#3 by Carnifex

The request sounded through the landing deck control room speakers eliciting both apprehension and relief from the occupants. Reginald Huntly was the project manager on the Gate Construction Site and he had been dreading this moment. As soon as it had been discovered that some very valuable materials had gone missing during the riots he had been hoping that they could be found quickly and quietly. Now those materials were going to have a chance to leave the station and if they did then Reginald would certainly lose his job.

‘Missing’ was in fact a misnomer in this case. Most of the items in question were data files. The originals were intact in the station’s restricted access computer network deep in the DSE only section of the station. However the activity logs clearly showed requests for duplication of the files despite the lack of any record of anyone signing in at a terminal, a security protocol that had apparently been overlooked by those responsible when they covered their tracks. To make matters worse the riots had caused power losses so the surveillance system had been down.
So ‘stolen’ would be a more accurate description. Missing was a word used to re-enforce the need to find the stolen material in the minds of the station’s DSE personnel.

“Sir..?” said a feminine voice from behind Reginald, “What is your reply?”
Reginald paused momentarily and breathed deeply. “Tell them to begin their approach Meg.”
“Ok,” replied the voice, a hint of tension detectable. “Samura White Wing, you are clear to begin your approach to docking bay two,” a pause while considering if anything should be added, “Umm.. Welcome.”
Reginald was already moving out of the messy and dark control room, “Harry,” he said to a tired looking and unwashed engineer standing by the door, “Get everyone to start moving the Samura guys down toward the bay two floor and make sure our people are armed, we’re going to search all of those Samura workers thoroughly before we let them go.”
“All six hundred Reg?” he replied in a whining tone.
“Yes, nothing that doesn’t belong to Samura is to leave this base. Not if we have anything to say about it.”

All through the station people, most of them sleep deprived and irritable, started to move through the piles of rubbish, destroyed furniture and equipment strewn about the now poorly lit construction base toward the launch pads.