Kill System Engaged 001 (Patreon)

All good things come to an end; in the end the House always wins.

Conner “Con” Morales sat in an uncomfortable pleather seat that squeaked and groaned with every jolt of his six feet five inch frame. His knees pushed into the seat before him, offering him the barest of support to keep his chained up figure in the shitty seat.

“Big guy,” a voice said. The voice dripped with hatred. Con guessed he wasn’t a fan.

He turned his head to the man. A man about his own age, mid forties, paunch belly and with a tight tan uniform of a prison guard. He wore a helmet and some cheap kevlar vest, but unlike his other companions, he only carried a baton and pepper spray.

Con didn’t have to turn his head to note the other three guards languidly turn to see what was going down. Two carried shotguns and the third was armed as the blubbery guard before him.

“Small man,” Con replied.

“What did you say?” the guard demanded, leaning in close to Con.

Even as he sat in the shitty seat, Con was eye level with the guard.

“Small. Man,” Con repeated. “As in your dick, your courage, and your brain.”

One of the guards chuckled, a older man, graying hair and a face like creased leather. He carried a shotgun at his side, his helmet resting on his lap and kevlar vest opened up. The air conditioning of the prison bus was non-existent and the old guard was sweating in the hot afternoon spring day.

“You murdering fuck,” the blubbery guard hissed, his hand rested on his baton. “You think you scare me, big man?”

“I know I scare you,” Con replied. “Why else am I chained up?” He grinned at the guard, his dark face splitting to reveal straight white teeth. “Unchain me and see how brave you are, small man.”

The bus shuddered to a stop, with a squeal of brakes and curses. The three forward guards stood up to peer at what was happening before them as the bus driver spat more curses at useless Californian drivers.

“Half of the fucks are on their phones trying to the a social media star and the other half have their producer’s dick in their mouths trying to be the next Amanda Bynes,” the old shotgun carrying guard cracked.

“Who the hell is Amanda Bynes?” a guard asked.

Con peered out of the steel grated windows of the bus he was in. They were heading out of Los Angeles, the glitz and glamor of the damned city behind them and miles of desert, suburbs, and traffic before them.

Somewhere out there was a prison that would be his home for the rest of his life. And if it were possible an additional two hundred years on top of it. Con grunted, two hundred and fifty years in a federal maximum prison sounded like hell, but he was looking toward it.

The thought of prison didn’t bother him, his reputation had proceeded him. It was all over the news; the biggest manhunt in this century; the hundreds of mini documentaries that had dug through his life and exposed everything he had done since he was the age of thirteen.

Prison didn’t scare him. Thirty years in the business and the only end that he could see had been his body being tossed into an unmarked hole in some remote spot. Retirement was something that had never crossed his mind. If some idiot tried to come at him in prison, then it wasn’t as if adding another murder to his list would do anything to his punishment.

Con leaned back in the shitty seat and eyed the other people in the bus with him. The sight of the other three chained up men only reinforced his views on the state he had been caught in. Con had fled to California to take a boat out towards Southeast Asia. He had a friend and someone who owed him, but instead he had been betrayed for the reward money.

There was no anger about the betrayal, it was a lot of money. Con could see the logic behind it. Yet the other three men in the bus had all made the state their home and from Con’s point of view, that only reaffirmed his biases.

There was Jamie Dorian, young, thin, and wearing thick glasses. There wasn’t much to do in lockup beside gossip and before the day was over, everyone knew what an individual was in for. Jamie was a twenty year old hacker and computer genius, apparently. He had tried to pull a Snowden and released terabytes of the government’s dirty laundry. Now he was going to spend the rest of his life behind bars with some truly horrid creatures barely deserving of the name human.

Another  one of the horrid creatures was August Gregori, a wild haired man in his early fifties. He had a deep love of setting hospitals on fire that spanned thirty years. Twenty hospitals and scores dead.  More than half being children hospitals. His love of fires had involved his own flesh, most of it shiny from old burns and scars.

The last of the group was Drew Smith, a man in his late thirties that was vanilla bland from the outside. White, mousy brown hair, and a face that was forgettable. What lay within was another story. A serial rapist and killer, luring minors and teens to his suburb torture house. From what Con had heard, the man also had a feet fetish, with nearly thirty pickled and preserved having been found in his home. Killing people was one thing; that Con could understand, but keeping trophies? That never seemed like a good idea to him.

