(Originally posted on AO3 on May 5th, 2014. Crossposted here due to the latest events at the AO3 board.)

i.

He leaves his mission on the dirty mud near the Potomac River and gets lost in Washington. It isn't very difficult to find a change of clothes, blend in the crowd, steal a jacket here and a pair of gloves here, a wallet on a businessman that allows him to sleep in a hotel room and take a hot shower. A burning hot shower.

(He is always cold on missions, perhaps not on missions too, but he never remembers it.)

He waits for some of his holders to come and pick him up.

(Three days and nothing happen. HYDRA is dead to him now.)

ii.

He walks around aimlessly, tries not think about his latest mission – he was supposed to wipe him, not save his life – but his thoughts run around in circles and he has to watch out for people sent out to kill him.

Ah.

(The only assassin he ever met who could have a shot at that was the red-headed Russian girl in Paris in 2000. They had been after the same goal and she had gotten to the target first, killing him with her thighs. He had let her go afterwards; the job was done. He doesn't know why he remembers her. Perhaps because there was another red-headed woman with his last mission.)

(The hair color was always the first thing to come back after having his mind being wiped out, and he never understood why.)

He has blood on his hands again by the end of the second day, but the body leaves a clear message for the others who will come after him.

iii.

He gets to the museum about Captain America eventually, blending in the shadows, and keeps looking at James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes until his sight is blurred. They share the same face, he will admit it, but nothing that he reads (watches, hears) brings memories back to him.

He remembers nothing.

(Nothing except the eyes of his last mission, and how he had had a feeling of déjà vu. For the life of him, he couldn't understand why.)

He feels uneasy, and scared, and tools are not scared. Weapons don't feel anything.

He leaves the exhibit and ends up in a bookstore along the street. People are idly chatting away, others lovingly stroking the cover of the books, and he can hear two teenagers talking animatedly, a pile of books in their hands. He walks past them and finds himself in the historical section of the bookstore – contemporary history, by the looks of it. There is only a young woman in it, all dressed in black, putting back books neatly on the shelves. She turns around and almost trips when she sees him, only catching herself on her desk.

"Oh, hello! How can I help you?"

He hesitates before answering.

"I am looking for a book."

His voice is rash but she nods vigorously, already looking like someone sent on a quest. It is probably not the first time she hears that, but it doesn't really help him feel any better.

"Something on a specific topic? An introduction perhaps?"

"Do you have any books about Bucky Barnes?" he asks before stopping himself and is a bit surprised when she lights up at his question.

"Sure! You're back from the exhibit, right? I keep telling my boss we should open a little store out there, but he won't listen to me. Says people come here if they are interested and always leave with more books than they planned to buy, which is always the case once you enter a bookstore, you know." She happily chats away as she goes looking for the books.

She is standing on a stool, little thing she is, but wearing heavy shoes – Doc Martens, according to the label, and he all knows about it is that these shoes are good enough to break someone's knees.

"I mean people usually come asking about the Howling Commando or Captain America," she is still talking, "the sergeant isn't as popular – I mean, he died quite young, right? And, safe for being the Captain's best friend, he was a regular soldier, like the rest of the Howling Commando…"

Yes, he had grasped that from the exhibit.

"I mean, I know I'm saying that he was just the Captain's best friend, but there is nothing just in being someone's best friend. Or friend, but that's not the point. You know, in the seventies, the historians – Ah!"

She has to stand on her toes to get the book she was looking for and he idly wonders if she is going to fall.

"The historians, well, some of them anyway, they started thinking there perhaps was not only friendship between them? Or a very deep one anyway, because the Captain went from being the army's monkey to a real soldier as soon as he learned that the sergeant was a prisoner and saved almost four hundred people all by myself while looking for his best friend –"

That hadn't been written in the exhibit. Nothing the Army would have been proud of, but still, it's a bit strange to have someone barely old enough to vote explaining these things to him.

