Author's Notes: Hellooo! Welcome back. I'm super excited for this chapter. Our favorite soviet spies are making some realizations, and it's so much fun. The feels alone . . .

Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel. Seriously. I'd be writing scripts and making this canon if I did.

Chapter 10: Past

The Soldat had been gone on a mission for over two weeks, and Natalia missed him.

She didn't realize it, at first. She'd never had anyone to miss before this moment, and so she didn't immediately comprehend her discontent as having anything to do with her missing Soldat. Her days were much the same, but they lacked the anticipation she had foolishly come to relish along with the excitement, the vitality, and the clandestine nature of their friendship. All of it had been replaced with boring routine and an absolutely boorish brute of a replacement combat instructor that Natalia made an utter fool of the first day by trapping him between her thighs and throwing him to the mats within a minute.

She was punished for her cheek, but the look of embarrassed fury on the oaf's face had been worth it, along with the pleased glint in the Madame's eyes.

It was only when her time came and went for her usual session with the Soldat that she realized the crushing disappointment she felt was due to longing—that heavy feeling in her chest that was nearly an ache. She missed him. She missed his twitchy smiles that were steadily growing broader and freer. She missed the teasing glint in his eyes when he caught her trying to sneak up on him (and he always caught her). She missed the way he pushed her in training, always setting a cruel pace that never let her rest or think. She missed being challenged.

She missed being understood.

So when she walked into her usual training with the other Widows and saw her Soldat waiting, she very nearly jumped in delight. She scanned him critically as he trained the other girls, cataloguing the stiffness in his left shoulder and the way he favored his right side. He didn't so much as glance at her until it was her turn and she stood in front of him. And he smiled. Not outwardly, but it was there in his eyes, like he was saying hello, and she let herself smirk in return before they fell into the harsh steps of a dance that she'd missed terribly.

It didn't stop her from using his apparent wound to her advantage. She targeted his right side, and only felt the slightest bit of guilt when she heard a rib crack. She wasn't worried about hurting him, particularly when he slammed her into the mats in the next few seconds. They danced until Karpov called time, and they were dismissed. She left without sparing her Soldat a glance.

That changed hours later when she returned to the room for her private lesson.

"Hey," she said. "You didn't write."

The Soldat smiled as she sashayed toward him. "Didn't know that was part of my orders."

"Well, you should have clarified."

"I won't make that mistake again."

"Good."

She stood right in front of him, so close that she had to crane her neck to meet his eyes. She'd nearly forgotten how tall he was compared to her and found the rediscovery comforting and familiar. The Soldat's hands twitched at his sides. His thoughts kept spinning in frustrating circles, all due to the bright warmth in his chest. He'd forgotten how distracting it could be. Throughout his mission he'd felt himself slipping into a familiar, disconnected state of mind that was silent and calculating, and part of him had welcomed it. It was easier, simpler.

Yet at night, he'd always fallen asleep thinking of green eyes and red hair and a low chuckle.

It was maddening and confusing as all hell, but goddammit Natalia was right in front of him, close enough for him to feel the heat of her skin just like when they'd danced, and he was . . . happy.

Natalia moved so quickly, so suddenly, that he nearly countered her attack—perhaps she'd only been distracting him for a tactical advantage—but though her arms wrapped around his neck there was nothing violent about it. She held herself close so that he felt the gentle press of her breasts against him and laid her cheek smack over his heart.

He didn't know what to do with his hands.

"It's a hug, Soldat," she said quietly with a smile as she listened to his heartbeat gallop. She wondered if he could feel hers racing just as fast. "Hug me back. That's how this works."

Some long-buried instinct rose within him, and he raised his arms. One wrapped around her waist while the other cupped the back of her head, and he unthinkingly bent his head toward hers until his lips grazed her hair and he smelled her plain lemon shampoo. A strange feeling swept through him, then. It was fierce and warm and determined. Protective.

And the Soldat knew in that moment that he'd done this before, held someone like this before, felt like this before.

He just didn't remember.

Only that made no fucking sense.

He quickly drew away from Natalia, partly in frustration and partly to clear his mind. Natalia always made his thoughts messy. "That's enough," he said. "We're here to train. There's no room for sentiment."

Natalia frowned but nodded. "Yes, Soldat," she said, in an attempt to settle him.

It worked, and they trained hard, harder than they had before he'd left. They trained like they had in the beginning, nearly three months ago now, when the Soldat had only wanted to break her like the rest, and Natalia relished every second of it because this time she held her own completely. Her back never touched the mats once, and by the end of the hour, the Soldat looked equally frustrated and equally proud. She grinned.

