Chapter 5
M’Baku returns to consciousness aching, though not as bad as it should be. He knows, without opening his eyes, who’s standing at his bedside. He does not want to open his eyes.
“Look at me,” Shuri commands. “I already know you’re awake.”
He opens one eye to see his beloved tapping at the display on a nearby screen. His heart rate is thudding along heavily, like a rabbit being chased. As Shuri’s eyes narrow, her frown too deep for her young face, he finds it to be an apt comparison. He is the rabbit, and she is the panther.
His Panther.
When he sits up, she comes back over and helps him. Her touch is as callused as ever, but gentle. She’s mindful of his injuries, and her hands linger even after he’s upright. She’s missed him; she’s been worrying over him.
M’Baku stares at her and waits for her to speak. He can see it, the lecture on the tip of her tongue. It pairs nicely with the hurt in her eyes, the red-rimmed pain he can’t wipe away like he wants to. He cannot undo the hours spent comatose here in her lab, nor can he reverse the attack that landed him in such a state.
She still does not speak. M’Baku only hums, curious. She has never been one to clam up before. Rarely does she avoid speaking her mind, especially when it comes to him. It is unsettling for her to be so quiet now. It reminds him of her grief. Those long, painful months after T’Challa’s passing, and the anguished night after Queen Mother’s murder. Shuri is never quiet. She is not meant to be quiet.
“I’m sorry, my Panther,” he tells her quietly. It’s not enough, he knows, but it’s all he can offer. “Where did I drag you away from?”
“It doesn’t matter.” She won’t look at him, but she hasn’t stopped touching him.
“I love your stories.”
Shuri shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she says again, firmer. She looks as though she wants to say more but the words seem to clog behind her teeth. M’Baku doesn’t necessarily want to encourage her to tear into him, but he can’t stand this silence either.
“Go on, then.”
Shuri finally looks at him. Her eyes are wet with unshed tears and full of fury.
“This is a very rare occasion,” he teases, “I am giving you free reign to—?”
She slaps him. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough to halt his words. The smack is loud in the emptiness of her lab. Were anyone around to see it, it’d be grounds for a national incident. Regardless of her status as Wakanda’s protector and her royal blood, an assault on the King cannot stand.
Thankfully, they are alone. He waits again.
“I never wanted you here.”
M’Baku frowns; her words sting at first. Then he watches her gaze shift to take in the laboratory around them. The sting fades.
“I never wanted you here,” she says again. She finally takes one hand off him and slams it onto the gurney below him. It sinks for a second, her strength weighing on its levitation, before settling. “You were never supposed to be here like this.”
M’Baku’s frown deepens. He won’t offer her banalities. She’s heard all of them before, never from him. He’s not about to start lying to her now. He can’t say it won’t happen again, or that it’s not as dramatic as she makes it out to be.
It will happen again. It is dramatic. He is the King, and there will always be those who wish to see him felled. Shuri knows this. M’Baku would be doing her a disservice to pretend otherwise.
“My Panther,” he says eventually. Her gaze stops roaming the lab and settles on him again. “I am truly sorry.”
She nods. Her lower lip wobbles. As she blinks, her tears finally begin to cascade. He reaches for her and she moves in tandem. She scrambles into his lap and curls up in his embrace. He wraps his arms around her as though he can shield her from what she’s feeling. She trembles in his hold and muffles her sobs against his naked shoulder. It reminds him, painfully, of holding her back as Okoye worked fruitlessly on Ramonda. That moment feels so long ago now, with how far they’ve come. Yet, it is still so raw.
“I am not used to this,” she admits a bit later, when her sobs have subsided. He doesn’t stop holding her.
He hums for her to continue. She no longer smells like grassy citrus, but instead like antiseptic and grease. When they are both less fragile, he will stick her under the spray of a shower and crowd her against a wall and will rake that familiar scent over her again until she smells less like anguish.
“I am not used to my King being in so much danger.” Shuri lays her head over his heart. “My baba was never in much danger, with the secrets we kept from the outside world. His death in Vienna was a fluke. Targeted, yes, but not for Wakanda alone. His death was one of many, that day.”
M’Baku can only nod.
“Mama, and brother, though they led Wakanda, they were never in danger like this. Brother moreso, because of his status as the Panther, but even then…” She shakes her head. She nuzzles him, like she might crawl inside, like they can never be close enough. “It was different.”
“I understand.” He does.
He may not know her grief the same way, but he understands what she means. Before Killmonger forced them into the open, Wakanda had little concern for outside threats. Before Thanos left them at a disadvantage, few people knew how to get to Wakanda, let alone attack it. Before K'uk'ulkan, the CIA was less bold with its disrespect. Those things have all changed.
