He thought he knew what Matt was trying to say - that repentance and forgiveness were better than knowing hate. But it wasn't that simple, he didn't think. Not for him, at least, not when hate was so fresh, so coveted, so treasured. Being able to hate, that was a kind of power in itself. Hating, at least, meant his thoughts were his own.
He began disassembling the weapon, packing each piece into its designated place with care. There was no rush. No one was coming.
A different vantage point would be required, next time. The window of opportunity had been a narrow sliver, and by being impatient, he'd lost his opportunity. Maybe when she was in transit to see someone she trusted, next time.
"Already did," he said, closing and locking the case. "Know where she's going." He had spent weeks following her and her brother, days of patient watching.
He paused. "Thank you," he said. He understood Matt was trying to do something good to make up for his...his frustration. Another new idea, shades of muted hate and that impatience that had driven him here, to tie up a loose end, to put a button on something long past.
He rolled his few belongings into his pack and shouldered it, standing up. It put them eye to eye at last.
Since his last wipe, now far enough in the past that thinking of it didn't immediately throw him into a barrage of sense-memories, he had not developed a taste for religion. He didn't know what that meant. Maybe Bucky Barnes had never cared much about religion, or maybe he had, and it just hadn't come back. It was difficult enough to wrap his head around missing so many years of the last century that worrying about God wasn't high on his list of priorities. All that came to mind when Matt talked about God was a sort of paper cutout concept and a deep uneasiness. He had heard people talk like Matt talked, but replace the 'God' with 'State' or 'Cause.' The people who deployed the asset were passionate about a better future, about living by a code and eliminating anyone who endangered it. There was none of that malice in Matt, but still. He didn't know if he would ever lean on something like that again.
The quiet that settled in the room for a moment wasn't empty, not really. He didn't always know, still, how to completely express an idea in words, not in English or Russian or anything else. "This is repentance," he said. Maybe that was something Matt could understand.