He snorts skeptically, though his expression still telegraphs his unease quite clearly.

"Like hell." The whole red-eyed thing - that's not normal. No kid smiles like that. No kid acts like that. Frankly, at this point he wouldn't be surprised to learn that they ate babies and kicked puppies in their spare time. "I bet you were real torn up about it."

Torn up. A dumb joke in the face of some obnoxious little shit that got a lucky strike in. A fatal luck strike, sure, but he's not really about to believe that they're really all that. Creepy, sure, but able to overpower him directly? No goddamn way.