Chapter Text
Pidge was not looking forward to her computer science class. She had tested out of the first required class, but she still had to take the second level class, Intermediate Programming Concepts. Cadets weren’t allowed to test out higher than this -- she had asked and then complained to no avail -- so she would be stuck in this one. From looking at the course summary it would all be stuff she already knew, so she was completely prepared to endure a boring and useless lecture.
Pidge could tell from the first five minutes of the lecture that the material was way below her level. The coding language was Java, which Pidge had known for years and the concepts the professor was introducing were more basic than intermediate. She sighed internally and settled in for a wasted hour.
But as the lecture went on, she couldn’t help but respect the teacher, Professor Sampson; she really knew her stuff. As she put up examples of code to illustrate programming concepts, Pidge noticed something she had never seen before: the professor had a very specific way of formatting the code that made it easier to read. It had never occurred to Pidge to do anything of the sort; she always wrote the bare minimum of code and aesthetics be damned. But Pidge realized she was onto something with this more readable code. It would certainly make it easier to spot mistakes. Pidge was good, but not so good that she didn’t make errors, and her more complicated programs always had at least a few bugs that needed to be corrected. It would be so much simpler to debug if her code was this easy to read.
Pidge paid close attention during the rest of the lecture. She was halfway paying attention to the material the professor was presenting, but mostly watching the formatting of the code, and by the end of the lecture she had figured out some of the key points of the formatting style. Every time a new variable was declared, there was a comment on the same line to define that variable. Whenever there were nested loops, each loop was slightly more indented than the last. Pidge was sure there were other things going on too, but she hadn’t figured them out yet. By the end of the lecture her opinion of the class was completely reversed: what she had assumed would be a waste of time had turned out to be a masterclass in how to write legible code.
The concept of formatting the code in this elegant way was so novel and compelling that Pidge made the decision to step outside her comfort zone and ask the professor about it.
As the other students were leaving, she collected her things in her arms and timidly approached the front of the classroom. “Um, may I ask a question?”
Professor Sampson looked surprised, but then she smiled and said “Of course, go ahead.”
Pidge screwed her courage to the sticking place. “Where did you learn to make code look like that, so easy to read?”
“My Ph.D. advisor. He insisted that everyone in the group write their code this way so that he and anyone else in the group could read it. He even had a style manual to follow, it was thirty pages long! At first I hated it, but eventually I realized it was one of the best things I learned there.”
“Will you be teaching that in this course?”
“I wasn’t planning on it, but if we have extra time at the end of the semester, I’ll add some material on this. I can get you a copy of that style manual, if you’re interested.”
“Thank you! I’d like that very much.”
“Great! I’ll bring you a copy to class next time.”
Pidge wasn’t sure what to say now, so she just smiled and awkwardly turned and left the room.
At dinner time she found Hunk waiting outside of the cafeteria to meet her. Dinner was burgers, fries, and some cooked veggies, which Pidge wasn’t thrilled about or anything, but it looked decent. Once they had their food, Hunk once again moved to join Lance, who was already sitting at a table by himself. Pidge sighed but didn’t complain; she didn’t want to fight Hunk, not on this, at least.
This time Lance actually smiled and said hello as they sat down. Pidge marveled at how cheerful he looked; if she had embarrassed herself as spectacularly as he had this morning, she would still be hiding in a hoodie, in her room, with the lights off. Maybe Hunk had been right about Lance just needing someone to be friendly to him.
They settled in and tasted their food. “This cheeseburger is surprisingly good for an institutional cafeteria,” Hunk remarked after a few careful bites. He then tried the vegetables with equal care. “They kinda fucked up the vegetables, though.” He brandished a piece of grayish carrot on his fork and examined it.
It’s just food , Pidge thought. What’s the big deal? “Maybe it’s usually terrible here and they’re just playing tricks on you by making the first day sort of good. It’s a bait and switch.”
“Don’t say that!” Hunk sounded offended.
Who cares this much about food? she thought. It’s just… food. She was there for the classes, not the cuisine. Well, she was also there to find her family, but definitely not for the food. She scrambled to change the subject, turning to Lance.
