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DoorMan (MCU SI) - #122 : Biryani, UBI & Humanity's Artistic tendencies....
🕑 Added 2025-08-25 06:57:20 +0000 UTCDisclaimer - I don’t own Marvel or any of its characters. The Mighty Mouse does =and I hope it is not standing behind me with a shotgun cocked and ready to blow my brains out the second I have the audacity to press PUBLI——
DoorMan #122
Wakanda [May 2008]
–Colin Baxter–
After that depressing ass conversation, Shuri decided that it was enough for the day and decided to treat him to a meal of a lifetime, in her own words. He was expecting some sort of gaudy royal meal, with the Queen of Wakanda not having the evolved taste buds of the literally uncountable number of dishes in the outside world but apparently, he was the one who was uncultured here.
Because, he was in a semi private dining space, with a very small table, that could only seat the utmost of 5 people, with the entire table full of enclosed dishes, a platoon of Dora Milaje standing guard outside the room, bowing to Shuri and eyeing him with wariness as they entered the dining room.
“Now,” Shuri began as the cutlery literally rose out of the table, glowing blue and purple, which could only mean one thing, “I know you think that the outside world is the best when it comes to food and we must be savages since we did not indulge in the kind of recipe sharing that the world went through in the past couple of decades but let me assure you, we Wakandans might not be the best at inventing stuff but we sure as hell are great at stealing them.”
He…did not know how to react to that. To the subtle jab at their country’s long standing policies of not helping the world advance but aside from that, actively sabotaging the world as well. For the sabotage to be successful, they killed people as well. Who knows where human society would have been right now with all those people alive?
Maybe they would be vastly more advanced and as a direct result of that, have vastly increased inequality, in terms of both wealth and quality of life? Or maybe the world would have been the same, only a few years ahead as the invention that Wakanda wanted to stop was just invented by someone else?
Or would they be far more advanced than they were now? A spacefaring species? A peaceful planet with far fewer war crimes as well as environmental crimes?
Ha! As if that would ever happen without a Sword of Damocles hanging over the entire planet.
“Moving on,” He said slowly, his hands hovering over the numerous spherical objects placed on the table, “What are these?”
Before Shuri could answer his question, the outer layer of the spherical object peeled off as his hand neared it, revealing Biryani?
“Ah, yes, my favourite! Chicken Biryani, made in the way I like it. Try it!” Shuri said, but before he could look for anything to take out the biryani, he leaned back a bit as a pair of large flat spoons made up of hard light appeared in front of the pot of Biryani, getting to work on serving it for him.
Shuri commented from the side, “There is a proper way of serving Biryani and it is best that we let the machines trained for that do so. Trust me, it tastes better that way. The perfect proportion of the two layers of rice and chicken is necessary for the taste.”
“If you say so,” He said to the apparently foody Shuri as the hard light constructs faded away. He took one look at the extremely appealing Biryani and dug in, as the flavours just exploded in his mouth.
____xx____
After that extremely sumptuous meal, wherein he thanked his enhanced metabolism multiple times, they moved on to a tour of the capital city. He did not know what this trip had turned out to be near the end but it was nice. No assassination attempts, no family drama whatsoever or even no attempts from Bast, which was odd but he let that matter be for now.
No need to poke the hornet's nest just yet, especially since Shuri was doing everything he wanted Wakanda to do, and at an extremely rapid pace as well, since Wakanda as a society had grown stagnant and change of any kind must be a shock to these people.
It was interesting to watch the underlying mechanisms of a city that could be called the closest to a utopia on the planet. He had not visited Talokan yet so the Birnin Zana was his only frame of reference when it came to utopianistic cities. There was currency, obviously but most of the immediate needs of the citizens were taken care of by the government.
Housing? State housing, given based on the family members, changed based on the needs as well. More children? More garden space and a bigger house? More elderly? Given housing in close knit areas with a heavy medical presence 24/7
Utilities? Water and Electricity were provided by the government. With Vibranium in the picture, providing a stable flow of electricity with no cuts would be very easy. With that same energy, Wakanda can afford to do energy intensive water filtration with ease, something that is unaffordable for most municipalities around the world.
The Internet was heavily censored, with regular media pieces falling into the government screened library of movies and music.
Food? Now food was the thing that interested him the most. The one thing they had used and in Shuri’s own words, was the one with the most success, to get Wakandans, people who would inherently have no need to work, to work.
Wakanda, despite its advancements in robotics and more, needed people. You can’t just have people interact with robots all the time and build a healthy society. So, Shuri’s ancestors used food as a means to get people to work.
Everyone here received a standard amount of currency each month, depending on their age and needs. Now, those credits covered most of what people needed and a little more because the main things were taken care of by the government.
What it didn't cover was food. More specifically, tasty food. Instead, everyone received three rations of meals a day, delivered to their homes if need be, containing exactly the right amount of nutrition and proportion based on their dietary needs, and accounting for allergies.
That food, as one could imagine, was not the tastiest food in the world. In fact, it was made purposefully bland, going so far as to add things that would remove any sense of taste from that, resulting in what could only be called goo.
He had seen it, and it could only be called that.
The real food? Like the one he ate right before this? That was blocked, behind higher costs, kept artificially inflated because only by working the jobs the government wants its people to work, could they afford the extra credit to get that tasty food.
Depending on the risk of the job, the people would receive government subsidised food that could taste just as good as a nice family owned restaurant, instead of a five star that just served bland food all the time.
Hotels were present everywhere, owned by the government, letting people on their version of Universal Basic Income save up and buy tasty food if needed. According to Shuri, even people on the lowest income level could get the tasty meals 5-7 times a month, depending on what they ate, which was…not that high but not nothing either.
She told him that it served as motivation, to get into jobs and earn the money necessary to eat that food especially since they made the food in a way that had the least possible amount of impact on anyone’s health, like cholesterol and fat.
Through that, they achieved both the things they set out to achieve. Reach the highest quality of life for their people, with their basic needs taken care of, and also make sure their people do not live a completely indulgent, hedonistic lifestyle and turn completely stagnant.
Plus, the diversity of jobs was something that got a raised eyebrow from his side. Just because they wanted their people to work did not mean everyone had to get a desk job or a security job. No, anyone could just go out and paint, or sing, or write. Even artistic work was rewarded here, not equally, but the effort was rewarded in a meaningful way, which he thought was beautiful.
As a result of all these policies, Wakanda had an unemployment rate of just 1%. Even the elderly people could go to libraries, schools, day care centres and help entertain kids, keep company with them, or just become friends with their fellow elderly people by taking shifts at the community centres.
Everyone worked in their own way, on their own time, at the job they were most comfortable at, and received an appropriate sum of money in return, on top of the already taken care of basics.
It really spoke to him in ways he could not vocalise that most humans, if given the opportunity of not having to stress about the basic needs, would turn to art in some way, a quiet reflection of what the kids of rich parents liked to do the most.
“So, ready to see the most important place in Wakanda?” Shuri asked him as they flew over a river that cut through the city and despite it being completely open, there was not a speck of trash in it as fish flew through the clear water.
He wondered how the laws were enforced here. A question for another time, since he was dying to see the Vibranium mine.
“Sure,” He nodded as they flew towards one of the mountains, which he knew was an illusion to hide the Vibranium Mound from the common population. The common man of Wakanda was kept in the dark about a surprising number of things, which just drove the point home since Dictatorship, in any form or in any country, would suppress the common person from knowledge to maintain that iron grip.
Well, judging by the standard of living of these people here, he would say that they got a good deal, based on the last few Monarchs they had.
