From cannon fodder to sweeping across thousands of stars.

Chapter 532 The oriole is behind
Upon hearing the news suddenly reported by the observation team, the captain of the modified reconnaissance ship couldn't help but shudder.

"What exactly happened?" He suppressed his excitement and asked in the calmest tone possible.

"According to the continuous tracking of the detection array, the unidentified target in the G9 area deviated from our predicted route 30 seconds ago and is suspected to have changed its trajectory!"

"Change track. Has the new route been predicted?"

"Yes, Captain! The shipboard control personality has made a rough prediction. The unidentified target seems to have adjusted its course according to the actions of the garrison fleet. Its current course is still heading straight towards the garrison fleet!"

While the observation team was answering, the target observation data and the predicted results of the virtual heading were also updated synchronously on the screen in front of the captain of the reconnaissance ship.

"Captain, do you need to warn the general?"

The one who spoke was the ship's intelligence officer. In addition to organizing reconnaissance activities and intelligence analysis, one of his responsibilities was to provide timely tactical advice to the captain.

"As for the early warning, we only have one chance. Once the early warning is issued to the fleet, even if the other party cannot decipher the encrypted information in a short period of time, they will be able to track the issuance point of the early warning to this gravel area. At that time, we will no longer be able to hide."

The captain of the reconnaissance ship did not give any affirmative or negative instructions, but instead explained what might happen after the warning was issued.

Intelligence officer: "You mean wait a little longer?"

The captain was silent for a moment, as if he was quickly weighing the pros and cons. After a moment, he nodded and said:
"Well, the garrison fleet currently has enough redundancy in its response time. We should wait until the enemy escapes from the influence area of ​​Grand Rubion and we can perform multi-feature identification before considering issuing an early warning.

According to our communication with the Atlas combat fleet a long time ago, they are proficient in using decoys equipped with corner reflectors for tactical deception, and some of the new decoys have the ability to change their tracks. We should be more cautious when fighting them."

"Yes, Captain! I will take my men to continue surveillance."

The intelligence officer nodded and saluted, then used a handhold near the captain's seat to lift himself up and float towards the observation team's position in the CIC.

The captain of the reconnaissance ship refocused his eyes on the screen in front of him. The dazzling red predicted route was piercing straight towards the garrison fleet, and it was piercing the flank of the fleet with a large projection area.
As one of the few veterans in the garrison fleet who had experienced the previous war with the Star Dragon Empire, the captain of the reconnaissance ship was definitely among the best in the entire fleet in terms of experience and professional level.

In addition, he participated in the reconstruction of the garrison fleet throughout the process and had exchanges and training with the Atlas fleet, so Major General Kimmel deliberately placed his smart reconnaissance ship in this rubble area.

Moreover, only a few people in the entire fleet, including the fleet commander and intelligence staff, knew about the deployment of this "secret sentry", and the captain of the reconnaissance ship also reported directly to Major General Kimmel.

The main reason for doing so is that the garrison fleet had previously experienced several leaks, which even had a direct impact on the war situation. Even if the fleet's military police and intelligence department conducted several internal inspections, there was no guarantee that the entire fleet was "clean."

This also made Major General Kimmel realize that this rebuilt fleet had many loopholes in this regard, especially since there were many new recruits in the fleet whose thoughts and spirits were easily affected by the current situation in the Rubion galaxy. So in some key arrangements, he could only choose to operate in the direction of letting as few people know about it as possible.

The combat deployment of this modified reconnaissance ship is one of them.

The dim cabin environment due to the blackout, coupled with the report just now from the observation team, made everyone else on the bridge feel a little nervous.

However, they did not try to guess the current situation by stealing a glance at the captain's expression, or in other words, in this situation their attention would involuntarily be more focused on the workbench in front of them.

The tradition of blackout has been passed down from the blue-water navy to the present day, and has been maintained regardless of how the human navy has developed and changed.

After all, human vision in dim conditions mainly relies on the work of rod cells.

The rod cells mainly rely on rhodopsin, which is more sensitive to blue light and insensitive to red light. Under red light conditions, the decomposition rate of this substance is slower, which also greatly slows down the rate of eye fatigue in humans in a red light environment.

This reconnaissance ship has been lurking in this gravel belt for 144 hours and has maintained a level combat readiness status throughout. Although each combat position has undergone several rounds of rotation, the crew's mental state and physical strength have still been greatly consumed.

