T’Challa shakes his head, “even for you this is needlessly dramatic,” he says.
Tony looks completely unrepentant about this and shrugs, “well it’ll all work out anyways. You’re gone so your sister will take the throne she’s always wanted, you don’t have to deal with politics you wanted nothing to do with, and I get you to myself. Everyone’s problems are solved!” he says enthusiastically, clapping his hands together.
“Except that pesky problem of my parents thinking I have been kidnapped by a dragon. Honestly did you even think this through?” he asks.
“I mean a little and your parents aren’t even that big of a deal, I’m sure we’ll be totally fine,” he says.
T’Challa thinks he’s underestimated how much his parents love him.
*
Bucky dislikes being a knight on the best of days but when he has to hunt down some fucking dragon in Italy because the damn thing, for some reason or another, made off with Wakandan royalty he especially hates being a knight. “Just don’t do the job,” Sam tells him because Sam wants him dead.
“You don’t turn down a job from royalty, Sam. Unless you have a death wish,” Bucky reminds him.
Sam shrugs, “worth a try,” he says wistfully, earning a dirty look from Steve for his efforts. “What? Last week Bucky offered to sacrifice me to a Mayan god so he could get our damn mark back, its not like I started this,” he points out.
“That god had taste, turning you down,” Bucky tells him, snickering.
“Both of you, enough. Bucky just do the job and quit, you’ve always hated being a knight anyways,” he says. Yeah, but some dumbass went and decided to be a knight as soon as legally possible and if that hadn’t been bad enough Steve had to go fall in love with Sam, the worst human this planet has ever had the misfortune of hosting. So Bucky has no choice but to be here really, he has to be a knight so Steve doesn’t get himself killed and so he can ensure that he has at least one non-trash human around.
That and it pays well.
*
Tony’s pretty sure the last thing the knight expects is to find his prince with a dragon curled up on his lap watching TV but that’s what happens as he crawls through the tower window. For a moment the knight looks at Tony, then he looks at T’Challa, and then he starts laughing. “Oh my god, that’s what kidnapped you? That thing is the size of a fucking house cat! You’ve got to be the most incompetent prince I’ve had to rescue,” he says, doubling over after another glance at Tony.
Offended Tony picks himself up off his side and repositions himself in T’Challa’s lap before letting out a deep breath. The fire just about reaches the knight a good twenty feet away and it surprises him, making him jump back and yelp.
“Holy hell, that thing can breathe fire!” he yells, quickly backing himself into a corner. Moron.
T’Challa laughs, lessening the tension of the room with it. “Yes, that is a common dragon trait,” he says dryly. “And Tony is not the one who kidnapped me technically.” That honor went to Natasha, who lost a bet with him and owed him a favor. Since she’s like five hundred times his size (seven hundred actually, he did the math once but he’s still coming to terms with the fact that there are breeds of house cats that are larger than him) she went off and fake kidnapped T’Challa.
“Um,” the knight says, clearly confused.
*
When Tony finally stops taking offense to Bucky laughing at his tiny stature, and he’s not convinced he’s done yet because Tony is so unbelievably adorable and bite-sized, he’s actually pretty cool. T’Challa too really and he can see why he didn’t mind going along with Tony’s ridiculous plans.
“I’m just saying we can spread a rumor that I ate Bucky, and then your problem is technically solved,” Tony points out, waving a fork with fruits on it around.
T’Challa sighs, “until they send a new-” his words are cut off by Bucky’s laugh finally bursting through. Tony looks downright scandalized by this but he can’t help it.
“Sorry, its just that it would take you like two years to eat me because my head is bigger than you’re entire body,” Bucky squeaks out.
“Keep laughing and I’ll test that theory,” Tony tells him, eyes narrowing.
“No one is eating anyone and we are not spreading rumors that you ate Bucky. It will only result in more knights,” T’Challa tells Tony. “Honestly we should be grateful they didn’t send Nakia.”
*
Bucky happily watches as Tony and T’Challa argue over the remote because he’s stolen it and their bickering means he can pick whatever he wants on the TV while they distract each other. T’Challa wants to watch some horror flick but Tony reminds him of that time he almost burnt the castle down out of fear over the jump scares and T’Challa tells Tony that he’d rather die than watch another Nicholas Sparks movie. Bucky takes the opportunity to throw some reality TV on because that’s real television, not some stupid horror movie that needs to hire blood flingers or some ridiculous romcom that overuses bad tropes.
By the time they notice they both look confused. “Why the hell are we watching ‘Real Dragons of the Louisiana Bayou’? Those aren’t even dragons they’re fucking shape shifters,” Tony says, clearly offended by the misnaming.
“Is that really the worst show he could have picked?” T’Challa asks. “Because I think those alien shows that claim that Wakanda was aided by aliens instead of being smart enough to build our own damn society are worse,” he says.
“This is that for dragons!” Tony argues. “Its offensive and rude, these idiots wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a dragon and a god damn gecko,” he says.
Bucky snickers, “I kinda wanna see that. You’d definitely be mistaken for a gecko,” he says, squealing when Tony leaps on him in an attempt to steal the remote away. He puts up a valiant fight but Tony packs a lot of power in his small frame and T’Challa ends up stealing the remote and turning on some slasher movie that has Bucky and Tony screaming in mere seconds while T’Challa laughs and pokes fun at the plot.
*
Sam has always had to clean up after Bucky’s stupid ass but this is by far the worst time. All he had to do was go pick up a fucking prince, that is not a difficult job and yet here he is going to do his job for him. Rumor has it that the dragon ate him but Sam trusts that any dragon with taste wouldn’t eat Bucky’s nasty ass so when he scales the damn tower he fully expects to find Bucky alive and held captive with the prince.
Instead when he crawls through the window he finds Bucky sitting with the prince and the dragon yelling at the television. When he glances over they’re watching Fairies and Tiaras and he lets out a long, drawn out breath because the lord is testing him right now. “You’re fucking the dragon, aren’t you?” he asks because that’s a very Bucky thing to do.
Bucky, T’Challa, and Tony look over and Tony lets out an annoyed noise. “I need better security out there. Or you know what, we’re just going to move castles, this is ridiculous,” he mumbles, hoping over the back of the couch and grabbing a tablet off the kitchen table and frowning at it.
“So?” Sam asks Bucky and he shrugs.
“The dragon is rich and the prince is hot. Seemed like a sweet retirement deal to me,” he says and Sam has to count to ten so he doesn’t roll his eyes at Bucky’s stupid ass logic.
Across the room however Tony is clearly offended. “Excuse me I’m the hot one!” he says in a scandalized tone.
“And I’m the rich one!” T’Challa says, also offended.
Bucky rolls his eyes, “fine whatever. Point is you guys offered a better deal than T’Challa’s parents.”
Sam looks off into the distance like he’s looking into a camera on The Office.