Fighting To Get Ahead

Corinne walked down the long hallway, the sound of her heels clicking against the floor. She kept looking down at the new assignment on the card she had been given, making sure she was going to the right place. She turned a corner and almost slid, trying not to fall as she hurried to the room. When she opened the door, she saw a huge space shuttle in the center of the room, and heard a loud rumbling. On the other side of the room was a control room with men looking into the room she was currently standing in. She moved to run to the other side, trying not to get stuck while they started tests on the shuttle. She made it just before the fan reached full speed, closing the door behind her. Everyone ignored her, keeping their eyes on the work in front of them so she went over to the secretary in the corner.

"Excuse me, my name is Corinne Hall, I've recently been assigned as a computer to this office?" She said softly, looking around the room.

"Right, Ms. Hall, your supervisor is Mr. Tomlinson, and you are not to address him unless invited to. Your desk is over there, best get a move on." The woman said, handing her a booklet of information she was supposed to begin computing. She turned, noticing someone was inside the ship she had walked under from the window, but looked down at the book and set it onto her desk, beginning to work on it.

Frances walked into the building, she was very unsure of this but her father had reassured her that she had this in the bag - so she accepted it. The pay itself would be very much needed if she were going to try and put herself through schooling, but she didn't have high hopes for them letting her graduate. She really just wanted the books, so if she could buy just the books for the courses she'd be more than happy with that. She held her purse on the crook of her elbow as she walked into the room and went to the secretary, "Hi," she smiled a little, "My name is Frances Smith and I'm the Mechanical Engineer that was assigned to come here - I'm not too sure where I'm meant to go,"

The woman nodded with a less than enthusiastic look on her face and she took a large binder from the woman, "He wants you to read over these manuals and make notes about it, please have a seat," she said and she sighed a little then nodded. Frances walked over to a desk then sighed, "Well lets see if I can understand this," she said gently as she opened the thick binder then began reading.

A man walked over, dropping another book onto her desk. "Both of these finished by the end of the day," He said, not sparing her another glance as he walked over to the men standing in the corner.

"We can't figure out why the machinery won't work on the inside," Anotjer man said in frustration, looking at the electronic equipment.

"I mean, we could ask the computer to recheck the math," Brian said to them. "It is what she's here for," He said, as a group of men turned to look at her. Brian walked over, gesturing for her to come over. "Can you do the math? We need the calculations rechecked, because the electronics aren't working."

---

She looked up as the man from inside the machine walked in, pulling off equipment. She focused on her work, but noticed one of the equations on the chalkboard didn't add up. She looked around before walking over to the board, fixing the equation quietly before going back to the book in front of her. She figured it was what she was there for.

She looked at him then nodded,"Of course I can do the math," she said as she looked at him then stood up and walked over looking at the paper with all the equations then snorted, "who did these?" she asked as she looked up then back at the paper before shaking her head and grabbing a random notebook and a pen beginning to fix it with ease. "Your problem is that your didn't equate your formula right - you're off by quite a lot," she said as she wrote out the problem then handed it to him.

"I did the formula - are you sure its wrong? A man asked and she looked at him.
"Yes, I'm positive," she said to him

---

James walked into the room and sighed as he looked around then walked over to the woman sitting on her own, "Do you need anything? A drink? food? You're going to be here all day so you'll need something," he offered as he stood there and watched her compute the information.

Brian snorted, taking a look at her calculations. "She's right," He said, reading over her calculations. "Rewire it, and put these calculations in." He said, pointing it out.

"But I was sure my calculations were correct," The man said indignantly.

"Obviously not," He said, shaking his head. "And I bet you now, they'll work," He said, stepping to the side and looking at her. "It's your first day here?" He asked curiously.

---

She looked up, stunned. It was the 1960's that was unheard of. "No, sir. Thank you." She said slowly, looking up at him. "I'll eat in the cafeteria at west campus at lunch," She said to him.

"She changed the calculations!" One of the men said in frustration.

"I fixed them, they were wrong," She explained, looking up from her work. "That's the reason the test earlier failed," She said to them as they crowded around the board.

She nodded,"I walked in the door ten minutes ago," she said as she looked at him then smiled a little then looked at the board they were complaining about eyeing it over, "Thats right, she didn't change anything - she fixed it," she said as she looked at them, "Try the test again," she told them then turned back to the binder, "What are you doing with these?" she asked as she pointed to the one equation on the book then shook her head.

---

He nodded a little then, "If you need anything let me know," he said to her then looked at everyone, "How does anything get done around here with men who don't know how to do their job?!" he said clearly annoyed with the other men who were complaining.

She looked around, before standing and pointing out the mistake that was made. "If you try again it should work," She said before turning to the man who's was standing closest to her. "If you go back in, those calculations should hold up."

