Summary: glimpses of Natasha and James's relationship through a series of hugs

A/N: This one-shot is an AU/rewrite in the sense that instead of just Natasha defecting to SHIELD, I'm writing it so both Bucky and Natasha defect together. Some things are going to be changed because of that, but I'll give enough context for the changes within each little section.

Italics represent Russian

i. Northern Tibet, 1989

He still couldn't believe his luck, though perhaps that was a fairly optimistic word for it. The blizzard was a pain to hike through and they'd both nearly frozen on their way to the safe house, but it also kept their handlers away for an extra night and he'd never curse anything that gave them a few more minutes together.

The mission had been rough and Natalia was sporting a large bruise on her hip, but they had gotten out and even if they were just going to be shipped back to Siberia and frozen until the next mission, he was happy.

Natalia, exhausted from both the mission and their earlier round of lovemaking, was asleep. She'd curled in on herself like she always did, putting her back to him in a way that signaled her trust in him far more than words ever could. While he would have preferred to see her face, to watch how peacefully she slept with him, he couldn't bring himself to turn her around. She'd wake up, of course, and then he'd have to explain. It was unlikely she'd fall back asleep, too, if she was forced to put her back to the only door of their makeshift bedroom.

Snaking his arms around her warm waist, James pulled her closer until there was no space between them. She huffed in her sleep but didn't stir awake. With his nose buried in her hair and his legs tangled through hers, he breathed in deeply and closed his eyes.

In the morning, they'd be returned to Russia and separated, put in cryo until their next mission. It was the same endless cycle that only got worse with each separation, but they had talked: him and Natalia.

After a chance encounter with a man named Barton, Natalia had a contact outside of Russia that was eager to get them out, should they choose to join the Americans. It was hardly a plan and Natalia had muttered about only going if he went too, but it was something. It was a start. And James would be damned if he let anything come between Natalia and a way of escape.

"Go to sleep," Natalia murmured in Russian. Her hand ran along his arm that was wrapped tight around her waist. "I can hear your thoughts."

"I thought you were asleep," James whispered.

"I was." She squeezed his arm. "Now I'm awake because you're thinking too much."

James muffled a soft laugh, pressing a kiss behind her ear.

"I'll sleep, love," he promised. She was already relaxing in his arms again.

"Good," she breathed, her voice barely audible even in the silence of their room. "I love you."

"I love you too," he echoed.

She was asleep a second later and, promising himself that they'd both get out soon, he followed soon after her.

ii. South African coast, 2015

She was shaking. She hadn't stopped shaking since that Maximoff girl had crept into her mind and Clint had found her pressed into a corner, silent tears on her cheeks.

"Come on, Nat," Clint murmured, gently pulling her to her feet. "Barnes is gonna rip my head off if you don't check-in."

She didn't respond. Her comm was missing and her mind was a mess, but Clint had mentioned James and it was all she could do not to shout for him.

"She's alright, Barnes." Clint wrapped one arm over her shoulder and used the other to press on his comm. "Lost her comm in the fight."

The fight. She almost laughed. It hadn't been much of a fight at all. She'd hardly entered the room before the Maximoff girl had twisted her mind and left her to deal with the aftermath. There had been no fighting, no shooting. She hadn't even had the chance to speak before the girl had appeared.

With Clint as a constant at her side, Natasha walked out of the shipyard. Rogers joined them at some point as did Tony, but she hardly registered their presence as she fought with her own mind to stay present. It was a struggle to blink and not see flickers of the Red Room, of Madam B, of her many, many handlers.

It wasn't until the quinjet landed in front of them that Natasha's thoughts cleared for a moment.

James was in there. They'd left him on the quinjet, miles away from the shipyard, to run point: monitoring von Strucker's movements and keeping an eye out for Ultron and the twins. He'd be kicking himself for not having anticipated them already being inside.

She broke away from Clint as the deck of the quinjet dropped. Clint let her, dropping his arm from her shoulders as she moved towards the pilot's seat of the quinjet where James was already getting to his feet.

"Natalia."

Her arms wound tightly around his waist, pulling him towards her as she dropped her forehead to his shoulder. As grounding as his presence was, it still wasn't enough to keep the lingering memories at bay and when Rogers dropped his shield on the seat beside him, she flinched involuntarily.

"Barton," James snapped. His arm curled over her shoulders. "What the hell happened?"

"The Maximoff girl got to them all," Clint answered from behind her. "We're the only two she missed."

"She's in my head," Natasha murmured in Russian. Her arms around James tightened as she lifted her head, raising one hand to brush his hair from his face. "She's in my head and you're gone."

While the others looked on in confusion, Clint was already taking action.

"I'll take controls," he muttered, stepping around them to pilot the jet.

