The specter of that loneliness looms darker despite Mat's reassurances, all of those fears he'd been trying to keep buried since he got out spilling through. First a crack in the dam, and then a deluge.

"It was a dark seaside. Covered in sick, oily black. And corpses, hundreds of them, thousands -- in the water, washing up on the sand. And it was cold and went on forever no matter how far I walked. I couldn't make anything. A threadbare blanket. A fire that went out after a few moments. A bottle of drink that broke in my hands. Nowhere to go and only the dead to keep me company."

He gets through it with voice breathless and breaking. He needs Mat to understand.

"Please don't go. I don't want to be alone like that again."