2014, Washington D.C. Safehouse:

Steve knocked on the safe house door twice, then again three times, and stood there for a minute while he waited for Natasha to verify on the security cameras that it was really him. The door opened to the tired-looking redhead the expected minute later, and they smiled bleakly at each other for a moment before she stepped aside and let him in.

"Hey, Steve. What can I help you with?" she asked, quiet but earnest, and he smiled again.

"Hey, Nat. I..." He shook his head a little, and laughed tiredly, lifting a hand to rub the back of his neck. He shook his head. "It's crazy. It's impossible. But I thought if anyone I trusted would know, it would be you," he said, and reached into his back jeans pocket to pull out his compass. Her eyebrows rose slightly, but as he flicked it open and turned it around to face her, her face paled. Steve frowned, the words he'd been about to say lost. "Natasha? What is it?"

She opened her mouth a little, closed it, then opened it again, eyes flicking from him to the compass and back again. "Who is that, Steve?" She asked finally, though her voice was not the usual steadfast-steel he was used to; her voice was worried. They stared at each other for a long moment before Steve's eyes fell to the compass again, and he tilted it so he could see inside. The picture within was a shot taken at the pub in London they'd all frequented before it had been blown up, an image of three people standing in front of the bar. A man on the left, his arm wrapped around the waist of the woman in the middle, whose arm was slung around the shoulder of the taller, dark-haired woman on the right. All three were smiling at the camera. Bucky and Kat and Peggy. One of the few times they'd all been in one place.

"That's Katherine Lewis," he said, knowing that Natasha was well-versed on who Bucky and Peggy were, and looked back at her. Her eyebrows were drawn tightly together. "She... Bucky and I..." He took a breath. He wasn't used to talking about them to anybody. About their relationship together. Sam had gotten the gist, but there had been a little stammering before Steve had managed to make the arrangement clear. Nat seemed to know what he meant, though, by the way her eyes had lifted from the compass to stare at him.

"Not to be that girl, Steve, but you could have told me this before I tried to set you up with half of S.H.I.E.L.D.," she said dryly, and he chuckled awkwardly.

"Yeah, well, after a while I thought maybe I should move on. And then Bucky appeared. And... I visited Peggy earlier. Peggy says she saw Kat in the 1950s. I checked the files you dumped online, and I found the report Peggy wrote. She saw Kat eight years after she disappeared. The report mentions that Kat didn't look a day over 25. And I think-"

"You think maybe she's still alive. Well, Steve, I've got news for you on that front," Natasha said amusedly, though she looked a little shell-shocked, and her voice carried just a tint of it. "That woman trained me in Russia in 2000. She was a temporary mentor. Brought in for a year to give us.. Something impossible to fight, to learn from. But Steve..." She didn't sound amused anymore. "She was... very obviously brainwashed. She didn't have a name and didn't respond to anything other than what we were told to call her; Soldat. Soldier. When the year was over, they came for her, and she went quietly. To where, I don't know. But I never saw her again."

Steve closed the compass after one last glance, slipping it back into his pocket, and he lifted a hand to rub his eyes. "That's... They made her into a Winter Soldier, just like Bucky. Metal arm and all, if Peggy's report is to be believed. Did she-"

"Yeah, Steve, she did," Nat supplied wearily, and Steve nodded, swallowing, and looked down.

"I need to know more. She didn't appear to deal with me when Bucky did, so either she's on ice, or she's somewhere else, or she's... or she's dead. I know I already called in my favor for Bucky, Nat, but..." he trailed off a little, and Nat shook her head slightly.

"No, Steve. I owe you more than the one favor. And we're.. Friends. So, favors be damned. Yeah, I'll start looking. If it's not hidden in S.H.I.E.L.D.s files, maybe I can pull some strings with a few old colleagues." She reached out to touch his arm reassuringly for a moment, the earlier lapse of self control gone, calm and collected again. "We'll find out what happened. And Steve..."

He raised his eyebrows slightly. "What?"

"If you know any more Winter Soldiers, now is the time to tell me," she said, and they both broke into weak chuckles for a moment.

"I think those are the only two," he smirked, and she nodded, smiling.

"Alright. Good. You have my cell. I'll call you if I find out anything. Now go get some sleep and let me get my own, hm?" She replied, raising her eyebrows expectantly, and he smiled a little wider, backing up towards the door.

"Alright. Thanks, Nat. Goodnight." He opened the door, and she stepped forward to take up grabbing it as he stepped out into the hall.

"Goodnight, Rogers," she smiled, and as he walked off, gently shut the door behind him.

A/N

Last chapter for tonight, guys! Thanks for reading! Love to hear comments!