Con had to smirk, some of the worse human beings on the planet were stuck in a small shitty bus with no AC and trapped in a traffic jam leaving Los Angeles. Wolves among all the sheep.

What’s the worst that could happen?

Rejoice, Humanity!

Con flinched as words appeared before his eyes.  Fancy, frilly red text crawled across his sight.  “What the hell,” he muttered.

The Deities have deemed your species weak and pretty damn sad to look at. How will you ever face the horrors of trans dimensional travel? Anyway, it is with great sacrifice and hardship the Deities had decided to change the fabric of your weak, sad world.

Rejoice. The System has come to your world.

Fight, kill, grow in strength and perhaps one day you shall join the ranks of the Deities… or go extinct. Both options are cool by us.

The words faded away a second before the world seemed to flash with brilliant red light. Con clenched his eyes shut as the world condensed into a ball of pain in his head.

INFAMY!

Your name is know, but in a bad, bad way, buddy. Normally, that wouldn’t mean much, another killer in the flock, another wolf in the pen, blah, blah, blah. But these are the early days of the Transition to the System and the Deities like to bet and see who will rise to the top. Cream and such, buddy.

Death Queen Oligalia has chosen you and your compatriots in this Bus of the Damned to be her champions. Go out into the world, pal, and kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.

It’s what you do best, ain’t it?

+1 medium boon

+1 large boon

Use ‘em or lose ‘em, bud. Oligalia’s placed some hefty mana on you and your pals. Don’t fuck this up and make her happy. Happy goddess, happy life.

“Get me the fuck out of these cuffs,” Con said.

Medium boon used. (Seriously, you used a medium boon for this?)

The chains and cuffs locking Con into place began to fall away. The hardened steel flaking away as if it had been turned into dust. Con stared at it for a moment, his cramped posture suddenly free. He grinned.

The guards were busy. They were staring a head, their concentration captured by the words marching across their vision.

“Give me a weapon,” Con said.

Large Boon used. (You’ll like this one, pal. Oligalia has the best weapons).

Con flinched as pain burned into his hand, hot and sudden. He gritted his teeth as his wrist were slit and blood began pouring out. He clamped his hand down upon his right wrist, trying to stem the flood. The blood continued and he stared in sick fascination as it began to take shape before him. Within a heartbeat, his own blood had formed a weapon.

A sword.

What the hell was he going to do with a sword? He had never used a sword before in his life. A gun, of course; a steak knife, once or twice. A sword on the other hand, nope. The closest he’d ever got to using a sword had been a machete. That had been a custom add-on by the client; they wanted it to look like some kind of cartel killing.

Oligalia’s Blood Sword

Life Leacher, Blood Letter, Death Dealer

Drink deeply of your enemies blood and slay all who stand in your way.

There was always a first time, Con thought. The blade was nearly two and a half feet, with a simple guard and pommel. Yet etched into the reddish steel was a sinuous figure, nearly snakelike and its mouth open toward the tip of the blade. There wasn’t much to the thing, the sharp point went into whomever and the double edge blade would slide and cut.

Con jumped to his feet and rammed the blade into the small of Blubbery Guard’s back. He let out a confused grunt, but Con was already moving, shoving the dying guard into one of his companions, the other non weapon carrying guard.

Shotgun and his buddy stared at Con as me moved quickly. They tried to get up, swiping their hands before their face, as if trying to shoo away a bug.

The weird messages, Con thought, as he gutted the Shotgun’s buddy from balls to tits. Blood gushed out and the stink of ruptured bowels filled the enclosed bus. Shotgun tried to raise his shotgun, but Con kicked him back into his seat. He could hear something crunch in the man’s chest as his cheap prison shoes slammed into him.

Con’s attention was on the fifth guard. The one who sat by the bus driver. He was staring slack jawed as Con slammed the blade into the metal grating separating the prisoners from the front of the bus. The metal parted like butter, allowing Con to stab his sword into the chest of the guard. The guard gurgled and dropped his weapon, clutching at his wound. The second stab took him the face, ending his life.

Shotgun was wheezing in pain as he stared at Con. The blade swiped across his throat, taking off the man’s head in one easy swipe. A fountain of blood erupted and Con turned to face the the last guard. He was sobbing and wiping the blood away from his face, the Blubbery Guard was shoved aside, having bled all over the man.

