Team Reforged: Vegas, Baby
Copyright© 2026 by FozzieBare
Chapter 16: Difficult Discussions. Difficult Decisions
Everyone was waiting for them in the hotel lobby. Not because they wanted to go out and sample Vegas’s night life. Elias had figured out that Kelto told folks that Kelto had wanted them to stay even longer, and Adrian had outsmarted them to let them leave early.
They wanted to thank Adrian and Amy. There had been a bit of worry by Adrian that they might think he was trying to hog the spotlight, but in general, the team’s position was: “We don’t need to stand on a stage any longer. The stage is very nice, but we’ve been around it a bit too long.”
Their spirits were raised even higher a couple minutes later, when Kevin took a brief phone call, and then came running back before the team could disperse.
“Hey, folks? Good news. I got a couple bits of information from Marcus.”
Everyone turned to face him.
“First off, he says. “Well done.””
That created a murmur. It was nice to know the team’s boss liked what they did.
Kevin wasn’t done offering Marcus’s thanks: “As a sign of appreciation, I’ve booked you guys on a later flight. 1:30 PM instead of 10:00 AM. Business Class. And I’ve also negotiated a late checkout with the hotel folks. By 11:30 AM.”
They could sleep longer? They were going to sit business class for the trip home?
They were tired, but at that moment, several people would have gladly charged through a wall for Reforged.
Kevin continued: “We’ll be heading to the airport around 11:00, so just be ready and packed to come down here around 10:30 AM.”
Adrian nodded.
“Ok, team, the rest of your time here is yours.”
One or two wandered toward the casino floor. Not to gamble, but to take in the wildness of the flashing lights and sound.
Most just marched beck to the elevators. Maybe not to sleep, just yet, but putting their legs up and mentally decompressing sounded great to them.
Adrian and Amy spent some time in the Hotel Lobby’s couches, just chatting and enjoying the feeling that time was finally on their side.
Kevin convinced them to make one ceremonial slot machine spin, so he could take a photo for social media.
Amy did the honors. Spent $1. Got $5 back. That summed up Reforged’s luck this tournament.
Having done the official Vegas thing in Vegas, the leadership cadre decided that they had done their duty to the gods of chance and luck, and it was their turn to make their way back to their hotel rooms.
There was a couple small disturbances in the hallway in the early hours of late night, as one of the teams apparently were trying to test the hotel’s patience in their celebrating an apparently successful tournament with running up and down the hallway.
No one really noticed, more than superficially.
Adrian watched a mindless TV show. He had thought about binging that stupid show Amy had watched with him but decided that was a show that the two of them needed to watch together. It was more fun making snarky comments about people’s poor choices when his vice-captain could laugh at them.
Soon enough, sleep arrived.
The players of Reforged were fairly recovered when they gathered in the lobby, the next morning. Kevin started checking off names as they came down. If you had offered them a chance to play a match of World of WarMachines, every single one of them would have said the equivalent of “Thanks, but I’m good for now.”.
Thankfully, they didn’t have to. They piled onto the shuttle. Kevin the last one on board.
He muttered something Adrian couldn’t hear.
Adrian raised an eyebrow.
“Just a bit of Latin-language doggerel, Adrian. Veni, vidi, vici”
Adrian laughed and shooke his head.
“We didn’t conquer, Kevin. Third place ain’t bad, but it’s not a championship”
“Close enough. We conquered the hearts of the fans.”
The flight home was nice and calm, on a mostly empty plane, with only a few elderly gambling tourists sharing the cabin with them.
Calm, at least, except for the row where the leadership cadre were sitting.
Amy had discovered that her actions the previous day had produced a consequence no one had seen coming.
She had thought her “I’m an alien infiltrator from Cedanda XIV” line was just a neat little joke, a way to defang the TrueGamers article.
It had done that.
The problem was that everyone else had appreciated the joke too. So much so that they were currently taking it to levels no one could have expected.
Clickbait faux-articles.
How To Tell If Your Vice-Captain Is An Alien Infiltrator.
Never Mind AI, Our True Threat Is Furiosa With Tentacles.
Cedandans Don’t Carry Purses. They Just Kick Ass.
Photoshops.
Amy wearing Marvin the Martian’s headgear.
The Reforged logo with a classic alien smiley face superimposed over it.
