Head Is Not My Home

Hard to Believe You Could Cause Me Harm

Natalia had tried. But the facility was empty the next night. Hastily emptied, by the look of it. Had someone known she was there? Surely she hadn't become that sloppy? In any case, the trail ran cold after that. No mention of the Winter Soldier could be found anywhere and most sources thought he was a myth. She didn't give up, but it was hard to keep up the search. Especially when so much had changed.

It had been years since she'd seen Ivan, or even Madame B. Her handlers were ever changing and her missions unclear. It was easy, when the moment came, to defect. To make a name for herself as the Black Widow. The other Widows were gone, everyone was gone. Her life was so different that sometimes she wondered if any of it had been real.

Clint Barton found her, chose not to kill her. So she'd become Natasha Romanoff, SHIELD agent, Strike Team Delta. The work was easy for her and she realized how much she needed to make up for what she had done. To finally have a place to do that was very important to her. But it didn't really strike home that she had changed sides until she saw him again.

Escorting persons of interest was a regular part of her job. She was good at it. Better doing solo missions, of course, but reliable nonetheless. The scientist outside Odessa was the first one she'd lost. Her handlers had dismissed her claims of the Winter Soldier as a myth, not a reliable lead. But she could not let go how he had shot through her, leaving her alive. Why had he done that? Did he remember? Was there any part of him that did?

Clint's influence kept her from chasing after a ghost when she recovered, and eventually she accepted it. Then she became one of the Avengers, regularly working with Captain America himself. It seemed a strange twist in fate that such a drastic change in circumstances would be what brought the Winter Soldier back into her life. Even if he didn't know her. Even if, stranger still, he did know Captain America.

When she had some time to recover her bearings in Moscow, she sought out Steve. He was in hiding, of course, but he wasn't a spy. He couldn't just disappear. And working with him was easy enough, even though they kept to the shadows. That was easy for her. Easier than being a hero had ever been. Sometimes Steve talked about his friend Bucky, and she would listen as though it meant no more to her than it did to Sam.

She thought a lot about what she might say to him if she saw him again. Though Steve was content to let him make his choice to stay hidden somewhere, it was obvious that he did not expect that to last forever. That he expected his best friend to join him someday. And what would Natasha do when he did?

Working with him would be painful. Seeing him and not being recognized had already been more painful than she had anticipated, and she didn't know if she could bear to make that a regular state of affairs. Even if she would work well with him. Even if Steve hoped they would all make a good team.

Sometimes she thought about telling Steve. But she couldn't. What would she say? Oh, hey, when your buddy was a brainwashed Soviet assassin, he and I knew each other. The thought was ludicrous. Just the idea made her laugh, maybe a little hysterically. No, she couldn't tell Steve. He had his own picture of what being the Winter Soldier must have been like and it was not her place to correct him.

After two years, things outside of anyone's control forced Steve's hand, and he took them to Wakanda. He told her briefly what he knew about it, and that it was where Bucky had been hiding out. Cryogenically frozen. Natasha had hidden her horror at that, telling herself that the Wakandan's technology wouldn't be like Department X's, surely. Steve wouldn't have left him there if that had been the case.

The moment came at last where she saw him again. He looked good. His hair was longer, so he couldn't have been frozen for very long. The Wakandans had helped him. He joked with Sam and Steve, and even with her. But he didn't really look at her.