Who: Natasha Romanoff russianspy & Bucky Barnes jbuchananbarnes What: Two old friends, catching up When: Sunday, April 26, early morning Where: Hope Springs Apartments; 109B Rating: Audience Discretion is Advised Warnings: Spoilers for the MCU; violence, two assassins, talk of the Red Room, brainwashing, etc. These are two very fucked up people. Status: Closed/Completed GDoc
~*~
Natasha wasn’t one for beating around the bush. She needed some time to settle in and so did Barnes, but it was about time she paid him a visit. It was a good thing she wasn’t in the apartment right above his, or she might’ve been inclined to go through the floor to get to his place. Many a test had been to get into a place he was undetected, though she’d never been able to catch him off guard. She wondered if that still held true, and if he remembered her at all. He’d been one of her instructors during her teenage years, from fifteen to nineteen, off and on. The more she improved, the less frequently he came, until the KGB had declared her training done.
Picking his lock hadn’t been hard, and she slipped in silently. Natasha had chosen to wear civilian clothes, figuring her Widow suit would only make him more inclined to kill her on the spot. She was armed still, with her Widow discs, garrotte line, and one of her handguns, tucked away at the small of her back. He would know her weapons the moment he laid eyes on her, because he was that good. She just wasn’t stupid enough to think she wouldn’t need them, the way Steve was. Knowing what she did now, Natasha didn’t blame him for what she’d gone through under his hand. He’d been a good teacher, and many of the things he’d taught her had served her well over the years. The sex, too, had shown her a lot, particularly how she liked it compared to what the Red Room had taught her to use as a weapon.
Knowing her presence wouldn’t go undetected for long, Natasha got busy cooking breakfast for them. Eggs were easiest, and bacon, both of which she found in the fridge. Half a dozen eggs and just as many strips of bacon were cooking away when she felt the weight of his gaze.
“I let myself in. Hope you don’t mind.” Natasha raised both of her hands up, but stayed facing the stove. “You remember me?” He wouldn’t need her to turn around to answer that question, she was sure of it.
~*~
"If I minded, you'd be dead already."
It was as much a fact as it was a statement. He wasn't a good man. Most of the time, Bucky Barnes didn't feel as if he were a man at all. It hadn't alerted any warning bells for him when the woman had come inside. She smelled familiar. Too few people were familiar for him not to be curious as to her identity so she was allowed inside, allowed to amuse herself in his kitchen, allowed to make herself comfortable as if she belonged in his place.
No one belonged in his space as far as he knew.
HYDRA had made him a weapon. In the process, they'd stripped him of his humanity in ways he doubted he'd ever recover from which separated him from the others around him. Bucky was what they called him when they spoke of him by name though it didn't feel as if it were his name. Mostly, he thought of it as something they called him by when 'Soldier' wasn't enough to get his attention.
Did he know this woman's name? Did he remember her?
"Romanoff," he decided, "Natasha. That's what you chose to use. You were Romanova. Natalia. A lot of other names. Why? Does it matter to you? I shot you. You're making breakfast. You aren't shooting me back. What does it matter? My memories?"
Steve Rogers acted as if it mattered if he remembered someone. Him. He seemed to mind if the soldier remembered him in particular. Some of the memories he had of Steve were confusing. Many of them were strange memories of pain, sickness, death. They had not been happy young men. Their childhoods had not been easy. Shared pain? Was that what Steve Rogers wanted him to remember? They had shared pain so they were---the same?
"A lot of people ask me what I remember. It seems to matter to them. I don't know why. I'm not that person. Not anymore. I'm something new. I'm not HYDRA's anymore. I'm not some boy from Brooklyn. I'm some other kind of thing, person, whatever, now. Why does the past matter?"
~*~
Natasha grinned at his answer, knowing the truth of it and the mindset he was in just from seven words. “Fair enough,” she replied, dropping her hands to continue making them breakfast. He probably needed to eat more than an average person, though not likely as much as Steve did thanks to his super soldier metabolism. It wasn’t long before she was plating, listening to him ask his questions. It provided even more insight for her, and information meant the difference between life or death in many cases.
“Here,” she said, setting the plate in front of him, along with a fork. She dug into her own breakfast across from him. “You shot me when I was Natasha Romanoff, but you first met me when I was Natalia Romanova, in the Red Room. The Black Widow program.” She was careful to keep her voice neutral, to tell him the facts. “I think we’ve fought enough on opposite sides to last a hundred lifetimes, and I agree with you. The past doesn’t matter all that much, these days.” Natasha smiled just slightly, allowing herself the honesty of her reactions because he deserved them.
“If I’m at least slightly familiar to you, it makes things easier. You don’t need to know the specifics. It’s probably better if you don’t remember the specifics of our interactions before DC.” She picked up a piece of bacon and chewed almost thoughtfully on it. “See, I’ve spent a lot of time getting to know Steve since he got defrosted. He was just drifting, wandering around with no real purpose except putting on the uniform because that was the only thing he had left. He hasn’t been having an easy time of it, but when I left him? I’d just handed him a file on you, to give him some direction. He means well, but I know him.” Natasha let that settle for a moment by taking a bite of her eggs.
