Roadside Picnic

by Arkady Strugatsky

The hell with it! One way or another, I won’t live till the end.

‘You ask: what makes man great?’” he quoted. “‘Is it that he re-created nature? That he harnessed forces of almost-cosmic proportions? That in a brief time he has conquered the planet and opened a window onto the universe? No! It is that despite all this, he has survived, and intends to continue doing so.’”

A man needs money in order to never think about it.