving heart but not the woman who had it. She had to learn everything about Wakanda as a country and its people, who they're allied with and who despises them, and how to properly lead a nation. T'Challa took his new role easily since he was trained his whole life for this day so it was no surprise that everyone loved him. As for her, the palace staff barely made eye-contact, despite her being the queen.

"Ororo," T'Challa says, approaching her. He sits on the bed next to her and takes her crying face in his hands.

"I can't do this, T'Challa," Ororo whispers back. "This is all so much for me. I wasn't meant to be a queen."

T'Challa looks down, trying not to accept what he was hearing because he doesn't like it. He has something to say to her but can't bring himself to do it because he knows it will hurt him so much. Ororo looks at him expectantly, wondering what is on his mind. She can infer that what he has to say has been on his mind for quite some time.

"I am giving you the option to leave," he tells her. Ororo sits up, listening in a way that she didn't see this coming. "I will provide you with money and resources, should you need them. I want you to be happy and if seeking joy requires you leaving, then I'm letting you go."

Ororo stares at him. She was isolated for so long as she travelled through Africa. Every day felt the same to her until she heard those gunshots and saw him for the first time. Before that moment, she wasn't sure when her last form of human interaction occurred. T'Challa changed her life and although she hated it now, she was the happiest with him. He saved from loneliness and provided her shelter and love when she needed it most. If she left, it would impact him the same way his father's murder did and then T'Challa would be back to where he started. Because he would feel like he died all over again.

In that case, Wakanda would only hate her more. Ororo wanted to give up but she loved T'Challa and wanted to prove to him and first and foremost, herself, that she can be his wife, his goddess, and his queen all at once.

Ororo wipes her tears and takes a deep breath. She wipes her tears dry and makes the rain vanish immediately. She faces her husband and gives him her best smile.

"Give me my crown," she says. "T'Challa, darling, we have a kingdom to take rule."

Ororo scoots off the bed and marches out of their room with her king following closely behind, anticipating what his wife will do next. It didn't take the two of them a day to win back Wakanda and it wasn't going to take another to be the perfect queen.

-o-

Years later, King T'Challa and Queen Ororo stand boldly and tall, the two of them proud and highly respected across Wakanda and, slowly, the world. He wears his Black Panther suit (minus the mask) and her the finest dress and jewels, holding still so the royal artist can capture their poses for their portrait which will hang high, next to the line-up of portraits of past rulers of Wakanda which decorate the palace walls.

"You have done it, my darling," T'Challa tells Ororo, softly, to avoid moving and getting the painter mad. "You are the best queen I could have ever asked for."

Ororo grins. "You tell me that every day."

"Because it's true."

"T'Challa…"

After a few more moments of being stiff, they try their best to move their shoulders and relieve the tension. The painter scolds them so they return to being statues. Ororo suddenly smiles to herself. T'Challa sees her expression from his peripheral vision and can't understand why she would be smiling at an occasion as boring as this.

"What is it?" T'Challa asks without looking at her. "Why are you so happy? Does standing still somehow amuse you?"

"I had a thought," she replies in the same fashion. "You know how all the portraits on the wall contain the king and queen?" He makes a small sound saying he does. "Well, I just realized that our portrait will not only have the king and queen."

T'Challa is confused. Even without looking all around him, he knows that no one else is being painted except for them.

"What do you mean?" T'Challa questions.

"In our portrait, there will be you, the king; I, your queen; and our future heir."

Ororo subtly places one of her hands on her abdomen. Her smile glows brighter than ever as T'Challa breaks his pose to look down in excitement, finally understanding what she's telling him. They have been trying for so long and it's finally here!

He tries to hold himself together due to their current situation of being painted but he breaks his composure. He picks up Ororo and spins her around. He kisses her tenderly, holding her close to him. She kisses him back, keeping her hand rested where their future baby grows. T'Challa puts a hand on top of hers.

"Forget being the best queen," T'Challa tells her, "you will be the best mother for our child and I will tell you that every day."

[Allow me to die in peace in my trash can].

[Thank you all for reading this story! I loved writing it for a multitude of reasons. I wish you all the best in life. If you're interested in reading more of Princess Iqadi and/or my stories in general, go check out my profile].

[2019: I would like to thank this story for being so easy to revamp. It's been the best five days of my life. This story gave me so many ideas for Iqadi and Imanu in SHIELD Academy. Please let me know if you read the revamped version!]

~ MysteryGal5