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  TO STAND DEFIANT

  DAKOTAN CONFEDERACY BOOK 2

  GLYNN STEWART

  To Stand Defiant © 2022 Glynn Stewart

  Illustration by Viko Menezes

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to any persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Published by Faolan’s Pen Publishing. Faolan's Pen Publishing logo is a registered trademark of Faolan's Pen Publishing Inc.

  CONTENTS

  Visit Me Online

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Other Books by Glynn Stewart

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  Chapter 1

  Conviction by Glynn Stewart

  About the Author

  VISIT ME ONLINE

  For Glynn Stewart news, announcements, and more, visit GlynnStewart.com

  1

  Dakota System

  18:00 January 30, 2738 Earth Standard Meridian Date/Time

  “You can’t be serious.”

  With everything that had changed over the last three weeks, it was a tiny thing for James Tecumseh to find a step too far, but the insignia laid on his desk was perfectly familiar—and that made it the problem.

  The jewelry box held four gold stars, each of them a match for one of the three he already wore. Except that he’d only been a Vice Admiral for a few months—and these were the four stars of a full admiral.

  “The new Cabinet was unanimous,” Quetzalli Chapulin told him. The new Interim President of the Dakotan Interstellar Confederacy—formerly the First Chief of Dakota itself—was a pale and delicately built Nahuatl woman whose build showed no sign of her sixteen years as a Marine officer.

  “Unanimous,” James echoed, still staring at the rank insignia. There were only three people in Chapulin’s office, and he knew the other two women well by now. Very well, in the case of the new Interim First Chief of Dakota, Abey Todacheeney.

  His girlfriend had enjoyed the noncommittal title of secretary when he’d first met Dakota’s leadership, but by the time James had talked the planetary representatives of two sectors of the Terran Commonwealth into secession…well, it hadn’t been a surprise when the currently black-haired woman had been elevated to Interim First Chief.

  “We need to show the people of our new Confederacy that we have an equal military force to the Commonwealth we have abandoned,” she told him gently. “That means we need a Fleet Admiral in command of the new Confederacy Navy.

  “And there is no one else we can put in that role. Even if we wanted to.”

  “Which we don’t,” Chapulin concluded. “You led us into this whole mess, Admiral, and you’re not getting out of it this easily. Put on the damn stars.”

  “There’s more changes to the uniform than just the stars,” James warned drily. “I’ll have to warn Chief Leeuwenhoek to get started on those. God alone knows when she’ll have time to swap them out, though.”

  Chief Steward Sallie Leeuwenhoek was James Tecumseh’s personal steward and general minder and keeper. Since she had previously conspired with Todacheeney on such things as completely redecorating James’s quarters and office while he wasn’t around, he suspected she already knew—and his girlfriend’s slight grin told him he was bang on.

  “She already knows, doesn’t she?” he asked.

  “I messaged her the moment I handed you the box,” Abey told him. “We weren’t going to let you turn this down. As our President said, you led us into this mess.”

  “I know a fight I can’t win,” he conceded. “Though that wasn’t what I came down here to discuss with you two.”

  “We know,” Chapulin confirmed. “Politics, as always.”

  A silent command from the President’s neural interface brought the office’s holoprojectors online, the blinds on her windows automatically closing. The room had been the office of Dakota’s First Chief—it hadn’t moved over to Todacheeney with that job, as the new Confederacy needed a space for its head of state.

  That meant that it was on the top floor of one of the taller buildings of Tááłaʼí’tsin, Dakota’s planetary capital and the DIC’s temporary interstellar capital.

  Twelve key star systems lit up on the display, in a clear wedge of territory covering space from the Arroyo System, the closest Dakota Sector system to Sol, to the Persephone System, the farthest Meridian Sector system from Sol.

  “We have heard back from all of the Dakota Sector systems,” Chapulin told him. “We have at least interim approval from Shogun, Gothic, Desdemona, and Krete.”

  “What about Arroyo?” James asked, looking at the sixth system of the sector.

  “While Patience Abiodun had the authority to do a lot of things, her governor feels that seceding from the Commonwealth was an overstep on her part,” Todacheeney said grimly. Head of state for Dakota or not, she was still fully linked in with the new Confederacy’s politics and government.

  “Governor Hoxha will come around. I have no concerns,” Chapulin noted. “She’s putting it to a vote of the planetary assembly, which will take some time to arrange. Minister Abiodun assures me that vote will go our way, but Hoxha wants that authority—given that she’s the most vulnerable of our systems…”

  “I understand her position,” James conceded. “We’re going to have to look hard at how we secure Arroyo going forward. Without q-coms, I need central fleets, but I also need warning.”

