Thunder Reforged
Copyright© 2026 by FozzieBare
Chapter 10: “I’ve scheduled my nervous breakdown for Tuesday”
The guild continued to grow, and not just in numbers. Elias wanted new members to feel like they belonged before Reforged brought in another wave. Their role in Maximum Boom’s victory had attracted more attention, including several players looking to leave other guilds and start fresh.
More than once, Elias had to make one thing clear: joining Reforged did not mean walking straight into platoon or company command.
“We need to know you can take orders as well as give them,” he explained. “And we need to make sure you don’t create personality conflicts the moment somebody tells you no.”
One or two otherwise promising candidates had become noticeably less interested after that. Elias did not budge.
In the couple of weeks following the battle, though, Reforged had started to feel like it had an identity.
They were producing a few standardized WarMAC models now. Nothing top-tier, but in several cases they were still better than what newer members were already piloting, so the guild sold them at cost. Sometimes slightly below cost, if somebody was short on credits.
Adrian, when he had time, helped people soup up their rides with practical suggestions on improving performance. Martin did much the same thing, although his work increasingly drifted toward the theoretical. Outside the custom upgrades owed to the Platoon Showdown winners, most of Martin’s experimental gear was being allocated to Adrian and Amy first.
Adrian’s WarMaster had always been modular, capable of filling almost any role with the right setup. With Martin’s hardware, it was becoming something else.
Not a better WarMaster in general.
A better WarMaster for whatever Adrian needed it to be that day.
Kevin had shown up and dispelled any lingering suspicion that he was anything other than what he had claimed to be.
His computer and WarMAC control setup were both top of the line. Even Marcus, who had spared no expense outfitting the guild’s systems, whistled when he saw the machine Kevin brought in.
Adrian looked it over.
“Hell, something like that? He turns it on, the whole building browns out, right? Does it have a flux capacitor?”
Martin looked faintly jealous of the machine, although he still preferred his laptop.
“I don’t think we could generate 1.21 gigawatts to power it if it did. The city would definitely require a permit.”
He studied the power specifications.
“I would recommend three separate UPS units and perhaps five circuit breakers in the loop.”
Kevin blinked.
“Is it really that powerful? I just asked a technical friend of mine to build me the computer of his dreams. Told him if he did it right, I’d pay for one for him too.”
Elias tried to find a comparison that adequately described it.
“The computers here in the Pit are Lamborghinis.”
He pointed at Kevin’s machine.
“Yours is a Formula One car with a warp drive attached.”
Kevin looked impressed. “Cool.”
Elias stared at him.
“That’s all you have to say?”
Kevin shrugged. “I was hoping it was good.”
Amy laughed. “That passed good about six exits ago on the superhighway, traveled through wow, and is currently leaving contrails through HOLY SHIT. How much did it set you back?”
“I don’t remember exactly.”
Silence.
Elias blinked.
“You don’t remember.”
“Not really. I told him not to cheap out.”
Amy stared at him.
“That sentence hurt me physically.”
Kevin shrugged.
“Even before I really hit it big, I was doing all right for myself. I made eight figures in commissions the year before I quit.”
Amy looked confused.
Adrian leaned over.
“He means at least ten million. Somewhere between ten and just under a hundred million.”
Kevin shrugged again.
“A LOT closer to the former. It wasn’t that great a year, honestly. I was getting burned out.”
Amy’s eyes widened.
“Whoa.”
Kevin shook his head.
“I’m still me. I just get to enjoy life without worrying now.”
A small shrug.
“I’m lucky.”
Adrian shrugged.
“Well, now the welcome dinner I arranged at Tankburgers is going to feel positively plebeian.”
Kevin lit up.
“Ooh, Tankburgers! That’s great. I haven’t had a double-double with fries in forever!”
Everyone looked at him.
Kevin frowned.
“Come on. I’m wealthy, not a snob.”
