AN: Okay, to the reviewer who said "stop the Bucky bashing," I have several things to say! First of all: this is my story and I will continue to choose how the characters act and develop. Secondly, please stick around and keep reading because, as I have been alluding for several chapters, Bucky's story does not end with the actions he did while brainwashed and under the control of the Red Room. Thirdly, I am NOT bashing Bucky's character. As you should know from reading the chapters thus far, his character was being controlled by the Red Room - which Natasha EXPLICITLY states and Steve corroborates that this is not typical of his friend. I would encourage you to go re-read the past 5-10 chapters if you happened to have missed that part because you really are missing some important points of the plot! Also, read this chapter closely because the beginning of his redemption arc was about to start :)

T/W: Talk of suicide, plus all normal T/Ws

When they arrived at SHIELD that afternoon, Natasha would not even make eye contact with Clint from across the room and carefully chose seats that were the furthest from his, while Tony sat protectively next to her and glared daggers at the archer.

"Now, what in the hell could be so important, Stark?" Fury said, slamming the door open as he entered the room. "I swear if this is another of your…" His sentence trailed off as he saw Natasha sitting next to him and Clint across the table.

"I want you to tell me about the other Widow that you had at SHIELD. I want a name, all of the photos you have, the note she left me, where she went and is now, and anything else you know. I also want to know how you got her here and what you're planning to do with me."

"Really, Stark? Couldn't even last a day?"

"She deserves to know the truth."

"She can't handle the truth."

"I am sick," she fumed. "Of all of you men making my decisions for me. I get to decide what I can handle and if you do not tell me what I want to know, I will have all of SHIELD's files released on the dark web in a matter of minutes. This whole organization will go down with me if you keep refusing to give me what I want, so you had better choose your next words carefully."

Clint let out a small laugh, smirking and playing with a pocket knife by flicking it open and shut repeatedly. "Now there's the Natasha we all know and love."

"Alright," Fury concedes. "You are a dangerous woman, Miss Romanoff."

"So I've been told."

"A few years before we sent Barton to kill you in Budapest, we received intelligence from an agent in Russia that there was movement outside of a compound we had been tracking for years. At the time, we had suspected it was a sleeper cell of Hydra, so we sent a team to investigate and brought back a wounded woman, about your age who identified herself after 3 days as 'Sasha.'" Natasha could feel her chest caving into itself as he displayed a picture on the wall in front of them. A beautiful girl with long, brown hair falling in waves around her shoulders and down to her elbows; she had bruises covering her face and a bandage wrapped around the top of her head, but from her small green eyes to the unmistakable birthmark on the left side of her neck, there was no mistaking this girl. It was the one Natasha had killed years earlier. Or maybe she hadn't because the girl in this photo, although sad, was clearly alive from the hand at the edge of the frame, blurred by motion. She steadied herself by pushing the palms of her hands into the arms of the chair and biting her lower lip while taking a deep breath.

"Is that her?" Tony asked next to her and she simply nodded her head, not trusting her voice to speak without shaking.

"At first, she was very forthcoming with information so that we would offer her protection, but she had sustained some brain damage and, beyond that, our psychologists and therapists were astounded at the amount and severity of trauma she had faced. She had experienced every form of torture imaginable, been assaulted in every way, and had undergone years of malnourishment, bodily injuries, and manipulation." Both Clint and Tony exchanged a knowing glance, recalling where the Widow had ended up and Natasha's experiences. Another photo flashed on the screen, showing the same girl with no head wrap or bruises, speaking to a woman in a small room. Sasha was perched on the edge of a seat across from a SHIELD therapist and appeared to be holding something in her hands which were, again, blurred by apparent movement. "We did everything we could to help her recover. Physically, she had healed from most of her injuries and only had minor impairments in motor function and speech. But the damage she sustained in the Red Room was.. irreparable. After a few months in our care, she hung herself with bedsheets and all that remained were the belongings she had accumulated in the months she spent here and two notes. One was addressed to SHIELD, the other to you."

"What did the SHIELD note say?" She tried to ignore the hot stinging of tears in her throat, and the words came out thicker than intended.

He skipped over a photo of the suicide scene, opting to not show Natasha her friend hanging from the ceiling fan with a broken neck.

"It was a short letter, translated from Russian as her English had been somewhat lost in the brain damage and she had found it more difficult to use. She gave us details about how to track when Widows were entering and exiting the Program Headquarters, as well as the nature of your missions, how to obtain a Widow, and your name and description. She wanted us to save you, no matter what, and apologized that she wouldn't be here to see you herself. After doing some research, Agent Barton was sent to kill you because three previous attempts to obtain you following her guidance proved to fail and we simply could not afford to lose the kind of intelligence you were gaining for the Red Room."

"Where is the note she left for me?"

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Tony asked gently from beside her.

"It's from her and she left it for me. I need to know what happened and I need to know whatever she wanted to tell me, but couldn't stay alive long enough for."

"I'll go with you," he replies shortly and she just nods her head in response, sharply grabbing the letter from Nick's hand and walking out of the room.

When they arrived in the room next door where she had fallen asleep before, she sat on the couch and began to tear at the corners of the sealed envelope. She had made a makeshift seal that would be difficult to redo with a marker, rubber band, and glue, so Natasha was relatively certain it had not been opened. A small piece of paper fell to the floor as she opened her letter.

To my sister Natasha,

I am so sorry that I will not be here to tell you these things in person. Please understand that I held on as long as I could, but I could not live with the possibility of being found and sent back to that awful place once I understood how the outside world truly is. It is beautiful and you will love it. I can imagine you now, listening to the beautiful songs I have heard and forming a friendship like the ones I have made here. No one here truly understands, but it does feel less lonely sometimes and I hope you will find the ability to trust people here, knowing that they will not hurt you for such a transgression as being kind to one another.

I hope you find love and happiness, as I have known in my short time here. The night that they forced you to shoot me is one I think of frequently, and I think of what an amazing friend you were to have tried to find a solution for us both to live or die together. Truthfully, I turned myself in so that you might live and, if you are reading this, I suppose it worked even though they failed to kill me. I had help, though. In the Red Room, I met a man. At first, he was sent to me, or rather, I was sent to him as a reward. They had given him some sort of drug, I could tell by the markings on his good arm and he forced himself onto me rather violently. But in the morning when we woke, he had barricaded the door and taken down the camera and microphones. He wanted to escape desperately and wanted no part of what he had done. Natasha, he apologized more times than I can count and I could see the hatred of himself on his face as I told him what he had done to me and probably others. I hope you did not meet him in this way, but my stomach tells me you did. His real name was Bucky, or at least that's what he wanted me to call him as a friend. He was the one who took me outside that night and placed me where he knew someone would notice me moving. I'm still not sure how he avoided his dose that night or why he chose to save me instead of running away. Maybe I'll never know.

He is a good man, I can tell. I hope you can save him if they save you. Lastly, my dearest sister, I want to tell you what I have struggled to learn myself. We were good people and it was the Red Room that made us do bad things: you, me, and Bucky. It is not our fault, it is theirs. There may be some things you can never forgive yourself for, I know I have plenty of red in my ledger. But you can heal here and you will be safe. Find people who make you feel safe and hold them tightly. Help save Bucky, if you can. He deserves better than what they gave us. Forgive yourself. And know that even if you can't, I forgive you for everything you did because you deserve to live a beautiful and happy life. You won't heal overnight. But you will find your way out of the darkness if you look for people that feel like sunlight.

Please find my sister and tell her I loved her with every ounce of my being. The extra letter in this envelope is hers.

My heart has always loved you.

Sasha