Chapter Text
It was the noise that woke Harry. The sound of many people moving past his door – obviously in a hurry – and the voices. These weren’t whispered voices, like one might expect for … a swipe of his hand brought a set of red numbers floating above his head. Two thirty? In the morning?
Shifting his head, Harry blinked at the stars out his window. The sound of pounding feet, not just one person running past his door but quite a number had him swinging his legs over the side of the bed and sitting up.
“Harry?” a sleepy Daisy asked.
Turning back, Harry patted her hip. “Something’s wrong. Go back to sleep, I’ll go find out what it is.”
But even as he stood, grabbing up a cloak that he’d tossed haphazardly over the chair in front of the small desk in the room, Daisy was rolling out of her side of the bed. Her bed-side light snapped on and he squinted at the unexpectedness of it.
“What? There’s no way that I’m going back to sleep now,” she told his raised eyebrow.
With a nod, Harry strode to the door of their suite, pulled it open and stuck his head out.
“T’Challa?” he called, seeing the King further down the corridor and striding away.
The Wakandan King turned back and Harry could see that he was dressed in his Black Panther costume – minus his helmet. He was also looking rather grim.
“What’s wrong?” Harry asked, stepping out.
“It seems that some foreigners have decided that tonight is a good night to raid the country,” T’Challa replied. “We intend to persuade them otherwise.”
“From the way that you’re dressed, I’m guessing that these aren’t just your ordinary raiders?” Harry asked.
A door opening directly across the corridor saw Nat and Steve join the conversation.
“No,” T’Challa replied. “Our drones have detected five trucks and a total of thirty-two men. They all appear to be heavily armed as well.”
“What’s their objective?” Steve asked.
“We are unsure,” W’Kabi, Wakanda’s head of security for the Border Tribe replied. “That part of the country is relatively empty.”
“Then it’s something that you don’t know about,” Nat stated.
“Perhaps,” T’Challa nodded. “Either way, they will not fulfil their objective.”
Harry’s eyes connected with Steve’s and together, they nodded at each other.
“We’ll suit up and give you a hand,” Steve stated.
“I’ll wake Tony,” Nat added.
“No need,” the man in question replied as he opened the door to his suite. “It’s not like I was going to get any sleep anyway with you lot yapping out here.”
“If you are coming, we leave in five,” T’Challa stated.
Harry turned back to the suite in order to find the rest of his suit; Daisy, though had already beaten him to it.
“It’s on the bed,” she said, even as she was pulling on one of her boots.
“What would I do without you?” he asked, stealing a kiss on the way past.
“Let’s hope you’ll never have to find out, Magic Man,” she grinned.
ooo00ooo
The Wakandan jets were quiet. In fact, the engines made even less noise than a quinjet. Steve grinned at Nat and jerked his head at Tony who was currently inching his way further back, his eyes fixed on one particular computer screen.
“Tony!” Nat called warningly.
“Yes?” he replied lightly, clearly acting as though nothing was amiss.
“We will reach the target in sixty seconds,” the pilot announced.
Instantly, the Avengers, T’Challa and the group of Wakandan soldiers in the craft tensed, preparing themselves for battle.
“There they are,” W’Kabi said.
The front window of the craft was obviously infused with some kind of technology that Steve wasn’t familiar with. Instead of seeing almost pitch black as one would expect for this time of night, what he saw looked as clear as day. The trees, rocks, even a small herd of antelope were all easily visible. If he looked hard enough, he was sure that he’d even be able to count the number of leaves on the trees.
But it wasn’t the trees that had their attention. No, that honour belonged to the five trucks that were parked just in front of a small hill. Even knowing that the trucks were the focus, Steve allowed his eyes to roam about, taking in the landscape, getting a feel for the terrain.
