The Shadow [a marvel fanfiction]

The Rest

I truly and sincerely apologize to the readers who came this far. This book meant everything to me for so long—Marie's story meant everything to me. I am nearly six years older than I was when I started this book, and I have changed so much. Marvel has changed too, and grown so much bigger than it used to be, to the point I can no longer keep up with it from a writing-perspective. All good things must come to an end, and so shall Marie's story.

I will never finish writing out every planned page. I simply can't keep up. So, I am sorry to any readers who are disappointed and even angry with me. I've done all that I can, and now it is time to move on.

But I will not leave you with questions. I will give you the remainder of Marie's story so that you know that everything turns out all right in the end, even if the end is not what we expect it to be. Take this as a lesson for life too.

So, here is the rest.

++++++++++

Somber

"Sound the bugle now, play it just for me

As the seasons change, remember how I used to be

Now I can't go on

I can't even start

I've got nothing left, just an empty heart

I'm a soldier wounded so I must give up the fight

There's nothing more for me

Lead me away...

Or leave me lying here."

"Sound The Bugle" by Bryan Adams

The cancer almost stole everything from Marie. She withered away through months of treatments, retreating into herself until she was nothing but an empty shell. She felt nothing. Days slipped by endlessly, months passing in the blink of an eye and even when the cancer was gone, Marie listlessly watched time move around her. The ache of exhaustion never left her bones. She was tired, always.

Wakanda had enveloped her in a plush blanket of warmth and kindness Marie had never seen. Even on her worst days, where she pushed it away while she was drowning, it lingered in gentle touches and soft smiles. But time went on and the kindness began to shrivel under her darkness. The warmth was quiet, still there but much, much quieter than before. Her darkness was worse than the cancer, Marie thought, and it clung to her.

It would take over a year to slug through the perpetual darkness to let a crack of light in. Shuri was determined, and in Marie's nothingness she found a little space to care. That little space grew wider when Marie accepted the prosthetic arm Shuri crafted for her, and wider when Shuri and T'Challa guided her from her wheelchair to walk for the first time in months.

Eventually, Marie began to fill in her shell. She would spend two months regaining her strength before Okoye pulled Marie under her wing to train her. It was different. Her powers had changed. Marie had changed. The force field projection was gone, her telekinesis was weaker. But the shadows remained, and Marie clung tighter to them.

In her time in Wakanda, Marie's mind often flittered to Alexander Pierce's words: A Wakandan man of no consequence. The father she never knew. Marie kept her lips pinched shut at the thoughts. Family had never been something tangible. She didn't need familial blood to keep her warm. But Queen BLANK thought different and one day Marie walked into the throne room to a handful of Aunties and a dozen cousins who swept her into their warmth like she had always belonged.