Vume - 2115 Highport

Vume Highport, like many others in the region, was built by the General Development Corporation (GeDeCo) to facilitate trade throughout the region. It was then put up for sale but no buyer emerged, so today it is run as a wholly-owned subsidiary of GeDeCo. A secondary goal of the port was to act as a base for exploration of an alien complex found on Vume, which the port orbits.
The port is entirely orbital, inasmuch as the ‘groundside’ facility on Vume is not owned by GeDeCo and is not considered to be part of the port. As to the planetside population, they have no share or stake in the orbital port and generally little involvement with it.
The highport is quite large, if a little run-down, and geared towards supporting large, long-range, high-jump vessels rather than smaller local ships. The port has extensive recreation facilities and makes a considerable amount of money from the crews and passengers of Imperial ships passing through. There is little trade or commerce done at the port; most of its revenue comes from services provided directly to passing vessels.
The general anti-Imperial attitude of the region is not as obvious at Vume Highport. There is at least a veneer of civility, which is necessary to getting Imperials to part with their Credits. However, the passing ships are seen as cash-cows and their crews as targets to be milked of every Credit possible rather than as possible friends or allies. This creates an atmosphere that initially can seem almost excessively (and artificially) friendly, after which it becomes apparent that the whole thing is a façade. The pretense is generally kept up even when the recipient makes it obvious they know they are being conned, making a visit to Vume a sometimes bizarre and often very irritating experience.
When the highport was built, it was provided with a fairly potent local defense squadron which has become inoperable over the years. Funds to repair and refit ships were never available, but the rise of piracy in the region made it necessary to create a replacement of some sort. The result was a rather ramshackle defensive setup, operated by trigger-happy mercenaries who have been fired upon by apparently innocuous ships far too often to take any chances whatsoever.
The docking bays that once held neat rows of system defense boats and fighters are now mostly empty. Those that are filled typically contain very old craft, kept flying by cannibalising others of their class, or are home to converted vessels. Many of these are broken-down old free traders and small merchant ships, their jump drives sold off for whatever spare-parts value remained. These craft at least have plenty of room for boarding parties.
A rag-tag collection of armed small craft is also employed, backed up by the highport’s armament. This consists mostly of missile racks and beam turrets taken from scrapped warships, but does include a couple of particle accelerator bays salvaged from an old Imperial destroyer. These are widely acknowledged as the reason no pirate fleet has ever successfully plundered or taken over Vume station – a couple have tried – and are considered the heart of the port’s defenses.
In addition to attacks on shipping using Vume’s highport, ambitious pirate bands have occasionally tried to take over the station itself. The approach that worked best was a ‘Trojan horse’ attack from ships docked at the port, which resulted in extensive gunfire within the port facility. Those that tried to simply shoot their way in fared less well. These incidents, along with the generally high level of piracy and lawlessness in the area, have resulted in a steady drain on the mercenaries protecting the port and thus contributed to an in-your-face, deal-with-it-or-get-shot attitude on the part of the patrols outside the port and its security personnel within.

Type

Orbital, Station