Chapter 1: Arrival.

The stars were passing by in the forms of streaks in the vast tunnel-like form of hyperspace travel, as he watched the route to it´s destination go passing and time to arrival went closer, the rebel crew aboard the Corellian Corvette- a CR90 with the name of "Spirit of Alderaan"- was busy doing it´s everyday labors, and preparing for their arrival to this new planet. Both senators Bail Organa and Mon Mothma, plus other officers were on the little bridge of the ship, as it was about to get out from hyperspace, awaiting for the outcomes of this mission, only their actions would tell.

As prior to some months, as the somewhat newly formed Rebel Alliance was on new missions and trying to expand itself to avoid falling to the power of the Empire, doing every kind of tasks to deal a blow to the Empire, the newly formed base on Atollon rebel crew found something quite "interesting" to say the least. This explorers were tasked to keep the activities of the rebel alliance on communication between each cell scattered in the galaxy, explore possible hyperoutes to keep the rebel fleet away from Imperial convoys, and even locate possible places far away from the known cores of the galaxy to establish allies and bases.

As one of this explorers kept looking some possible locations in the computer room, he found on his screen a very intense dot out of his calculations.

-Sir… can you come up over here? - said on the technicians, as his mind was trying to figure out the source of this signal. His officer came and asked him what was wrong, as to which he explained the source

The somehow confused officer exclaimed "A signal? Let me triangulate or pinpoint it… Attention guys, we got a signal, it´s unreadable but I want you to pinpoint it. It can be a transmission. We have work to do" the rest of his technicians started working on it until one exclaimed he managed to locate it to an approximate. "Well, put it on the big screen, let´s see what it is" and just as the screen, the officer and his crew were completely in awe of such information.

"We need to get this to the command, now!"

The team managed to find out about an interesting signal, coming from really far away, it was even doubtful something like this existed, but as the confirmation came in and they double checked, the technicians of the base were astonished as to this information, with a couple of them going on their way to inform the High Command, walking at a fast pace, and with urgency on their minds.

They managed to get some time to senator Mon Mothma and Organa, as well as some other admirals and officers to brief them about the situation in the conference room in the base, which was a room near the hangars that had a circular shape, an oval table in the middle with an holocomputer on it, and some chairs to it, as it was a very basic base of operations, given the possibility of being discovered by Imperial forces, and the low resources of the Alliance. Thinking it could be good information, the technicians explained the discovery of the signal in a resumed way to the officers.

"In other meanings, what you just told over everything else here is that we found possibly a opportunity to…"

"Explore this new place, Senator Mothma." Said one of the rebel officers, trying to elaborate, he kept explaining. "As we have discovered this signal, it came from a far sector in space that we tried to pinpoint and managed to get a proper origin of it… to this planet, the sensors have detected several life forms on it, and it seems habitable"

"Seems apropiately, but what about if it´s a trap or maybe it´s just a regular signal? We may lost time and we don´t have the resources for that. Our manpower is very scarce, and we do not possess so many assets to waste on an exploration like this" Said senator Organa with lot of reasons to oppose this system, the fleet wasn't at it´s prime moment.

"I know sir, but I assure you it´s not under any circumstance a trap, mostly because… the signal is man-made, and it comes from somehow far away, and from what we manage to pick up, it´s pretty primitive, but it´s somehow an attempt to contact to other species, from what we have known, they look like a pre-space travel species" said another officer, the leader of the group that discovered the signal.

Both senator plus a couple admirals were standing there, thinking about the possibilities, but the cons also. "How far?" asked senator Organa.

"Well, sir, that´s the little problem, as we made it to point out the exact location, we also found out another specific adversity".

"Well then, what is it?"

"It comes from a place not known to us in this galaxy… Sir, it comes from another galaxy".

"What?" the room stood in a somewhat state of shock, understanding that they have made contact with beings from another galaxy, probably for the first time in their history.

A Mon Cala admiral spoke: "You are telling me that we found life, not from this galaxy? And besides they sent a signal?"

"Yes sir… Apparently, it´s a weak one, but to say the least, it seems like if they were trying to communicate with us, like a general signal"

"That´s… odd. But, even if is a great opportunity to set a base of operations far from the empire, probably recruit allies and use that planet as a place to even use resources or make other activities far from it… how are we going to even get there? It is a great risk, we cannot put our already few resources in some probably backwater civilization which probably doesn´t even have the resources that we need, or doesn´t know how to probably fire a blaster." Said Mothma, with a heavy hint of realism, to no surprise of everyone in the room. "I´m sorry, but we will have to make this discovering a forgotten one, or use it later, we don´t have the necessary requirements to this."

"Well, ma´am, I'm sorry, but I tend to differ."

Just as everyone in the room went to turn around to see the man who just spoke, he appeared from the shadows, wearing an alderaanian consular guard orange uniform, with his white helmet on his hand. Some officers present in the room knew him, but in fact, didn´t knew much of him, just his name. And a silent, smirking few knew him, having fought with him several times before in the past.

