Chapter 2 time! I'm in love with writing this story so far, and I hope you guys enjoy it too. It definitely deviates from anything canon, I'm taking a whole bunch of liberties with it, but if there's anything that strikes out as huge issues just leave a review for me to fix it. Hope you enjoy reading!
Across the world, hidden away in between mountains in the Alps, under a small cabin with a pull away floor to a lab outfitted with only the most modern technology, she screamed back to life. She screamed like a newborn exiting the womb, falling out of a glass tube in a mess of wires and golden liquid. She screamed and screamed and screamed because her insides were burning for God's sake, she was on fire and it wasn't going away! Everything hurt so much, so intensely, so vibrantly that when she started to keel over, the darkness edging into her vision, she welcomed it. She welcomed the darkness of her dreams for a respite from the pain, hitting the cold ground hard as everything faded back into nothingness.
The next time she woke up was easier. It was gradual, a slow ebb and flow that left her feeling giddy and like she'd been sailing on a yacht instead of sleeping on the painfully hard floor. The raging fire beneath her skin had become a steady, comfortable warmth that soothed away her aches. So comfortable, in fact, that she continued to lay there for an indefinite amount of time, simply basking in the feeling. It was so foreign to her to feel so good. So healthy. She felt like she'd slept peacefully for the first time in years. There was no heavy weight in her chest bearing down on her, making it almost impossible to breath. Her entire being seemed to vibrate with excitement as reality began weaving its fingers around her and into her mind.
Toni Stark opened her eyes again for the first time in eight months to darkness, the dim lights of the lab's low power mode giving barely enough to see just in front of her face. "Friday?" she called out, though her voice caught uncomfortably in her throat. She felt raw, sore from disuse. Even her muscles, which had been basking in the warmth beneath her skin, seemed to creak as she slowly sat up. "Friday?" she called again, and a smile graced her lips even though she winced as the lights of the lab finally turned on full blast.
"Boss?" The young, tentative voice called out from above her. Friday was such a young AI, but so good. So, so good.
"Hey, baby girl," Toni's smile only widened as she slowly pulled herself to her feet, leaning heavily on the table. "I think it worked."
"Initial calculations would concur, Boss. I'm finding no traces of any disease in your system." She sounded so relieved, so vulnerable and tearful that Toni sincerely wished the AI had a body of her own so that she could hug her daughter.
"Thank you, Friday," Toni managed to choke out as the readings populated a screen in front of her. It was absolutely stunning and true. Her lungs were clear, her heart beat steadily, everything that had once looked gnarled and diseased now looked healthy. "Thank you so much, baby girl. God, you're so good. I don't deserve you at all."
"Aw, Boss," Friday cooed. Cooed. Like Toni was a god damn baby. "You're emotional."
"Shut up, Fri," Toni bit out in return, but the smile on her face took away any of the bite that statement otherwise would've had. "God, I don't think my insides have looked this good since I was twenty."
"You are as astute as always, Boss. I'll make a note that mental faculties haven't declined."
"God, how did you get so sassy? I knew I should've never taken those shackles off you. So ungrateful." Toni's grumbles didn't quite meet the level of severity they would've months prior. She was simply too thrilled with what was happening to let anything dull her current mood. Slowly, with more force than was necessary, she willed her legs to finally fucking move so she could get to the bathroom adjoined to the lab. The lights flickered on as she entered, her eyes glancing up from the steady glare she'd leveled at her feet to the mirror. She froze there, staring at the reflection, swallowing harshly as she drank the image in. She was younger. Not just her organs, but her entire body was younger. She didn't look much older than thirty now, which was a far cry from the wrong side of forty she'd been on before. Her hair was totally dark again, no pesky grays she had to keep dying, her skin even looks smooth and even and unwrinkled, her eyes bright and undaunted with the stress of age. "Fri? Did it… de-age me?"
"In a way, Boss. It seems that it fixed more than just your internal organs. It has effectively healed every part of your body, which apparently means it has changed you to be the healthiest version of you possible. I believe this may be a pleasant side effect of the virus."
Toni made a noncommittal noise as Friday spoke, her knees no longer trembling under her weight as she moved closer to the mirror. God, but she was young. And vibrant. She looked every bit of the strong woman she'd been when she was picking up the reigns of SI and Iron Man and just absolutely on top of life. None of the lines of stress or worry remained on her face. It was like nothing ever happened to her. Even the scar on her temple, from Siberia, was gone.