She was careful to catch his gaze when she added, “He doesn’t understand what you’ve been through, and it’s entirely possible that he never will. I can’t say I’ll understand all of it, but I can understand some of it. I know what it’s like to be turned into a weapon, to kill people on someone else’s orders.” Natasha set her fork down, her breakfast half eaten. “Took me two years to stop handcuffing myself to the headboard.”
~*~
'Handcuffs don't work on me.'
Most would consider it a strange first thought, but Barnes wasn't most. He wasn't anything like anyone or anything else as far as he could tell. All he was? Some remnant of a dead age, a leftover toy from a retired regime. He was a broken boy soldier who never got older. It was something out of a sad, sad song only it was his truth.
His ma had taught him about knowing his truth.
She hadn't been wealthy before she'd married his father; after they were married and the kids had started coming, she'd been even less wealthy. Financially, his family had been close to starvation more often than not. In terms of their truth? They were the wealthiest people in the world to hear his ma tell it. They had one another and their health. Nothing was worth more than family and good health to her.
"I remember more than I should. I won't talk about it. No one needs to know they made me fuck you. I'm not stupid. I'm not slow. I don't have brain damage. I have memory loss. I know I sound a lot of those other things from time to time, but sounding it and being it are two different things. You keep that in the front of your mind and I'll remember I wound up liking you in the end."
No one wanted The Winter Soldier to decide he didn't like them.
Barnes was dead in too many ways to count, but he was alive enough to take lives. HYDRA had ensured he was very, very good at it, too. He'd kill in a heartbeat if he had to and it was very possible he'd have to in this place. Bad things were mixed in with the good. He could tell somehow. Like called to like maybe? There'd been a saying about it. He couldn't remember the saying, but he knew it had fit.
"Food's good. You like cooking or is this your way of making a peace offering? Feeling me out for information? You're not getting much out of me. I don't feel like talking and even if I did, I wouldn't have much to say to you. Horrible things happened to me. They happened to you. Sometimes they happened to both of us at the same time. Reminiscing about them isn't going to change them. We could move on. Be new people to each other. It's easy. Hi, James Buchanan Barnes, but my friends call me Bucky. You are?"
He offered his human hand to her to shake, the metal one still wrapped around the handle of his fork.
~*~
It was a good thing that he remembered, in the sense that having one’s memory fucked was something she wouldn’t wish on anyone, least of all someone who’d been in a worse situation than her’s. Remembering would also help him come to terms with it, maybe find himself again. It would just also include a hell of a lot of guilt, but they couldn’t change the way their hands had been dealt. She’d faced her demons, still faced them. He could too.
Natasha smiled slightly. “You’re far from slow or stupid. I wouldn’t be alive still if you were.” For all that had passed between them, she wasn’t ashamed to admit that she’d be long dead if it hadn’t been for some of the lessons he’d taught her. “You always liked me. Perks of being the best in the class,” she added, her grin widening a little more. She could joke and tease about her past for the most part, the superficial stuff and what she’d already worked through in her life. Tearing down the Red Room brick by brick had done wonders for her soul.
“I know enough to get by. It’s a bit of both, peace and information. You’ve given me enough.” That was an obvious fact and it would serve him well, knowing it. Natasha took his hand without hesitation, her grip firm but honest. “Pleasure to meet you, Bucky. Name’s Natasha Romanoff, but my friends can call me Nat or Tasha. Natalia works too.” She wouldn’t mind being called Natalia by him, she didn’t think. It was hard to think in the mindset that a name mattered, that she could pick what she wanted to be called and be herself.
“How’re you liking it here? I managed to get myself a job at the park, working as a groundskeeper. I like it well enough, mostly because I get a lot of freedom outdoors and it’s fun scaring the kids who think it’s a good idea to deal drugs or get friskier than a few kisses.” She took maybe a little too much enjoyment out of her job, but wasn’t that the way it was supposed to be? If work was fun and enjoyable, it wasn’t truly work then, as the saying went.
~*~
"Natalia," he decided as easily as if he'd made up his mind to choose one shirt over another, "It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I've been working maintenance for Hope Springs and volunteering to help out over at Copperstone until they get their own crew. The little things are what matter to me these days."
Fixing a squeaking door, repairing a broken shelf, helping someone move in new furniture, it was all the same to him. Some little job which helped to make some person's life a little better. There was no real honor in it, but there was dignity. Anyone who helped to make a person happier, better, healthier? They were living in their own quiet dignity. It was worthwhile to him to think he made a difference even if in the smallest way for someone.
They couldn't make up for his life as a weapon of HYDRA. All the little victories in the world couldn't atone for the sheer number of casualties he'd amassed in his count for the side of Evil in the battle against Good. He wasn't stupid enough to believe he could do more for himself than make do. Bucky wasn't looking for absolution. All he wanted was a little bit of peace.
"I haven't made my way over for a walk in the park, but I've been by the local greenhouse. Helped to get some planters set up for a tenant. Real nice lady by the name of Ella. She's not local either. Seems none of the people in these complexes are locals. They're all imports, the same as you or I. Think it's nice of them to set us up in a way where we can find people with something in common with us even if the something they've got in common is they're not common here."
Could they pretend they were different? Could they pretend they were normal people being normal together?
Bucky chewed on his bacon and decided, yes, yes they could.
"Breakfast sure is good, Natalia. Thanks so much for cooking. I'll have to make it up to you some morning."
It could be that easy. HYDRA had made it that easy every time they'd wiped his mind, erased him to start over anew every day.