Behind the trucks was a forest. Surrounding them and branching out to either side for a couple of hundred meters, though, the ground was clear. But it was the hill that really captured his interest. It had a strange shape to it, almost as though it didn’t quite belong. It was fairly narrow for a hill and arched up fairly quickly. What made it especially strange was its length – easily five hundred metres long before it joined up with the rest of the hills that quickly turned into mountains.
“There is no indication that they know we’re here, my King,” W’Kabi said.
“That will change,” T’Challa grinned. “We will land to the west of the trucks. Have another of the jets land to the east. The final two should drop their men into the forest to the north for them to cut off their retreat.”
T’Challa looked to the Avengers then even as his Black Panther mask grew from his necklace to cover his head and face.
“Ready to go to work, Captain?”
ooo00ooo
They’d barely disembarked and rounded the jet in two columns – one to each side – before their targets reacted. From the rear of the last truck, men swarmed out, dashing either around the five trucks or into the trees to the north.
Tapping his glasses with his wand ensured that Harry could see perfectly as though it was day. A second tap on his head disillusioned himself.
Rapid-fire shots from a machine gun had the Wakandans flinging up their cloaks, a purple sheen sweeping over them as they absorbed the bullets with some kind of shield tech.
“Handy,” Harry murmured, impressed.
And then a flash came from the top of one of the trucks. That was obviously a lot more powerful, possibly some type of miniature rocket. Instinctively, Harry swept his wand up, grunting with the effort of ‘catching’ the rocket and diverting it, ‘throwing’ it far overhead and behind them. Thankfully, his gambit had been successful, evidenced by the massive explosion and fireball from behind them.
“Quake, give me a boost!” he called.
“As soon as I know where you are,” she replied and Mage took off, running in front of her, his wand trailing behind him, a dim glow from it.
At the right moment, he jumped and felt a wave crash into him, flinging him higher into the air and propelling him forward. Mage grinned as he saw the trucks below, the mercenaries oblivious to his presence.
As he reached the top of his arc, he focussed and sent the most powerful exploding hexes at his disposal directly into the third and fourth trucks. His arc over the trucks was interrupted with the extra heat-fuelled air compression, sending him a little further than he’d expected and all but tumbling him about in the sky. A quick change into his sparrowhawk form enabled him to land back on his feet before he reverted forms and instantly twisted, dropping into a crouch to survey his results.
The two trucks, as expected, were nothing more than flaming piles of metal. Three men were also down and clearly out of the fight. Yells and screams permeated the air as men fought for their lives.
The explosion of the rear truck preceeded a figure with five glowing lights swopping past – feet, hands and chest.
“They’re on the run, boys and girls,” Iron Man commented.
“Yes, straight into an old mine shaft,” T’Challa replied.
Looking about, Harry saw that he was right. While the Wakandans and Avengers were dealing with the trucks, mostly focussing on the remaining one with the large gun attached to its roof, men were running towards the hill. Tapping his glasses a second time, gave Mage a better view. Four, possibly five of the invaders were indeed making for a cave entrance that looked to have very recently had a whole lot of foliage removed from it.
Finally, the last spurts of weapon’s fire petered out.
“The last of them are in the cave,” W’Kabi stated. “We have twenty-two of them.”
“That means that there are ten unaccounted for,” T’Challa replied.
“Well, at least we know where they went,” Nat said, materialising out of the dark.
“Yes. The only question is, exactly where does that cave lead?” T’Challa asked rhetorically.
ooo00ooo
They approached the mouth of the cave cautiously, divided into two teams, leaving the middle, the area most exposed by those inside the cave, bare.
From what little T’Challa could see, the cave was deep, much deeper than he would have expected. Turning his head, his eyes narrowed at the shape of the hill. The way that it protruded, so much longer than it was wide and eventually joining up with the mountains, had him wondering if the cave extended all the way there.
