I snapped the clasp on my chest shield and tried out the gun on my hand; the smooth plastic felt cool and deadly. Ok, not really deadly, but cool. Our laser tag trainer called out the rules and instructions while a group of young kids (gathered for a birthday party at Laser Assault) snapped their chest shields into place.
“You guys are the red team,” she said, pointing to everyone on our side of the room. I looked down at the name tag on my chest shield; it said my laser tag name was “Jet”, and then my red light flashed on. Jon smiled at me as his red light came on, and his teeth looked florescent yellow under the black lights of the waiting room. His chest plate said “Nova”. Also on the red team: a 10 year old boy, two 7 year old girls, and a 7 year old boy.
The laser tag instructor then pointed to the 3 boys standing on the other side of the waiting room. “You guys are the green team.” Their green lights flashed on and their little 10 year old chests swelled with pride. Then she pointed to me and said, ”You, your chest shield is on backwards.” The green team laughed at me because I was an obvious noob. Jon, however, corrected them by saying, “Guys, she is REALLY good at laser tag, so everyone shoot at HER!”
The laser tag instructor opened the door to the large, dark, indoor arena and said “Go!” What followed was 10 minutes of pure adrenaline pumping action… and embarrassment. ”Let’s go, red team!” Jon yelled, and four short little red lights followed him into the maze. (Little kids love him.) He had become the alpha leader (because he was the tallest and oldest… by 25 years). Me, however… I went rogue. I wasn’t going to follow Jon — I mean, “Nova” — around, hoping he would protect me. I was out to frag me some cocky green team. I ran up a few ramps until I got to a good vantage point, a bridge overlooking the maze below. From there, I started picking off green lights. And since I was wide open on a bridge high in the room, they started picking off me, too. And they were really taking to heart the words Jon had spoken “She’s really good. Shoot at HER.” I wound around the room, shooting and ducking, and laughing and giggling like a little kid. It was so fun.
In the end, we exited the arena and went out into the lobby to check the stats on the screen. The green team won, despite being out-numbered 6 to 3. Jon was right behind them in points. And guess who took the most hits? Huh? Take a guess? Yeah, that would be me. But in my defense, half of the red team were sandwiched behind Jon in a kid-train throughout most of the game; it would have been really tough to hit them. At least, that’s what I tell myself at night, when I think of how I was schooled at laser tag by three 10 year old little punks.
This weekend I’m going to the arcade to brush up on my fragging skills…
Maybe “Area 51″ or “Buck Hunter”.
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I give you a thousand points just for going. I’m a big gaming baby; I would have opted to read a book in a cafe somewhere…I hate being schooled by punks.
Comment by stephanie — November 16, 2007 @ 4:22 pm
@Bad Mom- I’m not going to lie… it was REALLY fun. Maybe that makes me kind of immature, but whatever. It was really, really fun. You and Stu should give it a try one night for date night.
Comment by admin — November 18, 2007 @ 6:57 pm
I LOVE laser tag. A company I worked for a while back had a team-building exercise at a laser tag facility. It was freaking awesome! Of course, I’m terrible at it, but it doesn’t stop me from playing.
Comment by Leslie — November 18, 2007 @ 9:23 pm