"And there are some, like the one who wrote the book I'm suggesting to you because honestly it is one of the best biographies written about Barnes, my personal favorite if I might add. Well, there are some who think that the Captain was really reckless and didn't care if he died or lived once Barnes was dead. Well, lost. I mean everyone thought him dead but they never found his body so… Anyway, the whole "putting the plane in the Arctic" weren't exactly the actions of a man who allowed himself to mourn, according to them."

She stops to catch her breath and he takes the book wordlessly. That makes a bit more sense, and if the entire book explains Barnes's life the same way the young woman does, he might start to understand why the Captain – his mission – was so insistent on saving him – not fighting him.

Not hurting him.

"Do you want something else?" she asks and he looks back at her, noticing the heavy black rings on her fingers – sharp enough to blind a person getting her fist in the eyes.

"Do you have anything about the medical experiments?" he asks on an impulsion, and notices how high her eyebrows raise.

"Oh, the medical ones? On human beings?"

He nods.

"There are two excellent books on the topic – well, they don't deal only with World War Two, you know, they go deep in the Cold War…"

He listens to her chatting until he has left the bookstore, his jacket heavier with the three books she recommended him, and goes back to his hotel room. He packs his bags, checks a map, leaves the hotel at one in the morning, steals a car and drives towards the West Coast.

He wants to be at peace to read.

iv.

Seattle is good enough to blend in – very easy to get a new leather jacket and some comfortable gloves here – and he finds a little job as bartender in the darkest streets of the historical center. No one bothers him here – he has set up a few trails all over the country and over the borders before coming in this city – and the underworld is too busy destroying itself, with all the files on the internet, to come after him right now.

(Nine eliminations in seventeen days, five from or affiliated to HYDRA. The weapon is free and doesn't want a new master.)

He reads the books, understand a bit better why his mission didn't want to kill him, and what probably happened to Bucky Barnes after he fell off that train – found by HYDRA, they created his arm, and used trainers from the Red Room to turn him into the perfect weapon.

He is starting to remember elements of this time.

(The red-headed Russian in Paris, 2000, was someone he was looking after, assessing her skills. They worked together (?) a couple of times in Europe before…

Before she left? Died?

He doesn't remember.)

He is not so sure he wants to remember his past for now. He has been picking up pieces, trying to understand where he was coming from and who exactly would come after him, but he doesn't want to remember who Bucky Barnes was. He has already enough work on his hands with his time as a weapon for HYDRA.

(Some mornings he wakes up and doesn't know if the blood on his hands is real or just a memory. Some mornings he wakes up and thinks he still lying on the bloody snow, and he can't feel his arm, can't feel his arm. Some morning he wakes up and he is strapped down and he doesn't know from when this memory comes.)

He decides to call himself Dmitri, reads and tries to sort out his memories.

He doesn't remember the last time he felt so peaceful.

v.

It doesn't last, of course – it never does. The red-headed woman who fought along his last mission finds him three months after he has settled down in Seattle. She sits in front of him in a crowded bar on a Saturday night, her hair two shades deeper than he remembers from Washington, longer and curlier. She is wearing a leather jacket and he can see at least two guns and a hand knife in the few seconds it takes her to sit down.

"They have been expecting you to go on the run in Europe," she says, a glass of beer in front of her, voice calm, body stance non-threatening.

He raises his eyes from his book – the one about human experiments – and looks at her blankly, wishing her to continue. She is much happy to oblige.

"To raise a little hell on those who turned you into – "

"Into what I am now?"

His voice is as calm as hers, and she nods, piercing green eyes assessing his body. He knows what she is looking for – if his memories are coming back (some are, mostly blood and screams and broken voices begging for mercy – the snow, too), if his mind is crumbling down (it is not, he still has a firm hand on it – for now at least), if he knows what he is going to do (he has some ideas).

He smiles, all sharp teeth.

"Being unpredictable is what keeps our species alive, Natalia."

He knows he is taking a risk right now – if she is not the young girl he (sort of) remembers, who had been sent in missions with him between 1997 and 2000, whom he had trained, he knows it now, well… He might have to kill her, and he would rather not leave Seattle so soon.