It wasn't until they touched down in Iowa that Natasha's hands had stopped shaking and her hold on James loosened. By then, blinking didn't bring back blood-stained memories and she had some semblance of control over her own mind. Later, after Lila and Cooper had gone to sleep and she and James had slunk off to their usual guestroom, her nightmares would be more vivid than before and she'd spend the majority of the night clinging to James in the dark.

iii. Germany, 2016

Not for the first time since she and James defected, Natasha couldn't help but feel torn. All around her, chaos spread across the continent and even overseas where it was quickly destroying the team.

The team knew them. Perhaps not very well, but they knew what she and James were. They knew they'd done things in the past and they knew that they were trying to make up for it, but somehow the news of James's supposed bombing was too big for them to handle. It had only gotten worse when Zemo appeared, triggering James's mind in such a volatile, unpredictable way that Natasha had been the only one that could call him off. They'd slunk away immediately after, Rogers close on their heels, to find a place where James could recover and Natasha could plan.

With James's revelation that Zemo was after the Siberian cryostasis base, all of her plans were thrown out the window.

"You gotta get Stark to trust you," James told her, "or he's gonna fall right into the trap Zemo set. He wants us separated."

"James, no." Natasha shook her head, stepping forward to snake her arms around James's waist. "This is our mess. We fix it together."

"And we will, lyubov moya," he promised. "We have to do it from opposite sides, though."

For the moment being, they were alone. She knew all too well, though, that Tony was on his way to herd them and Rogers' makeshift team back into Thaddeus Ross's jurisdiction. Too much longer and they'd be forced into a decision.

"I don't trust Ross and I don't trust Zemo," she murmured in Russian. She dropped her head to his shoulder, holding onto him tighter than necessary. "I do trust you, though." With a reluctant sigh, she lifted her head to look at him. "Come back to me alive, Yasha."

"I will," James murmured, pressing a kiss to her temple. "I promise."

iv. Unknown location, 2018

James would not lie: he was antsy. Natalia had called, sworn she'd be there by the end of the week, and it was now 3 hours past sunset with no sign of her.

He'd known things could go sideways. As soon as that suit had attacked them in Norway, he'd known whatever she was walking into would either end in her battered and bruised or in the RAFT prison. There was no quiet way to bring down the Red Room, unfortunately, and Ross had been on their tails from the moment Natalia had helped break Barton, Maximoff, and Scott Lang out of his high-security prison. When he'd seen footage of the takedown on the news, he'd known there was no way she'd escape Ross's notice.

With a huff, James reached for his burner phone yet again and searched for a missed call or text. Perhaps Yelena had asked for another favor and she'd forgotten to tell him. Maybe Natalia's flight had been delayed.

Scratching at the door pulled James's attention from his phone immediately. He stood, not moving to open the door or reach for a gun. It could be Natalia. It could be Ross. It could be Steve who, despite his offer to join James in waiting for Natalia, didn't speak enough Romanian to pass as a local and not blow their cover.

"Goddammit." At the muffled curse, James leapt forward.

As he pulled the door open, he took in the sight of Natalia. She was, predictably, battered and bruised but breathing.

"Hello, soldat," Natalia said with a soft smile. "Missed you."

James's only reply was to pull her into his arms and shut the door behind her. He flipped the lock back in place, wondering briefly why she'd tried picking the lock instead of just knocking, and let out a long breath.

"Ow," Natalia muttered, crushed against his chest.

He loosened his hold but didn't let her go. Leaning back to check her for injuries, he asked, "How's Yelena?"

"She'll be alright," Natalia assured him, rubbing her ribs. At James's worried glance, she said, "Just bruises. Tony took care of the rest."

"Stark?" James echoed. He frowned and resisted the urge to hold her tighter.

At Natalia's hesitant nod, James's frown deepened.

"What happened, Nastasya?" he asked carefully. There was no reason for her to have gone to New York after her stunt in Russia. Especially with them both under scrutiny from the government and on the run.

"Spent three days with Ross," she muttered reluctantly. "Tony got wind of it."

While she promised that Helen Cho had personally looked over her injuries, James still pulled her into the hotel bathroom to make sure she was properly stitched up and healing as Natalia filled him in on her trip to Russia. Melina and Alexei were taking care of the girls now, she informed him, and Antonia hadn't been killed in their attack so many years ago. The guilt of what they'd done to Antonia twisted James's gut, but Natalia promised that she was in good hands now.

"We could have never known what Dreykov would do," Natalia murmured, holding his face in her hands.

James's arm wound around her hips where she sat on the edge of the sink counter. Her shirt had been discarded in his quest to search her for injuries, but James couldn't be bothered to think of anything aside from the Red Room they'd left behind and how Natalia had faced Dreykov alone.

"I'm glad you killed him," James admitted quietly.

