Update as of January 2019 - The first four chapters of this story have been modified. For starters, a lot of you wanted longer chapters so I did my best to provide those without making it look as if I was dragging on. However, nothing completely drastic has been changed to them.

The origin of this story is interesting: I had a different idea for this story, trashed it; got re-inspired after reading Margaret Stohl's Black Widow novels, trashed it again; and then this one just happened.

Disclaimer - I don't own Marvel or its characters and some of the scenes in this were inspired by comic snippets and research I found online.

Note - italicized text means flashbacks and normal text means present time. Locations of both are indicated by the chapter title. PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE FORMAT OF THE TEXT BECAUSE IT COULD CHANGE INSTANTLY!

Chapter One: The Red Room / Washington

"Over there is our best Widow, Natalia."

James follows the pointing finger to see where it leads his eyes. It passes twenty-six Widow trainees who all wear the same black spandex jumpsuit while running through their daily regimen of extensive and strenuous training. His eyes finally land on a pale redhead who seems to only get her biological colour from her vibrant hair. She was called Natalia, as he was informed. He watches as she flips through a complicated obstacle course composed of fatal blockades all while being blindfolded and deaf due to noise cancelling headphones.

The way Natalia moves is fluid: each move is performed without hesitation even with two primary senses confiscated. The only weapons currently at her disposal are her mind and instinct which are coincidentally a Widow's deadliest assets.

James is impressed but not convinced that she's the top of her class. He was probably brought out of cryostasis to train her and make her the best of the best. After all, they wouldn't defrost him for an introduction.

"She is the best?" James questions with overt disbelief in his voice. "She seems to be a gymnast."

"Actually, she's a ballerina."

Without proving his point, James already decides to put Natalia to the test. He enters the training arena, each Widow watching him with sharp eyes as he walks through without pausing from their training; all except for Natalia who can't see or hear anything. James approaches her from behind, stepping aside from the obstacles in his way. He lifts his loaded gun from his holster and aims it at her as she flips over. Natalia lands on her feet and pauses, exhaling a short breath. She hasn't moved nor has noticed James standing behind her. James is about to cock the weapon but the gun is immediately kicked out of his hand. He immediately gets pressed against the wall by the opposite heeled boot pressed against his neck, the gun falls out of his hand and skitters on the floor. Natalia removes her blindfold and headphones, and James finds himself staring right into her piercing eyes.

Another aspect of vibrant colour for her.

"I felt your vibrations from when you were stomping over," Natalia explains, her voice sharp and soft. "Keep that up and I might have to kill you with rapid fire all heading in her direction as she fires back through the smoke. As a missile gets fired at her, she leaps over the barrier that divides the freeway and somersaults out of the way of an approaching car. Guns aim at her rapidly as she rolls across the front hood of a car and then the moment she is behind said car for cover, as she expected, it gets blown off the freeway bridge. But she already flipped over with a gun in her grip. Using her other hand, she fires a grappling hook which fastens onto the belly of the concrete bridge and swings across. The car from before hits the ground and bursts into flames just as Natasha runs the other way.

Once across and back in the sunlight, she looks back up at the bridge to locate Steve and Sam both of whom she hasn't seen since their drive was fatally interrupted. Instead, she sees the shooter. It's a soldier with a metal arm that the sun reflects on. He sent her to the ground. Natasha watches as he scopes the scene from where he stands, prepping a snipper in his hands. Natasha takes a hold of her other gun and points the two she has right up at him, squinting her eyes against the sunlight as she begins to fire non-stop.

Natasha knows exactly who she's firing at, even with her eyes partially blinded by the light. She knew from the moment their car crashed even though she didn't want to believe it then. It's the Winter Soldier, a man once known as James Buchanan Barnes. The same James who was Bucky Barnes and Steve's best friend and ally before he transformed and trained her in The Red Room; who taught her how to always slice the right vein with the right blade; how to fire the smallest gun for the farthest distance; how to remain in the shadows with his head down and shoulders hunched, James walks through the corridors of The Red Room. He holsters his guns, approaching the exit. He suddenly stops in his path, straightening up. His eyes flicker a bit. In one swift motion, James whips around and grabs someone's wrist, pulling whoever it is to be closer to him.

Natalia tenses up as James' metal hand grips around her wrist, her trapped hand flinching. James' free and flesh hand holds her up by the small of her back. Her green eyes are open wide, almost spooked as her lips rest slightly parted. Then, she's smiling as if this was all fun and games for her.

James was proud of Natalia. He was only here to sharpen all of her skills even though she could slice through them easily: marksmanship, combined arms, tactical, close-quarters combat, naval aviation, navigation, military engineering, espionage, hacking, seduction, all of it. Though that list does go on for longer, there was only one skill she has yet to master. Being the best in The Red Room was nothing compared to being the best in the world.

"Trying to sneak up on me, Natalia?" James questions playfully, already knowing the answer to that. "You're not that good yet."

She grins a little. "I could use the practice."