Assuming that it did … T’Challa focussed his mind, overlaying what he knew of the mountains in this part of the country. And then his eyes widened. Perhaps it wasn’t so much the mountains above Wakanda that were the interesting part, but what lay beneath. Thinking deeply, he pictured the mines that crisscrossed the land below, following the vibranium deposits. He was sure that there were tunnels that reached under those mountains. And if there were mines there and this cave stretched far enough back …
“They’re here for the vibranium,” he stated.
W’Kabi stared at him. “You are sure, My King?”
“Yes,” T’Challa replied. “I’m certain that this cave leads straight into the mines below the mountains.”
“But there is no tunnel from the mines in this direction,” W’Kabi argued.
“That we know of,” T’Challa countered. “Go. Take some men and one of the jets. Join up with the Mining Tribe and find the entrance from within the mine itself. We will catch them between us.”
Slapping his arms across his chest, W’Kabi gave a small nod of his head, gathered a dozen men and ran for the nearest jet.
“Now, we need to keep their focus here and away from the mines,” T’Challa told his allies.
“Perhaps if we light the place up, give them something to shoot at, make them think that they have the superior position?” Iron Man suggested.
“Tactically, it could work,” Widow nodded. “They have the cover and they’ll want to use it to ensure that we don’t follow them in.”
“A good idea,” T’Challa decided.
Touching one particular kimoyo bead from the bracelet of them around his wrist, he brought up the remotes for the Wakandan jets. It was then a matter of firing them up and manoeuvring them closer to the cave entrance. Once they were landed in a circular arc around the cave entrance, he switched on their external lights.
Instantly, the area outside the cave was lit up as though it was day; the three different angles ensuring that there were no shadows at all.
“That should catch their attention,” Captain America stated.
“You know, I could easily collapse the hill and the tunnel,” Quake suggested.
“Not yet,” T’Challa replied. “We need to catch these invaders, find out how they knew about our mines and this entrance that even I did not know about. Besides, if even one escaped into the mines, they could do much damage. But thank you, I may take you up on your offer after this is all over, and to close this ‘back door’.”
“We’re going to want to keep their attention here,” Mage said. “How do you plan on doing that.”
“Quite easily,” T’Challa replied. “Watch.”
And then, trusting to his suit, the Black Panther strode into the open clearing in front of the cave entrance. He was careful not to appear to be heading towards the entrance itself, simply making himself a target. His plan, of course, worked perfectly.
Instantly a hail of bullets fired from the cave, striking his chest, arms, legs and one even ricocheting off of his helmet. Looking down at himself, he could see bright purple blossoms forming on his suit where the kinetic energy from the bullets was hitting and being stored. Otherwise, though, apart from a slight pressure, he felt nothing, the suit doing its job perfectly.
Slowly, he backed away, keeping himself in the invader’s line of sight. Then, having judged the distance, he took off in a sprint, heading straight at the cave. Bullets began peppering him nearly non-stop, all doing nothing to avert his charge. And then, just before the cave’s entrance, he jumped, propelling himself upwards using the kinetic energy of the suit to fly high, above the cave where he twisted about to land in a crouch on the hill.
The Black Panther nodded approvingly as he saw his Wakandan soldiers taking advantage of his distraction, stepping out from their hiding spots to fire into the cave before instantly stepping back once more.
When the last of the firing had stopped, T’Challa stood up and ran down the side of the hill, his feet nearly sliding at the steepness of it.
“We accounted for another two, my King,” N’Krain informed him.
“Good work,” he replied.
A bird, some type of predator dropped out of the sky towards them and T’Challa frowned. This was not a bird that he had seen in Wakanda before and it definitely wasn’t the type of bird that one would expect to see at night. The bird’s transformation mid-air to a cloaked human explained the discrepancy.
“I counted nine others still in the cave,” Mage stated. “None have gone very far in but they’ve found cover. One of them was a white man. A man with a mechanical forearm.”
This last was said grimly while he’d been looking at Captain America, Iron Man and Black Widow.
“Klaue,” Stark stated grimly. “Obviously, Ultron’s handiwork didn’t slow him down.”
