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Chapter 23: Mr. Blue Sky is living here today!Notes:

1) Exams kicked my ass and this chapter took ages to write. Legit wrote the second half over 3 days and still have a bunch of chapters to go.

2) Pls put whatever meme references you want in the comments! I'll see how I can incorporate them and any shennanigans would be fun to see.

3) THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR 2000+ KUDOS I LOVE YOU ALL AHHHHH 💜💜💜

Enjoy the chapter and leave a kudos and comment!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

He shifted as Tony gently shook his arm, his eyes fluttering open before he squinted to adjust to adjust to the light streaming through the windows. Sleepy warmth embraced him and tempted him back to sleep but he knew Tony wouldn't wake him up without good reason.

"Mm?" He groaned, stretching as he woke up and glanced out of the window. The sun was high up in the sky and lit up the sea, the lake sparkling below them. He had taken a nap after playing on his phone for the first two hours, his late patrol from yesterday catching up to him.

"We're about ten minutes away from the Royal Palace and I figured you'd want to look outside," Tony said, smiling as he stood up.

"Wait, where are you going?" He asked.

"You don't want to go to the cockpit and see?" His eyes widened.

"Holy crap! Yes!" He exclaimed, practically jumping out of his seat and following Tony to the front of the plane before he opened the door to the cockpit.

Would there be a towering palace with houses surrounding it? Would there be hundreds of shops around marble buildings? Wait, what would they use to build their houses considering Wakanda is in a hot climate? Would technology be integrated into normal things like pavements?

…yeah, he could see why Flash called him a nerd.

He shuffled to the side of the cockpit, excitedly gazing outside only to see farmland, the white specks of herds of sheep and goats dotting the verdant fields below them. Countryside dominated the landscape as far as he could see, trees and hedges separating the fields.

Wakanda had been an isolationist kingdom until a few years ago. Their technology was superior to the Western worlds in many ways, mainly because of their access to vibranium. It wouldn't be farfetched to think they used cloaking technology on a larger scale, would it?

"Do they use cloaking technology?" He asked as he turned towards Tony, surprise flickering in the billionaire's eyes before he smirked and nodded.

"Yep," he replied, popping the 'p' as he took off the EDITH glasses and hung them on the collar of his white t-shirt with the AC/DC logo on it. He still cringed in embarrassment the first time he called Back in Black a song by Led Zeppelin in front of Tony. He had looked so affronted that his reaction was as if Peter had committed a war crime.

Happy in the past timeline hadn't corrected him about Back in Black being by AC/DC and he had been so confident to say it in front of Tony! They had spent the rest of that Saturday listening to rock songs as Tony had practically taught him about all the old rock bands. He would never make the same mistake again.

They watched as the pilot talked to someone over transmissions before the plane started to slow down as they passed over a few huts only for a transparent dome to appear, the hexagons forming a mesmerising pattern as he watched the one in front of the plane flicker away to let them fly through.

His jaw dropped as the actual kingdom of Wakanda came into view. The tree-covered mountains encircled the tall metal skyscrapers that loomed over the hundreds of white houses with terracotta roofs that lined the area in front of them. The sun gleamed on the metal panels that lined the angular roofs of the skyscrapers and made the river below them sparkle as boats cut through the still water.

"Holy shit," he mumbled, leaning forwards as he took in the awe-inspiring view. Many of the skyscrapers were oblique and completely different to the skyscrapers in New York. He internally huffed at the mental image of him backflipping off one of the skyscrapers, but he knew he wouldn't dare to try that.

His Spidey-sense hummed gently as Wanda and Vision entered the cockpit and in his peripheral vision, he could see Wanda leaning against Vision as they took in the incredible sight. He knew that in the previous timeline, Vision and Wanda had gone to Wakanda to get Shuri to remove the Mind stone from Vision's head, but it hadn't been successful. Wanda had needed to kill Vision but Thanos had done something to get the Mind stone to complete the Snap.

He hoped things would go right this time. They all deserved a happy ending.

"Language," Tony jokingly chided. "But I'll let it slide because it's one of the few accurate ways to describe all of this." He gestured to the whole urban landscape in front of them.

