3
I didn't really hurt him, but I did feel every bit of his terror."
"Looks like she's doing just that, too," Thompson commented. It didn't look like much intervention, if any at all, would be needed -- not with the `servants of the Devil' appearing on talk shows trying to reassure people and looking like death warmed over. "What the hell do they do for food, then?"
Sanchez advanced the recording, then started playing it again. " -- willing Donors," the detective chief was saying. "We feel pain we inflict deliberately, yes -- but we can also project feelings. If somebody's willing to feed me, I can let feel the satisfaction -- even, if 's willing enough, the ecstasy -- I do when I feed. And I certainly wouldn't take enough to hurt, or even to weaken, !"
Sanchez shut off the recording. "You know, I believe her."
"So do I," Thompson said thoughtfully. "I do still have to investigate, of course, but I'd say from this that there's no crisis big enough to call in even a squadron for."
* * *
The E-Team's landing wasn't the covert operation Thompson had originally planned; instead, the Koslov called for clearance, and they landed at the main spaceport, where Thompson and his team disembarked in full uniform, complete with sidearms. He didn't particularly like weapons, but procedure called for E-Teams to carry them unless doing so would be more dangerous than not, which didn't seem to be the case here.
Landing openly, even an E-Team had to go through Customs and Health, which was routine enough until a tech told Thompson that he needed blood samples to test for susceptibility to the nosferatu pseudo-virus.
"What's that?" Thompson asked.
"What makes humans into Kins," the tech said, sounding as if he were telling them something they should already know. "If you're susceptible, and if the virus gets into your bloodstream, and if something seriously weakens your system more than twenty-four standard hours later, you turn into a Kin. The Count's orders are that any