“Please,” he cried and those were his last words as Con stabbed him in the face.

August Gregori began cackling, his blood covered face cracking open and displaying rotten teeth. Con didn’t even think, he stabbed the man in the mouth, jerking upward to tear the blade though his brain and pulling it out of the top of his head. He stared in horror at Con, but was dead a moment later.

Drew didn’t cry or look terrified. He stared Con down, his face emotionless and blank as Con stabbed him in the chest. The front of his prison issued uniform was a tattered mess, showing blood, bone, and meat. There was no hatred or fear in the serial killer’s face, only a blank acceptance of what was happening. Con felt a shiver run down his spine and decided to decapitate the man too.

“Protect me!” a voice cried.

Con looked to see the second to last survivor, Jamie Dorian. The man had shoved down onto the floor, practically hiding under his seat. Jamie had his hands over his head, big dumb terrified eyes staring at Con. A blue shimmer appeared around the man as Con stepped forward.

The edge of Con’s sword tapped the blue sphere and he felt an electrical jolt. He winced and tried again, adding more pressure. The blue shimmer hardened and his sword wouldn’t go any further.

“A shield?” Con asked. Jamie only stared back at him in utter horror and terror.

“Fuck this!” another voice cried. Con turned to see the bus driver tear open the door and flee the bus. He vanished among the cars, not even taking a moment to look cast a farewell glance. Con shrugged. He didn’t need to kill that guy.

“Don’t kill me,” Jamie cried.

Con grabbed August’s body and pulled it off the seat.

LOOT?

Con flinched.

“What?” he asked out loud.

“Don’t kill me,” Jamie repeated.

“Shut up. I’m not talking to you.”

“I touched this dead fuck and its asking me if I want to Loot.”

Jamie took a break from crower in fear to blink up at Con, staring at August’s corpse. The mention of loot seemed to pique his interest. He looked at Con and at August’s body again. Blood was still oozing out, along with what remained of his brain. Jamie gagged and slapped his hands across his mouth.

“Like a game?” Con wondered. He considered himself a decent uncle to his nephews and they were always squawking about console games and looting the enemies they killed. He’d killed plenty of people and none of their corpses ever offered up loot. Although, truth be told, most of those killings were from a distance. Not much call for up close murder and waiting around to loot a corpse.

The world was changing and in strange ways, Con figured. The messages, the boons, and now this.

“Gimmie what he gots,” Con said.

There was a glow and a box appeared before him.

20 lbs human meat

10 lbs human bone

100 Vex

1 Vitality block

“What’s all this shit?” Con demanded. Whomever had been texting him before didn’t respond.

Con dropped the human junk onto the floor. Jamie’s eyes widen at the red meat and bones, before turning another shade of green. This time he couldn’t hold in the vomit.

The Vex vanished into a glimmer of dull red light. At the edge of his vision, Con could see something flashing. He decide to ignore it for a moment, studying the last thing he had gained. A Vitality Block; it was a domino sized bit of rough stone with a red glimmering gem in the center. Con turned it over. A series of strange symbols and scribbles covered the back of the block.

Your Vitality is full. You cannot use this item. Yet.

He knew what vitality meant, there were some games he’d played with his nephews that had it as a type of resource. One related to health. Was it something that would heal him if he were injured.

Con pocketed it. He’d been injured plenty of times in his line of business and it always sucked. Getting shot and having to sit out two months of work because of injuries was a major hassle. If this block could heal him, then that would mean he’d never have to face another doctor or their fucking needles again.

You have killed a Chosen!

They hadn’t had the chance to use their boons, therefore they’re yours now.

1 small boon

1 medium boon

Con looked down at August. He remembered the message from the Texter, that everyone in the bus had been Chosen by the Death Queen. He touched Blubbery Guard’s corpse.

Like August, he got meat and bones, but also bile, more of the Vex, and a Vitality Block.

No boons. Guess the Texter meant the psycho assholes and not the guards, he thought.

Con rose to his feet, ignoring Jamie’s cowering form. He grabbed Drew by the head and saw the box appear above his corpse.

More meat. More bones. More Vex. Another Vitality Block. Some fat and mana string, the latter Con didn’t know what it was. A moment after looting, the Texter sent him another message.

