If the PCs helped the governor of Mara, by breaking out his friends, the Deputy of Internal Affairs will be able to give them some information, that will help them locate the Federation. He will know that several suspects have been caught frequenting three different taverns, one in the city by the spaceport, another that is a seedy place in Mara city and a questionable place on the major world in sector 12:O. He can tell them of several planets where traces of visitors have been found, but the GC keeps their eye on them. He thinks that they must have a base somewhere in, or around the nebula, as they always run to it when chased, though the GC has patrol ships routinely sweeping the perimeter. Merchants in the area have been found stranded on some of the minor worlds, their ships and cargo pirated and now cargo ships are escorted by five cruisers. The merchant lanes are a mess in these two neighboring regions and lately the pirates have taken to raiding some of the minor worlds. Oddly enough though, they destroy starport facilities and sometimes steal the cargo, but usually give an advanced warning, so that personnel can evacuate.

The PCs best bet though will be to put a spy team on the starbase, where they can pick up reliable information. Then they will learn that the GC suspects that a rebel faction is playing Robin Hood, to the minor worlds, their own spies give reports of the pirates distributing stolen cargo, on these worlds. The PCs can hang out on one of these worlds and wait until they drop by again. The Federation has been having to range further into GC space to find unprotected cargo ships, but has still been dropping it off on the minor worlds along the border. Several minor merchants buy the cargo, for information and pass the same to Federation agents on Mara, Beorin, and Harporra. If the PCs use Jedi, they can learn the details the quickest, otherwise they, or other agents of theirs will take about a year to make contact.

Six months after they start a special forces campaign, they will be approached, by a man who says he wants to help support their movement. He will offer to finance them 100%, in exchange for training some of his friends that will operate on other planets, he is from the Federation and is very impressed by their success. When the SF team tells him that they already have a backer, he agrees to meet with the PCs and they can go from there. None of the Federation agents though will offer information about the Federation, or it's location, but the PCs may suspect something, as they are highly organized. It is up to the PCs though to back track the Federation agents to their secret bases and then back to the Federation.

The PCs will need to direct their teams to not get too enthusiastic though, as any major operations will put the region on alert and increase the presence of the GC Security Force, who will think that the Federation is stepping up its own campaign, though they do not know of the existence of the Federation. They will though if the PCs teams are not restrained, as more GC ships will start patrolling the regions and venturing deeper into uncharted territories. The PCs will also have to counter the agent's offer with one of their own, that the PCs finance, or take over operations in the regions along the border, as the GC is close to starting a major campaign against the pirates in these regions. If the PCs can not take over within the first five years of the game (from the time they find the Cirrus starbase), then the GC will find the Federation in the year 2908 and launch a massive invasion force that will wipe them out.

The spies on the Mara starbase can find out that the "pirates" have dozens of ships and are seemingly well organized. The GC hasn't been able to counter the threat previously because of all the spatial anomalies in the lower parts of the quadrant. They haven't expanded into this area because of this and the fact that there are very few inhabitable worlds, their survey teams have charted the entire quad, but after losing numerous ships and several science vessels they decided not to expand any farther. For game purposes the GM should roll for the presence of a spatial anomaly (Part Two Session 1:18), at least twice a day. The Federation ships have played a large part in holding the GC back, destroying and capturing their ships in surprise attacks, but this area of space is also very hazardous. If an with aliens is rolled, the PCs will detect a Federation ship traveling at high warp, coming from, or going to, a rendezvous on one of the minor worlds along the border. Following one of these ships is the safest way to locate the Federation.

This area of space was the major battle ground between the aliens and the ancients and a number of the anomalies are from these battles. There are also subspace mines, ships, and weapons floating around in space here, some of which the Federation has discovered and uses. Some of them are still active, but will more than likely explode if they attempt to attack the PCs, or the PCs try to salvage them, the Federation has lost quite a few ships this way and finally gave up. When the PCs follow a Federation ship, they will notice that it makes a lot of course corrections, to avoid anomalies and some of these weapons and their sensors will pick up the energy signatures. The only way to safely investigate is to approach cloaked, with a damping field projecting and even then if the PCs use a tractor beam, the object may explode. There is a very slim chance that the PCs can safely salvage anything from this region, unless they design a ship specifically for this task. The scientist android has this capability, but will not volunteer the information, any other attempts may destroy the Xenophone and the PCs with it.

