....the other girl was also surprised by running water. 

"Social Services is probably pretty scary," she says gently (or, she's trying for gently, but she's very tired and not a temperamentally patient person and dislikes being this confused.)

"Is scary now, don't know. Maybe like hoses, is full of water, not scary. Maybe like other thing, not know word, know and is still scary."

Awwww. "I hope when you know, it not scary. Social Services look after children with no parents, or whose parents are not able to give them a safe home right now. We want every child to have a safe home where they can learn."

"My parents are not able to give them a safe home right now? My parents is far away."

"Right. Sending children far away outside the United States is hard. I will look for your parents, and if I find them, and you want to go to them, I will try to send you to them. But it might take time to find them, because I have not heard of Sarkoris. So right now, your parents are not able to give you a safe home, because we cannot find them."

"You find them, you not keep me?"

"No! We do not want to keep children away from their parents, only make sure all children have a safe home."

"Even I eat pizza, you no keep me?"

" - if we have a safe home to send you to we will not keep you. And it will not matter at all if you eat the pizza." WHAT?

"I no speak spanish good. You say again, little words, I eat pizza you not keep me?"

"We will not keep you if you eat the pizza." WHAT. "The pizza is yours, so you are not hungry. Nothing bad will happen if you eat the pizza." Unless the kid is allergic to pizza but there is no way she is going to get into that right now.

"Why you give pizza?"

" - because we want to ...feed... the ...children?"

"Why pizza? Why no - poor food"

" - we don't want the children who are in Social Services care to feel like they are less important than any other children. And pizza is not actually very expensive, and it travels well, and it makes kids happy." Most of them. She should ask Steel about Iomedae's pizza opinions. Maybe where they're from it's like caviar or something.

She did not follow that explanation.

She's very hungry, though. She eats the pizza.

This gets her a smile that is meant to be proud and encouraging though Diel is still missing the associated actual feelings. "All right. I am going to try to find a home for you here while I try to find your parents. It will have pizza and ...hoses*...and other nice things that we have here in Reno. Okay?"

*She thinks that this is Alfirin's word for indoor plumbing.

The smile kind of makes the pizza seem more suspicious.

"Okay. Hoses only nice when make water. Hoses not nice when not water, hoses bite."

" - well, I have never heard of any hoses biting. We will not send you to a house where the hoses bite. We will send you to a house where a person who is safe and can keep a safe home will give you a bed and meals and clothes and help getting to school and all the other things a girl of your age needs."

"Okay."

"Is there any thing a house should know about you?"

"No."

Right. Time to make a phone call.