"I know all of that, I didn't think guns were the only thing—"

"But you don't really see," Zash interrupts him, stopping walking and then turning to face him. "Because you're also a person to be helped. You also need to make yourself feel better, you're also a person who deserves kindness and love and peace.

"I know it's unfair. I know it's horrible that the world is going to keep turning while the most important people in it are gone. But if you're going to be alive then you gotta live. You gotta face the world, you gotta see these people who have, who have...

"...they love you, you know? They give you hell but you haven't starved, they've sheltered you and kept you around. Hilda keeps asking after you, Jill is an enormous fan, they all went along with it when you told me your name was John. If you go to them and say, hey, I need help, they'll help you. You can find your life again. I know it's been years, I know you don't know what life there is left for you, but there is a life here left for you. I just know it."

"And I'll help, too. I can't stay here forever, but... I can be here a while. Clean your place, bring you home when you inevitably relapse, bring you back up. You're not alone, John. Trust in people. Let them help you. Let us help you."

"That's easier said than done. I need a fucking drink, and I don't want to, and they're still dead. You know? They're still dead."

"Yeah. But you're not. Live for them. Live for us. And most of all, live for yourself."

He lifts his hands up to grab two fistfuls of his own hair and pull them out in frustration. "Just who are you?"

"I thought I'd said? I'm Zash the Stampede."