Many of the worlds in this area of space are still inhabitable because of the war, but several offer the PCs a location for secret bases, that neither the GC, or the Federation will find. Surveying and charting this area though must be done by the PCs, or they will lose quite a few ships. The Federation actually traveled around this area hundreds of years ago, coming from quad C and established themselves here because of the hazards in the area. The use it as a buffer between them and the GC, but before long the GC will find a safe passage through and discover the existence of the Federation. While they have impressive colony defenses, the GC can mount a massive invasion force and as they won't be able to land, they will simply bombard the planets from a safe distance.

The PCs may think that this is an opportunity, that less ships will be able to protect the GC, but this will not be the case, the invasion of the Federation will be over before the PC rebellion can start. If the Federation is invaded, the GC will actually have a thousand extra ships to attack the PCs with. The only way to prevent this build up is to suspend Federation operations and move their own operations closer to quad A, making the GC think it is their own people who are behind the sabotage and pirating. If the PCs simply start up their own operations along the border, the GC will think that the rebellion is growing and prepare for a campaign against it. The PCs will need to spend a lot of time on this aspect of the rebellion, if they are successful though, the GC will be dealing with internal affairs and not react as swiftly to counter the PC rebellion.

The problem of course is maintaining communications with the rest of the rebellion and if the PCs are not establishing a comm sat relay then their rebellion will become chaos and they will lose precious time running back and forth. Not to mention that the PCs still have the rest of the border to explore.

Once the PCs meet with the Federation their main contact will be Byron, a fleet commander who is in charge of the campaign against the GC. Upon talking with him extensively the PC Commander will realize that the man is a competent Commander and has more experience than all of the PCs captains put together, he is the Federation's top commander. He will want to be advised of all of the PCs efforts and if they tell him the ambition they have he will jokingly say that the Federation should join them, when the PCs do not laugh at this, but take him serious, he will begin thinking along these lines as well. Eventually they will want him to take the top position in the Strategic Command Department and he will make a superb admiral. This is the greatest resource the Federation has to offer the rebellion, but he also comes with three fleets of ships, fully manned, four dozen spies, a hundred armsmen that can be trained for special forces, and 5,000 armsmen that have a skill level of 6 in combat training.

If the PCs set up a supply line to the federation, they can produce a fleet of ships a year, including crews, along with a 1000 armsmen for the PCs armies. The Federation will not want to use it's own resources to build weapons, or ships, but will use their factories if the PCs supply them with resources. Ben the engineer from Cirrus will send a few men to the Federation and they will be able to produce TL-10 starships. The Cirrus starbase actually has the capacity to make enough equipment and weapons for the armies, but it will be ships they need the worst. The PCs can further entice the Federation to join their own rebellion, by offering defense satellite technology, these in combination with the other planetary defenses will make the Federation capable of withstanding a GC invasion. It will take about ten years for them to research, build factories, produce and deploy the satellites though and during this time they will still be somewhat vulnerable.

The Federation also has about 10,000 techs who will travel to the Cirrus starbase and assist in it's operation, requiring less training than the PCs recruits. Once they arrive, the starbase can begin full production within a year. The Federation will also offer to send teachers and more scientists, increasing the speed at which the PCs can gain full control over the starbase. When word makes it back to the Federation of the capabilities of the starbase, to out produce the combined industries of their worlds, the respect they have for the rebellion and PCs will go up. A little prodding by Commander Byron and a few Jedi, within the year the Federation will back the rebellion 100% and can be counted as rebel worlds, in the PCs population disbursements.

The main problem will be transportation between Cirrus and the Federation, it is about a 700 LY trip to go around GC space and unless the PCs design and build trans-warp capable merchant vessels it will slow things down considerably. The problem with this is that the PCs should not relinquish their control over the high tech and they will need to man such a ship with psionics. The Federation will be very interested in getting their hands on PC technology, but if they do, they will quietly back out of the rebellion and be more concerned with protecting their own borders. If this happens, the Federation will become a splinter group, which will hurt the players final score. So long as the PC and psionics, maintain their superiority in technology the Federation will bend over backwards to make sure the rebellion is a success and help the PCs any way they can.