"Me too," Natalia whispered, pulling him back into her arms.

v. Madripoor, 2024

He'd dreaded landing in Madripoor from the moment Zemo implied that he'd have to take up the mantle of the USSR's Winter Soldier again. It shouldn't have been a surprise given what Zemo had attempted in Germany so many years ago, but he hadn't truly thought it would come down to this: following Zemo through a too-full bar with his face blank and his mind void. There were no good memories that sprang to mind at the muttered zimnii soldat and the only way to keep them at bay was to empty his mind entirely.

They approached the bar, receiving more stares with every step. By the time they stopped at the bar, only two people were not looking at them and it was more suspicious than not. James watched as they slipped away, pulling their hoods around their faces and disappearing amongst the crowd.

In front of him, Zemo and Sam spoke with the bartender, taking their drinks and asking for someone named Selby. It was only after their request was denied that James was forced into action, given the command he'd anticipated but dreaded all the same.

He moved on instinct, letting his body take over and pulling back as far from his mind as he could. It wasn't until a shot rang out and Selby was dead in front of him that James snapped back to attention, forcing the Winter Soldier from his head so that he and Sam could get out of the bar alive.

The chimes of several cell phones preceded the gunshots, but James was already in motion. He snagged Sam's sleeve, tugging him in a direction away from the gunfire and towards an alley. The bullets followed them only to end abruptly with two shots that came from overhead, someone he couldn't see killing their pursuers.

"You seem to have a guardian angel," Zemo mused, rounding the corner after them.

"Get the hell away from them."

It was dark and her voice had come from the shadows, but James would recognize Natalia's voice from anywhere.

"Drop it, Zemo." Natalia stepped forward, pushing her hood from her face and scowling at the gun in Zemo's hand.

"Natalia Alianovna," Zemo murmured. James tensed, prepared to wring Zemo's neck if he spoke another word to her, but Natalia was ahead of him.

"Drop your gun," she snarled in Russian, "and get on your fucking knees or I'll shoot them out from under you."

Zemo set down his weapon, taking a cautious step back while James moved forward.

"Natalia, it's alright," James said. He didn't take her gun from her hands, but he did step between her and Zemo. "He's helping us."

"I was in the bar, James," Natalia said coldly. Her eyes were still locked on Zemo's. "I saw the whole thing."

Her hair was tied back, tucked under her shirt far enough that, if her hood was pulled up, it would be hidden.

The hooded people in the bar, James realized. She'd been one of them.

"I swear, he's helping us," James repeated. "I'll explain it all, I will, love. We need to find somewhere safe first, though."

With a nod, Natalia agreed.

"I know a place we can go," she said in English, nodding at Sam behind James's back. "Let's move."

The place she knew, it turned out, was a stolen art gallery that Sharon owned.

"When you mentioned that you were leaving to help Sharon," James muttered, his arm around her shoulders, "I didn't think you meant illegally."

"I'm not the one stealing art," Natalia assured him, patting his chest. "She just needed a hand wrangling in a few... loose ends."

James wasn't convinced that meant what she'd been doing was, in fact, legal, but he wasn't allowed a moment to ask. Sharon appeared then and after a bit of grumbling about whose fault it was that she was on the run still, she agreed to help them find Nagel.

"You might want to stay low, though," she added, eyeing James. "After that bar fight, you'll bring a lot of attention."

So Sharon had been the other hooded person, James decided. It didn't explain why she and Natalia had slipped away upon their arrival, but it solved the question of who hadn't wanted to be recognized.

"I'll stay with him," Natalia offered.

She and Sharon shared a look, but James knew Natalia would not be convinced otherwise. She'd made up her mind and at Sharon's nod of agreement, they were left in an empty penthouse while Zemo and Sam accompanied Sharon to a party.

The door had hardly shut behind them before Natalia turned and pulled James to her, her arms winding up over his shoulders to hug him tightly. At the feel of her fingers threading through his hair, James slumped against her and let out a long breath. His hands, he realized as he wrapped his arms around her waist, were shaking.

"Yasha?" Her voice was soft and her fingers in his hair were grounding.

"It was worth it," James insisted. "It was the only way to get to the Power Broker."

"Nothing is worth that," she whispered. Her arms tightened over his shoulders. "You're more than that, James." She pulled back to look at him, gently holding his face between her hands. "Nothing is worth your peace of mind."

He pressed a soft kiss to the inside of her wrist and gently squeezed her waist, giving her a soft smile. Natalia returned it.

"For what it's worth," James murmured, "I'm glad you were there."

"Even if I did nothing?" Natalia asked. Her face grew cloudy but when James brushed his thumb over her hip, she softened.

"You and Sharon had your own thing going on," James said. He understood why she hadn't stepped in; he was glad that she hadn't. They'd already been riding their luck with Sam posing as Smiling Tiger. If Natalia had stepped forward and bashed Zemo's head against the bar, things could have only gone worse.

"You're sure you're alright with him?" Natalia asked. James nodded. "Good. But if he puts one foot out of line―"

"I'll let you know, love," James promised. He leaned forward to kiss her temple. "I won't stand in your way."