Seventy-two hours after Kevin arrived, it felt like he had always been there. He never talked about his money. More importantly, he never tried to solve guild problems by simply throwing money at them.
He just helped.
If someone was running a PvE campaign and needed a wingman to get through a difficult mission, Kevin was usually the first to volunteer.
When Martin made a “slight miscalculation” while designing a souped-up missile with roughly ten percent more fuel and therefore more range, the resulting explosion damaged part of the factory.
He also defended Martin when the guild’s half-jokes started up again, calling him a “Mad Scientist” and “a danger to everyone around him.”
Kevin waved them off.
“Come on, guys. Give the man a break. He wanted more boom on his missiles. Isn’t that what we want?”
He gestured toward the damaged factory.
“Think of it this way. He didn’t fail. He proved the missiles had more boom.”
A beat.
“He just needs to work on controlling where the boom happens.”
Martin had smiled at Kevin for three whole seconds before he realized the hidden joke at the end.
“That is an extremely imprecise description of the failure mode.”
Kevin nodded.
“See? He’s already working on it.”
With a fourth member on site, the guild battles were now more even, with two leaders on each side.
Adrian and Elias were the best at the command side of things. Amy did her best, but everyone could tell she would much rather be in the thick of the fighting, or at most bodyguarding the actual commander, than directing the battle from above.
Kevin, however, existed at both extremes of command.
He had to actively resist using unorthodox tactics all the time, and on the rare occasions he got permission to try one, it either swung the battle decisively in their favor or turned into the tactical equivalent of putting a team of tap dancers in a crowded minefield.
Elias had to give Kevin a pep talk after one promising tactic turned into a virtual act of self-immolation.
Kevin had moved a platoon through a valley behind a dam, intending to burst out unexpectedly and hit the enemy flank.
Unfortunately, they were spotted.
Adrian, commanding the opposing force, took one look at the situation and had a nearby platoon destroy the dam. The resulting flood picked up Kevin’s entire formation and carried it nearly two klicks downstream, slamming WarMACs into rocks, trees, and anything else unfortunate enough to be in the way.
By the time the water finally subsided, the machines looked like someone had taken a jet-powered sander to every exposed surface. Several had taken water internally.
Damage estimates were described using words like catastrophic, extensive, and, in Kevin’s case, educational.
Kevin looked miserable.
“That went badly.”
Elias nodded.
“Spectacularly.”
“I thought it would work.”
“So did I.”
Kevin looked up.
Elias continued.
“The idea wasn’t stupid. The problem was that once Adrian spotted it, the terrain became a weapon against you.”
Kevin sighed.
“So less valley next time.”
“That is not quite the lesson.”
“No dams?”
Elias rubbed his forehead.
“Closer.”
He pulled the map back up.
“You could have crossed the valley here.”
Elias indicated a point about a kilometer from the dam wall.
“You’d have been less likely to get spotted. And even if you had been, Adrian blowing the dam wouldn’t have been nearly as catastrophic. You’d have had more time to get up the far bank.”
Kevin studied the map.
“Yeah...”
“It would have taken longer, but it might have worked better. I can’t say would have. Too many variables.”
Elias leaned back.
“Calculated risk is fine. Just remember that sometimes the risks are every bit as punishing as the rewards are promising.”
Kevin nodded slowly.
“Yeah. It’s a lot harder doing this as command instead of just being a grunt.”
Elias waited.
“When I’m part of a team and somebody gives me independent action, I can look at something and go, ‘Hmm. This might be interesting,’ and see what happens.”
Kevin looked back at the wrecked platoon markers.
“Here, my interesting idea got everybody killed.”
A pause.
“I hate that.”
Elias clapped Kevin on the shoulder.
“It should. That’s why a lot of people don’t want command.”
He glanced back at the tactical map.
“It’s like playing chess where the pieces shoot at each other and the rules can change without warning. A lot of people are happier being told, ‘Shoot that thing. Try not to get shot in return.’”
Kevin gave him a weak smile.
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