Stieg Larsson
:: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
"... if he can't handle the fact that you screwed up one time in twenty years, then he isn't worth the time you've put in for him."
"I owe you one."
"We always owe each other one."
"Your job description as a journalist is to question and scrutinize most critically. And never to repeat claims uncritically, no matter how highly placed the sources in the bureaucracy."
The whole point of the socialized human being was to not give in to that sort of impulse, regardless of how belligerently an opponent might behave.
That is how it goes. We are born. We live. We grow old. We die. He had played his part. All that remained was the disintegration.