Nashuri Collection (Namor x Shuri)

4 - 5

4. Burn Them with Me

"Have you reconsidered?" Namor looked every bit of the imposing, immovable god. His chest was bronzed (and oiled maybe), his eyes dark, searching, but his mouth was kept in a stern line.

"Namor—"

"Don't." The single word was uttered so darkly it would've caused a normal person to fold like an omelet. But, of course, she was the Black Panther, and more importantly, she was Shuri.

She sighed. "Kuku, it's not realistic to burn the world..."

He crossed the already small wooden table to stand in front of her while she still sat in her office chair. They were supposed to be discussing prevention methods from outside attacks on Wakanda and Talokan.

"These people would burn our children. Enslave your people. Genocide with no conscience. And yet you show humanity to them? There is no morality to these surface dwellers. And worst who was that creature who sat in on our last meeting? Too weak to be your security, of heart or strength.

Shuri snorted, already knowing who. "Everett Ross? A white mannnnn?" she drawled comedically.

"Yes, I don't need to be chaperoned."

"Well, yes, he does have the colonizer gene in his blood, but he's all right as of now." Shuri laughed before getting serious. "Despite that, Wakanda needs friends everywhere. He's our inside to the Americans and other Western nation's meddling."

Namor's smile was not happy or beautiful.

"Na-Kuku, perhaps, you don't understand some of these nations outside of Wakanda. You spend most of your time in Talokan. They destabilize countries that don't do as they demand; some feel Wakandans, Black Africans, cannot govern themselves without foreign powers intruding."

His not-smile only widened, but his voice gave no mirth. "I understand destabilization, civil wars, and political meddling. Do not think me a fool."

"So you understand playing the long game, gaining allies, and protecting our cultures and rights to freedoms, then? We cannot go guns blazing here. They cannot sanction us because we don't rely on them for trade, but they can desecrate our images. Make us the enemy to the world."

They had fallen into a rhythm these days, through the countless political meetings, cultural exchanges, and even a candle-lit dinner ... that was filled with Talokan ambassadors (who didn't eat due to water masks), M'baku, Dora Milaje, and Wakandan elders, but it was scarily easy to forget he could be cruel and ruthless. Until his knives punctured through the edge. She want the panther, but he was showing his fangs.

"If the world chooses to be my enemy, I'll fight like I always have."*

His hand was rubbing her palm in circular motions. So gentle. It was at odds with his gaze.

"The surface world how did they treat you?" he asked her.

Confusion made her eyebrows scrunch together. "Uh, fine? Wakanda is prosperous, so I've not experienced much horror or discrimination—outside of being female and brilliant. I'm also a princess, so there's that."

He murmured. His hand never stopped the ministrations. Her hand closed around his. "You've experienced much. Don't underestimate yourself. You're surviving grief and knowledge that the world would smite you and have you kowtowed if it had the power."

"Mmm..." For a moment she could only concentrate on the massage before her vision blurred the slightest. 

It hit her at random moments now. She would always miss her brother, but what killed her inside was that she had times when she forgot him. It was like how the Wakandan fireflies were brightest when close, but as they flew away their light was less intense. She could be making a breakthrough with her invention and go to text T'Challa before realizing he wasn't there. Or being joyful at something before a pang chastised her for not thinking of him. "I... at least have my mama even if my baba and brother are gone."

As if, recognizing the stir of sadness in her eyes, he opened her hand and flipped it over. Kissing her knuckles, repeatedly. But cleanly no slobber.

"How did they treat him?" he asked. The dangerous aura around him had simmered down, and he seemed to honestly ask the question.

Shuri closed her eyes. She couldn't trust that the tears wouldn't spill. He stopped his kisses, waiting for her words. 5 minutes may have passed before a single word was uttered.

"He was everywhere. The international news had a whole day covering his de—passing to the ancestral realm." Even now, her conflict with faith and fact was difficult, but she was managing with the acceptance she had now. "Social media had him trending for 2 weeks straight. He was Wakandan, but he had touched so many black communities around the world. He gave children someone to look up to ... Of course, we had our mourning period. So much of the world loved him, but none more than me."

"But," he said, slicing through her recollection like a clinical scalpel.

"Not even 2 days after his passing..." She opened her eyes. Anger infiltrated every crack in her soul. "International media started terrorizing. Saying he was a poor leader, asking if Wakanda needed a foreign power to act for us as if we don't have our own succession line and practices, and jeering at how weak our fabled Black PAANtherrr..."

Her voice cracked. But she was too hurt to feel embarrassed. Shuri's eyes hadn't left his. Two sets of brown eyes met each other in intensity.

"—How weak our fabled Black Panther was. Hit piece after hit piece. Defamation scandals even came out that he was corrupt. That Wakanda was a dictatorship. My family has never lined our pockets with Wakadan wealth meant for our people. They mocked our technology despite salivating over it. Saying if my intellect and machines couldn't save him... Then, maybe Wakanda wasn't this utopia. That maybe we had no value, and that T'Challa had no value."

She sniffed but held his gaze. It was just them. The only two in one of the Wakandan offices. Was this how it would always be? Namor and her feeling like the only ones who could understand each other. The heavy mantle of grief and leadership.

"You're so strong, but even you need to be protected. I know what to do, princess."

Shuri wiped at her eye.

"And what is that?"

"Crush them." He clasped both of their hands together. "Burn them with me."

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5. Surprise

Namor was furious, but Shuri was calm.

He had his hand at the ready. With one gesture, he would sic Talokan warriors and his terror of a cousin Namora upon them.

"Yield," she ordered. Only the Dora Milaje was at her side, beyond capable warriors but they were outnumbered as they often were when it involved Namor's people.

"And why would I do that, Queen? You're at a disadvantage."

"Because..." She grabbed his hand, placing it on her stomach. "I'm with child—yours to be specific. If you would like to keep an heir, stand down."

Immediately, Namor yielded and grabbed her into his arms. She didn't know what she was growing inside. Would the child be a mutant? Would it breathe air or water? Or both? She was only 6 weeks! As if the baby in her stomach already knew its father, she felt a kick—a flutter really—in her stomach.

The Talokan army and Wakandan elders sported matching shocked faces.

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*Yes, that is a quote from Shadow the Hedgehog.