"It's your first time visiting Wakanda?" He asked, completely taken aback. He had thought Tony had visited before since T'Challa came to help during the airport fight.

"Yeah, it's my first time visiting too. Wakanda is the whole country by the way. This is Birnin Zana, otherwise known as the Golden City."

"I can see why they named it that," he remarked, watching as they flew towards a mountain, the sunlight making the rock seem a mix of orange and pale yellow before he finally registered the palace was in view.

It was massive! Five large golden pillars towered over them as they approached the landing pad. He glimpsed a geometrical web of golden beams before the jet engines slowly stopped humming and stopped on the landing pad in front of one of the massive pillars.

"Right, let's go," Tony announced, grinning at him, Wanda and Vision.

A couple of minutes later, he jogged down the steps as he tried to take in his foreign surroundings, his heart racing as he saw the large shadows cast by the pillars. There were a few other aircraft in the area, many of them made from silver metal that he had a gut feeling was vibranium. The largest aircraft was elevated on the other side of the castle but seemed the grandest of all the aircraft and made the Quinjet pale in comparison.

A few metres away from the jet stood three people: one was a man wearing mainly black but with a long indigo sleeveless jacket with golden accents on the shoulders, the other a woman wearing a bright red warrior outfit with gold armour on her shoulders and chest. The final person was a girl no more than a year older than him. Her hair was braided and partially tied up and she was wearing a bright orange dress that fitted her slim figure.

His heart skipped a beat as he realised he was meeting the Wakandan royal family. He was meeting King T'Challa, Princess Shuri and Okoye in their own nation! He didn't need to bow, did he? He didn't need to do anything formal like they did in England with Queen Elizabeth? He hoped he didn't.

Tony hadn't told him much about what he would be doing in Wakanda, but he also hadn't said anything about formalities outside of 'what he would do when he was a guest at someone's house', which really wasn't good advice considering how vague it was.

Was he meant to bow? He glanced at Tony for any idea of what he should do but his calm demeanour gave nothing away. He swallowed nervously as they stopped in front of the royal family, his heart thumping in his chest as he waited for someone to start talking.

"Tony, thank you for accepting my invitation," T'Challa said, smiling as he and Tony shook hands. "And I assume he is the intern you were talking about?" He gestured to him, and he smiled nervously, waving politely even though he internally flinched as Princess Shuri and Okoye looked at him curiously.

He hadn't formally met Shuri or Okoye in the other timeline except briefly meeting them on the ruined battlefield of the Compound and Tony's funeral, but they had all been preoccupied on both occasions. T'Challa hadn't been interested in talking to him when he went to Berlin for the airport battle and had swiftly departed once it was over.

"Um, hi, I'm Peter," he replied, his heart pounding as he waited for T'Challa to reply. He technically hadn't seen him since the final battle -he hadn't talked to many people at Tony's funeral so that didn't count- and he didn't know how to approach the king. 

"It's nice to meet you. You must be Vision and Wanda?" He turned to them, smiling politely but they could all tell he was hiding his fascination about Vision. It was rare for someone to meet a synthezoid made of vibranium with the Mind stone in his head. It was even rarer for said person to be requested to remove the Mind stone from said synthezoid's head in a bid to stop a genocidal titan.

More pleasantries happened until Princess Shuri spoke, directly talking to him instead of Tony or even Vision.

"What do you do when you intern for Mr Stark?" She asked. He silenced the panicked voice in his head that told him she sounded suspicious when she was probably just curious. He and Tony had sorted out an alibi that was a half-truth for anyone that could be involved with the Avengers.

He didn't want to reveal his identity like he had last time because it had bitten him in the ass to the point of time travel and he couldn't risk causing something even worse to happen.

"I mainly help with coding robots and sometimes nanotech," he replied, trying to be casual but he knew she was searching for an elaborated answer.

"So, if I asked you about using nanobots in construction, you would be able to answer?"

He shrugged. "Depends on what it's about-"

"False," Tony said, turning to face him. "You could answer any nanobot question without any doubts and have a dozen ideas in five minutes."

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean half of them work," he replied.

"85% of them did work. Stop downplaying your abilities."