  The Terran Commonwealth’s interstellar communication network was gone, destroyed by the people they’d tried to conquer in the Alliance of Free Stars. That had thrown a hundred–plus inhabited worlds into chaos, allowing their enemies in the Stellar League—on the opposite side of the Commonwealth from the Alliance—to try to conquer border systems.

  And had set into motion the chain of events that had led to Fleet Admiral Walkingstick becoming Imperator of the Commonwealth—and ordering James Tecumseh to turn the Dakota Sector into the arsenal of the Commonwealth, regardless of the price for the systems of that Sector.

  Every lesson James Tecumseh and the other Commonwealth Admirals had ever learned about strategy, operations and tactics had been predicated on the assumption that they would have FTL communications the Alliance had wrecked. Worse, their enemies—like the Stellar League—still had those coms.

  “The other systems are holding votes of some kind, yes?” he asked delicately, which got him amused looks from both women.

  “You know Dakota did,” Todacheeney told him. “A planetary referendum with eighty-seven percent in favor, if you forgot.”

  “None of the others have had time. We have encouraged them all to hold referendums,” Chapulin noted. “The approvals so far are interim but sufficient for us to move forward as a nation for the moment.”

  James nodded with a sigh.

  “Sorry, starting to get…twitchy about everything.”

  Freedom. Justice. Democracy. Unity. These were the principles and core values of the Terran Commonwealth. Except that the Commonwealth had always put unity above the other three, leading to the whole campaign of Unification…and some other, even-less-pleasant things.

  “This nation will be born and built on democracy,” the Interim President told him. “Or we are throwing away the opportunity you gave us, James.”

  “Gothic should be holding their referendum today,” Abey noted. “We won’t hear the results for a week or so, but the last polling we saw was suggesting an even-more-thorough blowout than here.

  “All the planetary governments seem to need to do is put your little speech on the airways on constant play.”

  James grimaced at that. He was a soldier, not a politician, but his appeal to the Dakota Sector Governance Conference had come from the heart…and it had worked.

  “So, everything is proceeding as planned?” he asked.

  “On our side, yes,” Chapulin confirmed. “Yours?”

  “We’re finished the repairs to Saint Bartholomew.” The battleship had carried the Imperator’s chosen representative to Dakota—and when James had decided to defy the Imperator’s orders, he’d had his Marines storm the ship.

  “She’s being brought back online under Captain Ferreiro.” Arjun Ferreiro had been James’s chief of staff when he’d been the second-in-command of Sector Fleet Dakota. He’d been at loose ends since then, as James h
ad inherited the Sector Fleet staff along with the fleet.

  “Though”—James looked down at the insignia and tapped it—“may I assume that this comes with blanket authority to promote as I see fit?”

  “You are the uniformed head of the Dakota Confederacy Navy,” Chapulin told him firmly. “Once we have a full constitution and legislature, I’d like to run flag ranks through them—but for now, the Cabinet would like to be consulted on flag-rank promotions.

  “But with that condition, you may promote as you wish.”

  “I need a personnel bureau,” James realized aloud. “But for now, I’ll stick to making Ferreiro a Commodore so there’s no argument whether he’s senior enough for a battleship, and mull over stars for my staff.”

  Saint Bartholomew was his largest battleship, too—and if she’d been a second Volcano-class carrier, the Saints’ fighter-carrying counterpart, James would have picked a more-senior officer to command her. But even Saints didn’t rate that highly on his list. Battleships were backups.

  Carriers fought wars.

  “There are a lot of changes to come as your ships move from being TCN to DCN,” Todacheeney reminded. “Obviously, the civilian side of the Confederacy admin will support as we can, but we have our own tasks ahead of us.”

  “We’re all going to be very, very busy,” James agreed. His implant pinged, notifying him that a new ship had arrived in-system. No, two ships flying in company.

  That was unusual—and so was the fact that their vector suggested they were from the Brillig Sector. There’d been limited contact with the sector to their galactic north—decided by the orientation of old Earth, a hundred light-years away—which at least explained why the ships weren’t on any schedule.

  “James?” Chapulin asked.

  “New arrivals,” he told the two politicians. “From Brillig, though my people haven’t nailed down the exact system yet.”

  “That’s a good sign, if we’re seeing trade come in from outside our sectors now.”

  “It should be, yes,” James agreed, but he was rolling the information around in his mind.

  “You seem concerned,” Abey said softly.