Two Chosen, bud? Really, Oligalia spent mucho mana on these guys, hoping they’d be your murderous little doggies in this apocalypse. Anyway, you get this sad kiddie raper’s boons.

2 medium boons.

Con turned to Jamie. If the other two had boons… then again Jamie had cried out protection and formed that shield that surrounded him.

“You used your boons?” Con asked.

“Yes,” Jamie said quickly. “I got a medium boon.”

“The shield?”

Jamie nodded, eyeing Con’s sword.

“Seems like you can loot the boons too. If they haven’t been used yet,” Con said, grabbing one of the guards. “Not everyone gets them. Like these fucks.”

“I got… I got a message that the Thunderous Mage Alivano had chosen me. Something about Infamy and Glory.”

“Glory?” Con asked.

Jamie shrugged. “I don’t know what it meant.”

“I got Infamy,” Con grinned.

Jamie swallowed loudly. “We all know what you’ve done,” he said. He glanced at the eight bodies stinking up the bus. “I can see why you got Infamy.”

Con grunted and dropped more human meat and bones onto the floor. More Vex, another Vitality Block, there was also something new.

Malleable Matter

There was no description on what it meant. Con twisted the six inch brick in his hands. It was reddish in color and had the same odd scribbles and carvings into it. The texture was rough, like stone but also rubbed smooth in some areas. He dropped it onto the bus floor and it gave a heavy boom as it landed.

“What is that?” Jamie asked.

“Malleable Matter,” Con said. “Dunno what that means.”

“It’s probably a resource,” Jamie said. “Like in games.”

Con nodded. “Figured as much too,” he said. “But its too heavy to carry around.”

“Did you use your boons?” Jamie asked.

Con grinned at him. “Looking to kill me?”

“No,” Jamie said quickly. “These boons are gifts from whatever these Deities are, so there must be a list or something you can look at to choose the boons, right?. Like that sword. Or maybe you can get some armor or maybe something to carry stuff around in.”

“There are bags,” Con said, gesturing his head to the black duffle bags the guards had on them. He suspected they were filled with clothing, ammo, and whatever they needed on the trip to the prison.

“No, like an Inventory,” Jamie said, a glint in his eye. “If the boons were the gifts from these Deities, then that would mean you could get anything, right?”

Con shrugged. “Show me the boons I can get,” he said out loud.

You don’t have to speak out loud, the Texter responded. Here is a list of what the Death Queen is offering to her Chosen Killers.

A list appeared before Con, showing scores and scores of weapons, armor, tools, and various things. Con blinked at them.

“Too much info,” he sighed.

“Can I see?” Jamie asked.

Con looked at the man and shrugged. “You can,” he said.

Jamie blinked and stepped back, his eyes focusing on the spot where the window had opened showing what was available. He moved his hands against the screen and Con watched as the display scrolled through various things.

Gallavan’s Death Gauntlets, medium boon.

Zathvaka’s Murder Talons, small boon.

Murder Hobo’s Traveling Pack, small boon

Jamie shook his head as he muttered the names and cost of things. Con leaned back in his seat and peered out the grated windows. A few minutes had passed since the driver ran off, but between the Text messages and the looting, he hadn’t been paying attention to what was happening outside.

Shit had gone downhill. Con watched as some weird creature crawled across a turned over BMW, their long scythe arms dripping with blood. A body lay on the asphalt, a fat man in a suit, his guts ripped out and a dozen small rat like creatures on two legs chowed down on the bounty.

People were screaming as monsters tore through the parked vehicles. Where they had come from, Con didn’t know. It seemed they had just appeared. Perhaps some portal to Hell had opened up and now the demons were free.

“There,” Jamie said.

Con realized that the screen he had been looking at hadn’t stayed in his line of sight. Instead it stayed with Jamie as he had been looking out upon the road. That was interesting.

“What do you got?” Con asked.

“Inventory, medium boon. It says it’ll give you an eight by four dimensional inventory, holding up to two tons total.”

“So it’s magic bag?” Con asked.

“It’s not physical, it just… is a part of you. You can access it and put stuff into it.”

“Alright,” Con centered the screen back into his line of sight and looked at the purchase before him. It showed an outline of a human with thirty-two small boxes beside him. An animation showed a man stuffing heads into a box until all thrity-two were filled.

