A/N: Please read chapter two of "Reclamation" before reading this one-shot. This one is actually my personal favorite, probably because this scene was the first I thought of before I even began this series. I hope you enjoy it!

Reset (2012)

Steve had expected September first to be difficult, but he honestly had no idea how hard it would be to wake up and get ready for the journey to Hogwarts until his eyes opened that morning.

Nothing felt right—it hadn't in three years—and the same familiar sensation of something missing descended upon him the moment he woke up. He knew what it was, of course; he'd known it since the first day of his fourth year when he boarded the Hogwarts Express and his best friend never arrived. It wasn't really like he had expected Bucky to show up—by that point, everyone knew where he had gone and why. There was still that tiny part of him, however, that held out hope that maybe he would come back, that maybe Hogwarts was deemed safe enough for him to return while the rest of his family remained in hiding. It had been a spark that was extinguished the moment the whistle blew to signal the train was leaving the station, but that didn't stop it from reigniting at the start of his fifth year only to be doused once more.

This time was different. This time not even that tiny shred of something like hope would exist because it wasn't possible. Bucky had been gone for a few weeks now and was less likely to magically appear on the train than it was that Phillips would be the same surly asshole as usual. The chunk of Steve's heart where Bucky had always resided wasn't just aching anymore—it had been cut out and thrown somewhere Steve wouldn't be able to reach until he discovered for himself what came after death.

So, with a heavy sigh, he hauled himself out of bed and got dressed in the jeans and T-shirt his mom had laid out for him the night before since he couldn't be bothered to. He mechanically brushed his teeth and ate the waffles his mom had waiting even though they tasted like tar and made him want to gag. He couldn't even be sure whether it was just him or the food—he wouldn't tell her this, but his mother's cooking had taken a decided dip in quality ever since they'd gotten the news, and there had been a lot of take-out this summer as a result.

When it was time to leave, Steve paused in the entryway, his eyes automatically drawn to the black frame buried in the middle of all their memories. The whole family was there—his and Bucky's combined—so happy and so very ignorant. It hadn't even been four years ago yet, but it seemed like so much longer; the old man he felt like now was far removed from the little boys grinning up at him. Bucky's dark brown hair flopped down into his face; the boy in the picture kept shaking it out of his eyes, laughing as Winter swatted a paw at it.

Steve tried desperately to sear that image into his head, just as he'd done pretty much every day since the funeral, to no avail. The memory of Bucky's smile always dissolved into the recollection of his unsure expression as he'd followed Professor May to Fury's office for the last time or the charred remains that had haunted Steve's dreams for weeks. It didn't stop him from trying, though, and Steve took one final look at the happy family they used to be before heading back into the living room where his mother was waiting.

"I'm just saying, the fur's a little much."

Rolling her eyes, Peggy observed, "When you go to school practically in the Arctic, what do you think they're going to wear?"

"I get that, I do," Sam replied with a shake of his head. "But seriously, this is Hogwarts, not whatever ice castle they had."

Steve smirked slightly, glancing over at the group of Durmstrangs Sam had started the conversation by pointing out. He saw Sam's point, but it appeared that old habits died hard. After all, he wasn't sure they had even gotten Hogwarts robes; this new arrangement had only just happened, so it wasn't like they would have had much time to prepare. They'd probably be stifling once they actually got to Hogwarts, although maybe that would do something to thaw the cold expressions they wore as they observed the Hogwarts students gathering along the platform. It wasn't that Steve expected them to jump right in and integrate themselves—no one did that unless they were unbelievably friendly or wanted something from you—but they didn't need to stand along the brick wall looking like they were waiting to be torn limb from limb either.

As Sam and Peggy continued to trade barbs, Steve let his mind wander. It wasn't as though he could focus on the conversation anyway, not when every little thing reminded him of the hole in his chest aching to be filled. Voices swam through his head, only they weren't the ones in the here and now. A constant flow of conversation rose in the empty spaces around them—journalists calling for stories, shared looks between a put-out father and a sympathetic friend, unspoken aggravation, bittersweet farewells between siblings—ghosts of the past that would never truly be gone from the place, at least not for Steve.

"—ow they play Quidditch in those things," Sam was musing when Steve eventually tuned back into the conversation, reluctantly forcing the specters aside for now.

"I assume in very much the same way you do," joked Peggy with a smirk.

Sam snorted. "It would totally throw the weight off, though."

"Not like you'd be playing Quidditch at all if it was that cold," Steve jabbed. It was an ill-kept secret that Sam was not into flying around in the cold—he loved flying, but…

"Something about your balls freezing to your broom just doesn't interest me," he exclaimed for the millionth time since he made the Quidditch team. It was a sentiment Bucky had shared.