T’Challa pivoted to face him.
“Klaue? As in Ulysses Klaue?” he asked.
“You know him?” Stark replied. “What am I asking? Of course, you’d know him. The guy did manage to steal a hefty amount of vibranium a few years back.”
“Yes, we know him,” T’Challa replied. “This changes things. We’ve been chasing him ever since he escaped.”
“What’s your plan?” Captain Rogers asked.
“You say that there are only nine of them?” he asked Harry and received a nod. “Well, nine against the Black Panther is no match at all.”
“But nine against the Black Panther and five Avengers is even better odds,” the Captain countered.
T’Challa stared at them. This was not their fight. Still, they all seemed determined and he was right. And there was less chance of them escaping into the tunnels that way as well.
“Agreed,” he said. “Shall we?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Stark replied.
“Nat, keep close, I’ll cover you until we’re in,” Harry stated, receiving a nod in reply.
Together, the six of them approached the cave entrance from its side. And then, at T’Challa’s nod, both he and Iron Man stepped out. A second behind them came Quake, staying low to the ground in a crouch. Her hands were up and T’Challa could see the very air moving backwards from them with her pulses.
What was even more remarkable was watching the bullets that were streaking towards them suddenly come to stop mere inches from them before reversing and shooting back where they came from. And it wasn’t just the bullets that was sent flying. Dirt, rocks, bits of stick or branches, really, anything that wasn’t nailed down was instantly picked up and hurled down the cave.
As the others emerged, Quake stood. Suddenly, her right hand lifted aiming above and beyond the heads of the invaders. T’Challa watched as her quakes struck the roof of the cave, slamming into the dirt and rocks there. Instantly, rivers of dirt began cascading to the rocky floor below. And then, all at one, the roof of the cave gave way in a great pounding roar. Mounds of dirt and rocks collapsed, completely blocking off the rear of the cave and sending plumes of dust billowing towards the mouth of the cave.
The team, though, didn’t wait around, instead instantly taking advantage of the distraction.
T’Challa raced forward, seeking the man considered Wakanda’s greatest enemy. The first of the invaders that he encountered, he surprised by striking him across the back of the head, instantly knocking him out. The second that he approached, though, was ready for him. He was good, too, but nowhere near good enough to combat the Black Panther.
They traded blows, both blocking the other. Ducking one strike led T’Challa straight into his other fist and, while it didn’t hurt or even make him move backwards at all, it gave him an idea. T’Challa grinned behind his mask as he blocked the next three punches before letting the fourth through. As the invader’s fist struck – incidentally in the exact same place as the last time – the kinetic energy of the suit went to work, slamming back into the invader and firing him across the cave to slam into the far wall where he slowly slid down in a boneless heap.
Looking up, T’Challa saw that most of the invaders had been taken care of. All that were left was a single dark-skinned fighter who wouldn’t have looked out of place in Wakanda and Klaue who was currently backed up against the wall, his arms raised, a defeated expression on his face.
The fighter, though, he was proving to be of interest. T’Challa watched as he traded blows with Captain America, the latter using his shield to block punches and knife thrusts as well as a weapon, slamming it into the man’s hand and shoulder. The fight finished quickly, when Captain America dropped to the ground, spinning his leg in an attempt to catch the other fighter off-balance. The man was up to it, though, jumping high and straight into a red bolt of magic, causing his eyes to roll up into his head and his body to crumple to the ground.
“I’ll take that, I think,” Iron Man was saying to Klaue as he twisted the prosthetic and removed it.
“Well, that was almost anticlimactic,” Natasha remarked.
T’Challa retracted his mask and grinned at her. “It was, wasn’t it.”
ooo00ooo
Melissa arched her back, her hands on her hips and her head thrown completely back. Hearing a series of pops had her sighing in relief. She knew that she’d been hunched over her workbench for far too long. Not that that was any surprise. No, it’d always been the same with her, be it back when she was studying her engineering degree at Empire State or even these days when she was doing the books for the pet shop – Melissa tended to have a one-track mind, a mind that got so lost in her work that everything else, including comfort and food, fell away into being inconsequential.