Inventory

When you don’t want to carry around a pack or just need some non-physical space to stuff your loot. Identical items can stack, twenty per stack, up to two tons total.

Con pressed the accept button. Pain flooded through his body. It was quick, but intense. He leaned against the seat gasping for breath while Jamie looked on in horror. A moment later he could see another blinking light at the edge of his vision.

“What are these blinking lights,” Con asked.

“I think they’re notifications,” Jamie said. “Like messages from the System.”

Con grunted. That’s what he needed now, some asshole trying to get in touch with him about his car’s extended warranty.

“Deal with them for me,” Con said, rising to his feet.

“I don’t think I ca-“

“Unless you want to deal with those fuckers coming our way,” Con said, using his sword to point at three massive yellow fleshed figures marching in their direction.

“I can be a secretary,” Jamie said quickly.

The creatures were big, about eight or nine feet tall and wide in the shoulders. Thick corded muscles ran the length of their arms and legs, and they were hung like an elephant. Welcoming humanity into this new system didn’t seem to be their intent, as they grabbed fleeing men and women, and then smashed them against vehicles in a spray of blood and gore.

Con limbered up his arms and marched forward. He’d never killed anything inhuman before. Sure, a lot of low life assholes, more than a few dogs, and a walrus, but nothing that looked like it came right out some metalhead’s album poster.

The lock that separated the prisoners from the driver was no challenge to Con’s blade. He kicked the door open and exited the bus. His cheap shoes creaked on the asphalt and the heavy smell of smoke, blood, and shit filled the air.

The three yellow bastards were smashing their fists against an SUV that held a screaming mother and two kids. The glass shattered easily and one of the creatures shoved their arm into the interior, pulling out a screaming kid. There was mad lustful glee in the creature’s eyes; that kid was in for some hell before they were eventually killed.

Con rushed forward, the blade seemingly vibrating in his hands, eager for blood. He made an overhand chop that took the yellow fuck’s arm off at the bicep. The sobbing kid hit the ground and the two other monsters stopped their attack, staring at the new threat.

One Arm began screaming in an annoying manner. Con brought his blade up and took off the fucker’s head. The two other yellow bastards rushed at him. They were big and so was Con, but he was smaller and able to dodge around the immobile vehicles. Even with their massive strength, the weren’t able to move around a few thousand pounds of trucks with ease.

Con kited the two away from the mother and children, pulling them deeper into the more packed vehicles. The two followed him eagerly, seemingly enraged at the death of their companion.

“Hey, you’re the fuckers who came here,” Con said as one of the yellow fuckers lunged at him, long talons scraping across the top of a Jeta.

Con lashed out and took the hand off at the wrist, laughing as the yellow fucker began screaming in incomprehensible noise. Con rushed the beast as it staggered back back, colliding with a box truck. It’s pal was slow on the uptake and only stared a moment before trying to rush to his buddy’s side.

Con’s cheap sneakers nearly slipped on the trunk of the Jeta, but he got some purchase on the metal and lunged across the distance between him and One Hand. The beast didn’t seem to comprehend the attack, like it had never seen someone rush it before. It’s shock died quickly as Con drove the blade into it’s chest, pulling downward. Flesh and bone were sundered under the unnaturally sharp weapon.

Con was caught up in enjoying the spray of yellow blood that it was an utter surprise when the last beast punched him in the back. It’s massive hand spanned the space between his shoulder blades and Con buckled from the impact. It was like being hit with a sledgehammer, something he had experienced once.

Con let out a ragged cry, his breath exploding from his mouth and his knees going weak. The sword clattered to the ground and he flopped to the blood soaked asphalt, his arms and legs going numb. A hiss of claws whistled over him as the creature tried to swipe at him again. The long talons tore into the metal of the box truck as if showing him what would have happened if he kept standing. Con regained some feeling in his body and quickly crawled away. Pain gnawed across his back, sending electrical tingles down his arms and fingers.

A foot caught him in the midsection, he felt the bones in his hips grind and pop. He was lifted off the ground and caught some air time before slamming hard into the back of a pickup truck. There were landscaping tools and the hard metal dug into his already screaming back.

The creature stood back and roared, taking a moment to revel in its victory. Con took that moment’s reprieve to pull up his Inventory and pull out the shotgun he had nabbed from the dead guards.