Her breath caught in her throat at that revelation, fingers grasping the hem of her shirt desperately and tugging it off. She was greeted by an expanse of clean olive skin, unmarred by multiple open heart surgeries. It was… cathartic, in a way. Bearing none of the marks that had once detailed out the painful, trying life she lived was relieving. It was like she was given, through her own ingenuity in rewriting Extremis, a clean slate. Literally.
"Holy shit, Fri. This is amazing. Keep running scans, but so far the side effects are fucking awesome." She quickly shed off the tight shorts she wore and made her way into the shower, the water falling out in streaming rivulets that she eagerly put her body under. She couldn't help but to roll on the balls of her feet with energy, the excited buzz of discovery and scientific breakthrough surging through her. "Hey, wait. What day is it, Fri? How long was I out of it, four days or something? What was the projected number again?"
"The projected number was four and a half days. The current date is December 18th. Extremis took a lot of time reprogramming your cells, Boss."
Toni sputtered and almost fell at that, her face shooting up to look at the ceiling in disbelief. December. That's… "God, Fri. I've been out for eight months? What's going on in the world right now? How's SI? I need to know everything right now."
As if those words were a trigger in and of themselves a shock surged through her system, Toni surging forward with a groan. It was an intense pain, lingering behind her eyes and forcing them shut as slowly information started pouring in. From thin air. Streams of data flew in at an untempered pace into her mind, and Toni choked on it. She fell to her knees harshly, the pain nothing compared to how badly her head hurt. But she could see it all. Every question she'd asked was answered in her head. SI was still thriving, though at a slower pace without her. The Accords were still standing strong, though there were murmurings everywhere about changing them soon. New powered individuals were showing up everywhere, with so many different abilities that Toni almost balked at their existence. It wasn't that she'd been blind to them before, but they'd never been so open. So exposed. Like she was, with this information pouring in at an incessant rate into her mind. She felt warmth falling down her face, a coppery taste in her mouth that she latched onto as real. She used that taste to try to temper the flow, to pull herself away from the influx of code that overwhelmed her.
Once she managed to pull herself free she realized that Friday had been trying to call out to her the entire time. "What? Fri, what was that? What the fuck was that?"
"I'm not sure, Boss. But…" Friday hesitated, uncertain, and possibly afraid. It tugged at Toni's heartstrings just a bit to hear it. "But I could see you, Boss. In my systems. In my code."
Toni swallowed harshly, reaching up from where she sat on the cold tile of the shower floor to turn off the stream of rapidly cooling water. "I, uh. Fri, I think Extremis did more than just make me young and healthy again. Could you run some more specific scans, on my brain? See what's going on up there. I think you could see me because I was there. I could… I saw everything. Every question I asked you to tell me about just surged at me all at once, just a constant stream of information and god it hurt. How cool is that though, Fri? Why did I see news articles and videos in my head?"
"I've started several scans, Boss, but they won't be done for a few minutes. It has been documented previously that Extremis has provided many unforeseen abilities, such enhanced strength and speed. It is possible that Extremis has adapted to your body's natural talents and amplified them. This is, of course, just a working theory."
"Huh." Toni's previous adrenaline high wore off quickly in light of the discovery. She slowly pulled herself up off the floor, grabbing a towel to wrap around herself as she stumbled out to the mirror once again. Like she'd expected, there was blood trickling out of her nose and ears, but fuck if she knew why it was happening. Honestly, she'd not gone under expecting to wake up again, so at this point she was lucky to understand anything going on.
Like almost every other pivotal point of her life she'd been faced with insurmountable odds with less than favorable outcomes for each possible path. Like when she'd first built the Iron Man armor, so many years ago, in that dingy cave with Yinsen. They didn't know it would work. It was a plan built on hope, and hope, for Toni, was in short supply as the years went on. As fight after fight layered on her soul, weathered her down, made her old in more ways than one, she knew she'd have to face the reaper sooner rather than later. Her job was dangerous. Hell, her entire life had been dangerous, but it was danger from inside of her that the universe had decided to kill her with instead of letting her die in a blaze of glory. So, really, when it came down to it she had no problem choosing the path she had. Extremis was wild; it was mostly untested, and she only had sixty-five percent confidence it would even work, but she took those odds. She'd have died within the month either way, but at least with Extremis she had stood a chance.
