I. A LONG, LONG WAY FROM HOME
__________

Luna woke up with a start. Instantly, a nauseous feeling came over her. Her head spun, as she tried and failed to remember where she was. Even stranger, she could not, for the life of her, remember how she had gotten there. Luna sat up straight and felt the table underneath her, sturdy and cold.

Looking around her she found herself in one of the most fascinating rooms she had ever seen. The floor had a geometrical pattern and in the middle of the room was another large, cilindric room with stairs going around it. The roof was painted with white-on-black patterns and symbols she didn't recognize. Luna's first thought was that of a lab, a really cool and futuristic lab.

"Hello?" Luna called out but immediately regretted it as the words pounded in her head. She stood up slowly, tip-toeing through the room and marveling at the many scientific devices and equipment.

"Good, you're awake!"

Luna hadn't heard someone entering the room, she must've been off her game because usually she would feel it if she was being snuck up on. She turned to the entrance where a girl about her age, maybe a year younger walked into the lab-ish room. She wore a white dress that reached to her knees and her hair was braided into a practical up-do. She had a choker adorned with shells around her neck.

"You had us quite worried there for a moment, Avatar." The girl spoke with an accent Luna couldn't quite place yet.

Maybe South-African, oh god, was she in Africa?! And that would raise the question of how the hell Luna had gotten there in the first place. Luna's hand slowly went to her boots where she always kept her knifes, only to realize she was bare-foot. She also wasn't wearing her dear jacket. Actually, she wasn't wearing anything that belonged to her.

"Oh, yes. We had to fabricate you new clothes because your old one's were all ripped. Do not worry, your backpack was fine, but you were in quite a state when you showed up at the border," the girl said. "You were out for an entire week."

Luna's eyes widened. Her mind raced with possibilities. Had this girl drugged and kidnapped her? Or did she get here by herself? She vaguely remembered soaring through the air but the memories stopped there.

"I've been out for a week? No, wait, who the fuck are you? Where am I?" She wasn't concerned with her headache anymore, the dull aching replaced with worry and stress and anxiety, the usual.

The girl seemed more amused than anything. She walked to one of the nearby computer screens. "Do you remember anything yet? You were pretty out of it."

Luna finally deemed the girl not much of a threat, with those skinny arms and the white get-up she seemed more a scientist than a fighter. So she relaxed, jumped back on the table and perched crossed-legged on top of it, "I'm gonna ask you again, where am I?"

"Wakanda." The girl said.
       
Well, shit. So she was in Africa.

"We found you crashed in the lake near the border, we had to fish you out. It was really funny." The girl continued as she grabbed Luna's bag from behind the table and handed it over. "My name is Shuri."

Luna's gears started turning. Wakanda? Where had she heard it before? "Isn't Wakanda a poor country?" She gestured to the high-tech equipment all around her.
         
Shuri smiled, "We like others to believe that, if people knew what we really were it would be dangerous."
         
"Mysterious, I like it." Luna said and went through her backpack.

She pulled out the usual: spare change of clothes, knives and a weird, long wooden stick. A button protruded from the wood, and of course Luna couldn't resist pushing it. The stick expanded, first longer, to Luna's height. Then it spread purple wings. She had seen this before; a glider? Then she remembered, "I made this."
         
"You remember? You took a hit to the head when you fell, I wasn't sure every memory would be in place." Shuri said, "I have been helping the healing process but I couldn't do much until you woke up."
         
"I made this. I remember," she dug deep and then laughed at herself, "I remember dropping out of high school. I remember getting a job at a coffee shop, the ones where they actually sell coffee, and... an apartment?" She snapped her finger in the air, "I got emancipated, that's it!"

The story began piecing itself back together. After the battle of New York, Luna had left the orphanage. She couldn't exactly go back to school, people would recognize her and she was nowhere near ready for that. Besides, she was so far past high school.

She had gotten a job and before she knew it she had gotten emancipated to live her life on her own, at an alarmingly fast pace (she suspected Tony had something to do with it). She had gotten a crappy, small apartment, with money that came available to her from her parents' inheritance, in one of Brooklyn's wonderful neighborhoods. Turns out her parents were packed.

But then her mind went blank. There was something with a glider, then another something with flying. Then... a storm, maybe? It was a vague blur in her mind, an itch that needed scratching but both her hands were tied behind her back.