"May I know who you are?" asked senator Mothma, with a little bit of surprise

"Dekon, Major Dekon Ocangy, Senator Mothma" Said the brown-skinned man, presenting himself at the time, just as another officer tried to make him elaborate and asked him: "Well, Officer Ocangy, may I know how is it that you differ from this opinion or even have a solution for it?"

Ocangy, stepping up to the hologram picture, continued to speak as some of the officers considered bold of him to step up and try to differ like that with senators Organa an Mothma.

"Of course, Admiral, if you let me use this holotable… Ok, considering that it´s not per se another galaxy far away, but a galaxy near us, or even our closest one, I can consider that probably we could find an hyperspace array or loophole that can make the jump to the place that is located, depending on the parsecs and other locations, if we calculate it correctly with the hyperdrive, we could make the jump to the planet in no time, minimum: 10 or even 7 days. And as for the resources, I don't consider sending a task forces of revelant sources, just 2 Corellian Blockade runners and a Nebulon-B frigate, considering that the Empire doesn´t even know about it, we can just go and pass without much trouble. We could just make this opportunity to explore more planets in the system and expand our power out of the sights of the empi"-

"Still is a great risk, you just can´t put lots of hope on a mission like that, kid." Said Mothma.

That was the final straw, admiral Dodonna, present with them at the moment, actually knew Major Ocangy, and knew that if there was anything that inspired the boy more than anything on existence, it was hope.

Taking a moment to take a brief chuckle, and while he clenched his fist over the table, he looked up straight in the eye at the senator for Chandrilla, and said.

"Well, Miss Mothma, let me tell you one thing… Don´t call me kid, because everyone here then is one, and you should respect the "kids" that are the bone of your army that make all of the work that is possible, at least, you should call us but what we are, by rank, by experience, by what we do to keep this Alliance on float, not kids just because you are 20 years older than us."

Everyone in the room was silent, Dodonna and the few man that knew Ocangy weren´t surprised at how he talked like that to a senator, and Mothma even taken aback by how he talked to him, about to speak, with his characteristic serenity, she was shut down by his next words:
"And just so you may know, if there is anything about rebellions that everyone here should know, is that they are built with hope. That´s the very foundation of everything we do here. If it wasn´t for that, I think nothing of this could exists. It´s what keeps us together, is what makes us feel graced, is what makes us fight the Empire and it´ll be what makes us win this war. I know I shouldn't defy the command like this, but the command also makes errors, and one of those is not having hope like in this moment. And that is, senator, why we fight… That is how we fight. For hope. So, shall we, gentlemen?"

Silence still echoed through the circular room as much of the presents in the room were completely awe by the defiance of this kid, but nevertheless, a majority of officers decided to support the decision of Captain Dekon.

"I say we should explore!" Said a rather enthusiastic admiral, followed with some cheering from other officers.

"You are a bold one, aren´t you?" Say Mon Mothma, with a change of heart, and really confident that this was a peculiar officer

"Indeed, Senator." Said a calmer Dekon, despite the differences, both agreed that this couldn´t be a wasted opportunity.

After the meeting, the officers went to their daily business, with a handpicked few by Dekon to stay with to discuss some things with Admiral Dodonna and Senators Organa and Mothma. They accorded that the task force will be just the 3 ships that Dekon recommended, but no more or less. If anything bad happened, they were ordered to fight if it was possible but to escape immediately if the Empire discovered the planet, as they couldn´t risk losing ships. Not on this moments of dire needs against the fight with the Empire.

The officers that Dekon picked were some of his most trusted companions. They knew him, and he knew them from previous skirmishes against the Empire, and the rest were some officers that although he didn´t knew very much, he knew they have done all kind of things for the rebellion: spying, lying, sabotage, raids, hit and run attacks, assasinations. He didn´t share his dose of thoughts against this last, but he knew those men had honor, they wouldn´t harm civilians or innocents and he was going to need this kind of men that knew could make strong decisions, and would make the fight to the empire with all they had, and knew how to operate like them, just without going to extremes.

The setup and logistics of the plan were completely finished, and thus, all of the operation was prepared. As the idea was his, the command decided to give total control of the task force to Dekon, by recommendations of Admiral Dodonna and some other men.

And therefore, the mission for another galaxy was established, Dekon left the room with his men and some guards as he heard Mon Mothma´s voice calling him back, as he turned around, she just told him "May the Force be with you."

"Always" replied with a grin to his face, which was corresponded by Mothma.

"Good luck, and be safe… Commander Dekon." Said a calm Jan Dodonna, making sure that in front of everyone, it was official his new rank.

Just like that, Dekon and his officers went out of the room, prepared to start the instructions and alert his troops about the assignment, what was about to come as an exploration mission, gave Dekon a sense that this would change the ways to fight the Empire, for a better day, for a New Republic.

For hope.

Well, there goes my first serious fanfiction, I think I made a pretty good job with this lecture, and in the meantime, leave a review, comment what you think and stay tuned for the next part.