She looked tired. The show of misery, Bucky had thought that might be a partial lie. But that weariness, it looked genuine to him. It looked like it went too deep to sleep away, and it looked like a bad place to start from. The Arena, it ate away every scrap of energy, every part of your soul. You had to be alert every second, never sleep deep enough to not wake at the shift of a footfall or the crackle of a leaf. You had to keep going on next to nothing and try to keep thinking through hunger and terror and lonliness and whatever pain you were in. You had to survive, and she was already exhausted and feeding a life that wasn't her own. It was too much, the kind of handicap that he didn't know if anyone could overcome.
But he didn't think getting rid of it would help either. If she was far enough to know, then there had to be a recovery time afterward, he thought. She'd still go in sick and tired and it would be too late. "It's fine. Telling me. I just thought ..." there would be a reason. Natasha didn't do things without reasons, and Bucky hadn't usually either. When he had, she had asked him why. He didn't feel right asking the same question now when he reason might really just be that he was there, and she'd needed to say it.
Bucky looked at her, huddled in his coat, small and tired and still too pretty. Her life would probably have been easier if she was less beautiful, Bucky knew now. He didn't think he'd known that back then, the last time they were here. He could try to say something nice - something comforting. But what was there to say? It was all bullshit, and she'd know it. "He's not going to win anyway," Bucky said heavily. "I ... he shouldn't have to, you shouldn't. But he's not young, and he doesn't want to kill people, and he's not everybody's favorite. You could win. If you want it, you could win; you they'd let win. He could help you get there, and that'd be enough for him." Bucky stopped. He pictured Clint, slumped heavily into him, in his arms, talking quietly. It was a betrayal, maybe, but Bucky thought she probably already knew. "He loves you," Bucky said. "Helping keep you going, the idea you might have his kid, that the world might change after you do ... it'd be the best end he can get, where he's going." It didn't matter if she had it or not, later, if things changed - the illusion could be enough, and if Clint knew, then they could use it for help along the way. It'd be an obvious weakness, too, but Natasha was canny and quick. She could work with that.
She'd said that Steve was lucky to have someone like Bucky love him, once. He didn't agree, but Bucky thought him and Clint probably had that in common. Dying for someone they cared about more to come through - it wasn't that big a sacrifice. "But if you still don't want to come back out alive either, then don't tell him." She'd told him that, too. That she didn't want to be the last one standing. And Bucky understood that. If he was her, if he was back in, he woudn't want it either. He'd want to be finished. But if she wasn't going to fight for it, then he shouldn't know. They should just get to go out together, however they chose to, or however the Arena wanted.