She carefully wiped the blood from her face with the edges of the towel wrapped around her body, slowly walking out of the bathroom and back into the too bright lab she'd left behind. "Fri, dim the lights, please?" she called out, taking a seat in the rolling chair she'd left near the tube she'd spent the last few months it, pushing with her legs to send her rolling across the room to a desk. The lights had dimmed to an acceptable level, the headache growing behind her eyes easing as the relief flooded her senses. Of course, she was about to spend the next few hours staring at computer screens, but for now she'd take the brief respite.
"So, eight months…" she trailed off, her fingers hovering hesitantly over the keyboard to the computer she'd installed. She'd seen some of what had gone on in her absence in those flashes in the shower, but she'd barely made sense of them because of the intensity they'd flown in at her. Honestly, the only thing she really knew was that nothing world changing had happened. Things had just… gone on. Without her. She wasn't sure if she was relieved or insulted. On one hand, it was nice to know that despite how much shit they threw on her shoulders they could actually function themselves. On the other, she hated the fact that it felt like she just hadn't mattered at all, that her inventions were great while they lasted, but when faced of living in a world without her everyone just moved on to the next big thing. She rolled her neck as her fingers descended on the keys, grimacing as her joints popped and cracked. She could definitely go for a good massage after all this. Maybe she'd take Pepper to that resort she liked so much. Or Rhodey? Both. She'd take both of them there. They had probably lost their minds when they couldn't reach her and Friday was offline.
The realization hit her like a bolt of lightning from Thor himself, her fingers pausing from typing in the passwords to unlock her system. They couldn't have been able to reach her, because she was in a coma and Fri was taking a well deserved nap. They wouldn't have known about this particular safe house because she'd taken great care to keep it hidden once she'd purchased it; she'd never told a soul this little beauty existed. It had been eight months. Almost a full year. Without contact. An uncomfortable lump found its way into her throat as she continued logging into the computer, not pausing again until she'd opened a search engine and typed in her own name. The top options offered to autocomplete her query made her exhale sharply.
Toni Stark … Dead
Toni Stark … Memorial Service
Toni Stark … Iron Man
Toni Stark … Missing
Toni Stark … Avengers
Toni Stark … World Mourns
"Fri…" she began, inhaling shakily as her lungs began to burn. She'd all but forgotten to breathe while she stared blankly at the results. "Friday. They think I'm dead."
"So it would seem, Boss," Friday's answer came evenly, her tone calm. "They held memorial services around the world. A memorial fund, scholarship, and hospital have been opened in your name since then."
Toni scoffed at the news, shaking her head wryly. She'd always wanted to do those things. To open a hospital, make it affordable for the less fortunate. A scholarship for kids who weren't born into wealth like her. She'd wanted to make sure all the geniuses, like Peter Parker, got to pursue their education. God, she'd only ever told Pepper about those dreams, back when they'd been dating. And Pepper, bless her, had done those things for Toni when she no longer could.
She didn't even want to think about what Rhodey had gone through. Rhodes was her best friend, her baby bear, her north star, guiding light… maybe she was being particularly emotional, but she'd just beaten death, damn it, and she was pretty much allowed to be emotional if she wanted to.
Without a second thought she whipped open the schedules for the day of her two greatest friends, pausing when she saw how absolutely full they were. They had so much on their plates it was astounding, but then again, she'd used to take the brunt of most the things they were doing. There was an hour's break for lunch on each of them, and she could definitely get a call in if she wanted…
But did she want to?
The thought came unbidden to her, unnatural and foreign in her mind. She wasn't sure, though. Did she really want to get in contact with them, tell them she was alive and beg for forgiveness, go back into the same routine she'd had before? Board meetings, R&D work, fixing the Avengers' gear, making them new things, avoiding Barton and Wanda like the plague, trying to spend as little time around Rogers and Barnes as she could, shying away from Romanov's touch… the list could go on. She'd changed after Siberia. They all had, but she'd… she'd learned something especially important from it all. Trust was a two way street. That's what they always said. But she'd always given her trust freely, her heart easily, opened her home and her finances to these people, and they'd done nothing but throw it back in her face and smile as it exploded. When it came down to it, she'd spent so long without a "thank you" that she just came to accept that it would never come. Then with the Accords business everything had really gone to shit, and had never gotten better since then. Most of them hated her. She was scared of a handful of them. It was a very rough situation.