James still holds her, forgetting that he was even doing so in the first place. She looks down and sees the full uniform on him and his loaded weapons in the slim space that still lies between them. Natalia knows that James was constantly frozen in the cryostasis unless it was for two reasons: training her or completing a mission. Since it wasn't the former, it had to be the latter.

"Where are you going?" She asks.

"Return to your room," James orders quickly and quietly.

"Take me with you."

"You know I can't do that. If our superiors found out, they - "

"They'll what? What are they going to do? Huh? Tell me. How could they possibly harm us? You speak as if they could pull the trigger on us but not only are we needed here, we're also indestructible. They can't point their best weapons at themselves."

James doesn't comment. He looks down at the way he's holding Natalia: one hand still locked around her wrist as the other remains around her waist. Noticing this, Natalia uses her free hand to tilt his chin up so his eyes meet hers.

"Did it hurt when you got the prosthetic limb?" Natalia asks, changing the topic. "Because I can tell you that I don't know what it felt like to have them invade my body and pry away their worst fears."

James never expected anyone to ever ask that question, especially someone here in a place where everyone goes through their very own personalized hell. It's the first time that someone actually seems to care about his well-being.

"Not sure," James replies honestly, "it was all in a faze. I just woke up in an operation room with it already attached to me." He eyes her. "How about you? Did it all hurt when you got here?"

Natalia scoffs. "It's ironic how this place works. As little girls, society trains you how to be a mother but here, they take that opportunity away from you. Instead, they make you kill mothers and have their children watch before you kill them as well."

"Fair point."

"Could you ever kill someone with a family?"

His response is automatic. "We'd have no choice."

She smirks. "Fair point. We're assassins who are conditioned to not let out feelings get connected to our missions or anything for that matter." She looks up at him and he swears that he sees her eyes glimmer in the darkness. "That doesn't make us heartless, James, it makes us obsolete. They'll destroy my tubes and my mind, not my heart."

Again, James is impressed by Natalia. Even though she's a product of The Red Room's abuse and brainwashing, she still manages to cheat the system and try to be her own person for a moment, he doesn't believe his eyes. He doesn't believe that he's seeing her. The bright red curls in the distance don't put a name to the face nor did the graceful leap off the freeway bridge. None of that. The realization of her identity came from the one bullet from her gun that put a crack in his goggles. As he rips them off, the sun enters his eyes.

They warned him about her but still, seeing her in action after all this time makes it feel unreal.

Natalia Romanov. Natasha Romanoff. The Black Widow. Agent of SHIELD. Avenger. Former daughter of Russia. Former creation of The Red Room.

A woman from the life he barely remembers...now working with the man who is his target.

Despite all the aliases and the time that has passed since they were all active, her red locks were omnipresent. If there's one thing she should've changed about herself so she could guarantee not being found, it was the hair.

His orders were to kill Captain America and anyone that may get in his way.

That included her.

James fires everything he's got at her. She ducks behind a bus for cover. When he runs out of bullets and has to reload, that's when she returns her shots, now with two guns in her hands. Each of her shots is precise and accurate, thanks to her expert training. Once she's all out, she turns around and starts running into the streets.

James swings his gun over his shoulder. He takes a few steps forwards, stepping off and falling from the freeway. He lands on a car, crushing it in one stance. James looks ahead, searching for where she went now. She couldn't have gone that far. He paces himself as he walks around, reloading his gun. Civilians run around in a panic and he couldn't care less about them because he's searching for her. It's not a desire of his to look for her. She's simply in the way of his true target.

He hears something soft. It sounds like her voice. James eyes a car parked on the side of the road and he gets down on one knee behind an SUV to hide. He pulls out a small spherical bomb from his belt and rolls it over to where she is. James stands back up as it rolls over, pointing his gun and ready to shoot. The car explodes and he lowers his gun because she wasn't there. He's been fooled by a remedy, a relief, an escape from the pain that burns in his brain. Going through another cycle of brainwashing really took a toll on him this time. His mind and body felt completely burned, almost as if he has a disease in his system that's taking out whatever good it could infect. But if anyone were to ask him, there was nothing good left in him to infect.

James stumbles into his chamber and sees Natalia sitting on the edge of his bed, one leg crossed over the other. Her eyes are focused on him as if she's studying him. Then, surprisingly, she smiles at him; and not one of those snarky or diabolical grins but a true and genuine smile. (It almost takes all his pain away).

"I like seeing you like this," Natalia says to him.

"What?" James questions. "Disoriented?"

"Struggling," she states. "You walk into it thinking that it will be easier than the last but it never will be, even when you think you can finally handle it. I don't think it will ever be tolerable."

"Your tortures are nothing like mine," James spits at her.

He stumbles to the ground, landing on his metal arm. He curses. Natalia gets up from the bed and kneels in front of him. She lifts his head and rests it on her knees, combing her fingers through his sweat-drenched hair.

"Did you know that if you get heat stroke once, your brain remembers the circuitry of the events so it knows how to adapt if you ever get it again?" Natasha whispers rhetorically. "Well, I never expect for you to get heat stroke in Russia, but it's a metaphor. All you have to do is take the pain they inflict on you and put it towards your enemies. Survive by simulation - think you're shooting and strangling the ones who poke around your mind. Make your pain your pleasure. They can no longer break what they already tore apart. They will eventually run out of pieces to shred."