But he does not have to worry. She looks at him, deadpan.

"You remember me," she says, flatly, and he can see her tense, notices the intercom in her ear, and realizes she has some backup somewhere.

Hopefully not his last mission.

"I remember some elements," he answers, and puts a bookmark on his book before putting it in his jacket. He will have to leave soon.

She looks at him for the longest time, reassessing what she knew of him, cold green eyes blinking two or three times, before relaxing ever so slightly. Her hands are still in view, no one has come over them and it would be impossible (except for him) to shoot one of them from their position.

"You are expected in Europe," she finally repeats, and her tone is slightly more urgent this time.

(He remembers the nuances, the variations. Of course they used to be more pronounced, but she was younger, and not as trained as she is now. A deadly weapon in a suit of pouty lips and bright wide eyes.)

"By whom?"

(If she wants to give him some information, he won't complain. They are difficult enough to get as it is now.)

"By everyone."

Ah. HYDRA and his last mission then. Along with everyone else in the intelligence community who wants him dead. He can deal with that.

"And why are you telling me that?"

She looks at him, again, and he realizes she is looking for someone in him. Possibly what his last mission told her, possibly what she knows about him (what he was, who he used to be before being a weapon), possibly…

Possibly someone else.

Someone who could be backing her up right now.

"Paris, 2000," she finally says, and he looks right back at her, waiting. "We were on the same target, but you didn't remember me."

"You killed the target," he says, because this, he remembers. They must have wiped him between the last mission he trained her and this one.

"I did. And you weren't even angry – because he was dead, and that was the whole point of the operation."

And she smiles.

"You told me to leave. And not to come back, or I would be dead this time."

"I guess I would have."

She smiles a bit more, and there is warmth in it.

"You told me to leave on our last mission together, Dmitri."

Oh.

"And then I forgot you", he says slowly – and yes, the memory is lurking around the edge of his mind. It will come back later (wouldn't be the first time it happens), but the feeling is already there.

"You did. And you shot me in Odessa to kill a scientist. 2001," she adds, and he nods.

He doesn't remember that but he is grateful for the information. They stay silent for a few minutes. Natalia nurses her beer and he looks at his own glass of Perrier. People are talking around them and he can hear a crooner singing "I remember you, I remember you, I remember you –" He wants to snort.

"So you are settling a debt," he finally says, and she nods slowly.

"Your advice was a good one."

He can still see the young girl he trained in her. (The young girl he had wanted to save, apparently.)

"Thank you for the information," he declares, and she smiles. "I take it you're not alone on missions anymore."

She smiles again, and he can see a little arrow necklace around her neck.

"Got a good aim?"

"You know you are the best sniper, Dmitri" she tells him gently, and he has everything he needs where Natalia is concerned.

He didn't destroy her when the Winter Soldier woke up in Washington. This is… good.

Probably.

"I know someone who could take a look at your arm, if needed," she offers, and he looks at her with surprise – and some kind of defiance too.

She shrugs and puts a card from Stark Industries on the table in front of him.

"Tell them you come from Natalie Rushman," she says and leaves, glass of beer empty in front of him.

He hesitates a long time before finally reaching for the card and taking it. It doesn't mean he has to call the number if his arm starts acting against him, just that the possibility is around the corner.

Apparently, Natalia just got the upper hand on offering him some kind of safety nest.

vi.

He leaves Seattle the next week and goes back on the road. He still doesn't sleep a lot, memories flashing in front of his eyes every time he tries to get some rest, but deep tiredness eventually wins over every few days.

His dreams get bloodier and he often finds himself waking up with his (metal) fist in his mouth to stop himself from screaming out loud.

He should have expected that running into someone from his past would have triggered something.

(At least more memories are coming back, and the puzzle of his life looks a bit clearer.)

vii.

He goes to Europe, eventually. The weather is still good, even if it's the fall here too, and Italy is lovely at this time of the year. (There's no mud and he is a bit surprised at it, at first, before remembering the war has been over for a long time.)

He enjoys Rome a lot.

