Chapter Text
“And our communications officer is... Who the heck is Pidge Gunderson?” Pidge heard a tan-skinned, lanky guy with brown hair ask the boy standing next to him as she was walking up to the board where team assignments had just been posted.
“Right here,” she called, approaching the pair.
“Welcome to the team, Gunderson. I'm Lance, your fighter pilot.”
“Hey, I'm Hunk,” the other boy, the engineer of their team, introduced himself.
“We got a lot of great times ahead, so we should probably start bonding now. What do you say we sneak out of campus…” Pidge’s attention shifted from Lance to Commander Iverson, who was talking to security guards down the hall.
“Security for the Galaxy Garrison's mainframe is our first priority. It's been breached once. And by a little girl, no less. It can not happen again!” She listened in, glaring slightly. He started walking toward the three of them, so she saluted. “Wrong arm, cadet.”
Pidge sighed, embarrassed at the mistake, but grateful he hadn’t given her any extra attention. Lance seemed completely unphased by the commander, “Hello? Pizza? Girls? Astronauts?”
“Sorry, I don't have time to mess around with you guys. See you in the simulator.”
“What's his problem?” Lance whispered to Hunk, although he was loud enough for Pidge to hear him as she walked away.
Pidge figured she could have had a worse team. They both seemed like decent guys, but she knew Lance would constantly get on her nerves. Regardless, Pidge had only enrolled in the Garrison because they were hiding something about the recently failed Kerberos mission and she was going to find out what because she knew Samuel and Matthew Holt were not dead.
Snooping around would be even more dangerous now that two people had been caught. Keith, a fighter pilot who would have been in the same year Pidge enrolled as, was expelled for “issues in his behavior” but Pidge knew he had tried snooping around for the same information she wanted. She, of course, had gotten much further than he did. Enrolling at the academy with a fake identity wasn’t what she had in mind, but at this point her family was more important than her future career. She considered it a miracle that she had even pulled it off; she was the spitting image of a younger Matt after she cut her hair, but Matt didn’t have a younger brother so she guessed they treated it like it was a coincidence if they even noticed at all.
She knew she was going to have to blend in if she wanted to avoid suspicion. It’d probably be normal to become close with her teammates, but she wasn’t sure how well that would go. Lance sort of had a reputation for stirring up trouble and didn’t seem to take anything seriously. She didn’t know much about Hunk, other than the fact that he always got wrapped up in whatever Lance was up to. Pidge couldn’t risk getting caught breaking rules with them because she feared Commander Iverson would start to recognize her.
The day after teams had been assigned, the lunchroom was as Pidge expected it to be. Everyone was sitting with their new teammates and she was sitting alone in her usual corner.
“I don’t know, Lance. Maybe we should give him some space.”
“Nope, we’re a team. We should at least sit together during lunch,” she heard Lance argue with the engineer. He came up to the other side of Pidge’s table and sat himself down. Hunk followed suit, giving an apologetic look. She said nothing and continued eating.
It was awkwardly silent for a while, until Lance took a breath like he was about to say something. As if it was a cue, Pidge gathered up their belongings and lunch tray and walked away. She could hear Lance’s voice, clearly unhappy, but she paid no attention to what he was saying. The remainder of her lunch break was spent in her room.
The trio was fairly unsuccessful during the first quarter. Pidge and Hunk faired well individually, each earning perfect or near perfect marks on written exams. The simulator, however, was a different story. Lance was very capable of taking charge and it was clear that he knew how to fly. He tended to make impulsive decisions for the sake of trying to be impressive and paid minimal attention to Pidge and Hunk until things started going wrong. When Lance’s piloting was faster and more unpredictable, Hunk’s motion sickness kicked in and that was always the end of it. Iverson scolded them after every simulation, much to her dismay, but he tended to direct his words at Lance.
Exams were coming up again, and Pidge had agreed to study with Hunk. She didn’t feel she needed to, but she actually really liked her conversations with Hunk and his peanut butter cookies were to die for. Plus, they had a sort of friendly competition going with their exam scores, so studying together meant one wouldn’t have any advantage over the other. Not to mention, completely isolating herself would do nothing but raise suspicions, and Lance would be even more unbearably nosey than he already was.
“Let’s watch a movie!” Lance announced as he entered his and Hunk’s dorm room. Pidge groaned and Hunk sighed.
“You’re the one who’s going to fail, Lance. Study.”
“It’s a Friday night! Live a little,” Lance smirked, “You’ve already made snacks! We just need some popcorn.”
“Study snacks. For those of us in the room who are studying.”
“I’m making popcorn and we’re watching Mean Girls .” There was almost no convincing Lance once he had his mind set on something. He grabbed a bag of popcorn from beside his desk and left for the student lounge.
“Sorry about him, Pidge.”
“It’s fine. I’ll just go back to my room or the library or something.”
“You sure? He’s kinda right in a sense. Sure he’s extremely pushy, but we should take a break and, well, live a little.” Pidge pouted and closed her notebook. “I wasn’t supposed to say anything, but Lance is actually really worried about you. He thinks you’re spending too much time with your nose in books and not enough time ‘having fun.’ I know his kind of fun isn’t everyone’s kind of fun, but a movie night is harmless enough, right?”
Pidge avoided making eye contact, wondering why someone she hardly gave a second thought to was thinking of her. She didn’t know what to say, and her mother always said that actions spoke louder than words, so she packed up her things and sat with her legs crossed at the end of Hunk’s bed. He was frowning watching her pack up, but when she made it clear that she wasn’t leaving he was a bit surprised, but smiled.
Lance returned, piping hot bag of buttery goodness in hand. He didn’t comment on the fact that Pidge hadn’t left, but he grinned before striking a flashy pose, “The party has arrived!”