“So, what is geo-cartography?”
Before Lance could gather himself to reply, her attention was caught by Hunk, whose face had split into a big grin, which he promptly hid behind his cheeseburger, though his eyes still sparkled as he watched his friends. She was almost surprised when Lance answered her question after a breath.
“It’s about maps of geological features, like hills and stuff. Apparently it’s really useful for navigating cargo ships over different types of terrain.” The words cargo ships fell bitterly from his lips. Pidge wondered how long he would be complaining about his placement.
“Why don’t the ships just fly above all of that stuff?” Pidge asked.
“Fighter pilots do,” Lance griped, “but apparently cargo ships are more energy-efficient near the ground.”
“Why would being close to the ground make a difference?”
“I didn’t understand when he explained that part, something about magnets.”
“I’ve heard about something like that,” interjected Hunk. “Universal terrain magnetic drive. I haven’t studied it, but I’m sure it will come up in one of my engineering courses.”
“How can magnets work on any terrain?” Pidge objected stubbornly. “It doesn’t make any sense.” She turned to glare at Lance as though he personally owed her an answer.
“Don’t ask me, I told you I didn’t understand it. And anyway, the professor said we don’t really have to understand it. We just need to know to stick close to the ground.”
“Well, I need to know this,” said Pidge, making a mental note to look it up when she got to her room.
Hunk laughed. “What does a communications officer need to know about ship propulsion?”
“I just need to know, okay?”
“Yeah, I don’t get why you’re so interested,” added Lance. “It all seemed so dull to me.”
“It doesn’t make sense to me and that bothers me. I just wanna figure it out out.”
“All right,” Lance shrugged. “How you waste your free time is up to you. Speaking of, I’d rather be off throwing a frisbee.”
“Meh.” Pidge was unimpressed.
“Really? But aren’t you excited about the first ultimate frisbee practice tonight? You said you were gonna sign up for it.”
“No, I’m not excited. I already said I was doing it just because it sounds like the easiest one.”
“Me too,” said Hunk, “I’ve thrown a frisbee like, twice, and it’s not that much fun.” Lance deflated at this, and Hunk suddenly seemed worried that he had insulted him. “But maybe I’ll like it when I try it,” he backpedaled. “I promise I’ll give it a real try.”
“Well, thank you.” Lance gave him small smile. “For my part, I’m super excited. It’ll give me a chance to show off my best quality.”
“What’s that, your big mouth?” Pidge teased.
“No! Obviously it’s my natural sporting talent. The girls will be all over me after they see how far I can throw a frisbee.”
“So it’s a ‘mine’s longer’ contest, is it?”
“No! I mean, maybe? Just wait till you see me.”
She rolled her eyes dramatically. “Can’t wait.”
She wouldn’t have to wait long, not that she cared in the least about seeing Lance play frisbee. Unless he messed up and made a fool of himself. That would be worth seeing. It was already six o’clock and time to leave the dining room, and intramural sports sign-ups were at six-thirty, followed immediately by the first practice.
As she made her way to her room to relax a bit before she had to go to ultimate frisbee, her thoughts turned to Lance. He was annoying, and an idiot, and Pidge wasn’t going to forgive him soon for making her waste fifteen minutes standing uncomfortably on the parade ground. Still, she had to admit he was friendly and earnest; if it wasn’t for the whole lateness catastrophe, she might have even thought he was a decent guy. Hunk seemed to like him at least, and for some reason she found herself wanting to trust Hunk’s taste in friends.
She climbed onto her bed in her single room and folded her legs. She was already starting to like this room, with its large window that let in the afternoon sunlight and made the space feel cozy. The fact that she had hacked the system to get her own private room made it even more satisfying. She had about ten minutes until she needed to get ready for frisbee, and she didn’t feel like looking up that universal terrain magnetic drive thing or doing her calculus homework - it’s not like it was going to be hard anyway - so she just sat back against the wall at the head of the bed and let the events of the day whirl through her mind. She had plenty to think about, and all to soon it was time to go. She put on her ugly exercise uniform, and headed to her first ultimate frisbee practice.