DoorMan (MCU SI) - #73 : Pinnacle Adaptability BABY! Wakandan brand of Stupidity.....

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DoorMan #73

Ta-Lo [February 17, 2008]

–Colin Baxter–

He was happily munching on the food, same as Shuri, creating a temporary truce between them because just moments prior, they were furiously arguing about their respective perspectives on the very reality as they knew it.

Shuri refused to believe that minds could change reality as they knew it, without any external biological interference. Her argument about having some sort of genetic markup that created mutations leading to energy and matter manipulation might have some merit, considering humanity as a whole was an aberration in the wider universe.

Borne from the lifeblood of Celestials, the pinnacle of living beings of this universe, humans had the most malleable and adaptable DNA in the known universe. That is what he really believed humanity's trump card to be.

Sure, on the surface, the main power of humanity lay in their intellect, their ability to build tools to build tools to build giant fuck off weapons. While nice to have, weapons themselves were not going to be the thing that would set Humanity apart from the rest of the civilizations in the universe.

People like Carol Danvers, Hulk, Spider Man, Inhumans, and yes, even The Leader, were going to be the ones who were going to define the era going forward. Those faces were going to be used as Earth's representation in the wider universe because that's just how things worked in the wider universe, especially if a civilization was trying to gain an Ascendant status, as Asgard did.

And no one knew, atleast to his knowledge, the sheer potential humanity had to churn out more and more of those powerhouses. Entire species and multiple planets have been ruled with an iron fist by people weaker than Carol Danvers, Hulk or hell, even Spider Man.

If the rest of the superpowers realised that Humanity's DNA could make people like that, and that Carol Danvers was not just a one time freak accident, well then, they might as well just say goodbye to Earth as a whole as it will be turned into a large breeding factory with humans being placed in the same cage where humans put mice in, for research purposes.

Drinking water in between inhaling his food, he looked at Shuri who was trying, unsuccessfully might he add, to restrain herself, both from eating the food and asking about the food.

"This is so gooood! I can't believe there's nothing artificial in this. Not even a hint of microplastics, even in the seasonings. What is this place?" She mumbled, both for herself and to him as both of them worked on demolishing the giant stock of food that the Village CHief had arranged for them, bless his blackened greedy heart but hey, at least the man knew how to apologize properly.

"This," he said as he spread his arms wide dramatically, with a fork still in his right hand, "is one of the few places on Earth more magical than Wakanda, full of wonders that even I have not fully explored yet."

Shuri nodded but then went right back to the food.

Both being enhanced, they could put away a lot of food before either of them could start feeling anywhere near full enough, perks of being people with enhanced metabolism.

Speaking of enhanced, he had been meaning to ask this since their little encounter back in LA, "So," He wiped some of the barbecue space off his space as he set down his plate temporarily, "what's up with you becoming the Black Panther all of a sudden. I thought T'Challa was already Black Panther, and next in line."

Shuri stilled, for less than a second before she relaxed and shrugged, continuing to eat her food, "Who says we can't have more than one Black Panther at once? And the succession stuff is not set in stone yet."

On the outside, he nodded repeatedly even as his mind churned at the implications. Not yet set in stone? Is she planning on challenging her brother and her father for the throne?

As for the Black Panther stuff, "True, there is no rule as such but in all of your recorded history, I believe this is the first time that there has been two Black Panthers. There must be some reason for that. I'm just surprised that the Strict priests guarding their treasure gave you the Heart Shaped Herb." 

He was quite skeptical about the degree of willingness of the Priests when they handed over the Heart Shaped Herb to Shuri. If he was not wrong, patriarchy at some level was still ingrained in the really old people who comprised the bulk of Wakanda's ruling class so he could imagine some sort of struggle from Shuri's end when she became the Black Panther.

She stopped eating and pointed her fork at him, "You…know a lot about our country, things you shouldn't know and would probably have been executed for, if it were someone else instead of me here."

"Really?" He rolled his eyes at that, and leaned back arrogantly, "As if you or your people could do anything to that," With his neck, he gestured at the giant lake in the distance, referring to the Water Dragon here, not that it would ever come to that.

Jin'Ya alone would obliterate Wakanda, and that too without even breaking a single brick, if only the Ancient One had not nerfed him and stopped him from using mass mind control on Heads of State, Heads of Organisations, Heads of Armies, Major politicians, and most rich people.

Basically, everyone who had a shred of power on the planet was off-limits to Jin'Ya's massive mental magic, unless he was in danger, which was really nice as well as really suck of the Ancient One.

It meant he would have to advance his agenda on his own but also meant that if he was ever in danger, he had someone who could scramble the minds of everyone on Earth if need be.

Shuri tilted her head and nodded, agreeing with his argument, "True, I doubt there is anything we have right now that can do anything to your Water Dragon but if I am not wrong, the Dragon cannot leave this pocket dimension but you will have to. Then, you are free game."

"Oh, please," He rolled his eyes extra hard at that, "I am way stronger than anyone in Wakanda, not even the Black Panther's powers will give you an advantage over me. Also, yes, Vibranium weapons are scary but only if the people using them know how to use them properly. Wakanda doesn't have an army but groups of soldiers sent from Tribes who have not trained with each other. No cross tribe exercises, no coordinations, nothing."

In the middle of his rant about Wakanda's stupidities, he failed to notice that Shuri had put down her plate and was recording everything he was saying.

"The only force that the King has under his control exclusively is you, i.e., The Black Panther or Panthers now, the Dora Milaje, and the staff at the Royal Labs, that's it. Don't you ever read history books? Having decentralised power is nice but so much decentralisation makes you vulnerable to defections, betrayals, not to mention the obvious chances of defections from the Dora Milaje as well because of their connections to their tribes."

He then used minor telekinesis, one of the few things that Jin'Ya taught him successfully, and beckoned a piece of potato, yes, they had also grilled veggies, he was not a picky eater, as he spoke, "Don't even get me started on the whole isolation stuff that you are looking to change, kudos on that by the way. I could maybe understand if the rest of the world was still backwards ass but it is now catching up and it is doing so without a crippling reliance on Vibranium. Sure, you can mine your Great Mound for thousands of years without running out and you guys keep track of every single milligram of Vibranium, even the one that is scattered throughout the world because Vibranium is 100% recyclable."

Shuri was halfway through throwing in her argument when he shushed her and continued to speak, something that definitely angered her but she was willing to listen, probably because of all his good points.

"But what will you do when you get out of this planet?" 

That single question stumped her as he could see Shuri's mind try to think of an argument.

It really amazed him how foolish some really smart people could be, how they could be blind sided by stuff. In this case, Shuri knew about aliens, and by her humanoid comments, it was probably the Kree and yet, even after that, her mind did not drift towards emergency procedures on how they could evacuate their country, how their reliance on Vibranium, a rare mineral even in the rest of the universe, would be the one thing that would hamper them from ever becoming as powerful in space as they were on Earth.

"Yeah," he said, self assuredly, munching on some crunchy veggies, "Think on that."

Future Queen of Wakanda.

That…was an interesting event and he would love it if that happened because as far as his interactions with Shuri went, he would actually prefer her as the Monarch of Wakanda because she was somehow more liberal than T'Challa.

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