Remember Me

Chapter 6

A few days have passed after the incident and Natasha still hasn't seen Bucky. She's nervous. Will he recognize her? At least he did earlier, he called her Natalia, maybe she can make him recognize her but she doesn't want to push it not knowing how he would react.

"Only one way to find out..." She mutters to herself. Steve looks up at Natasha. "What?" Steve utters.

Natasha leaves Steve behind in the room with the one way mirror and walks up to the door to enter Bucky's room. Before she enters she sighs, trying to build up some courage. Come on Nat, you're never nervous, it's now or never.

She turns the knob and enters the room. She sees Bucky looking up to her with a surprises look.

"Hey" she softly says.

"Hey" Bucky replies.

"I heard you were doing fine. Any memories coming back?"

He is hesitant to answer her question. He never spoke to her before, and he's not sure why she's here. Could she be worries? Or maybe just assessing him is he's still dangerous. There's something familiar about this. "Yeah, a lot actually. Mostly bad memories. I'm trying to find out if they are false memories HYDRA put in there, or real memories. Slowly some memories makes more sense than others." He rubs his eyes. "How are you doing? I didn't hurt you did I?"

Natasha shakes her head as she softly touches her neck where finger-shaped-bruises have formed and a bandage is covering a cut. "Not really, I've been through much worse." She gives him a soft smile. "Did Steve show you the picture again? Maybe you recognize the person now?" She pulls the picture from the pocket inside her jacket and hands it over to Bucky.

"Yeah, I do remember this guy. He is the son of someone.. The name is a blur. He was the leader of some Russian group. It's on the tip of my tongue." He squints at the picture. "Dreykov... The son of a General called Dreykov."

Natasha startles at that name. "The KGB?" she asks.

"Yeah, that's him." Bucky looks up. "Wait, the KGB? But that is where you.."

Natasha interrupts him and rolls her eyes. "Yes, yes I know.." she starts pacing up and down the room.

Bucky now noticed the white bandage on her neck. He walks up to Natasha and stops her from pacing. He looks at her, she still looks down, thinking about Dreykov. Bucky lifts her head with his thumb on her chin and turns her head to the side. He sees the blood leaking through the bandage. "I did that. I'm so sorry."

He touches her neck softly. Natasha turns her face to Bucky. Just after a few seconds they notice their faces are just inches from each other. They stare in each other's eyes. Natasha sees his blue eyes light up. It's like he is remembering her. All she wanted is to crash her lips into his, but Bucky lets her chin go and steps back, confused about this feelings and not knowing why he did that.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me. I hope you have enough information about this Dreykov so you can find him."

She can't believe he was that close to her and he still didn't recognizes the person he met years earlier. The butterflies start fluttering wild in her stomach and she needs a few seconds to snap back to reality. She tries to change the subject.

"Your memories... Do you remember something else? Maybe something positive?"

He looks at Natasha, insulted. "Nothing during the reign of HYDRA was positive." His fists clenched so tight his skin turns white around his knuckles. He knows he is lying. He can remember something positive. He's just not sure if it's a false memory or not.

"I'll leave you then. Get some rest." Natasha turns on her heal and leaves the room. After she shuts the door she leans her back into the door and sighs. "Goddamn Dreykov."

She almost bumps into Steve in the hallway. "What was that?" Natasha remembers he was in the room with the mirror. "What was what?" She asks like nothing happened.

"You had a moment." Steve utters.

"Please stop it. Nothing happened." Natasha replies. "He got me the name of our guy." She holds up the picture, pointing at the mystery guy. "Dreykov. Come let's do some research"

* * *

After a few hours of research they find out that the son of this general is called Egor Dreykov. He followed in his father's footsteps and is a sympathizer of HYRDA. They could not find a lot of information about him, he's like a ghost. No record, no arrests, not even a speeding ticket. He has a lot of henchmen who do all the dirty work for him.

"We need to think of a plan to find this guy." Steve says.

"Or..." Natasha replies. "We know he is looking for Barnes.. Maybe we just wait him out? He will end up here sometime soon."

Steve disagrees. "No. We won't use Bucky as bait. We already let him go through this. And I don't think he will agree."

"Why not?" Bucky is standing in the opening of the door. Steve and Natasha turn in their chairs with a surprised look in their eyes.

"You would do that?" Steve asks.

"I'm awake now, why not have some action in the mean time?" Bucky leans into the doorframe. "I feel fine. Refreshed. Like I just woke up from a nap."

Natasha squints her eyes. "Are you sure..? Or.. did you hit your head..?"

"What? No! I do remember a lot of things, but nothing I can't handle." Bucky smiles a soft smile. "Also, Nakia has a brand new arm made for me. I'm heading out to get it fixed. Want to tag along?"

Steve and Natasha are surprised by Bucky's positive behaviour. It's like nothing has happened.

"Sure, we'll tag along."

The three enter a laboratory to find Nakia there. "There he is, ready for your new arm?"

Bucky nods.

"Take a seat." She points at the examination table. Bucky sits down on the table and grabs the back of his shirt to pull the t-shirt over his head. Natasha gasps softly as she glares down over his exposed upper body. As she is staring at his sculpted muscles she just hope the guys don't notice.

Nakia removes the black cloth from his shoulder. The metal remaining in his shoulder looks different then he can remember. Last time he looked at it, it was freshly disintegrated by Tony. Cables and other shit was dangling from it. It didn't hurt back then but it just felt weird. Nakia must have worked on his shoulder when he was in his cryogenic state. His scars are almost healed and the transition from flesh to metal is much nicer, neater somehow.

"I'm impressed. Did you fix this?" he asks Nakia.

"Yes I did. I had some time to experiment... uhm I mean work... on your shoulder." She quickly changes the subject. "It's actually very user-friendly your new bionic arm. It has sensors that connect to your new shoulder implant. Let me show you."

Nakia takes the bionic arm and turns it toward Bucky's shoulder. Both his shoulder and arm react to each other. Mechanical pieces start to move and before he knows the arm attaches itself to his shoulder with a mechanical sound.

"Amazing..." Bucky moves his new bionic fingers and wrist, he open an closes his fist. He stands up from the table and swings his arm back and around in a circle really fast. "Amazing. I like this new arm." Bucky smiles. "Thank you, Nakia!"