To help a friend

[ACMI: Vampire Killer]

Joule opened the door to the office as Saten lifted the bags inside.

"Hello!" Saten called out happily as she placed the bags on the table and looked around "Is Kuroko not here?"

Uiharu spun her chair around from where she sat.

"Hi Saten." She noticed Joule and said hello too before continuing "Kuroko is out right now, she's tracking down a group that stole a case."

Saten began unloading the food as Joule looked over.

"A case? Wouldn't the insides of the case be the stolen thing?"

Uiharu shook her head "We don't know what is inside the case, we know some details about the case itself though."

Saten looked up from the food "Okay, so what is special about the case?"

"It has school district 23's emblem on it and it is a type of case designed to be air tight and to counter cosmic radiation."

"So it's a space case?" Saten asked.

"Yes." Uiharu nodded "Either used to bring something into space or bring it back."

Thinking, Joule asked a question "What is in school district 23?"

"Among other things, space development. That explains the case in a way."

"...and this robbery took place outside of School district 23 right?" Joule continued.

"Yes." Uiharu again nodded "What have you thought of?"

Joule was quiet for a moment before answering "It is probably bringing something back from space then. If something was going up to space it would probably have been brought to school district 23 in a less... interesting container, either that or made there to start with. The only reason I can think of for this scenario is that it is something that has been recovered from space and was stolen as it was being taken to whatever lab will be researching it." She paused for a moment before finishing "Right?"

Saten nods "It makes sense, in a way."

Uiharu nodded too but then frowned "So what is it then?"

"A piece of Endymion maybe?" Saten suggested as she got out some places for the store-bought rice balls "Something from the part in orbit?"

"Could be," Joule noted "but Endymion isn't part of School district 23. I'm not saying it's impossible that they just took a case from elsewhere and used it but I think it would have been simpler if they just took it down the elevator instead of, maybe, using a space plane from 23."

Uiharu hummed as Saten passed her a plate "It is a little odd. Let's just call it the 'unidentified space object' for now."

[ACSR: Precious Friends]

"USO?" Saten asked with a smile "Couldn't you have used a word starting with 'F'?"

"Hmm?" The joke didn't seem to get through to Uiharu but Joule chuckled softly "So 'unidentified foreign object' then?"

Yes, that made Saten break into a grin. At that point Uiharu got it but after a short laugh she tilted her head.

"'UFO' Saten? I really doubt that the case has a Foo Figher in it?"

Saten frowned good naturedly before mewling her retort "But Aliens! Aliens Uiharu." She turned to Joule who raised her eyebrows.

Grinning, Saten drew Joule back into the joke "Come on Joule, we have Espers and now Magic. Would Aliens really be that odd?"

"Well..." Joule dragged the word out, pretending to concider it before laughing.

Saten's face was covered in mock indignation "Now really. They might exist, out there somewhere in the blackness."

Uiharu smiled and looked like she was about to reply as her phone went. She answered as Joule began eating her plate of rice balls.

"Hey Kuroko."

[ACMI2: Confusion]

Saten and Joule were silent as they watched Uiharu's face pale as Kuroko said something from the other side.

"Are you alright?" A note of fear in Uiharu's question made the two onlookers pale as well.

Kuroko said something from the other side and Uiharu turned to start looking something up on her computer as she listened to what Kuroko had to say.

It was just a question of waiting until the talk ended.

End of chapter.

Yes, it's short. I just don't like doing longish timeskips near the end of chapters.