[center][b] Eric Dean/Alsia[/b][/center]
Upon hearing that the battered young woman did want food and something to drink, Eric immediately went into the kitchen, where he began looking through the refrigerator He located the pizza first, BBQ Chicken and bacon, his favorite pie from Petrillo’s in town, and in his opinion, the best pizza in the city. He pulled the pizza from the fridge and grabbed a plate. As he put the pizza into the microwave he called to the girl.

“You sure you just want water? I’ve got soda, and juice. I think I’ve got some V-8 in here somewhere.” 

As the man walked out of the room Alsia looked around the room quickly, scanning for anything that would indicate this place was a risk or a trap. Then satisfied that there were no apparent signs of lurking hostility she reached down and pressed a specific point on the side of her pack, locking it down unless she gave the activation command. With that done she allowed herself to relax slightly, sinking back into the couch cushions, it was comfortable.

“Water is fine.” She called back; she vaguely remembered the early tests with human food. There were many things that had reacted poorly with her when she had been fed them and Alsia knew water at least was safe.

The microwave beeped, Eric carefully removed the plate with two slices of pizza and set it down on the counter. He went back into the fridge and took out a bottle of water, then returned to the couch with the food and drink. 

He looked down at the young woman, and he felt a surge of anger wash over him. Someone had done a number on this poor woman and left her in an alley. 

Who could do that to someone? Eric thought to himself as he handed her the plate and placed the bottle of water on the coffee table in front of her.

“It’s not much, but there’s more if you want it.” He said as she looked at the pizza. “Listen, I know you might not want to talk about it, but do you know who it was that did this to you?” He asked, indicating the bruises on her face. 

As soon as the heating device beeped and the food was removed Alsia could smell it, and the smell just served to make her hungrier. There was definitely meat in the smell though there were some less than appetizing scents as well, still she couldn’t be picky and when the human returned to the room she let her mouth shape a real human smile. “Thank you.” She spoke again as he put down the food and the bottle of water.

The Visisth had anticipated the questions and staved them off for a moment by opening the bottle of water, and taking a long drink from it, nearly half gone in that one long sip. What did humans of this era expect women to act like; Alsia was not quite certain and wished she had done a proper reconnaissance and cultural primer. “It, it happened so fast.” She stammered out in her best effort to impersonate someone who had had been assaulted.

“There was this man in a mask and he hit me and took my money and bags.” She pointed to the one at her feet. “Some luck he couldn’t get the straps off my back and he ran off after a minute. And it was the empty bag.” 

Alsia lifted up the first piece of pizza and examined, it didn’t smell quite right but she was starving and in the end she took a bite. It was edible she decided, even if there wasn’t enough meat and far too much of this hard tasteless material. Why did humans of this time eat a plate under the food?

She inhaled the rest of the first piece of pizza, barely managing to keep her second set of teeth from descending to hasten the process of chewing and swallowing. That hadn’t been right she realized belatedly and looked up at the man with the same half smile her face always naturally wore. “Sorry for the manners. I’m just hungry.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. I’ve got more if you’re still hungry when you finish those.” Eric said, lightheartedly. Though, his mind soon traveled back to her assailant. 

“Do you want to call the police and file a report?” He asked, though by her reaction to his earlier suggestion that he get her to a hospital, he already knew the answer. 

With the confirmation that how she was eating was fine Alsia simply inhaled the second piece of pizza as well and then drained the rest of the water bottle in another long drink. 

"I'd rather not." She said after a minute. "I don't think it'd help much." She sighed as if there was some deep past experience that made her biased against such forces of law and order on this planet. Then she held out the plate, "Could I have more please?" Already she was starting to feel her strength coming back, she wouldn't want to make any shifts for at least a few more hours but she was on her way.

“Of course.” Eric said, slightly surprised at how fast she devoured the pizza. He took the plate and returned to the kitchen, where he loaded another couple of slices onto the plate, and placed it into the microwave. Then, he returned to the young woman with another bottle of water.

“I’m Eric by the way, and you are?”

"Nice to meet you Eric, I'm Alsia and thank you for helping me." She spoke in response to his question and then smiled again, as she took the second bottle of water and consciously made an effort to just sip at it instead of gulping it down; she did remember that humans ate far less than she did.

“It’s good to meet you Alsia, though, I wish it were under better circumstances.” He said as the microwave went off again, indicating that the pizza was done. 

After retrieving the food, Eric made his way back to Alsia and handed her the plate. 

“Listen, do you have a place to stay? I mean, you could stay here for as long as you need.” He said, unsure how she would take his offer. 

After she took the plate Eric asked if she had a place to stay and Alsia hesitated. She hadn't considered this possibility but there was little likelyhood of finding a better place to hole up and having a place to base herself out of in her attempts to plan a new attack on Macros would be useful. 

"I don't" she said finally. "I was looking for one before I-" she broke off as if it was painful to talk about. "Thank you so much." Alsia finished with a carefully engineered sincerity.