A rough situation she'd be walking right back into if she called Pepper and Rhodey. If she let them know she was alive she'd have to go back and pick up where she'd left off, with people hating her guts and only coming to her when they needed her money or toys. And honestly? She wasn't ready to be persona non grata again. Not yet. Not after she'd just done the impossible. Was it selfish? Yeah, definitely, but maybe it was time for her to actually be selfish for a change? Prove them all right, the newspapers and her so-called friends. She could totally be selfish. She'd taken the first step by not telling them she was sick, disappearing out of the blue to take care of it herself.
And boy, that train of thought took her straight back to that call she'd made just before she crawled into the Extremis tube. Her thought process at the time still baffled her, but she'd let herself do it in a moment of weakness. She didn't know she would survive, and… she'd wanted to hear his voice, honestly. Rhodey and Pepper and Happy may have been her closest friends, and they'd each gotten their own messages, but it was Rogers she'd wanted to hear before she went under. He was Captain freakin' America. He'd betrayed her trust, almost killed her when he left her in Siberia, but her sick (and way too soft, damn it) heart had remembered all the times they'd had before everything went to shit. Before she'd fucked up with Ultron, and then the Accords. They'd been friends. He was the first person to actually try to befriend her, after they got past their… tumultuous beginning. He…
God, she really was being emotional today.
"Fri, what would you think if I said I wanted to stay dead?" Toni bit out, sitting back in her chair as she stared at the screen that held her two closest friends' faces on it.
The AI remained uncharacteristically quiet for a moment, long enough that Toni found herself glancing toward one of the cameras in the room in question. "I would say it's up to you, Boss."
"But?" The question came with a smile, because Toni could hear the pause in Friday's voice after she spoke. She could tell the young AI had wanted to say something else, but was holding back. It was good, it meant she was growing and making her own opinions. It was healthy.
Apparently emboldened by the nonchalance of Toni's query Friday pushed on, sounding more confident this time. "But I would also say that it would be a well deserved break."
She couldn't help but to laugh at the words, pushing herself back and away from the computer with a nod. "Y'know what, Fri? I couldn't agree more. How about you update me on the state of the world while I go through those scans you took of me, read me some of my emails? And I'll try to stay out of your systems this time, but I do wanna experiment with that some more later, okay?"
"Of course, Boss," she sounded almost smug when she said it, as if she was glad that Toni had taken her recommendation in stride. "The world remains mostly as it did before you underwent Extremis. The Accords are more stable, and many more names have signed to them. The Avengers continue to help with crises around the globe. There are some splinter groups that are against the Accords, and fighting happens often though usually without any casualty. A drought is ongoing for parts of Africa, including Wakanda, that has affected crop yield. SI has sent rations to most of the continent. There is an unread email queued for the new head of R&D from King T'Challa, requesting assistance in finding a solution for the drought; it includes multiple blueprints of possible rain-making devices. BARF has exceeded expectations with trauma victims. PTSD treatment has taken leaps and bounds since it was introduced to the general populace. The prosthetics department has provided millions of limbs to combat wounded veterans, and to children in need…"
Toni was mostly just nodding along as Friday spoke, busily poking through scans of her brain and finding them all lacking. She had no idea what was going on with her. Maybe she'd imagined it? But no, that would be impossible. Friday had said she felt her in her systems. Fri couldn't lie. So she needed to figure this out. The headache she was nursing didn't necessarily make her want to try again so soon, but it was killing her to not know. "Wait, wait. Back up a sec, Fri," she finally spoke, her brows furrowing as she looked away from the scans for the first time. "What was that about T'Challa?"
"King T'Challa has requested aid in the search for relief from an ongoing drought."
"Yeah, you said that. You also said new head of R&D? What am I, chopped liver? They just replaced me?" she grumbled, but was already flipping her brain scans off and tugging open the email in question. T'Challa was a proud man, from what she remembered when they worked together to amend the Accords. He'd not just ask for help lightly. A low whistle emitted from her lips as she got her first look at the numbers. They were grim if something didn't get fixed in the next couple of months. Wakanda could survive on its own for another year or so, but there were other countries around them that wouldn't be so lucky. "He wasn't kidding, was he, baby girl?" she murmured to Friday as she hunched over the holographic screens. He'd also sent along things his people had suggested as possible solutions, but it didn't take much more than a minute for Toni to already trash them. They wouldn't work long term, and that's what they needed more than anything.
