"I am wealthy in my friends"
Luna dropped the Avengers’ ‘presents’ off just behind them after they hung up with Fury (I was perhaps, just a little jealous of those hologram consoles) and turned to watch the news. Timing after all, one of the most important components when you were trying to make a point—we didn’t stick around to watch their reactions, though I imagined they were hilarious. After all, we had dates.
And of course, because Irony has no shortage of love for us, when we showed up at the restaurant to meet our dates, all they wanted to talk about was the Avengers and their connection to an explosion in China.
To say the Chinese government was not happy was an understatement. The Avenger’s being a new sort of privatized, global security and the fact that two of their merry boy band (the Widow’s a little outnumbered) were not from Earth led to a whole slew of peculiar diplomatic issues on the global and intergalactic scale that I didn’t want to touch with ten foot (or maybe twenty million lightyears) long pole. I wouldn’t take that job for anything in the world, my secondary Political Science degree notwithstanding. As Luna loves to say, “Nope!” and flail as she ran away, that was me.
Our dates were cute, the food was amazing, and I’m sure under any other circumstances they would have made great conversationalists. (There was a ‘but’ coming, as there usually was). But, they were both very serious fans of the Avengers—we’re talking like stalk them through the streets if they thought they saw anyone who even vaguely looked like them—or at least their measurements, they’ve used all the media footage available to cross reference for that, since the Avengers by and large don’t go out advertising who they are. We left before dessert, leaving them arguing over who would win in a fight between I don’t even remember who. We paid the check and told them to call if they were ever ready to grow the fuck up.
They still haven’t called; last I heard they were still arguing.
Things were quiet for weeks afterwards in the Queer Penthouse. What else would you call the home of two pan-aesthetic, likely panromantic, cis-gendered women (though I’m riding the line of genderqueer) on the asexual spectrum? With the exception of the fuss the Chinese government was putting up over the whole debacle with the Avengers, everything was weirdly quiet.
Things were so quiet that I had to make my own excitement when I contacted T’challa the day after our daring rescue. The fire didn’t turn into a forest fire, we made sure of that, but because of the gas and the chemicals and probably due to the magic in and around the compound, and despite every effort, they were forced to let it burn itself out. And then while they were letting everything cool down, but, but before S.H.I.E.L.D. or anyone else could access it; I had to let him know about the Vibranium. While dismayed at the news I conveyed (and more than a little irked by the diplomatic mess he was walking into), T’challa was more than happy to agree when I offered to come for a visit, and since I was going to be there, help him track down his smugglers.
Which was perfect, because I hated to be around during the last few weeks of the school year, and this gave me an opportunity to be away while all that happened, and then I’d meet Luna at this year’s end of the semester vacation. As a reward for not murdering her students, and for me, well, we’ll say research for my next series, but honestly it’s more just a chance to travel with my friend. This year we were headed to Indonesia, from the last week of May through the end of June, maybe longer if we decided we weren’t done, it wasn’t as if money was an issue. Between my novels and the security systems my blogger personality designed and Luna’s family money (being a dragon and all that) we technically never had to work another day in our lives, but we like what we do, so we weren’t going to change that.
But back to the present, S.H.I.E.L.D. had mostly broken the terrorist ring since we dumped so many of their members in their lobby. Poor, dear, Pirate Leatherbooty was too busy sticking his uninvited nose into the diplomatic mess since it involved the Avengers and he seemed to think that S.H.I.E.L.D. had some proprietary claim on them to bother over much with the who, the how, and the why of the ring’s sudden (unconscious) appearance on their doorstep. He yelled at a dozen agents to fix the obvious security holes and assigned Agent Coulson’s team to track down ‘whoever the motherfuckers were’ who do could do such a thing. But with no faces, no trace evidence, no energy signature, and no confirmation from the Avengers themselves that there even were other parties involved, they were at a standstill.
We sent the Avengers a very large fruit basket for not telling S.H.I.E.L.D. about us, signed ‘The Rescue Aid Society’ as well as copies of the movies.