He racked the weapon and fired. A spray of buckshot hit the creature’s head, shredding off skin and muscle, but not killing it. Con took note that it was a strong fucker.

He fired again, this time cursing as a bean bag struck the creature in the face. Although it wasn’t majorly injured, the creature still turned its head and flinched in pain. Con fired again and again, evert damn shell was a bean bag round. The beast staggered back under the onslaught, but not far enough. Its face was a bloody mess, looking like he’d gone a few rounds with Drago.

Con clamored to his feet as the creature crouched in a defensive posture, expecting another round to the face. Instead Con reached down into the pile of tools he had been laying upon and grabbed up a pickaxe. The beast dropped its hands and focused a good eye on Con as he charged the creature. It tried to rise to its feet, but Con leaped from the truck bed and slammed down the pickaxe into the side of the creature’s face.

The bones were hard as rock, but the pickaxe did its job, punching through the bone and into the noggin of the fucker. It squeal and threw itself back. Slamming into the Jeta and thrashing. Con rolled away, crying out as his back screamed at the abuse. He lay on the asphalt gasping, his arms twitching and pain lancing down from the back of his head to his asshole.

As he lay there, he saw the sword he had dropped. His fingers wrapped around the hilt and Con forced himself back to his feet. The beast was not dead, instead it thrashed about, slamming into cars as it tried to remove the pickaxe.

“Hey, fucker,” Con snarled, but the creature had not interest in his quippy remarks. Con growled and charged forward.

He rammed the blade into the creature’s belly, under what would have been the sternum in a human and drove the blade upward into the chest of the beast. If it’s anatomy was anywhere near a human’s, its heart was now chopped in half. Con didn’t take any chances deciding to take the sword on the sightseeing route out of the monster’s body.

Thick ropy coils of intestines and a waterfall of yellow blood followed the blade out of the monster. Con stepped back, as a offal flooded over his shoes.

He stood there in pain and gasping for breath, the blade he noticed glowed a dull red. He watched in fascination as the red moved down the blade, following the sinuous figure and growing a brighter. Warmth filled his hands and he could feel the tingling pain from his shattered back begin to fade. Cuts and scrapes were also fading away.

Life Leach: a portion of your defeated enemy’s Vitality will be given to you. Kill more, gain more Vitality.

The text message appeared and Con shook his head. He still felt like shit and his back was still painful as hell, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been. Con had to smile at that. As long as he killed things, he could heal himself.

That thought reminded him of the Vitality Blocks he had gained from the guards and prisoners. He pulled one out of his Inventory and looked at it.

“Gimmie some love, darling,” he said to the stone block.

The Vitality block shimmered and the red glimmer within it grew brighter. A moment later the stone vanished in a what looked like a flurry of red ash. Con sucked in a breath as the intense pain in his hip eased up and a loud pop filled the air. He let out the breath in exquisite relief, leaning against the battered Jeta.

3 Vitality restored.

Two more blocks later, Con strode back toward the prison bus. He wondered if Jamie would still be there. If the kid was smart, he would have run off the moment Con turned his back.

It turned out the kid was an idiot. Jamie sat in the seat of the driver, flipping through the menus and screens.

“This is awesome,” Jamie said as Con sat down on Jamie’s former seat. “I set it so that you auto loot all the things you kill,” he added.

He had forgotten to loot the creatures. Con waved his hand and the thirty-two blocks of his Inventory appeared. There were the shotguns, all three along with what ammo the duffle bags had held. Con frowned, he had expected the guards to be packing heat, not non-lethal rounds. It still worked somewhat, but more in a shock rather than killing way. He’d have to find some shells for the guns.

There were new items in his Inventory.

900 Vex

2 Upgrade Tokens

1 additional Malleable Matter

1 Red Sunstone

2 Grit blocks

Three new kinds of items. What they did, Con didn’t know, but there was someone who seemed to be a bit more knowledgeable in this regard.

“Figure this shit out,” Con told to Jamie.

The young man stared at him. “What?”

“You seem to know what you’re doing,” Con said.

“Uh…”

“I wasn’t asking,” Con said. “Figure it out and tell me what’s up. Point out what looks good for the boons I have left. There are monsters out there and even with the piddly shield you got, you’re not going to last long out there.”

Jamie stared out of the bus’ front windows and visibly shuddered.

“I can kill things pretty good,” Con said. “Don’t try me, kid.”