a long silver Kill-O-Zap gun at them. The designer of the gun had clearly not been instructed to beat about the bush.

"...a long silver Kill-O-Zap gun at them. The designer of the gun had clearly
not been instructed to beat about the bush. "Make it evil," he'd been told.
"Make it totally clear that this gun has a right end and a wrong end. Make it
totally clear to anyone standing at the wrong end that things are going badly
for them. If that means sticking all sort of spikes and prongs and blackened
bits all over it then so be it. This is not a gun for hanging over the
fireplace or sticking in the umbrella stand, it is a gun for going out and
making people miserable with."