“If,” she starts, then stops. “If I asked something of you, what would you do?”
There is very little his Panther could ask of him that M’Baku would reject. He would move mountains if it suited her. He has even made some trips outside their homeland for reasons other than diplomacy. He finds he is quite partial to Canada, interestingly enough.
But, as much as he loves her, he would never agree to her requests without knowing their full extent. He may be a fool in love, but he is not foolish.
“Ask me.”
Shuri shakes her head. “You’ll say no.”
“Why would I say no to you?”
“You always do, when it’s the right thing.” The admission does not come lightly from her.
They butt heads often—as foretold by their first meeting in the days before Killmonger waged war on them—but in different ways. They are both stubborn and thick-headed. Their arguments are not harsh, but they are many. For her to admit this, that he is right to disagree with her, is wonderful and painful.
“Ask me anyway.”
Shuri sighs. “I want you to take the powers of the heart-shaped herb.”
M’Baku sits back and stares down at her. She looks so young like this, cradled in his arms and face stained with tears. She looks scared. He doesn’t deny her, not immediately, and she carves her way into his pause.
“It is only right that the King of Wakanda be as strong as the nation’s protector. When I am away, the country deserves certainty that its ruler will not be struck down so easily.”
“By that logic,” he says slowly, “all the Dora should have the herb as well.”
“The Dora are not the ones who refuse my technology in their uniforms. The Dora already have enhanced abilities thanks to my upgrades.” She glares at him pointedly. “You do not want a suit, not even a necklace.” Her hand falls to her own, the solid gold piece that sits around her neck at all times. “If you refuse my help, the least you can do is grant me peace of mind.”
M’Baku sighs. She makes a good point, frustratingly so. Part of him burns indignantly at the thought of taking the herb. For so long, it was a gift his people were denied. They lost sickly patients that could’ve been saved; crops that would’ve thrived in Birnin Zana perished in the soil of J'Abariland. Beyond that, M’Baku has always prided himself on being strong without any help beyond that of his tribe. The Jabari have never been about the one, always about the whole.
But he is no longer just of J'Abariland. They are not separate from Wakanda, or anywhere else. Even this conundrum isn’t about himself, because he is no longer just one. There is no him without Shuri.
And, he suspects, there is no Shuri without him.
“A compromise,” he declares quietly. She startles, and he sees exhaustion in her eyes. He knows that if they do not finish this discussion, her rest will be fitful. “I do not want the strength or the power of the herb.”
He shushes her when she starts to protest.
“I do want the safety, though.” His voice is hushed. Part of him is ashamed to admit it, even to her. She’s seen him at his lowest and yet this feels worse. Knowing he alone is not enough to keep himself safe. Knowing that he cannot single-handedly keep Wakanda safe. “I do not need to be a Panther.”
“What do you suggest then, oh Great Gorilla?”
He snorts. It is rare that she uses his former title. It has a nice ring to it, though it’s not quite as sweet on her lips as when she calls him king. “You are a scientist, no?”
She scoffs at him.
“Make me a new herb, my Panther.”
His words shock her, clearly. It’s rare he gets to leave her speechless; he finds he quite enjoys it.
“You have already cleaved tradition in two by taking on the mantle of Panther but not Queen, what is a bit more desecration of our history?” He smiles at her. “A new herb for the new reign. The heart-shaped herb will buoy our protector. The new herb will do the same for whoever rules Wakanda.”
He thinks of Killmonger, the raging power and greed that flowed from the man. There is no need for a man like that to have the power of the heart-shaped herb, especially not when sitting upon the throne. He feels even more sure of his decision.
“I don’t know how long it will take.”
M’Baku shrugs. “You haven’t been home in quite some time, my love. The world can rest without you for as long as it takes. Send your poor little white boy in your place instead.”
“Which white boy?”
M’Baku shrugs again. “I don’t care which, they are all the same to me.”
Shuri laughs finally. It’s wet and a little weak but so stunning, so loud, so vibrant. He laughs with her and holds her close until the gurney beneath them starts to shake under their combined weight. Finally, Shuri slips off his lap and onto unsteady legs at his bedside. She doesn’t object when he swings his legs over the edge as well. He is ready to return to his own bed.
“I will make a new herb,” she says. “For you.” She grabs his hand and drops a kiss to his knuckles.
“And I will try harder to avoid assassination attempts, for you.” He kisses her forehead in turn. “Though if that’s what it takes to get you to stay home for longer than a few weeks, then…” He trails off.
Her punch leaves a nasty bruise on his shoulder. Ayo pokes it as she escorts them to his chambers, a smile on her face.