"'World In Catastrophe: Killzone Experiment Department.'" He recites the full name the acronym represents, but Steve is right. It's freaking stupid, and he shrugs. "I didn't make it up, man."

'War', okay, that could mean anything. What he's more interested in - "I mean humanity. How many are left? Are there quarantines? Are there... people who're sick, outside?"

Thomsa sighes, hands on his hips, and explains more. "The area around the equator is called the Scorch. Nothing lives there anymore - it's a desert, nothing grows, and there's these freak lightning storms that..."

That massacre anyone out in them. He swallows, moving on. "It's just where they drop the Cranks now. The sick shanks who're so far gone they're dangerous."