Someone had even done a rough edit in the style of a Boris Vallejo painting: a fearsome barbarian woman standing over a fallen warrior, axe in hand, defending him from unseen enemies. They had crudely photoshopped Amy’s face onto the barbarian, and Adrian’s onto the valiant wounded man she was protecting.
Amy just closed her eyes. Not to count. Just out of sheer disbelief.
Adrian was laughing. Kevin was in his element. Elias was wildly amused.
Amy opened her eyes and glared at them.
“Traitors”
Kevin made it worse.
“You’re not going to report us to High Command, are you?”
“I hate you all.”
Elias’s turn.
“Does that mean we’ll be the first against the wall when the invasion happens?”
“I will find a way to throw you off the plane.”
Adrian struck the final blow.
“I dunno. Just think, guys, if we hadn’t brought her on the team, this whole thing might never have happened. We should get the highest award in Cedandan culture for allowing Amy to live her dream”
Now that was something Amy could do about. The other two were out of her reach.
Adrian, however, was sitting in the next airline seat over. In ranged for a hard smack.
If the flight attendants had seen it, they would have smiled at the high energy that they showed.
Maybe a gentle warning that beating up the person in the seat next to you isn’t allowed, even when the fasten your seatbelts sign was off.
Marcus had arranged for a small bus to take them back to Reforged HQ, and then the folks who lived off the premises could get taxis or walk back to their apartments as necessary.
There was one new addition. The workers were just putting the finishing touches on it when they trooped off the elevator at Reforged HQ.
A trophy case had been setup, just outside Reforged HQ’s main door.
Inside a plastic case was Reforged’s first trophy. Their trophy for being the Team of the Tournament for the semi-professional Spring Tournament.
Marcus had also paid someone to make sure the security camera that covered their entrance would keep the trophy case in sight at all times.
They stopped and stared at it for a few seconds, as a group.
Kevin spoke up.
“We’ll put Amy’s Queen of Dueling trophy there when they re-award it to her.”
Amy nodded. Her eyes were on the trophy case.
Kevin, however, couldn’t resist.
“Maybe next time we’ll add the championship trophy to it.”
Adrian and Amy whipped their heads towards Kevin.
Kevin took the glares with equanimity. He just shrugged.
“No Pressure.”
The team had been sent off with strict instructions. The kitchen was open, if folks wanted Antonia’s cooking. The computers were available, if people wanted to hang out.
But there was no practice for four whole days. Adrian made it clear that anyone who started playing the game in the Pit before forty-eight hours had passed would be netted by Kevin and dragged away.
The team filed off, for some guaranteed rest and relaxation. Elias went back to his room. In the spirit of the city that they had left earlier in the afternoon, Adrian gave it two to one odds that he would log on to WoWM just to make sure the guild was running smoothly.
He wouldn’t be the one to find out. He had no desire to log on. He might do so casually tomorrow, just to show the guild that they were still around, but tonight? No chance.
Kevin also took the opportunity to wander off. He hadn’t played, but being the sole responsible person all weekend had made him feel all un-Kevin like, so he wanted time to rest and plan his further shenanigans.
Amy and Adrian were left in the Pit.
Adrian raised an eyebrow at Amy.
“Want to watch another episode of that show?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Under Protest, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Good job, Ames.”
“Good job, Adrian.”
They wandered off to their rooms.
Nothing more needed to be said
Life slowly went back to normal.
Marcus sent a warning to them two days after their return.
“Going to be a bit noisy for a little bit upstairs. I’ve acquired the lease to the floor above you guys. There’s going to be a crew up there converting areas for mini-apartments/rooms, a secondary training area, etcetera. Sorry, nothing I can do about the noise.”
Adrian was simultaneously happy that they were going to have more space and irritated at the fact there were going to be people with power tools on the floor above them working all day. He sent an “all-hands” email, advising folks of the situation, and that if it was okay with the team, they would be moving practices to evening hours while the work was going on over their heads. They all appreciated that.
Leadership had a celebratory dinner at Mama Bianchi’s. Mama Bianchi barely understood anything they were talking about, but was absolutely aghast that they let Reforged sit all day, playing their games, and didn’t give them a chance to eat properly and rest. Pietro had to talk her out of calling them up on the Bistro’s phone and telling them in no uncertain terms what she thought of them overworking her poor bambinis like that.
