A Girl from Nowhere (The Firewall Trilogy, #1)

by James Maxwell

veins

"Arteries," not "veins," blood pulses are felt in arteries.

He didn’t know why the world had to be such a harsh place. All he knew was that this savagery couldn’t go on.

The scene from Star Trek where Kirk tells the advanced alien intelligence, "We're savages, but we don't have to be. We just have to say, 'I won't kill today! I have killed in the past and I may kill tomorrow, but I won't kill today; by saying that day after day we become less savage!" Or words to that effect, when he refuses to kill the Gorn Captain he'd been fighting.

At public gatherings, he spoke to his citizens’ emotions and heightened those that were most keenly felt: fear, anger, and a sense of kinship for their friends and neighbors. It didn’t work on everyone, but all the Protector needed was a core of vocal supporters.

Hmmm. Sounds like . . . 45!