"Tony, I can't believe you've done this," he groaned, his cheeks flushing as he turned back to Shuri only to see her eyes widened slightly. Shit, had he made himself look like an idiot in front of her?

"Do you know what day it is?" She asked, grinning when he hesitated because he genuinely couldn't remember the date. "It's Wednesday my dudes."

His jaw dropped.

Was the Princess of Wakanda quoting a Vine in front of him? Was she a memelord?!

"Can I get a waffle?" He asked, excitement filing his chest as he grinned.

"Can I please get a waffle?"

He could feel the others' confused stares on his back, but he didn't care as laughter bubbled to his throat and he burst out laughing. Who knew the Princess of Wakanda was a memelord? Ned would absolutely lose it if he found out and Michelle would fall in love with Shuri more than she already had. She had literally said that her first celebrity crush was Shuri during a round of 21 questions.

"I can tell you and I will be very good friends," she said, a delighted smirk on her face.

They had toured most of the palace within the first hour as he and Shuri had several rounds of what Tony dubbed 'gen-z humour' and T'Challa merely called it something he needed a translator for. For all the languages he was fluent in, Vines was not one.

"These are the royal gardens where we grow a variety of medicinal herbs and fruits, some of which can be traded internationally once we settle an agreement with a few governments," T'Challa said as they passed through a lush area with baobab trees dotted over areas to provide shade. Clusters of acacias acted like a natural barrier between the gardens and the cliffside.

A massive mopane tree cast shade over where they had stopped, its branches acting like shelter from the sun. Verdant grass mixed with vibrant orange flowers -he hadn't read much about flowers since finding nice flowers in New York was a struggle if the bouquets weren't in a flower shop- and he could see many people tending to the flower beds a few metres away.

"Ah, brother, I need to go to my lab and check on the results for your suit," Shuri announced as she checked her bracelet – hold on, what? Had she integrated technology into her bracelet? He knew she was one of the smartest people in the world and had probably created but how did it work?

"Just make sure to be on time for dinner," T'Challa replied, raising an eyebrow at Shuri's mischievous expression. "What is it?"

"It'll be fine if Peter comes with me?" He jolted in surprise, completely unprepared to be invited to Shuri's lab. "He knows a lot about nanotechnology and I want to his reaction to a couple of things."

Excitement fluttered in his chest as he sent Tony a questioning look to see if he would agree, smiling when he nodded.

"I don't see why not. I expect him to be in one piece when he comes back."

"He'll be fine." Shuri waved of T'Challa's concerns before grinning at Peter. "Let's go!"

He didn't know what to expect from Shuri's lab except that it might be grander than Tony's considering how advance Wakanda's technology was. Shuri strolled through the palace with ease whereas he took every second as an opportunity to look at the grand architecture, making sure not to trip over his feet with amazement.

They descended the spiralling stairs as Shuri projected something from her bracelet, deftly moving the schematics with her fingers as she talked about the alterations she had made to the Black Panther suit.

From what he made from her ramblings, she had changed something to do with how the kinetic energy the suit gathered from enemy attacks before the stored energy could be gathered in any part of the suit. Apparently, it could be used to attack an enemy or act as an incredible defence.

A tiny part of his brain wondered why she was allowing him to know of all this. She had literally met him this morning and yes, they both loved memes and sciences, but Wakanda had been an isolationist nation. He was an outsider in every sense of the word.

They reached the bottom of the staircase and he glanced curiously at the rock walls, enjoying the coolness compared to how hot it was outside. The white doors slid to the side after Shuri had entered a password and his eyes widened at how large the lab was.

Brilliant white lights underneath translucent glass that formed a ring around the room lit everything up including the glass stairs. The black floor was made in a mosaic pattern and there were transparent blue screens and various prototypes on the white tables integrated with the walls.

Admiring the artwork on the walls as he followed Shuri down the gently spiralling stairs, he wondered what she created for Wakanda. The bracelets they used for communication -though maybe that was only for the royal family and high level staff- and many of the jets where they had entered were more than likely her ideas.

Since Wakanda had developed a massive presence in the global economy when it started to sell vibranium, medicinal herbs and food to various countries, a lot of information was released. He suspected any information had been carefully processed from the royals and only presented a certain image of Wakanda – a positive one at that.