With the Federation's knowledge and resources, the PCs can quickly spread their influence throughout quadrant B and into the border regions of quad A. This will all take about two years and as long as a comm sat relay is in place the PCs can move on to their next part of the campaign. Which will be exploring the rest of the border for starters and establishing bases in strategic locations all around the GC.

Exploring the border along the Alpha Quadrant will take the PCs the better part of a year and as they will be out of contact with the rebels during this time, if they haven't established the command structure of organizations like the National Security Council, the Company, etc…, when they return the rebellion will have faltered and it will take them several years to get it back on track. In this event their special teams like the special forces and spy network will be in chaos and together, having caused several splinter groups. More than likely the campaign will not be won during the twenty year time span and the PCs will need to regroup and start the rebellion over. Having the command structure in place though will have caused the rebels to cut a swath of influence from the starbase to quad B and the PCs can begin pushing their influence closer to the Alpha quadrant from quad D. The PCs should be about five years into the campaign by now and have a rough idea of what they are up against.

Their expansion into the Alpha quadrant will be a little more difficult than the outer quadrants, as there is a lot more merchant traffic and patrols. They will have to remain cloaked and be careful about jump flashes and warp signatures and will have to deal with satellites on every planet they visit. The safest way for the PCs to operate in this quadrant will be openly, through the machinations of the Merchant PC. Seeing all the merchant traffic this PC will drool at the opportunities available and if the PCs allow it, this PC will want to put factories in every region. Except for entering the system where Gal-Prime is located, if the PCs are careful, they can expand their influence into this region with one consideration. All of their teams will have to be based on stealth ships, the presence of satellites will prevent them from building, or using bases on the planets in this quadrant. They could build bases on the outer planets, or on inhabitable worlds, but as they need stealth ships to support them, they might as well just operate from them. Their best opportunity is to create the Tactical Orbs, that can cloak and orbit a planet, so long as the GC does not upgrade their sensors, because the PCs have slipped up, this will provide a superior tactical advantage when open conflict erupts.

If the PCs deploy the Tactical Orbs though and the GC upgrades its sensors, thereby discovering them, it will throw them into a panic and they will launch a campaign in record time. They will torture the prisoners to learn of the extent of the threat and within a year will be locate and destroy the Cirrus starbase. The PCs will need to be very careful from the time they deploy Tactical Orbs, but with them in place they stand a far better chance of winning the rebellion as they can attack fleets after they have powered down, are in orbit, and prevent any ships launching from the surface. With their cloaking capability and the ability to move, they offer a prime location to base special units, by transporting in and out, teams will be more effective that surface based ones and actually accomplish goals in half the time. The PCs will actually need to restrict their level of operations and restrain them from doing all the damage they can, otherwise someone will suspect high tech is being used and additional satellites will be deployed with upgraded sensors.

The PCs best way of infiltrating the Alpha quadrant is to help the Merchant PC and as soon as possible start a merchant shipping line. Once the PC is granted permission to buy a mansion on Gal-Prime, the PCs will have the power and shipping transports to step up their campaign. During this time they will need to get spy teams onto the starbases and jedi onto the prime worlds, while the special forces teams will have to take it easy, the other aspects of the rebel plans do not have to. Once the Merchant PC has a mansion on Gal-Prime, it will come with a private starship that will allow the PCs to travel about GC space openly, so long as they follow a patrol, or join a convoy they will have no problems. If they set out on their own however they will become circumspect, as nobles are too fearful of travelling alone and anyone who does is subject to repeated inspections and background checks.

The PCs will have to park their stealth cruiser, or have it follow them discretely, but android is competent and will do a better job of timing the jump point than the PC captain. The PCs will actually have less of a chance at getting caught, if they openly travel the Alpha quadrant, so long as they follow the restrictions of private yachts. The PCs can branch out from Gal-Prime this way and if they don't try to base any teams, other than psionic ones on Gal-Prime they can operate in secrecy. They will of course need to remove themselves from the wanted lists of the security forces, but if the Company is in operation this should be well on its way. They will not be able to deploy any comm sats in the Gal-Prime system, nor enter the system in the stealth ship, or they will immediately be detected.