Sam shoved Steve hard in the shoulder, propelling all three of them into laughter. If Steve's was a little more strained than usual, neither of them said a word about it; Sam was kind enough to avert his eyes and Peggy simply laced their fingers together with a reassuring squeeze. Steve managed a quick smile in return before his attention was caught by a sudden movement of scarlet in the corner of his eye. Glancing over, he almost wrote the guy off as just another Durmstrang—then Steve saw the pair of big round cat eyes zeroed in on him over a red-clad shoulder. Steve frowned and began to turn—

"Steve? We should go find your mum."

Peggy's gentle suggestion broke through the static that he hadn't realized made the rest of the world go fuzzy, and Steve shot her a startled look before whipping back around.

The boy and the cat were nowhere to be seen.

"You all right, man?" inquired Sam with a frown of concern creasing his forehead. Steve didn't answer at first, his eyes glued to the spot where he could have sworn he saw them. He let his gaze sweep over the surrounding area, but he didn't catch a glimpse of red robes or pink-orange eyes. Swallowing hard, he tore his attention away and offered a tense smile.

"Yeah," he murmured. "Just thought I saw someone."

Those eyes were still haunting Steve as he stretched out in the compartment, allowing the light conversation to flow around him as they traveled further away from London. It had been difficult to leave when he could see what it cost his mom to let him go, but she practically pushed him onto the train with promises that she was going to be just fine. He swore he would write every day, which seemed to soften the stern lines around her mouth a bit, and he hoped that would be enough. For both of them.

When he met up with the rest of his friends in the compartment, it was to find that none of them really had much to say at first either. They felt Bucky's absence the same as he did this year, and conversation in the face of their grief seemed sacrilegious. Eventually they moved past it, quietly discussing what had been a fairly uneventful end of the summer for most of them, but the shadow still hovered close over all their heads.

"I would have thought the British Ministry would join the task force," sighed T'Challa with a frown. For him, the last few weeks since the funeral had been spent in the United States with his father, who was working jointly with the Magical Congress to put together a task force against Hydra and terrorist organizations like them. "This happened under their watch."

"That would mean admitting that they failed in something," responded Thor, almost unusually reserved.

"Which they did," Clint grunted. He slid lower in his seat with his arms folded across his chest as he surveyed the landscape slipping by outside the window. Out of all of them, Steve thought he might be having the hardest time—having missed the funeral, he didn't get the kind of closure the rest of them did. If it could even be called that.

"Not if you were to ask them," argued Peggy derisively. "They think they did a spiffing job. They haven't taken any responsibility for the fact that Castle and Fisk knew exactly who to ask to get what they wanted, and they're not going to. That's probably why they rushed the whole affair."

Frowning, Thor clarified, "The funeral, you mean?"

"Of course. Who in their right mind buries the bodies before the case is closed, especially if they might have evidence?"

"Look," interrupted Sam, whose eyes Steve had noticed darting between himself and Clint. "Maybe we should just leave it alone. What happened happened—arguing about it isn't going to change anything. Let's just… Let's just talk about Clint's crazy circus family, huh?"

The tension in the compartment fizzled out a bit as the others laughed. Even Clint had to grudgingly smirk at the joke when Sam jabbed him insistently with his elbow, recounting how he'd tried to do one of the tightrope tricks and ended up flat on his ass. The mood lightened considerably after that as each of them put their own two cents into the story. Steve was actually feeling a bit better for the first time that day until a sharp pain shot up his leg and he yelped, more out of shock than injury. Jerking his leg back from the open doorway, he reached down to pull up his pant leg only to get a face full of—

"What the…?"

Steve knew his mouth was hanging open as he pulled the cat back and stared, blinking stupidly. The black cat—with her white left paw and folded over ears and pink-orange eyes—meowed in his face. When he showed no signs of moving, she batted her paws at him to smack his nose. That snapped Steve out of his stupor enough to look around at his friends, unable to ask the question he really wanted to: are you seeing this?

Across the compartment, Clint was sitting ramrod straight with narrowed eyes as he surveyed the new arrival, his mouth opening and closing a few times as if he wanted to verbalize Steve's thoughts. The others were frozen in similar states of confusion and alarm, all their gazes locked on the cat that continued trying to goad Steve into pulling her closer.

Which he did. Whether it was a trick of the light or really just the luck they had come to expect in their lives this summer, Steve couldn't not hug her close to his chest like she belonged there. The cat seemed to feel the same, purring contentedly and nuzzling his chin before making her best effort to smother him with cuddles. It took him back to another time—to being an eleven-year-old kid in Gryffindor Tower and waking up to find Winter asleep on his face. It didn't help the illusion that she even smelled the same…

After an immeasurable moment, Steve pulled her back just enough to hug the cat tightly in his arms, letting her chew his fingers the same way Winter used to as he tried to find something—anything—about this creature that wasn't identical. All around him, his friends were speaking in hushed whispers as if the cat were a ghoul that might vanish at the slightest provocation.