He huffed. "Don't get cocky, malen'kiy balerinoy."

"I wouldn't dream of it, Soldat."

The Soldat felt his lips twitch against his will. "Then what would you dream of?"

Natalia shrugged. "What do you?"

"I don't dream."

"Never?"

"Not that I remember."

"Meet me on the roof tonight."

"What?"

"The roof. Tonight. Meet me there."

"It's against the rules."

Natalia smiled. "I'm aware."

The Soldat liked her smile. Three weeks away hadn't changed that, it seemed, nor had it dulled the urge to be the reason for her smile. "You'll be punished," he said.

"Only if I'm caught. And I won't be."

He believed her. "An hour after lights out," he said. "The soldiers will be in the middle of a shift change."

He didn't want to see her punished. And as he waited for the hours to pass, cooped up in his quarters, he thought that by that logic he should have dissuaded her. Only he hadn't. He hadn't because he wanted to see her. See more of her. He wanted to talk with her and ask such trivial things. He wanted to know what she had learned while he was away, if the Red Room had sent her on a mission without him. He wanted to know her favorite book, her favorite color—such trivial, insignificant things but he wanted to know every single one. He wanted to know about her dancing, if she missed it, if she thought of their waltz as much as he did . . .

The Soldat thought of all these things rationally. It felt to him more like compiling a terribly thorough dossier so that he could better understand Natalia Romanova, the Black Widow that so plainly had him caught in her web and yet in no hurry to leave. It didn't make sense. These . . . these emotions didn't make sense. They were new and vivid and overwhelming and distracting and God help him, he soaked it all up like a sponge. Like an addict.

He felt alive. He felt like he was more.

And that goddamn warmth in his chest just kept burning brighter and brighter, like there was something inside of him scratching and clawing to get out, but he'd be damned to know what it was or what it meant.

That didn't keep him from being on the roof at the agreed time.

Natalia arrived no later than a minute after him, but didn't show herself. She stared at him, standing stalwart and strong despite the brisk wind that made his hair dance on his shoulders. She waited a moment longer, and then a small smile twisted her lips. It was a game they had begun before he'd left for his mission. Their hand to hand training had taken a turn for more subtle instruction in stealth and surveillance. Her skillset hardly made a damn bit of difference if someone was able to sneak up on her or recognize that they were being watched.

The Soldat made no move to hint that he knew of her presence. He purposefully kept himself relaxed, shoulders slacked, breaths even, a soldier at ease admiring the Moscow skyline. He didn't need to turn his head to know that Natalia was silently creeping up behind him on his left, knowing it to be his heavier (and therefore slower) side. He kept track of her by the breeze blowing the scent of her lemon shampoo toward him, and then once she was close enough, by straining his ears to listen to her heartbeat.

He smirked the moment he felt the air shift as she made to leap onto him, and said, "You've still got a lot to learn if you want to sneak up on me, Natalia."

"Dammit."

Natalia pouted and then scowled to hide what felt infuriating like a blush on her cheeks when the Soldat looked down at her with a smirk and—dare she think it—fond eyes. "You wanted to talk," he said. "What about?"

She shrugged. "Anything. What was your mission?"

"You know I can't tell you that."

"C'mon, just give me a location." She smirked up at him. "I promise I won't tell. It'll be between just you me."

And though she said it all with a devious smirk that no one in their right mind would trust, the Soldat heard a wisp of truth in her voice. Not to mention there was those three words again. You and me. He was beginning to think that it meant something totally different, he just didn't know what. "Brisbane," he said after a moment.

Natalia's eyes lit up. "Somewhere warm."

The Soldat scowled. "It was a fucking sauna."

"Aw, did you get sand in your arm?"

"I feel like you're not taking this seriously."

"Whatever gave you that impression?" She smiled teasingly but freely, rare and genuine, before plopping down to sit on the ledge of the rooftop. Her legs swung back and forth as she leant back on her hands. Concrete dug into her palms but she ignored it. "You never did answer me," she said. "At the Gala." She turned to look at the Soldat who had joined her on the ledge. "About where you're from."

It should have been a simple question, but it wasn't. During his time in Australia, entirely alone with the exception of his daily radio check-ins, the Soldat had found plenty of time to think while he surveilled his target, Marcus Kent, a bigtime gun runner who had a habit of selling to the Soviet's enemies. In the time that he wasn't learning every second of how Kent spent his days, the Soldat tried to remember. He had thought to start simple. A name.

He knew of no other title than Soldat.

And that wasn't right.