After the snacks had been set up so they were all easy enough to reach and the movie was ready to play, the three of them sat next to each other on Hunk’s bed. Lance sat close to the engineer, while Pidge was a bit further away. The two of them were obviously close, which she guessed was what would happen when you lived with someone.
“You ever seen this movie, Gunderson?” Lance asked through a mouth full of popcorn.
“Nope.”
“Get ready for a life changing experience.”
Pidge had to admit it wasn’t a bad movie. In fact, she’d probably say she enjoyed it, and Lance reciting lines along with the actors hadn’t actually bothered her like she knew it would have with any other movie.
“Well? Best movie you’ve ever seen?” Lance asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
“Best movie? Probably not. Good movie? Yes.”
“I’d be careful with your words. Lance will literally make us watch it over and over again until you agree that it’s the best movie ever made.”
“I wouldn’t do that to him, Hunk.”
“You did it to me!”
Pidge shifted in her seat. “I’m gonna head back to my room I guess. It’s almost curfew. I’ll see you guys in the simulator on Monday.”
Hunk and Lance looked at each other briefly before turning their heads to her, but didn’t say whatever they were thinking. “No problem. G’night, Pidge.”
She didn’t know if she would have stayed much longer if there hadn’t been a curfew, but she was grateful for the excuse to leave. Her phone vibrated a few times while she was still walking, but she waited until she was back in her room, changed into pajamas, and sitting in bed before looking.
From Lance
pidge!!!
From Lance:
u should hang w/ us more often
From Lance:
ive got plenty more mind blowing life changing movies :) :) :) :)
From Lance:
and u should pick a movie sometime 2!! or game we should have a game night
Lance was exactly the type of person who would text like a thirteen year old who just learned about text slang. She chuckled.
To Lance:
Let me know when, but I would like to actually study with Hunk before exams. You really need to study, too.
From Lance:
y must u and hunk hurt me in this way he said the same thing
From Lance:
fine!!! but u both owe me a snacks, games, and movies after exams are over
To Lance:
Deal.
She muted her phone and placed it on the far end of her nightstand. Lance and Hunk were the two most welcoming people she had ever met. Despite how close they were to each other, they still wanted to have her around. It wasn’t exactly odd; Lance had mentioned bonding as a team, but she thought it would just involve strategizing and preparing for simulations. Movie and game nights were not something she had anticipated.
Hunk and Lance’s friendship was nothing like any of the friendships she’d had at her previous school. Outside of lunch breaks or study sessions, she didn’t hang out with anyone much. Thinking about it, she had always excelled academically, and it wouldn’t be a shock if they’d only kept her around to help them keep their grades up. She imagined they must have hung out more, but never invited her along. Matt had been the only person she was really close with.
Spending the evening with Hunk and Lance brought her back to the times she’d pull all nighters with her brother. They’d watch documentaries, talk about space or conspiracies, among other, more pointless things. Their mom would always get mad when she inevitably found out, but never mad enough to stop them.
She laid back, staring at the ceiling like she usually spent hours doing while she was thinking. I need to stop. Thinking about her brother wouldn’t do anything but keep her awake. While she didn’t have class or anything to wake up for in the morning, she didn’t want to stay up if she was just going to make herself upset. Tomorrow was a new day and she could spend the rest of the weekend focusing on gathering more data on Kerberos.
Monday came, quicker than anyone ever wants it to, of course, and Pidge, Hunk, and Lance stepped out of the simulator and were met with Commander Iverson’s glare and scolding. Lance refused to look at anything that wasn’t the floor and Hunk looked like he was still trying not to throw up. She sighed, and turned her full attention to Iverson.
“And worst of all, the whole jump, they were arguing with each other. Heck, if you're going to be this bad individually, you'd better at least be able to work as a team! Galaxy Garrison exists to turn young cadets like you into the next generation of elite astroexplorers, but these kinds of mental mistakes are exactly what cost the lives of the men on the Kerberos Mission.”
“That's not true, sir!” Pidge couldn’t prevent herself from calling out.
“What did you say?”
“Sorry, sir,” Lance covered Pidge’s mouth, “I think he hit his head when he fell out of his chair. But point taken.”
“I hope I don't need to remind you that the only reason you're here is that the best pilot in your class had a discipline issue and flunked out. Don't follow in his footsteps. Next!”
Lance walked Hunk to the infirmary, giving her a half smile before they left the simulation room. Pidge wanted to leave, but didn’t want to draw any more of Iverson’s attention her way. Every other team was able to complete the simulation with either no or minimal issue. Being on the bottom like this sucked, and Iverson seemed to enjoy constantly using her team as an example of what not to do. She felt especially bad for Lance, but it didn’t seem like it was affecting him too much. Hunk would know better than she did about how he felt, so she didn’t dwell on it.
The class was dismissed after some spiel about when grades would be posted and how he was impressed with “ almost every team,” emphasis on the almost as he looked in Pidge’s direction.
About a half hour after Iverson had called for lights out, Pidge scurried out of her room and headed for the stairs that lead to the roof. Going out after curfew tonight was mostly just to spite Iverson. Pidge was, to say the least, pissed off.
She sat toward the edge of the roof and set up her equipment, immediately starting to scan for any sort of signal or radio frequencies. She wasn’t having much luck picking up anything clear, but then she picked up something crazier than she’d ever heard before. Voltron. Someone out there was looking for something called Voltron . This wasn’t the first time that word had popped up, but this time it sounded almost frantic. She pulled out her notebook and made a note of it again, but she still had no idea what it meant. Was it a planet? Was it a machine? The name of a living being?
Whatever it was, something big was happening out there and it was dangerously close to earth.
Stars fall at my feet, keep me grounded as I reach
Higher than I see, is there something there for me?
Pulling back the reins, letting go again
I'm not afraid, I'm not