Taking off the overly large goggles that she’d been wearing, she blinked her eyes into focus. Everything seemed so big when she was wearing the magnifying glasses that it always took her a couple of minutes to refocus.
The microchip that she’d been working on looked so very harmless sitting there on the desk. But what it represented, that was anything but harmless. Or tiny.
Picking it up, Melissa slotted it into the auxiliary port that was connected to the computer. Instantly, line upon line of coding appeared on the screen and began scrolling down it. Computer coding had been her secondary major and she cast her eyes over the code, looking for anything that seemed out of place.
Twenty long minutes later, she sat back once again, a huge smile on her face. Theoretically, it was done. All that was left now was to test her invention.
Disconnecting the microchip from the port, Melissa transferred it to the miniature ‘case’ that it was designed for, after all, one couldn’t simply leave exposed circuitry lying around in contact with blood, bone and nerves.
Picking up the case, she strode further back into the lab area that she’d designed and built under the pet store and into her operating theatre. The case went on the tray before she turned to survey her ‘subjects’. The cages against the wall currently held three dogs and a cat.
“Eenie, meanie, minie, moe!” she said, landing on the Labrador puppy.
The pup was eager to get out when she opened the door and, being a dog, was also eager to leapt straight into her arms. Its wagging tail was only a slight annoyance as she placed him on the table. Then, with one arm wrapped around him to ensure that he didn’t go anywhere, Melissa picked up the amnestic syringe, uncapped it with her teeth and carefully injected the pup’s front left paw.
A sharp yelp followed by the pup struggling didn’t help it at all, not with the way that she had him held. The spent syringe was dropped back on the tray and then it was simply a matter of waiting. Gently, Melissa stroked the puppy’s head and cooed to it as its movements slowed. It took less than a minute for the pup to fall asleep.
Then, leaving the pup where he was, Melissa prepared herself for the surgery to come.
She hummed as she thoroughly washed her hands and arms, all the way up to her elbows. While the tune changed, the humming continued as she put on her surgical gloves, face mask and glasses. A third tune began as she inserted the drip into the pup’s paw and began shaving the back of its neck.
Soon, everything was ready. Bright yellow blossomed on the freshly shaved skin from the cotton bud full of antiseptic. Reaching up, Melissa pulled down the large circular magnifying glass, adjusting it to the correct angle and distance.
“Now, let’s begin,” she smiled.
Picking up a scalpel, she made her first incision.
ooo00ooo
Ideally, Bucky would have preferred to wait until Steve was back from visiting Wakanda.
Once upon a time, the two had been nearly inseparable. They’d grown up together, more often than not with Bucky chasing away the bullies that tended to pick on the smaller Steve. Times were tough back then. And they became even tougher for Steve after his parents had died. But that had only brought Bucky and Steve closer together.
Then had come the war. Bucky, of course, had been accepted straight away. Scrawny, little Steve with his myriad of health problems, was rejected. Not that that stopped him from trying to enlist anyway. Even after Bucky had finished training and had been sent overseas, Steve had kept on trying, using fake name after fake name.
Finally, after a series of events, each more amazing than the last, the two best friends had been reunited. This time, though, it was Steve who was doing the saving, rescuing Bucky from a HYDRA prison camp.
After that, as they say, the rest was history. Literally, in their case. They’d fought together until Bucky had been supposedly killed, an act that Steve emulated not long later. Against all odds, both had survived, and, seventy years later, had been reunited.
And even after all that time, their friendship had remained strong. Consequently, there was no one else that Bucky wanted standing beside him today of all days.
Unfortunately, that just wasn’t going to happen.
“You know, you could at least smile,” Sam remarked from beside him. “This is supposed to be your wedding day, you know, the ‘best day of your life’ not a jolly execution.”
