Saturday, August 13, 2011

Captain's Log, Day 46: In Which I Get Shot

          I got to visit with some of my friends from South Dakota today!
          After making a local burger joint millionaires (man, they had some good bacon cheeseburgers...), we decided to head to a lazer tag area for a showdown for the title of Most Deadly With Non-Lethal Weaponry. Jordan was very confident in his abilities. Jake was confident that Jordan was going to lose. I was ready to beat both of them.
          After the smack talk (which, for guys, is almost as much a part of sporting events as playing the National Anthem--which we forgot to do, by the way), we got our lazer gear and began trying to figure out how this was going to work. We were not the only people entering the arena; we'd met up with two other friends of mine (Maggie and Mariah) and three families were gearing up as well. They chose the teams Green, Blue and Yellow. The girls, Jake and I decided to play on one team, Team Red, with Jake and myself competing for number of kills. Jordan decided to join the Blue Team and compete for both the team championship and number of kills. I wished him good luck and then tried to shoot him. Unfortunately, the guns weren't activated yet.
          We filed into the arena, which was pretty much a two-story maze. I immediately headed for the second floor, figuring that I could shoot down at the first floor and that most people didn't notice what was going on above them 99 percent of the time anyway. Considering that I wasn't even tagged until I went downstairs midway through the game, I thought my strategy was highly effective.
          One of the girls, Mariah, and I teamed up for a few moments right away, but then she vanished. I turned around to check where she was and found someone backing down the corridor at me. I shot him in the back and dashed over to one of the side ramps, annihilating people as I went. I tried to shoot Jake when he popped out of nowhere, but since we were on the same team, nothing happened. Whew.
          Jordan was down on the first floor under the ramp, taking out innocent little kids, so I leaned over and alternated shooting him with shooting the "innocent little kids" who decided to take a few potshots at their savior. They missed. Jordan eventually figured out that I was the one shooting him, so he vanished into the depths of the first floor maze. I decided to pursue and walked right into Team Yellow, who were having a little family confab about strategy.
          Sixteen shots and a big ego boost later, I continued on my way with my no-hit record intact. I spotted Jordan charging down the hall at me and ducked around a wall into a corner. Also into Team Green, who were also having a family conference but were infinitely more ready and trigger-happy than Team Yellow. I decided discretion was the better part of valor and fled, but not fast enough to prevent them from shooting me. Several times. A brush with a vengeful Team Yellow later (knocked out all but one of their squad, who managed to shoot me), and I reverted to my earlier strategy of hiding on the second story. Unfortunately, Team Blue decided to hide up here as well. Maggie, Mariah and I made a few bad decisions that wound up with us getting pinned down in a room with only one exit, surrounded by the building wall on one side and two seven-foot-tall walls on the other two sides. I tried to sneak out. I ducked back in, vest buzzing like a beehive and a hail of lazer fire taking personal effect. Kind of annoyed now, I jumped, grabbed the edge of a wall with one hand, pulled myself up and raked Team Blue from above. We beat a hasty retreat as Jordan shot me in the back from wherever the heck he was hiding. Later in the game, Jordan and I teamed up to knock out two teams' worth of fighters hiding on one side of the arena. We each took our share, and then I returned the favor and shot him before I vanished.
          Anyway, Jordan did very well. He took second in both the team championship and kill score. I don't know what his official kill scores were, unfortunately. The Red Team (Mariah, Maggie, Jake and I) took first, Jake and the girls came in fairly respectably in the kill score, and I took first. To be fair, Jordan had a better accuracy rating than me. My standings were (I happen to have the sheet with me):

          Shots Fired: 724
          Accuracy: 21.82%
          Tagged Players: 158
          Tagged By Players: 17
          1st Place: Team Red - 37450
          2nd Place: Team Blue - 28750
          3rd Place: Team Yellow - 23300

          Apparently, I had an itchy trigger finger. Anyone want to challenge me? Maybe my brother?

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