---

"That's classified information and nothing for you to be asking about," one of the engineers said. "You're here to do math or we'll find someone else who can."

Brian rolled his eyes slightly as he looked at her. "Why? Are they wrong too?"

She looked at him, "Obviously you can't do it yourself correctly so leave it to a woman to have to do everything right," she said as she looked at the one who spoke back to her, "I wouldn't be here if you knew how to do your job correctly,"

"Where do you get off speaking to us like that?" one of the men spoke getting aggravated with her.

---

He looked at them ,"If you're going to be hostile to your colleagues I'm sure we can find someone to replace you," he said as he raised a brow.

"Fire her," One of the engineers said, laughing a little. "Women in the workplace is bad luck, and we don't need that here."

"Call the supervisor, I agree." Another engineer said, turning away.

"And if she's the only one who can correctly compute these equations?" Brian asked them.

"Can't be, we have a pool of computers. Find someone else." The first engineer scoffed.

---

She shook her head, looking at them. "I didn't mean to be hostile, I'm here as a computer, so I just... computed..." She explained looking back at the work and in front of her.

Frances took a deep breath then smiled, "Please, contact your supervisor I'd love to hear what he has to say about you getting a basic algorithm incorrect and likely ruining your chances at getting to the moon before Russia and China," she said to him as she continued to work out the other formulas, "So, as I asked before - what is this for? I can't give you a correct formula without knowing the reasoning behind it,"

---

He shook his head, "He brought her in himself, both of them are here because he wants them here - he won't fire them because your egos are bruise, now get back to work and stop complaining," he demanded.

"Its classified, you don't have clearance to know," One of them said to her.

Brian sighed, looking at the paper. "What exactly is wrong with it?" He asked curiously. He knew while they were right and she couldn't know some things, if she was catching mistakes that they had missed, they needed to know.

---

Corinne sighed, putting the book she was working on to the side and pulling the other one forward. It was a stressful environment to be working in, she wanted to see Frances and ask how she was doing in her area.

"The numbers are making absolutely no sense, the decimal here can't change to this - see? I don't know what this is for so I can't properly equate the formula," she said frustrated, "If I'm meant to do my job I need all the information,"

---

He looked at them then shook his head a little once everyone quieted down, "If you need anything let me know," he said to her then looked around grabbing some papers to look them over.

Brian shrugged. "Give her the information she needs, I don't see how she can do it if she doesn't have everything," He said to them. "Then we'll try a second time and run the damn thing again."

---

She nodded, working on the papers in front of her. "When you go into the ship, do you hear rattling?" She asked curiously, looking up from her papers.

She thanked them once she had everything then laughed a bit as she looked at the papers and continued, "This will work here, run the tests," she said as she looked at them then stood up straight.

---

He nodded a little,"Yes I do, why?" he asked as he looked at her.

She noticed she was getting glared at by the other engineers but kept speaking. "It's the pressure against the ship versus the density." She said to him. "The pressure of the fan that represents space is too strong for the current metal density. If the density were to increase, it would be able to withstand the pressure around it," She explained.

"You aren't an engineer, just do your work." One of them muttered.

"I am here to compute equations and the ones given to me are incorrect. If you want to send this man to his death that is on you, with that current calculation the space ship would crush him the minute he left the atmosphere."

---

Brian went to the control panel and re inputting the calculations. "Alright, run the test," He said, gesturing to start the machine. He stood back and watched as the machine worked exactly how it was supposed to. "Alright, now does antonenels have any desire to fire Ms. Frances?"

She pushed some hair out of her face then smiled a little, "Alright, now here this manual is showing to wire it this way," she said as she looked at the machine, "but you've miss matched some cords - this should go here," she said unpluging and replugging causing the screens to light up, "great!" she said excitedly as she looked back down to the book and began to work on some coding that would further their progress.

---

He looked at her then nodded a little as she explained it to him, it made sense but he didnt know why no one else had thought of that - it seemed so clear that that was the issue,"

The room emptied out as people went home and Corinne turned in her last book that she had finished checking. She stood and stretched, walking over to the door and walking into the room with the ship. She had always dreamed of being an engineer but knew that it would probably never happen. But it didn't stop her from dreaming. She saw James in the ship and backed away. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have gotten so close."

He lifted his head and looked at her then smiled a little, "No, you're fine," he said to her as he stood up and walked over. "Did you finish everything alright?" he asked her curiously.

---

When she finished up the last bit of coding for the day she sighed then rubbed her eyes sleepily, "Ugh,"she groaned laying her head on the table. "so sleepy," she murmured lightly then wet her lips and her stomach rumbled; she'd worked through lunch just to get everything done on time.

"I did, thank you," She said nodding a little. "Well, I won't keep you. Have a good night," She said, smiling a bit.

---

He walked over to her and smiled. "Want some coffee?" He asked curiously. "I can bring you some," He offered.