AN: Hey long time no see! This is one of many new and very unfinished stories I'll be posting over the next week or so, and I'd really love if you could give me some feedback about if this is worth continuing or not: was it intriguing, does it sound like a good start to something you'd want to read, etc. Thanks, and enjoy!

He found her...actually, she found him. It was late November, he was in the woods. He couldn't remember where. Or maybe he did find her? No, he's pretty sure she found him. He was trying very hard not to lose control of himself, which was pretty unsuccessful; these were the early days when he was still trying to shake off HYDRA's programming. It might have been in Washington, actually. Or maybe New York? Somewhere with a busy city close by. But he was in the woods, trying to stay in control, and he thought he was alone. Then his memory lapsed.

Then she was there, and he wasn't crying in the memory, but it seemed like the kind of situation where he might have cried had he not been somewhat numb at the time. He knows she found him because she was holding him, which sounds awkward and may have looked awkward but to him in that moment, it was the most comforting thing he'd felt in a long time. She was holding him, and as she held him she murmured to him in at least three different languages, perhaps trying out each one she knew to find one he might understand. HYDRA's soldat tried to respond to the Russian she spoke, but the Bucky deeper down grabbed and held tightly to her English. It didn't even matter at that point what she was saying, just that she was saying something.

Maybe it was Chicago?

But he remembers her dark eyes and her fine nose and her soft lips moving, moving, moving, talking to him, even if he can't remember what exactly she was trying to tell or ask him. His memory lapsed again, for how long he doesn't know, but the next thing he remembers is in a dim and cozy room, scarves and fringe and beads hanging from the ceiling and the shade-covered windows, candlelight flickering and fluttering on the neutrally painted walls, the scent of jasmine and incense filling the room, the haze of the light smoke from the burning incense softening everything in sight.

Now that he's thinking about it, he isn't entirely sure he was in the US when she found him. He doesn't remember what he did after pulling Steve Rogers out of that river. Hell, he barely even remembers pulling him out of the river.

He woke up, or at least he assumes that was a point where he woke up, comfortable and warm, lying on his back on a mattress in a corner, concealed by a folding paper screen. He must have made some noise, although he's sure at this point he might have been deaf, since he can't remember any words or any sounds at all, because she filled his focus again, ducking around the screen with a cup of sweetly spicy tea, kneeling next to the pallet, next to him. For some reason, he let her help him into a sitting position, and for some reason, he let her guide the cup to his lips, and for some reason, he drank the untrustworthy-at that time-tea, and for some reason, he didn't snatch her throat with his metal hand and squeeze the life out of this unfamiliar woman, this girl, this person he most certainly couldn't have trusted at the time. He doesn't remember what he was thinking, and he doesn't know if he wants to remember. After that cup of actually very good tea, she sat behind that paper screen with him and maybe she talked to him. Maybe he talked back. Maybe they had an entire conversation that he simply can't remember, or maybe she talked to a brick wall. Honestly, he doesn't know.