Pidge just knows she isn't going to be able to explain this in a way that won't make her sound like a complete and utter racist. Even if it does turn out that she has a similar enough cultural background to understand why seeing someone out of a fantasy would evoke that response, it's probably different when you're on the other side of it? Pidge would assume, anyway.

"Well, in my world elves aren't real soooo when I saw you that, um, just kind of...happened."

This is why Pidge spends most of her time with machines.

"I'm sorry."