Selling vibranium was definitely a massive way of making profit – after all, one gram of vibranium would sell for $10,000 with no negotiation. Of course, selling vibranium to the wrong country could result in catastrophe and vibranium had harsh regulations in all countries except Wakanda.

"Um, your highness, thanks for letting me in here but…why?" He asked. "Don't get me wrong, your lab is incredible!"

Shuri chuckled as they reached the bottom floor, she turned to face him. "You intrigue me. I don't think Tony Stark brings an average Stark Industries intern to Wakanda of all the places. There must be something about you that is special." Oh shit. That…that wasn't good. "After all, you understand and manipulate nanobots. You have a lot of potential." She smirked.

Well…she was one of the smartest people in the world. He should have expected her to realise something but he became too comfortable with not being questioned since he only went to the Compound. Most staff knew him as Tony's personal intern and obviously Wanda, Vision and Natasha knew he was Spider-Man.

Fighting to supress the underlying panic that always followed the possibility of someone finding out who he was, he nervously smiled and sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck.

"Wow, thank you," he replied as she tapped the side of a black unit a couple of metres away. "If you don't mind me asking, what do you work on? Similar tech to your bracelet?"

"Ah, my Kimoyo Beads. They allow me to communicate with my brother and the Dora Milaje as well as control technology all over Wakanda and beyond," she said as she brought up a hologram of the Black Panther suit and typed a few things.

Controlling technology over long distances, whilst completely possible, hadn't been perfected by many, at least not in America. He knew the Avengers were able to do it considering Tony had literally called the Iron Spider suit up to the stratosphere or mesosphere -he had been more preoccupied with the decreasing oxygen and possibility of passing out than measuring his distance from the Earth- but it was far enough.

Thor could call Mjolnir from literally anywhere to his hand and so could Captain America, but he put that down to magic rather than whatever explanation there was for that.

"So…hypothetically, you could remotely control a car from across the world?" He asked, looking from a distance at the schematics on her screen. The claws of the suit were pulsing white and violet until Shuri selected the chest area and changed something, though he was unsure of what it was.

He tilted his head as he thought of webs that could absorb the kinetic energy of an opponent if they were in combat and somehow strengthen the webs or perhaps increase the stickiness. It was a good idea in theory but in practice…not so much. Mini web bombs that kept people suspended in the air -ha, anti-gravity webs- sounded like something he would be more able to create.

"Ha! Hypothetically? I've already done that." She snickered as she closed the schematics and started searching for something else. "Whatever the West deems possible within the next 15 years, we have already achieved."

"Flying cars?"

"Functional and used daily."

"Teleportation?"

"In the testing phase."

"Space exploration?"

"We have settlements on the Moon for researchers to visit and are miles ahead of other UN countries on Mars research."

"Hyperspace?"

"We have theories in progress." She smiled when his jaw dropped. "There are ways to achieve a fictionally conceived method of travel."

"You're behind hyperspace theories? No freaking way?!" He exclaimed, his eyes widening. "I thought about space entities exiting that could use wormholes like 'jumps' to get from point A to B but we don't have the technology for that yet."

"Other civilisations do. Alas, we'll get there in 5 years. The West…we'll see if they make it within the next 10." She laughed to herself. "Now, how would you feel about a lightsaber battle?"

No fucking way.

"You made lightsabers?!"

She grinned and a minute later both of them held lightsabers.

"I made these a few years ago when I was bored. They won't hurt either of us but they make all the noises and simulate a proper battle."

He weighed up the cylindrical piece of metal in his hand, ripples of excitement passing through his body as he grinned. A fictional concept was in his hand and he knew Ned would use his new powers to teleport to Wakanda if he had enough incentive. Maybe he would make his own lightsaber when he was back at the Compound.

"One question though…" Shuri trailed off, continuing after he nodded, slightly confused but too happy to challenge it. She had literally just handed him a lightsaber and told him he could fight against her so he wouldn't contest that.

"Yeah?"

"Are you Spider-Man?"

Notes:

Comment any meme references and scenarios you wanna see with Shuri, Peter and any others!