For the first time, he dreams, not of his memories as the Winter Soldier, but as Bucky Barnes.

(Bucky Barnes's last memory is of Steve Rogers not reaching far enough for his hand and watching him fall down the Alps.)

He wakes up with wet cheeks, a bitter taste in his mouth, blood on his lips and the realization that Captain America let his best friend fall into HYDRA's hands.

viii.

He goes on a murder rampage through the continent.

ix.

It doesn't do any good for his memories – the trail of fire and blood he leaves behind him only triggers more memories from his time as HYDRA's weapon.

He is angry.

(Furious doesn't even begin to cover it.)

(Nothing prepared him to the bitter taste of betrayal.)

The intelligence community gets nervous (again) and he sees Natalia in Berlin, meeting her stare across what used to be the no-man's-land between West and East Berlin. (He is in the East part, of course he is, and the irony is not lost on him.)

He doesn't stop until he crosses the Russian borders and then disappears.

He is a ghost after all, and no one can find him if he doesn't want to be found.

(He doesn't dream of a small, skinny Steve Rogers sleeping in his arms.)

x.

For the first time, he dreams of the war (his war, the one he died for) and realizes he didn't kill Howard Stark. Could have, was there (to make sure he is dead if the agent sent to kill him fails – and, oh, he remembers what he was supposed to do to said agent if he had failed in his mission; he was suspected of being a traitor after all) but he just watched from the sidelines as the murder was made to look like an accident.

The realization leaves him unsettled.

He was sure HYDRA would have used him to get rid off of Howard Stark, American genius and known for his search for Captain America, but… no.

(He was apparently busy in South America bringing more chaos.)

He straight-up tortures two people (old, not in the business anymore) who were around giving him orders when Howard Stark died, but both, utterly and completely terrified, assure him no one ever ordered him to kill people he knew from before. (Until Alexander Pierce came along, one of them tells him, which was a huge mistake, and this is the sentence that gets him to die in even more pain than the other.)

Strangely, this is the first time he feels (oh, ever so slightly) good since the fight on the Helicarrier and his last, failed mission.

(He has a knife with Captain America's name on it.)

Of course, because who said his life was easy, this is when his arm decides it doesn't want to go on with the revenge quest and literally dies on him.

This might have something to do with the acid poured on it on a HYDRA facility lost in the middle of the Balkans. The fact that the facility blowing up in flames so close to the Russian missiles doesn't even make it to the Western European newspapers, so he needs not worry of anyone in the USA hearing about it by the civilian conducts.

(Captain America and his new sidekick are chasing ghosts in South America at the time and he knows Natalia won't tip them off.)

xi.

Getting an appointment with Anthony Stark is surprisingly easy, until he finds himself in the lift of the tower with the man himself, who looks at him like he is bracing himself for a murder attempt.

Stark babbles.

(His poker face is crap.)

"I'm here for your technical expertise," he finally says, slightly annoyed by the man's chatter.

Stark stops dead in the middle of a sentence and looks at him – really looks at him – in a cold eye that isn't without reminding him of Howard.

(Howard looking at Steve and God knows how annoyed he was at his behavior.)

"Romanoff told me your arm could be an issue for you in the future," Stark slowly announces, arms crossed in front of him. "I have to say I expected it to be sooner," he admits after a few moments of silence.

"It is difficult to break", he answers in a cold voice, and Stark squints.

"What happened?"

He ponders his answer for a few seconds before going for the truth. After all, Anthony Stark is only one fit to take care of his arm, and it will be better for both of them if he knows from the beginning what he is dealing with.

"Acid."

Stark whitens a bit and stays silent until they reach their destination. He is a good host, if his collection of scotch is anything to go by, and offers to deal with the arm either in the kitchen or in his lab. Natalia must have told him a few things because he isn't surprised at all to end up dealing with the arm in the kitchen, tools everywhere and with a robot assistant. (Not to mention the AI present everywhere in the building, but it has the distinction of a British butler, so he won't complain about it.)

"The good captain will be sorry to miss you," Stark mumbles at some point, working on the wires after having cleaned up the surface of the arm. "He has been looking everywhere for you."