A soldat was a title, not a name. But try as he might, the Soldat could not think of any other name. He tried his date of birth next. Nothing. His parents. Nothing. Friends. Nothing. Even when he tried to remember the flashes from the Gala when he'd danced with Natalia . . . they were still hazy. Indistinct. A muffled voice. A flash of blue and red. Cold.

"You and me, right?" he demanded softly.

Natalia frowned. "Promise."

"I don't know," he admitted. "Where I'm from, any of it. I don't remember."

The Soldat was glad when Natalia did not immediately respond. Instead her brows drew together and her lips thinned. "Well, there are only two options," she said. "Either you lost your memory or someone took it."

Yes. Those were the options he had come to in Australia rather quickly. Neither left him feeling as if he had solved anything. "I don't . . ." He shook his head. "I remembered something. At the Gala."

Don't keep me waiting, sweetheart.

Natalia fought a smile just thinking about it. Glimpses into the man beneath the Soldat were fleeting, but she cherished them and hunted for them with the same tenacity with which she trained. The words had flowed so easily from his lips, and in an unmistakable Brooklyn accent. American, then. He was American.

"What did you remember?" she asked.

"None of it makes any sense," he said with a shake of his head.

"So?"

He sighed. "There's a voice. Male. I see a flash of blue and red, and it's cold."

Natalia nodded. "I can work with that." The Soldat was growing used to smiling, but he tempered the urge. "Do you think you're compromised?" Natalia asked suddenly.

He stilled. There was no edge in her tone, no predatory bite that insinuated she may report him. His mind and body railed at the notion, sending a flood of adrenaline through him. It had never distracted him before. He knew how to channel the energy into combat. He always, always chose to fight.

But in that moment, the Soldat wanted to run.

He was scared.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt scared.

"Would you report me if I was?" he challenged.

Natalia opened her mouth to answer, only to shut it when she realized that she'd meant to say that yes, she would report him. The success of the mission was paramount. Anything and anyone hindering the mission was to be neutralized. It was ingrained into her very being, it felt like. The mission always came first.

But to turn in the Soldat would mean a punishment for him. He would be taken away for certain, killed at worst. The KGB had no room for weak operatives, and the failure of their greatest asset, the Winter Soldier, would be an embarrassment they would cover up and bury deep.

Which meant that Natalia would be alone, and that thought was so abhorrent that she shuddered. To go back to such a boring, repetitive existence; to feel and hear and see and touch in a world so dull, so grey . . . it would be torture. Knowing that there was more, that she could be more . . . to lose that felt akin to death. Of herself, of everything she could be.

And it wasn't worth it.

"No," she swallowed, and for the first time since she walked into the training room and saw him standing so menacing and dark, Natalia truly realized just how much she had changed. She realized what it meant. The way her heart ached for him, the way her chest felt warm at the thought of him, the way her stomach somersaulted when he smiled, the way she smiled when he said her name. He made her laugh.

It was just like the films she had watched to learn English and so many other things. It was exactly the same.

She loved him.

The thought echoed in her head as she continued to sit quietly beside him and stare at the cityscape. She loved him. She loved him. She hated the way her heart seemed to sing and her blood pulsed in her veins. Like a celebration, like a victory. She supposed it was, in a way. She was meant to be a Black Widow. She was meant to be above such petty sentiment.

But she loved her Soldat.

And she didn't feel weaker. She just felt . . . more complicated. And complexity, surely, would work in her favor. The ability to think, to understand—not just to deduce and rationalize, but to truly understand, to empathize—surely that worked in her favor. It was knowledge that the other Widows were not privy to, emotions and thoughts and feelings that they were incapable of understanding and therefore unable to fully manipulate. They would always underestimate.

Natalia would not.

She glanced at her Soldat. He sat hunched, his metal arm resting heavily on his thigh. His hair fell to obscure most of his face, but his sharp jaw could not be hidden entirely. She wanted to trace it with her fingers, feel his stubble beneath her fingertips. But it wasn't the right time. She could see that. Her Soldat had far more important things to understand.

First, who the hell was he?

"So," she said. "Where do we start?"

Her Soldat hummed. "Start?"

"On your memory, of course."

He studied her, confused and cautiously hopeful. It felt . . . comforting to think that he wouldn't be alone. "You'd help?"

"Just you and me, right?"

He gave her a little smile. "Right."

Natalia ignored the way her heart soared. Oh, those words had such a different meaning now. "So," she said. "Where do we start? What do you want to know most?"

Her Soldat looked down at his metal arm and then at the city lights. "My name," he said. "I want to know my name."

Shit's getting real, y'all. He wants to know his name.

I know I've been skimping on chapter previews, so here's a line from the next chapter: Natasha! "We may be assassins, but we're still civilized."

See you Friday,

AC