"I will try to help you with your memory, but you will have to do most of the work yourself. And I hope you don't mind, but I saw you on the news. I was bored and well..." she turned the screen she had been working on towards Luna.

It looked like schematics, maybe of a suit. And next to it was another one of her glider. There was a color palette in the top-right corner. Purple and black. Luna loved purple and black, they were the colors she had worn at the Chitauri attack.

"A suit? Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not actually an Avenger. I kinda quit when I left the country." Luna gave Shuri a sheepish smile, "Besides, these ideas would be impossible. The schematics are lined with vibranium and the skeleton of the glider..."

The only vibranium Luna knew of was Captain America's shield, and that came from the forties. And there wasn't a lot known about the metal. Only that it was indestructible, disobeyed the laws of physics and well, it vibrated.

"That won't be a problem, Avatar—"
          
"It's just Luna."
          
"—Okay, just Luna. It won't be a problem. There is a mountain full of vibranium right here in Wakanda."
         

The words took a moment to settle in. "There's what now? That- oh my god- and the technology. That makes no sense. Why would you keep this from the world?" She exclaimed.

Luna understood, of course. Look at Captain America's shield. That thing was powerful and dangerous. It had properties that hadn't been discovered yet. Imagine if it fell into the wrong hands.

"Come on, Luna. There is somebody you should meet." Shuri kept her mysterious ways, even though she didn't seem like a mysterious person. Maybe she was pulling Luna's leg. Shuri lead her through long hallways.

Luna was thoroughly confused. The floor was still the same, the same pattern and color and the walls were a solid white. The ceilings reached reasonably high; this place looked too big, too fancy to be in Wakanda. But then again, Wakanda wasn't what Luna- and the world- thought it was. Eventually the hallway stopped, and they walked into a big, circular shaped room. It had the same futuristic undertones, but the decor seemed almost tribal.

It was what Luna was expecting to see in Wakanda, the culture. The culture was also shown in the clothes the people in the room wore. Robes, and dresses, Luna guessed. They were bright colors, with strange patterns, but they somehow managed to pull them off. In the middle of the room stood a large chair, a throne probably. Oh god, was Luna in a palace? Did Wakanda have a palace?

A man approached the two. His thick hair was cut very short and he had a trimmed, black beard. He was tall, and definitely well-build. "Sister, I hope you didn't scare her too much." The man had the same accent as Shuri, and apparently they were siblings.
          
"Of course not." Shuri gave him a sly smile.
         
The man turned to Luna and held out his hand, "Molo, Avatar. How are you doing? You were unconscious when we found you."
          
Luna carefully shook his hand. She didn't know a lot of Xhosa, or any. But she could guess Molo meant Hello. "I've been better," Her headache was slowly fading, but she would still kill for a painkiller. "Who are you people? I don't remember coming here, you tell me I'm in freaking Africa, apparently there's a mountain of Vibranium in Wakanda and I'm kind of freaking out."

"I am T'challa, prince of Wakanda. You have met my sister, Shuri."
          
"You're... the prince? Okay, good, that's good," she said, trying not to freak out. "Should I be bowing?"
         
T'challa chuckled, "Do not worry about formalities, Avatar. Besides, after New York, I should be thanking you. It has been a long time since there was an Avatar.

Luna frowned, "You... know, about me?" That shouldn't have been possible, nobody knew about the existence of the Avatar, or bending. He must've meant something else.
           
T'Challa gave her a knowing smile, "I pride myself on knowing the history behind the spirits. The spirit of the Black Panther is the one I carry, after all."
           
"Wait, spirit? I'm confused."

"Walk with me, Luna." T'Challa didn't give her much of a choice as he began walking away. Luna quickly caught up to him. They were walking in a calm pace as the prince began explaining, "In Wakanda, we appreciate our history. We try to remember. For generations, books and scrolls about the ancient art of bending has been taught to the king and queen and their family. I took a particular liking to the Avatar and Raava, the spirit that gives them power. I was under the impression bending and benders had been wiped off the face of existence. Swallowed by vengeful spirits."

"Yeah, me too, man. You must've been quite surprised when you saw the news." Luna fidgeted with her bracelets.
          
T'Challa chuckled, "We all were."

          
"In a good way, I hope?"
          
"Of course. And it's fate that has brought you here."