  “It’s nothing…I think. But I also think I’m going to cut this meeting short with my apologies,” he told them. “Something doesn’t sit right…and if there is anything even remotely out of the ordinary, I should be on my flagship.”

  “Of course,” Chapulin agreed instantly. “We can pick up the rest of what we were talking about this evening on a holocall.

  “We trust your judgment, Fleet Admiral Tecumseh.”

  2

  Dakota System

  18:30 January 30, 2738 ESMDT

  Wing Colonel Anthony Yamamoto was the scion of a long line of sailors, spacers and pilots, stretching back through Scotland to Japan and the architect of the attack on Pearl Harbor—via around fifty generations and at least three famous soldiers of one stripe or another.

  He was also the man tasked with assembling the starfighters of a dozen scattered local defense forces and three battered fleets into the newborn Dakotan Confederacy Starfighter Corps.

  With five carriers and as many strike cruisers, plus the defensive formations, Anthony was responsible for somewhere in the region of three thousand starfighters, nine thousand starfighter crew, and about a hundred thousand people all told.

  And the dark-skinned Japanese-Scotsman knew perfectly well he had no business being in a Katana starfighter flying an in-system patrol between Dakota and the Second Dakota Belt. He had more datawork floating around the back of his implant and the networks attached to his office on Krakatoa than he could shake a stick at.

  But he was also a pilot, and he did some of his best thinking with his brain interfaced with a starfighter. So, his command ship, a twenty-meter-long egg shape massing fifty-five hundred tons, led another Katana in a sweeping eight-hour patrol.

  The lack of FTL communications increased the value of a senior officer being farther out, and he needed to share his people’s tasks and see how they performed…but he knew all of that was excuses. Or he would have told the Admiral what he was doing.

  “You see those ships?” he murmured to his crew, highlighting the two freighters. “Gut check?”

  Anthony had seen images of Isoroku Yamamoto and knew he was the spitting image of his distant ancestor. That meant he leaned hard into the Scottish burr he’d grown up with, partially to confuse people but mostly to intentionally break their assumptions.

  “Vector is definitely from the Brillig Sector,” his new flight engineer told him. Lieutenant Lindiwe Navarro had replaced another officer who had decided it was appropriate to make a pass at their pilot and commanding officer. To smooth over some of consequences of that change, Anthony had picked up an entirely new flight crew, with Lieutenant Kattalin Gunther now managing the fighter’s weapons.

  The Hispanic Navarro was from Gothic in the Dakota Sector and was almost as dark in her way as Anthony was in his. Gunther, on the other hand, was from central Germany on Earth and was as blonde and pale and heavyset as the CAG and the engineer were dark and slim.

  “Can you narrow it down?” Anthony asked. “The Brillig Sector has seven inhabited star systems, and Sector Fleet Brillig was headquartered at Brillig itself. If they’re coming from Brillig, I’m relatively comfortable with them.

  “But we’ve heard nothing from the entire sector since we lost communications. So, I’m a bit concerned to see two ships show up.”

  The problem with replacing his flight crew was that he had to teach the new duo what he needed—and since the justifications for First Fleet’s Commander, Air Group who was also the head of the DCSC to get into a starfighter would be few and far between, he wasn’t going to get many chances.

  “Gunther, keep an eye on their current vector,” he ordered.

  “Course is toward Dakota orbit at fifty gravities,” the gunner replied instantly.

  That was Tier One acceleration, the first of several efficiency plateaus in the interaction between antimatter thrusters, inertial compensators and mass manipulators. At fifty gravities, the big freighters were spending a tiny fraction of the fuel their true mass would require for their acceleration.

  His fighter wing was currently accelerating at two hundred and fifty gravities, Tier Two acceleration. Still far more efficient than uncompensated engines, it was maybe one percent as efficient as Tier One.

  Only starfighters were rated for Tier Three thrust, around five hundred gravities, and only missiles and sensor drones for Tier Four’s thousand.

  There was no way the freighters could escape the warships in the system without going back to FTL. Anthony was running vectors in his implants as he waited for Navarro to narrow down the origin of their new guests. Of the fifteen two-fighter wings patrolling the inner system, he could vector eight to intercept the strangers.

  “CIC back on Krakatoa will probably be able to nail it down more closely,” Navarro finally said, “but I think they’re coming from the Blyton System.”

  “Krakatoa has a thirty-minute turnaround for information from these guys,” Anthony pointed out. “We’re only two light-minutes away. That puts the burden on us, Lieutenant.

  “What does your database have on Blyton?”

  “Single habitable world, six planets, no belt, seven hundred million people,” the engineer reeled off. She’d anticipated that request, which was a good sign.