Closer to the Ground (Kidge One Shots)

Chapter 4: The Punk and the Nerd

     Katie went through the same routine all week long. Same rejection from Keith. Lance and Hunk helped with the tracker. Coran taught 5 of her seven classed. Everything was the same. It was Friday afternoon, homeroom when it all changed.

    Pidge and Hunk sat in homeroom, working on the tracker again. They were almost finished when the end of school bell rang.

    "Ughhh," Katie groaned. "We were getting so close!"

     "Yeah, hey! We could meet up at Kalenecker park this weekend! I could get Lance and we could finish it! It is also close to the woods!" Hunk said.

     "Yeah! I'll see you there!" Katie said and she headed home. (Time Skip to when they have all met up at the park.)

     "One more tweak...and there!" Katie said. "Finished! Now let's test it out on a dead phone!"

     Lance, Katie, and Hunk looked all over the park to try and find someone with a dead phone. Katie looked around, not paying attention to what was in front of her and she bumped into a stranger.

     "Oh, I am so sorry, that was my bad," Katie told the stranger. He turned around and it was Keith. "Oh, hi Keith, I-I'm just going to go over there..." Katie ran over to where Hunk and Lance were.

    "Any luck?" Hunk asked. Lance shook his head.

     "Would turning one of our phones off work?" Lance asked.

      "Yeah, that should work, let's try it," Hunk said, taking his phone out and shutting it down. "Okay now Pidge you hide it, and Lance and I will use the app to find it. We will close our eyes too," Hunk said, then he and Lance turned around and closed their eyes. 

      Katie ran over to the playset and hide it in the abandon slide. Then she ran over to the bench on the other side of the sidewalk and texted Hunk to go. She watched as Hunk and Lance slowly made their way to the playset.

      "What are you guys doing?" Someone asked. Katie looked up to see that Keith was looking down at her.

      "Um-were testing the-uh phone tracker we made," Katie said, and Keith looked utterly confused.

     "PIDGE!! IT WORKED! IT FLIPPING WORKED!!!" Lance yelled holding up Hunk's phone and running over to her. Lance and Hunk were talking excitedly and Katie stood up and took the tracker.

     "Matt..." She whispered as she frantically typed in his phone number. The tracker beeped and Katie's eye's widened as it found the phone. Tears in her eyes she ran passed Keith, Lance, Hunk and bolted into the forest. 

     "KATIE WAIT!!!" Hunk yelled after her. Katie ignored him and tore through the underbrush. Deeper and deeper into the forest she ran, tears streaming down her face. She looked down at the phone to check if she was getting close. 

    Faster and faster she went until she reached a wide-open clearing. She checked to phone and walked a few feet further into the clearing. She looked around for her brother because the tracker said she was right on top of him---oh.

     Katie bent so and pulled a phone out of a clump of grass. She connected her phone and the one she had found. She turned it on to see the home screen was a picture of her and her brother in front of a NASA rocket. 

    Katie's knees buckled and she fell to the forest floor. Tears drenched her face and she looked down at the phone. Her brother's phone. He's was here, I got so close. Am I too late.

    "Katie! Katie!" Lance shouted from a ways away. She could here Hunk's voice too, but what surprised her the most was the hand that she felt on her shoulder.