"I'm pretty sure that it was a storm that brought me here. Hey! I remembered!" Luna perked up and smiled wildly. Shuri was right, her memories would gradually grow back. "Yes, I went looking for the remains of the southern air temple, I read somewhere that it had been protected from whatever destroyed everything."

After many twists and turns, the two finally arrived at a large balcony. It was high up, and it overlooked all of Wakanda. The sun was warm, even warmer than in New York. It seemed to glow more orange, like it was trying to give you a big hug. Everywhere she looked was color, drenched in the baking orange sun. Everything the light touches is our kingdom. But a king's time as a ruler rises and falls like the sun.

She glanced at T'Challa for a second. "This place is beautiful."
           
A smile grazed T'Challa's lips, "It is home."
          
A serene minute passed until Luna's eyebrows creased and she turned to look at the man, "What date is it?"
          
"August 16th. Why?"
         
"It's been a month..." Luna ran a hand across her face and sighed, "I have been gone, for a month. And I'm no where close to where I'm supposed to be!" She exclaimed to the city below her.

"I wouldn't say your journey has been for nothing..." T'Challa said and Luna shot him a questioning glance. "You see that forest?"

She looked to her left and for as far as she could see, stretched a large forest, with large and tall greenish-yellowish trees and thick vines. In the distance she could see something white, maybe a large pole or statue poking out from beneath the tree-tops.

"Not many people dare to go in there, they say it is haunted."
          
"What do you say?" She eyed him curiously.
          
"I say, I believe in spirits. And somewhere out there, in the forest, lies the ruins of the southern air temple where the veil between the humans and the spirits is thinnest."
          

Luna huffed, and puffed out her chest, a determined look on her face, "Guess I'm gonna have to see that for myself."

• • •

This'll be fine. Everything's gonna be fine. Luna repeated in her mind as she strapped her backpack tighter on her back. Shuri and T'Challa had been unbelievably nice to her. Maybe because the king and queen weren't actually home for the weekend, they had gone on a diplomatic trip in Europe.

The prince and princess had her stay in a guest bedroom for the weekend. She still had some recovery to do before she was ready to take the perilous journey into the woods. Shuri had given Luna a full-fledged tour as Luna had tried not to freak out at the scientific marvels in front of her.

Shuri had also provided her with clean clothes, heat- and water resistant black -leggings, -shirt, -shoes, -fingerless gloves and -backpack. Luna decided to keep her leather jacket. She didn't want to part with her brother's jacket.

Finally, after two days, Luna was standing in front of the forest.

"Keep heading west, travel by day and sleep high. You do not want to know what crawls around during the night." T'Challa handed her a tablet that would track her movements.

It had everything she needed; music to her liking, weather charts, information on what berries and plants not to eat and a digital compass. Then he handed her an analog compass just to be sure.

Shuri had provided Luna with rations, a spare set of clothes and stuff to set up camp for the night, "You are going to need to find food yourself if you run out. Don't worry, everything is on the tablet."
          
Luna quickly swiped through the tablet's contents. No cactus juice, no black and red berries, don't sleep against these trees, etc.

"I think I got everything." Luna took a deep breath and nodded, standing in front of the two siblings, "Thank you, guys, for everything. I would have literally died if it weren't for you."
           
"You are The Avatar. You are Luna Carter. Go and find out what that means. When you get back, I will have built those schematics. Go on, shoo!" Shuri tried to shove Luna toward the forest.
          
Luna laughed and as she turned to the tall forest she said, "Ndiza kubona mva."
          
Shuri made an 'almost' gesture with her hand.
          
"Wish me luck." And she took her first step into the vine-covered trees.

It was as if a switch had been turned. The sun barely got through the tree-tops, only singular rays of sun-shine able to break through the tough barricade. What about that shadowy place way out there? That's beyond our borders, you must never go there.

A chill ran down Luna's spine. She turned back one last time, and the sun-filled Wakanda already seemed so far away. She heard a rustling and quickly snapped back. She felt eyes on her. She took a deep, shaky breath as she fumbled with the tablet. Pressing once, music began to blast from the device. The battery would last for one week, if she was lucky. What better way to waste her battery than blasting some rock?

Luna quickly decided that she hated the woods. And she hated walking. And she hated the way she could feel eyes following her deep within the night, wherever she went.