And at that moment, the student becomes the teacher.

Natalia looks into James' pained eyes. She decides to lean forwards, jump at him foot first. Mid-air, his gun falls to the ground as she grabs his shoulders and spins her legs around his neck to prep herself onto. Using her garrote around his neck, Natasha pulls hard, using all of her strength. James resists, stepping backwards and walks into a car.

A Black Widow hanging by herself on a single string is dangerous; but when she's the one hanging someone else, it's deadly. Natasha never fails to fight so brutally efficient with graceful beauty.

James gets a grip on her thighs and throws her off of him. Natasha slams against another car and falls flat on the ground. James picks up his dropped gun as Natasha pries something off of her bracelet. She whips a disk at him which electrocutes his metal arm, making it stiffen and giving Natasha the time needed to get up and run off. James narrows his eyes as he watches her red locks get further and further away from him. Once James is able to remove the disk from his arm, he holds it between his fingers, watching the electricity pulse through her body. Natalia stretches her fingers before gripping them on the armrests of her chair, her knuckles blanching. Her limbs, torso, and neck are tightly restrained, sweat pours down her face and soaks her curls. Her breaths are shaky yet confident.

"You disobeyed us, Natalia..." Her superior mutters to her. "Now, you must pay the price."

Natalia spits in the man's face. He pauses for a second and scoffs, disregarding her crude action. James, who stands in the background as a mere witness, remains impassive to all this. Her chest pants up and down in a constant rhythm despite her current state.

"Any last words before we sing you a lullaby?"

Natalia purses her lips together. Her eyes meet James' and she sees his hand over his holster, fingers fanning over the handle ready to grip tightly and shoot. She opens her mouth just to say -

"Get out of the way!" Natasha screams at nearby civilians, sprinting through the streets. She waves her arms frantically, telling them clear out.

Suddenly, a small projectile whips past her. Believing that it hit her, Natasha falls forwards and lands on the ground as shards of glass from a car window land on her. She sits up against the car door, clutching her heart. She begins to inhale and exhale spastically as she looks around for The Winter Soldier, Steve or Sam. She didn't want to be alone right now. Despite her extraordinary skills in combat, she's beyond terrified to be here right now on both a physical and an emotional level.

Hearing someone coming from behind her, she turns around and sees James on top of a car, pointing a gun at her. Her eyes are full of tears and suave. Natalia stands to the side, one hip cocked out like a gun. She wears a black knee-high dress with a flared skirt and elbow-length sleeves. A black mesh sits perched on top of her pulled back curls, barely covering her piercing green eyes; her bright red lips are still out for the show and tell. In her gloved hands, she holds a loaded gun in one hand and a grenade in the other.

"You think I can't disarm you?" James questions her.

Natalia claps her lips together. "If you take the gun, I'll drop the grenade. If you take the grenade, I'll drop a bullet in your brain."

James smirks, taking a step closer to her. "This isn't supposed to be a live-ammunition exercise."

Natalia lightly shrugs. "Rules are meant to be broken, darling. Besides, you could always test the authenticity of my weapons."

James huffs, trying to think of a strategy as Natalia holds out the weapons out for him like an offering. Either hand would result in his defeat - in the case that the weapons were only dupes- so he goes for something else. James pounces forwards, swiping both of her weapons away. He grabs her head in his hands and presses her lips against his.

Shocked, Natalia accepts the kiss, letting him take full control of it. This was his play after all.

James suddenly tenses up once he feels something metal slip into his mouth and tongue. He feels it as the key to the grenade. Damn women and their seducing skills.

Natalia smiles before running off, leaving him with the ticking grenade at his feet. She turns back around and watches him as he stares at her with that stupid smirk on his face. It could only mean that he approves in more ways than one. He kicks the grenade away and lets it blow. The fires pour down and Natalia's bright red hair blends in with the burning sensation that corrodes his body.

It was moments like this, during their training sessions, that their romance first began. In secret, of course, because their love was born out of suspicious circumstances. They were never meant to be functional and The Red Room always tried to make sure of that. They never approved because Steve stares in shock at who he has been fighting the whole time once the mask is on the ground. He isn't even processing that someone who was once his best friend is now out to murder him.

"Bucky?" Steve could barely get out.

"Who the hell is Bucky?" James responds pointing a gun directly at Steve.

Steve doesn't raise his shield because he can't look away. This is too much for his mind to process. Lucky for Steve, Sam flies in and kicks James over before he could fire. However, James quickly gets back onto his feet and tries to shoot Steve again but Natasha uses the little energy she has left to fire a missile at him with James' gun. Once it flies, Natasha pants as she leans against the side of the van. If she thought this was hard, then she will hate for when she has to explain all this to Steve.

The missile explodes and when the flame settles down, The Winter Soldier's already gone.

It feels like déjà vu for her.

I'm pretty sure that this story is a play on déjà vu in general.