"It can't be…"

"Did they say anything about finding Winter?"

"It wouldn't matter—Fiendfyre would have destroyed anything that was left."

"Hey, they found his family. They should've found her."

"Even if they did, how on earth would she have gotten here?"

They didn't have time to ponder the answer before they were interrupted by the abrupt arrival of the red-robed boy from the platform, startling them all into silence.

Only Steve felt like he'd been struck by lightning.

He couldn't explain it. It made no sense—something just…clicked the moment their eyes met over the furry ball of fluff in Steve's arms. He'd never met the Durmstrang before, nor had he seen him before today, but there was something familiar about him that sent a stabbing pain of something through the center of Steve's heart. He just couldn't put his finger on what it meant.

For whatever reason, it appeared that the Durmstrang felt much the same way. His gaze never once left Steve's face, not even to return the looks he was getting from the other inhabitants of the compartment, and his gaping was just as noticeable as Steve's.

Does he feel it too? Whatever it is?

Steve struggled to open his mouth and say something when another Durmstrang barged in, pushing herself through the now crowded doorway while asking something in what Steve assumed was Russian. The boy didn't answer.

"This your cat?" inquired Sam in his most obvious Something's Fucking Wrong Here voice. Steve couldn't help tightening his grip on Winter—not Winter, he chided himself, the cat—in his arms, not quite ready to relinquish her yet. He got a cold little nose to the cheek for his trouble, so he figured it was all right with his new friend.

The girl, whose red hair clashed brilliantly with her robes, shot her companion a look before switching to English to reply, "Sorry, Yasha doesn't speak much English, but yes, that is his cat."

Based on the pointed quality of her assertion, Steve assumed his time was up and stood from his seat reluctantly. For some reason, Yasha's eyes grew even wider for a moment and he stayed rigidly rooted to the spot. No one else in the compartment said a word as Steve stepped up to him, Yasha extending a hand after a long moment of their continued staring contest. The cat meowed at the sight of her owner, the sound much louder than it should have been in the silence falling heavily around them, and Steve hesitantly held her out for Yasha to take.

The look of relief on Yasha's face was potent as he plucked the cat into his own arms and buried his nose in her fur with a sigh. It almost made Steve feel bad about not wanting to give her back—almost. Could he really be blamed, though, for wishing that there was just one link left to his best friend?

He took it as a sign from whatever higher power there was that the answer was a resounding no when the cat started pawing at Yasha's arm, which Steve hadn't noticed until that moment was hidden behind his leg where no one could see it.

Yasha remained still for a moment, a strange look on his face as his eyes once again met Steve's, but eventually his pet's insistence won out.

When he handed her a familiar stuffed monkey, Steve honestly thought he was going insane.

Maybe it was the fact that the cat looked so much like Winter. Maybe it was the strange sensation Steve got in his gut looking at Yasha. Maybe it was just the fact that it was September first and he was missing his best friend more than words could describe.

Whatever it was, Steve found his mouth opening, Bucky's name coming unbidden to the tip of his tongue—

When Yasha blurted out something and took off like every demon in Hell was on his tail.

Steve took a few aborted steps forward before he found himself face to face with the redhead, who was still standing in the doorway and staring after Yasha with an inscrutable expression on her face. When she turned back to them, she pasted an awkward smile into place.

"He said thanks," she translated with a shrug. "Sorry, he is not usually like that."

"Is he all right?" asked T'Challa quietly from somewhere behind Steve.

The redhead nodded, her smile growing a bit more genuine. "It was just a…really long summer, that's all. Anyway, thank you. I don't know what he would have done if he had lost her."

Apparently it was Steve's turn to talk, although he found it rather difficult to form the words. After a pregnant pause, he managed to reply, "Didn't do much, but my pleasure."

With a wave of farewell, the Durmstrang took her leave, presumably to follow Yasha back to their own compartment. She seemed nice enough and, if she was to be believed, Yasha was probably a nice guy as well. It really wasn't their fault that they left Steve feeling like he'd been run over by a pack of wild centaurs. It wasn't their fault that he couldn't get those brown eyes out of his head long after they'd left, when his friends exhausted the subject enough to turn to something else.

It wasn't their fault that those brown eyes haunted him as he defended Yasha on the platform, or that Yasha sounded so much like someone else when he spoke to Steve for the first time.

It wasn't their fault that those brown eyes felt like they were watching him as he argued with Sam and Peggy over the whole thing and whether maybe, just maybe…

It wasn't their fault that brown eyes haunted his dreams alongside grey ones that night.