What Ingrid heard was praise.  Outside of some intentional decisions to engage in honorable dueling, had she ever been [i]truly[/i] on the Colonel's bad side?  There were failures, as even the greats of the Inner Sphere experienced, but it didn't often come to a scalding after-mission dress down.  She was, at her worst, competent but headstrong.  A tempestuous person who usually knew better than to let those chivalric impulses influence every possible decision.

It still felt off.  Maybe it was that little remark that she had trouble hearing as anything but a barb; you [i]would have[/i] dropped that Jenner if you attempted to.

Everything that he said about her felt like it was meant to be positive, but she couldn't help but read it as the least charitable interpretation.  Ingrid's eyes kept staring forward as she was debriefed, her face taut and her posture tauter, and she ended it with a quiet [color=SteelBlue]"Thank you, sir."[/color]

The rest of them did a well-enough job, minus the...concerning lack of control on the part of Mechwarrior Rivers; if it wasn't the Colonel's prerogative she'd also prepare a few remarks on trying to act like a human instead of an animal...and she gave them terse nods in turn as the Colonel finished speaking with them.  Regardless of her own doubt, she didn't want it to leak out to the people she temporarily stood above.

She could've solved her issues with some of the alcohol so graciously donated by some backwater hick with more curiosity than common sense, but all the same, an intruder was also a good distraction.

The first introduction the newcomer received to the House Daschke style of hospitality was a sword.  She was standing behind the rest of these armed men and women, having watched with cool regard as he was relieved of his moonshine, but the curved sword she had at her side only came out [i]after[/i] he was mercifully cut free.  Even if he was now their guest instead of just a mere intruder, that short lady in the back sure seemed as if she was looking for reasons to use that sword.

If only because she was standing next to him at the time, Tarak heard a brief mutter: [i][color=SteelBlue]"I was hoping we'd keep ourselves secret...if he returns, he'll tell his whole village of the cave-people with a fresh load of supplies..."[/color][/i]

[@Th3King0fChaos]