The Colonel didn't take her bait...or saw through it.  Ingrid couldn't get a read on that man sometimes, and it worried her.

Their reputation was her concern, but so was her own personal interpretation of honor.  To fire on unarmed people simply trying to run away was a shameful thought, and yet she couldn't get that across in a way that mattered to these people.  It's true, yes, they were already being slandered.  Did they need to fuel the fire even further?

Ingrid stepped away from the table with a composed look on her face.  She was going to be leading them directly; didn't need to slander her [i]own[/i] reputation any further - her reservations were kept to herself.

A short while later, she was standing below the green hull of the Ostroc, looking up at a man standing on a makeshift gantry - in the absence of real repair bays, the astechs had to find creative ways to get up to the Battlemechs' levels.  [color=SteelBlue]"Sanders."[/color]  She had taken the time to memorize the names of those on her machine's duty, though they often didn't care to remember hers.  [color=SteelBlue]"Have you loaded this yet?"[/color]

"Not much to load, ma'am," he said, his gray beard hanging down as he looked over the edge of the gantry.  "Just the SRMs, right?  We'll get those done last."

[color=SteelBlue]"Tell the lead that I wish to have but one shot loaded.  Distribute the remainder to the rest,"[/color] she said, [color=SteelBlue]"I'll be fine without them."[/color]

He looked away from her at a printed sheet on a clipboard, flipping a couple of pages.  "Ma'am, yer 'Roc's ain't even got a half-ton of ammunition for it anyway, without dipping into the Hawk's...does it make much difference?  Don't think anybody else can even load these things with the long-ass name."

Her nose scrunched up.  She tapped her foot, and put her hands on her hips.  [color=SteelBlue]"Then so be it!  If it's that much of a problem, I won't ask...and they are [i]Totschlagens[/i].  TAWT-shla-gens.  Not difficult."[/color]

"Ma'am, I'm from Bluford, Crucis area."  He wiped sweat from his wrinkled head.  Even with Ingrid's snappyness, he doesn't seem to have enough energy in him to get truly annoyed.  "They don't teach German there; they barely teach English!  I'm sorry, but I got to get to your hand actuators before the boss comes 'round.  We can talk about pronunciation later, if you don't mind."

[color=SteelBlue]"...I'll leave you to it."[/color]  She kept any further clarification to herself.