"Are you not telling him I'm here?"

He is slightly surprised – Howard wouldn't have kept something like that from Steve.

Captain America.

Stark gives him a cold, assessing look from behind his glasses before going back to the wires.

"I won't unless you want me to. Romanoff was pretty insistent on me not doing anything behind your back, and preferably keeping your position secret from the captain, and Barton really insisted, too. I would rather not have to deal with two pissed-off master assassins on top of everything." He stops, looks at him again and picks some new tools. "Well, three master assassins, but from what I've heard, I'm not on your bad list."

He hums in agreement and watches the interior of his arm with fascination. This seems to be a mess of wires and melted threads, but Stark has no problem working his way through it. His voice is running a commentary of everything he does and sees probably for the benefit of his AI. He is not too pleased with the fact that more information about him (about the weapon) will be available for who knows where to look, but he doesn't have a choice for this time. His arm has to be repaired.

"I know about your parents' death," he declares at some point in the night, dinner long eaten.

Stark's hand on his arm jerks and he raises his head so hard that he hears the cervical vertebrae crack. He is livid.

Perhaps now wasn't a good time to tell him what really happened, but he would rather pay the service Stark is giving him now than later.

"Did you kill them?"

He blinks.

"No. It was the mission of another agent, I was only here to supervise."

Tension eases off from Stark's shoulders, but soon comes back.

"And what happened to this agent?"

"He died in Budapest."

Stark squints again – he must know, by now, that this is where Natalia decided to give a chance to the USA (to S.H.I.E.L.D.) rather than trying to get out of the KGB's hands on her own and with no backup. (People still talk about it, to this day.)

The rest of the night flies by and he leaves the tower in the morning with a repaired arm, Stark considering him with a new eye. He will probably start working on his own version of an arm as soon as he can, if half of the rumors he heard about him are true.

(He doesn't really mind. Knowing where he can find another arm is useful.)

"You can come back here, if you need to," Stark finally says while they are both standing in front of one of the emergency exits.

The streets are calm around them, New-York soft in this winter morning. People walk quickly, restricted in heavy cloaks and long scarves. It will be snowing soon.

"I have to go," he finally says, and Stark's eyes are full of understanding.

He hesitates slightly, looks towards the end of the street, and then to the tower.

"You can tell Rogers I was here," he offers before leaving, Stark's still looking at him in silence until he disappears in the night.

xii.

He does not go to Brooklyn.

xiii.

He stays in New-York and the memories of Bucky Barnes come crashing around like bullets.

He probably should have expected it – he got a clear idea of what the Winter Soldier did while he was burning down HYDRA's facilities in Europe – but the shock is no less violent.

It is difficult to reunite the image of Steve Rogers and Captain America (the skinny boy in his arms with whom he shared so many nights versus the huge, bulk leader who walked through enemy lines in the depths of the European winter), even more when he remembers the last time Bucky Barnes saw Steve Rogers (falling from a train, hand stretched with nothing to hold onto). His head is a mess.

(His heart is worse, and now he knows he was in love with Steve Rogers, a long time ago. Could still be, perhaps.)

He wanders through New-York endlessly.

xiv.

Clint Barton (Natalia's backup, the archer for whom she wears a necklace) sits down next to him on a bench in Central Park one day in the middle of December, two cups of coffee in his hands.

"Are you taking turns on watching me?" he asks without heat, too glad for the coffee to be really angry. No one has tried to be stealthy about the damn thing, and he thinks he can recognize the Avengers in a crowd everywhere now.

"Natasha is worried," Barton answers with a shrug, noise deep in his coffee cup. "She knows what it's like to do what you've been doing since Washington."

"And?"

Barton looks at him and they both drink in silence. No one cares about them.

"I know what it's like to be unmade too," Barton finally adds in a cold, clipped voice. "And Tony, well… he went through some stuff of his own too" (he knows, he has read everything there were to read about Anthony Stark) "and Steve…" Barton trails off and looks at him, worry in his eyes.