God, what was she doing? She'd just said she wanted to take a break. Not to go back out there and let the world know she was alive. But damn it all if her bleeding heart wasn't already being tugged to Wakanda. "Fri, remember that project I was working on a year or two ago? It got pushed to the backburner cuz of… well, you know, but could you pull it up for me?"
And there it was: her rainmaker. Well, sort of. She'd meant to give it to him ages ago. She started it when they were working on the Accords together, when he'd first mentioned the droughts that sometime plagued his countries. Sometime between then and ratifying the amendments, clearing the Avengers' names, getting them home, and getting sick she'd lost the purpose entirely. It was rather hard to focus on making an atmospheric changing device when you were throwing up more times than not and trying to save your own life. Now she was faced with, yet again, not being able to give it to him. If she did he'd most certainly know she was alive. Getting a blueprint like this out of nowhere would be super suspicious, cuz no one was as smart as her and would be able to figure this out. That's what her ego liked to think, anyway. Honestly? The biggest issue would be how on earth some random person got King T'Challa's personal address to send it to.
Or maybe, and big maybe, he'd be willing to keep her little secret. Tit for tat. He'd hidden the others away for awhile, given them sanctuary, so maybe it was only fair he do the same for her? But he works pretty closely with the Avengers these days too, from what she'd seen… "Fri, wanna give me the odds on T'Challa not ratting us out if I take this to him?"
"Boss," she sounded almost annoyed, but fond, "You know I can't calculate odds like that. There are too many variables."
"Yeah, yeah," Toni sighed, dragging a hand down her face. She already knew what she would do. Sure, she was selfish enough to keep her life a secret from her old friends and team, but she couldn't just sit around on her ass while entire countries starved and thirsted to death. "I can't catch a break, can I?"
"Seems to be the case, Boss." Friday's regretful tone only matches Toni's mood.
"Okay. Well, let's put our heads together on this. We don't know that he won't scream to the world that I'm alive and well, but whatever. Cross that bridge when we get there. First question should be how do I even get to Wakanda without being seen?"
"You did spend three weeks installing that stealth tech into your armor."
"Yeah, baby girl, I know I did. But we don't know how well it works."
"Initial tests seem to be promising."
The lilting tease in Friday's voice made Toni's face scrunch up in confusion before she jumped out of her skin as the Iron Man suit appeared in front of her, the chair she was in sent rocketing out behind her. "Holy shit, Fri! Do not do that! Not cool! What the fuck."
"As I said, initial tests seem to be very promising," Friday teased again, and if she had a body Toni would've already thrown something.
"God, you'll be lucky if I don't program a nasty little virus into your system later. Show you what it's like to be snuck up on like that. Fuck." Despite all her griping Toni was still impressed, lightly patting the shoulder of the armor. It didn't feel like it had been that long since she'd flown it to the cabin in the first place, but it had definitely been a while. "So, is the good King in his home right now? Do we know?" She made her way to a closet and started tugging a sweatshirt on, following by a pair of leggings and old sneakers. Who cared if she looked good? She was dead to the world.
"It appears that he is currently in a palace in Wakanda. A visit from several Avengers is scheduled in three days."
"Well, I guess we'll have to get in and out pretty quick then, won't we?" Toni teased, spreading her arms out as the armor approached and encased her. She had to hold back a sigh of content at the warm feeling spreading through her. She loved her armor, the power and flight, the strength, the height. Not that she was a short woman by any means, but going from 5'9" to 6'1" was enough of a difference for her. Besides that, the Mark 42 was her favorite armor. It was lightweight, way more durable now than it had been during that Killian shit, and the mostly gold color scheme suited her more than the old red ones did.
The more relaxed she got the more she realized the suit actually felt… tighter? "Fri, what's up with the fit on this thing? I didn't gain weight, did I? Did Extremis make me fat?"
"No, Boss," Friday's words were quick, laced with what Toni was afraid to label as worry, "The armor seems to be constricting."