Reforged’s leadership held a brief Q&A session with the guild. A few of the more enthusiastic types wanted to celebrate Reforged’s tournament run with going on a rampage in nearby space, and that got Elias’s eye twitching in remembered stress.
He complained to Adrian, “I don’t mind if folks do a little raiding. God knows that if they don’t do that sort of thing on a regular basis, people will get bored and leave the guild. It’s WARMachines, not PEACEMachines. They don’t care for spreadsheets and supply chains, they want to blow things up. But if we start bullying folks on a regular basis, we’re on our way to becoming Blades 2.0. Gods above save us from that.”
Adrian nodded. They had good relations with most of the small guilds around them. He needed to find a way to keep Reforged from being “just another big guild pushing folks around.”
He came up with an idea.
“Tell you what. We’re going to do a few “objective raids”. This is not planetary conquest. A platoon or two, per planet, tops. We tell them to find the most difficult target on the planet. Their job is to take it with as little damage as possible, to themselves, and the target. Once it’s done, they can take half the goods on-hand and bring it home. I’ll build a couple machines for folks to give out as rewards. We’ll just need to remind them that it’s more like a friendly game then a Blades invasion. We’re just giving people a reason to scrap with no hard feelings afterwards.”
Elias nodded.
“If we are starting to get credits from the Reactor Critical deal, let’s contact the guilds afterwards and just offer a “make-good” repayment. Not a bribe to let us do what we want, but more of a ‘hey, we’re just trying to keep our players from going feral, here’s some credits to help clean up the mess.”
Adrian did a singsong version of a commercial tag line.
“Like a bad neighbor, Reforged is there.”
Elias laughed.
“Well, if we’re offering to pay it, we’re not a horrible neighbor. More like the kind who hosts big parties and forgets to tell the attendees not to block your driveway in the middle of the night.”
“Good idea. It’s all fun and games. Not serious business. Hell, we could probably turn it into a local-space championship. Tell our neighbors to put together unofficial teams and have a couple of teams of Reforged guild members in the tournament as well. The winner gets to take on Team Reforged in an unofficial match. Give them a reason to see us in a positive light.”
“You’re just coming up with the idea because it’ll be my job to put together this tournament, right?”
“That’s what you have folks for now, remember?”
“Yeah, kinda forgot.”
“It’s nice having quiet time, isn’t it?”
Elias gave Adrian a look.
“Adrian, you’re not the one who has to listen to Amy gripe about the latest “Cedandan” memes every day.
“Guild leader’s work, obviously.”
Elias’s voice could have sucked up all the moisture from the ocean, it was so dry.
“Obviously.”
Adrian grinned.
“She spends about ten minutes griping about it before watching the night’s episode of Lords and Ladies.”
“My heart bleeds.”
“Hey, it can be good. Instead of feeling uncomfortable when moments like Lady Thurston’s secret midnight soiree, where the vibe is “no clothes, no problem”, we just look at Cedandan memes instead. Although she really was pissed because at that moment, the top meme was “Amy Williamson, Hot Cedandan War Babe”
Elias laughed.
And he thought.
Mostly, it was saying “Adrian, you fool.”
He had barely avoided telling one-half of the “relationship that wasn’t a relationship but was really a relationship” that they were absolutely clueless, he wanted nothing to do with the other side of the equation.
He was very glad that Amy had apparently completely forgotten about the discussion they had on the first day of the tournament. He wasn’t going to be bringing it up.
So, instead of agreeing not to watch sexy scenes together because it might make you uncomfortable, you look at memes together? Adrian, I swear, you both are oblivious. The mental block must be made of titanium to survive this long.
The conversation came to a natural end, and Adrian wandered off to play the game for fun. What a novel concept, he was thinking.
Unfortunately for Elias, he had violated one of the fundamental rules of dealing with friends and colleagues.
The second you think they’ve forgotten about something, they remember it.
Thirty minutes after Adrian left Reforged HQ for a walk, Amy found him in his office.
“Ok, Elias. I’ve waited long enough. It’s time to finish the discussion we started on Day 1 of the tournament.”
Elias closed his eyes.
“I really was hoping you’d forgot about it permanently.”
“I did. Almost. Then I remembered. So spill.”
“Alright. I did promise. Close the office door, however. This is going to take some time.”
Amy raised an eyebrow, but did as he asked.
Elias took a deep breath.