Hear my words, spider: your Soldier is alive.
When she listened to those words, holding her breath, Natasha Romanoff could no longer maintain the appearance of a levelheaded professional with a strong poker face. She thought she would be happy to finally hear this from someone, anyone really, but that was just the thing with always looking for people and hoping without seeing any actual results: you start to expect bad news every time anyone tells you they have news and you don't know what's real anymore. She almost slapped the other person. You're fucking with me. What do you think this is, some kind of sick April Fool's joke?
The informant only smiled patiently. Darling, don't be so venomous. Why would I lie? I still owe you a debt for helping me escape from Russia.
This was true; the other person was not lying. Then there was only one thing Natasha needed to do: she needed to see the Winter Soldier with her own eyes. She took on additional work, choosing missions where she knew the Soviets and the Winter Soldier would be involved. In the past six months, she would return from each one bloodied, exhausted, and near death, but when the other concerned Avengers, especially Steve Rogers and Clint Barton, asked her if she was okay, she always nodded. She couldn't worry about her own recovery; she needed to keep looking. Whatever Natasha was feeling, she had never forgotten her promise to the Winter Soldier: she would always find him. She would always come back for him.
Unfortunately, without her knowledge, Steve Rogers had been selected by the other Avengers to be her de facto bodyguard and she was forced to let him accompany her on the latest mission, where they both managed to get close enough to the Winter Soldier. This was the first time she learned that Steve not only recognized the Winter Soldier, but her assassin was his fallen brother, Bucky Barnes. But she wasn't surprised when the Winter Soldier recognized neither of them and didn't react to Steve's name for him.
She wasn't surprised that he remembered nothing at all.