I was sincerely tempted to continue to mess with the Director; did you know that when he’s pissed enough, he can actually do the throbbing vein thing on his forehead like the cartoons? I thought it was hilarious. I wouldn’t even had to do much, just sneak into his office and move everything just an inch to the left, just enough for the super paranoid leader of a supposed secret government agency to realize that something was wrong, but not enough for him to necessarily know. But I decided to err on the side of caution. In hindsight, rescuing the Avengers in such an ostentatious fashion wasn’t the best move for people who were trying to fly under the radar. No need to wave the cape in front of the bull any more than necessary.
Two weeks after the events in China I left for Wakanda, or as far as my (first class) plane ticket was concerned, for Kenya. T’challa would have someone meet me at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, and from there to a private airstrip to travel with a returning ambassador’s party. Then what I had to look forward to was a lazy two and a half weeks all to myself. Interspersed with helping T’challa catch his smugglers, of course. Well, and a few more, ‘personal’ matters.
***
Luna met me at Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali the last week of May after my Wakandan furlough. She tucked herself against my side as we grabbed my suitcase and walked out to the waiting taxi. We didn’t say a word the whole ride there, though the driver gave us a peculiar look when she half curled up in my lap for scritches. I swear, dragons are just big cats, or at least this one is. She even swiped at me when we reached the hotel and I had to wake her so we could get out and I could pay the driver.
Upstairs in our suite, the door had barely shut behind me before Luna started in on me. “So how was the trip? Was your boy his usual . . . accommodating self?”
“Luna,” I said gently, the faintest touch of rebuke in my voice as I dropped onto the sofa, “you know I don’t talk out of school.”
“Oh please,” she responded with a snort, sprawling across my lap once more, “he knows we don’t have secrets, you told him that upfront and he was fine with that. I don’t want all the details—I’d be too jealous—but come on, let me live vicariously through you. Spill.”
And by and large, I couldn’t begrudge her at least a few crumbs from my recent activities. T’challa and I had a bit of a thing once, and it has carried over every once in a while. It wasn’t romantic and we didn’t sleep together in any way but the most literal definition of the word. “Yes,” I finally said, “he was. For the entire trip, we was mine. Anything I wanted, however I wanted it, because it was my will.” At the memory, something a little dark and warm must have crept into my voice because Luna shivered in response on my lap. My hand shifted from scratches to long, slow strokes from her shoulders, down her spine, and back up. “Whoa, whoa, easy, honey. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for that to happen.”
“It’s all good,” Luna replied slowly, her voice gone a bit dreamy. She twisted her head and stared up at me through slightly glassy eyes, “I’ve said it before, but you’ve got full permission to float me just about any time you please. Now come on, tell me more.”
“Are you going to fall asleep on me?”
“Probably. Problem?”
“Eh, only some. I’ll wake you in two hours so we can go for food.’
“Food, food is good,” Luna mumbled a little nonsensically as she settled back down in my lap for more scratches. That was probably one of the reasons why our friendship worked the way it did, with both of us on opposite sides of the proverbial slash in the BDSM community, and being friends in handy, because we could scene and it would work, or just even have a moment here or there.
“Speaking of food,” I said, returning to scratching the oversized dragon-cat in my lap, “there’s something very visceral about an actual prince bringing you breakfast in bed. Let me tell you . . .”
***
That might have been how we spent our vacation, amazing food, kitschy touristy things interspaced with treks into the jungles that we could only get to due to our unique abilities, as many festivals as we could get to, fantastic souvenirs, and so on. Except, (there was always an except) three days later, as I was sitting on the balcony writing up a blog post late in the evening, Luna’s voice drifted through the open doors.
“Oh, Gimli?”
My fingers froze. I knew that tone of voice, knew it all too well. I slowly raised my head from the screen. Luna was standing in the middle of the living room, eyes glued to the T.V. I let out a long breath and laid my hands flat against my keyboard. “Yes, Legolas?” I answered, just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“The Avengers are fighting aliens in Manhattan. I want to go watch! Or help. Maybe both!”
THUNK! went my head into my laptop.
I’d created a monster.