"You can't save all beaten Dogs." "One way or the other, sooner or later, it would anyway turn out exactly like this: you got older; the storms quieter; the inner voices would fall silent; your urge would die down; you would sit at the bar and remember the old battles, wounds, and pain, and you would laugh at how powerful and intense it had all been, and how useless and destructive. In time, even these memories would fade until you knew them to be there somewhere, but couldn't feel them anymore. Just like he couldn't feel them right now. It would all be reduced to images and thoughts. Or not even that - you would only have a faint notion that there once was something different. That you once had felt and lived like that. But nothing would touch you anymore. You would have made your peace with everything. Eternal peace would rule where mighty battles were once raging. It would be like becoming a new person. Or perhaps rather a different person. A person you had longed to be in those dark, cold moments of your youth. Then you would finally arrive at the point that Alex had reached long before. You would know that the only possible happiness in life consisted in downing a few beers and having some lonely little thing suck your dick only to give her what she was craving for the most: a tender kiss and arms to hold her in the night. No more, no less."