According to the Federal Navy's combat regulations, with the exception of two special types of ships, long-range reconnaissance ships and infiltration reconnaissance ships, the longest mission deployment time of other conventional reconnaissance ships or part-time destroyers and frigates when performing high-risk reconnaissance missions cannot exceed 160 hours.

When the time limit is approaching, the ship must be rotated with other ships that have been repaired. For this reconnaissance ship with a "half-new and half-old" crew, this mission is also the longest since the garrison fleet was rebuilt. Many new crew members had only been deployed for 86 hours in combat missions before.

Although the captain had been worried that his crew would suffer from severe mental and physical decline due to long-term combat deployment, it seems that he is lucky now. He has not received such a report from the boatswain for the time being.

Moreover, after the observation team has finally identified the unidentified units in the G9 area, the mission of their reconnaissance ship will basically come to an end.

If the unidentified unit in the G9 area was really Atlas' fleet, he would not hesitate to issue a warning to Rear Admiral Kimmel and command the reconnaissance ship to retreat from the gravel belt - after the position was exposed, he believed that the enemy would not hesitate to cover the area with firepower.

Although such an attack might not necessarily hit the ship, it would still be fatal to the reconnaissance ship by causing collisions and chaos in the rubble belt.

"No matter what, this is finally going to have a conclusion."

The captain of the reconnaissance ship thought silently in his heart, but at the same time he always felt like he was being "spied on", as if someone was secretly observing him in the dark.

But the question is, isn't this reconnaissance ship of ours in the 'dark'?
-
"Do you think we have won the first prize?"

"Maybe. Maybe?"

"The captain of the enemy reconnaissance ship was found in the lurking gravel belt. This is a bit too outrageous no matter how you think about it. Why don't you wait until this is over and participate in the group's monthly 'Contribution Lotto'?"

On the equally dim bridge of the Polarized Light, Captain Tom of this special mission ship was talking with the bridge duty officer and the tactical operations officer.

This special mission ship, which was previously sent to the Rubion galaxy to secretly support the Renaissance Alliance, joined the formation after Randall led the fleet to arrive and was organized into an independent reconnaissance team after receiving supplies with the other two special mission ships.

The special mission ship's advantage in covert operations allows Tom and his team to perform reconnaissance missions with ease, even a little effort.

However, even though Tom was full of confidence in this battleship, he did not expect that they would actually find themselves under the nose of a reconnaissance ship.
The Polarized Light was originally sent by Randall to this rubble belt to perform surveillance tasks. Due to the location and natural concealment of the rubble, the commanders of both sides chose to "put eyes" here.

Moreover, the Polarized Light, which arrived a step later, did not discover the reconnaissance ship with activated optical camouflage at first. After all, the other ship was also modified with the help of Atlas, and its stealth performance was still not bad.

The two sides coexisted in the same rubble belt for several hours without disturbing each other. Because of the different surveillance directions of the two sides, neither warship detected the radar waves emitted by the other.
However, the omnidirectional alert monitoring on the Polarized Light finally discovered an abnormal "image fluctuation" nearby at any time - that was a momentary disorder caused by the battleship's optical camouflage after being hit by a larger piece of debris.

Although the "image fluctuation" lasted only half a second, it was still captured by the shipboard control personality on the polarized light, and Tom and others soon realized that they had "won the first prize."

As for the mission the other party is performing here?

Tom knew with his butt that he was acting as a "secret sentry" in this gravel belt.

However, based on the Polarized Light's subsequent surveillance of the reconnaissance ship, Tom and others also confirmed that the other party had probably not issued a warning to the garrison fleet, but this was only temporary.
Because Tom knew that the "unknown unit" in the G9 area was the Third Task Force commanded by Randall.

Judging from the current situation, Randall's tactical deception did work. The Rubion galaxy garrison fleet was indeed misled and rushed towards the torpedo decoy group.

But if the Polarized Light does not find a way to eliminate the reconnaissance ship 500 kilometers away in the next ten minutes or so, the other side will probably issue a warning to the garrison fleet soon.

Thinking of this, Tom couldn't help but turn his gaze to the three-dimensional model in low-brightness mode in front of him.

In this rubble belt model generated by the shipboard control personality, the positions of the Polarized Light and the enemy ship are marked by two miniature ship models, one green and one red.

And between the two warships, there were four other small green dots crossing the rubble belt and approaching the enemy ships.

Tom, who saw this scene, couldn't help but shake his head and sighed:
"Unpowered, they crossed the rubble belt and 'physically implanted' the electronic warfare virus. Commander Baninger, it seems that only your Immortal Legion can perform such a trick."

(End of this chapter)