Bucky shot him a look, his eyes narrowed.
“I know that!” he snapped back. “And for your information, I am happy.”
Sam shot him a dubious look. “Well, for your sake, I hope that Daphne realises that.”
The swell of music interrupted any response Bucky was going to make.
As the traditional wedding march played, the small congregation – mostly made up of the Avengers and their friends as well as two women that had travelled all the way from Britain for this – rose to their feet. The doors at the far end of the room opened and Bucky straightened, his gaze intense, longing for the woman he was waiting for.
Of course, that wasn’t how weddings worked.
The first through the door was Melati, her deep forest green dress with gold edging and long, flowing sleeves worked well with her green skin. The dress flared at her slender waist, meaning that her tail had ample room within it before it popped out behind her. She was beaming at everyone and only those that really knew her could see the trace of uncertainty on her face.
Behind Melati, came a witch that Bucky had only met the night before. Astoria Greengrass, Daphne’s younger sister. She was remarkedly similar in looks, with the same long, blonde hair that today was piled upon her head in an elaborate knot, small wisps falling about her face. Like Melati, she, too was dressed in the elegant dark green dress and carried a bouquet of red, white and yellow flowers.
And then, finally, came the one that Bucky was waiting for.
She walked slowly by herself, her father having died long ago. A soft veil of white, matching her dress hung in front of her face, but not obscuring her broad smile and her shining eyes. Deep folds of material hung from her arms, her hands clutching the bouquet in front of her waist, droplets of gold falling from her sleeves and matching the golden twisted rope that she wore as a belt. Her train swept the carpet behind her before the ends of it were held up by tiny flittering creatures that Bucky would swear were fairies although how she got them to do that, he had no idea.
His eyes never left hers as she approached and it was only the prod in his back that had him moving at the right time to meet her at the foot of the three stairs that led up to the small platform that he’d been standing on.
Offering her his arm, she laid her hand on his forearm and together, they climbed the stairs to stand in front of the ancient wizard.
As the wizard began speaking, Bucky finally managed to tear his gaze away from his bride to face him.
“… James Buchanan Barnes and Daphne Ophelia Greengrass in holy wedlock,” the wizard was saying. “They shall be entered into a sacred bond that none shall break. Do you James, come before all here today of your own free will?”
“I do,” Bucky replied, wincing slightly at hearing his voice catch.
“And do you, Daphne, come before all here today of your own free will?”
“I do,” Daphne replied.
“Then let it be known to all that these two shall be wedded today,” the wizard declared. “Please join hands.”
Instantly, Bucky turned, smiled at Daphne and held out his hand for her.
“Will the Bonders step forth?”
Bucky turned to see Ted step out from behind Sam, while Astoria stepped from behind Daphne. Together, the two stood one step down and together, they pulled their wands placing their tips, crossed so that the tip of Ted’s wand was touching Daphne’s wrist and the tip of Astoria’s wand was touching Bucky’s.
The sudden tingling feeling that blossomed from the touch almost had him jerk his hand away. Thankfully, Daphne had explained that, with a magical wedding, this was an integral and most important part and he was able to remain still.
As the wizard had them say their vows, Bucky’s eyes were momentarily drawn from Daphne down to their joined hands. His eyes widened at the sight of three golden strands of … of magic wrapping themselves around their wrists. Finally, the final vow was completed by Daphne’s “I do” and he felt the warm, tingly feeling of the magic seeping into his skin.
“James Buchanan Barnes, Daphne Ophelia, I now pronounce you man and wife,” the wizard declared in a loud voice. “Well, don’t just stand there, man. Kiss her!”
Never in his ninety-eight years of life had Bucky ever wanted to obey an order more.
Thus, never once breaking eye contact with her, he quickly lifted her veil over her head, slipped his arms around her waist, pulled tight and kissed her, pouring all of the love that he had for his new wife into their first kiss.