Steve.

(Steve, who had to destroy the robot threatening them both on this train, in order to have a chance to save him. Steve, who put down a plane in the Arctic to get rid off of Red Skull.)

(Steve, who refused to fight him on the Helicarrier.)

(Steve, who, has been looking for him ever since.)

Barton sighs and drinks the rest of the coffee.

"Sam said – Sam is the guy with the wings, you remember him?" he waits for a confirmation before going ahead "Sam works with the army veterans so he has some experience, and he said it was important for you to know that there are people waiting for you when you are ready to come home."

He can't help but snorting, and Barton looks even more worried.

"I can never go home," he admits in a hushed voice.

Not the one he wants to. (The one he had in the 1930's, before the war, because even if it was the Great Depression, he had Steve, and there were both still mostly untouched by the darkness of the world. Now… now he has lost himself along the way, lost the man Steve loved, and lost Steve too, because he is too tainted for Steve's purity, there is too much blood on his hands now. And not for the right reasons.)

Barton frowns, looks at his coffee cup like it holds the answer to every question in the universe and then turns back his attention to him.

"Do you know who you are?" he asks very seriously.

"What?"

He is taken aback by the question – does Barton want a biography?

"Do you know who you are? Really? You went on a self-discovery journey Barnes, and I don't even know if I can call you Barnes or if you prefer another name. Natasha said you answered to Dmitri but this name was between the two of you, and you haven't really said which name you wanted people to use when talking to you. So, do you know who you are?"

Oh.

A name. This is what Barton wants – what they want.

(Perhaps what he wants, too.)

"I'm James," he finally answers, and yes, this is the right name. (For now at least.)

Barton nods.

"Nice to meet you, James. I'm Clint."

They shake hands and this feels more surreal than a lot of things that happened to him.

"Alright, so, do you know who you are? What your identity is?" Barton asks again, and he thinks about it, wonders if what he knows about himself (what he wants, what he feels, every single thing about him) is enough to say that he knows who he is.

It is. He nods. Barton seems slightly relieved.

"Alright, so, this is your home, okay? Your identity. Knowing who you are."

He thinks about it, and perhaps this works for him. Perhaps his home was burned to the ground when HYDRA found him and turned him into a weapon, but now he has rebuilt himself, and he doesn't think the foundations are too shaky.

"You are home, James," Barton says gently (and he has a feeling this Sam has a hand in what he is saying) "and now the question is, do you want to invite people in?"

He gets up, looks at him with a small smile and says "It's up to you. You do whatever you want, and everyone will respect your choice."

The no matter how hard it can be for some is unsaid, but he hears it anyway.

"Stark's invitation still stands," he adds before leaving, throwing his cup in a trashcan nearby.

James watches him leave and considers the situation.

xv.

Christmas comes and goes, and so does New Year's Eve. He doesn't really mind spending it alone – it gives him more time to deal with his thoughts.

(Perhaps he is a bit afraid to let people in his life, now. Perhaps.)

Sam Wilson comes around on the 6th of January, invites over for a coffee that soon enough turns into a lunch and talks about PTSD and army veterans, about psychological help and group sessions. It seems useful, somehow, and less frightening than dealing with specialists from what used to be S.H.I.E.L.D. He keeps the list of numbers and watches Wilson walk away at the end of the meal, after having given him a small package.

There's a pair of gloves (from Steve) and a scarf (from Natalia) in it.

H

e wears everything and wanders for two more days, still doesn't go to Brooklyn, and finally lets his feet bring him to Stark Tower.

Perhaps he is ready to let people in, now.

(Natalia hugs him, briefly, and he remembers hugging a young girl a long time ago, under the Eiffel Tower. Clint shakes his hand – again – and so does Stark, after some hesitation. He meets the rest of the Avengers, minus Thor but with Pepper Potts, and shakes hands with Sam Wilson too. He stays silent and still in front of Steve for what feels like a long time before pulling him for a hug, too, and now he is sure.)

(He is home, in the end, and he doesn't have to go on alone.)