"...It wasn't so bad," he agreed, leg rocking gently on his heel, swaying back against Max's foot. "Some of the bits there just before the end I won't miss-" the strange leathery monster that had taken him in the sand, Howard's pale snarling face, the silence that had followed both, "-but it could'a been a lot worse."

He took a drink, bottling tipping against his lips, head foaming noisily when it clicked back against the table top, thumb picking at the wet corner of the label.

"I thank ya, for that, Max."