The Winter Soldier felt more than lost after he dragged the man who claimed to know him for his entire life from the Potomac. Like the ghost he was known to be, he disappeared into nothingness in an attempt to recover from his injuries and recover who he really was. With HYDRA scattered and disorganized for the time being, he was left alone to his own devices but he was not without the basic knowledge on how to survive in today's age. Going to ground for a time, his dislocated shoulder was allowed to mend. His bionic arm as still functional, thankfully. With his handlers dead or in hiding, he realized for the first time he was free and beholden to no one. Desperately wanting answers he went in search for them. Who was he and what had happened to him to make him thus, he wondered.
It was mere happenstance that he saw a billboard with Captain America's name plastered on it, claiming that the hero had his own display at the Smithsonian. He decided quickly, after assessing the risk involved in such a visit, that it was a risk worth taking if it answered even a few of his questions. He would need different clothing though and while he had found an old Army coat he needed a way to cover his hair still. Making his way to a gas station he found the bathroom and cleaned up a little, knowing that he needed to look a bit more presentable if he wanted to go unnoticed. On his way out, a man had left his baseball cap sitting on a shelf and he quickly palmed it, slipping quietly out the door.
The nice thing about Washington DC was that the museums were free for anyone wanting to visit but he still didn't want to walk through the security that they had set up. Slipping in through a service door to avoid the need to interface with anyone directly, he walked into the Smithsonian. It was almost overwhelming with all the displays, videos and sound bites that played at each display. Making his way over to Captain America's display, he watched and listened intently at every little detail he could glean from it, memories of his childhood flooded his mind in no discernible order. Finally he came to his own display and while the image before him looked like him it felt surreal as though he was looking at someone else. The information there seemed distant and foreign, making no sense to him whatsoever. It was like his mind was blocking every part of what he read and it infuriated him to no end. Even his name, James Buchanan Barnes, felt foreign to him. He cursed quietly to himself. He wasn't a fucking hero. He was no one and certainly not a hero.
Gritting his teeth, he walked out, feeling more frustrated than when he went in. He played out the events that led up to HYDRA's fall in his mind once more, recalling a red haired woman that he had shot. He sat down on a park bench and rubbed his eyes as though it would somehow clear his inner vision somehow. The woman's fighting style seemed…familiar to him. If felt like he was fighting someone he knew. The more the thought on it he realized she fought very much like he did. Lifting the baseball cap, he ran his fingers through his hair and replaced the ball cap back on his head as he thought about his next move. He wanted answers and given that he only spoke Russian to his handlers, he decided that he needed to go to Russia. He wasn't even certain where he needed to go. Only that once he was there he felt certain he would instinctively find his way.
Unable to sleep and too restless to stay in the subway tunnels any longer, he soon found shelter at one of the smaller HYDRA bases he remembered that was hidden in an unobtrusive building right in the middle of DC. He vaguely recalled having been there before. The building was abandoned now, but not empty and shelter was not the only thing he found there. After spending a couple of hours wandering through the cold and empty corridors he found himself in a small room resembling an office of sorts. Something inside of him recoiled at the thought of rifling through the drawers. He forced himself to do just that and actually found several passports; most of which had nothing to do with him, but there was also one obviously meant for him.
It was a Russian passport, issued to someone named 'Petrov'. This name even sounded familiar, he thought, as he stared at his own picture, and since there was no one he could ask perhaps this was a clue he should follow. He knew he understood Russian, and now he even had a passport. Somehow it felt like he had a new mission, something to cling to that felt familiar. Clutching the passport tightly, he rummaged through the remaining rooms, finding a shower and clean clothes as well as some Russian rubles and US dollars that was tucked in a drawer. After a shower and a save he pulled his hair back with a rubber band to get it out of his face. Assessing himself in the mirror he sighed and glanced at the passport picture to see if it was passable. Deciding it was, he left the remains of his combat vest and clothing on the floor and dressed in the jeans and sweatshirt and jacket he had found. Time to go, he decided as he caught a cab to the airport, using some of the money he had found.