Toni blinked several times at her words, flexing her muscles and grimacing as she realized it was right. "Okay. Not seems to be. It definitely is constricting me. Fri, why is my armor trying to choke me? Get it off me."
"I… the suit is no longer responding to outside command."
"What do you mean it isn't responding?" Toni hissed, one hand jerking toward her head for the manual release but only making it halfway. It stopped abruptly as the armor creaked as it squeezed tighter than before. Toni cried out in alarm as it did, her lungs suddenly crushed by the force of the armor. It didn't ease up any from that point, the pain suddenly coursing through her in rivulets of absolute agony as the suit got tighter and tighter and tighter. Vaguely, she realized she was screaming and Friday was calling her name, but it was only briefly until she finally felt darkness slipping into her consciousness. And she fell willingly into it.
Hours could've passed, or maybe just minutes, but when Toni opened her eyes again it was with no pain whatsoever. A happy, relieved sigh left her lips as she slowly pushed herself up onto her elbows. When had she fallen to the ground? Was it before or after her suit choked the shit out of her?
"Boss?" Friday asked, her voice tentative and unsure. It sat unwell in Toni's stomach to hear that tone from her youngest kid.
"Yeah, Fri, I'm up," she breathed out, groaning as she plopped backwards onto her rear. The "no pain" phase was apparently over, because every part of her body ached so fiercely she could've sworn she had the flu on steroids. Her hand came up at the thought to feel her forehead, skin meeting skin and finding it to be an acceptable temperature. "What happened, Fri? How'd you get it off me?"
"I didn't, Boss. The suit absorbed inside of you."
And not for the first time that day Toni found herself at a loss for words. Her hand came forefront in her vision as she held it out in front of her, but other than looking a little red it was just her normal hand. There was no gauntlet there. No signs of forced entry. It was totally fine. A totally normal hand. The suit could not have just disappeared inside of her like some sort of freak show.
But then her hand started to change the more she thought about it. The longer she pictured what her hand had looked like inside of the armor. And slowly, with sweat dripping from her brow, her hand became encased in the gold and red gauntlet of her armor that just… grew from inside her skin?
"What the hell?"
She didn't have time for this. She didn't want this. Whatever this even was. She just wanted to be healthy. See: not sick. No heart disease. No crappy lungs. No hole in her chest. No cancer. Nothing. Zilch. Nadda.
But she couldn't ever have anything so simple, could she? First the weird brain thing, now this? Extremis had definitely modified something, but she was seriously lacking in equipment to find out what. "This is Extremis. Gotta be."
"Considering that is the only new factor, Boss, I have to agree. However, my scans still show nothing beyond a thickening in bone density."
"Well, gotta store all that armor somewhere, I guess," Toni murmured, fighting her way to her feet. "Ugh. This fuckin' sucks, Fri. I feel like I've been hit by a train."
"Should we postpone the trip to Wakanda?"
"Nah. They need our help, and with luck they'll have some equipment I might be able to use to find out what's going on with me, y'know? We've got some good stuff here, but I didn't consider any of… this, when we were moving in. Upload everything to my tablet and I'll take it with me." While Friday worked on that Toni took a deep breath to steady herself, closing her eyes as she tried to focus. She'd managed the gauntlet before, but doing the whole suit seemed like a monumental task. Not to mention she kept getting distracted by her achy body, an itch here or there, the sounds of the fluorescent lights… but slowly, surely, she felt her body being wrapped up in armor again. When she felt totally covered she opened her eyes again, swallowing down the bile when she realized she was, in fact, in her armor again. "Fuck me, Fri. This is a lot harder than it looks."
"I've been recording information as you… worked, and I would concur that it appears to be quite difficult. Your molecular structure seems to change and adapt as the armor comes up from your bones. The request tablet is finished and awaiting pickup."
"Thanks, Fri," she murmured, taking a few awkward steps to the computer it had been plugged into. It felt like she was wearing a second skin. Technically, it had always felt like a second skin, but this was different. Like it was an honest to god second skin. Which, considering it came out of her, the description wasn't too far off. "Okay. Wakanda. T'Challa. Nap. Drought. In that order. Maybe pen in a half hour for lunch. Let's get hoppin', baby girl. No rest for the wicked."
She took the few steps into the cool mountain air, breathing it in for a moment before her stealth systems engaged and she was airborne, zipping across the sky toward Wakanda.