Welcome to Gaia! ::

General Information
The portal opens up into an observation room, and down the stairs, an odd chamber for something like hunter training. At the center of a piranha-filled pool stands a solid stone table and several chairs. The Life Arena was built underneath the demolitions and ballistics testing areas, and the chamber rumbles with the occasional explosions above. Pinpoint red lasers sweep across the room regularly, as if hidden snipers are searching for a nice target. In the center of the table sits a wooden tower, made up of smaller wooden blocks. Yes. That's right. The Life Hunters prefer to train via Jenga.

Note: Distraction techniques and Yo Momma jokes are considered viable weapons when playing competitively.

If you fail: you have knocked down the tower! A small dart hits the back of your neck. You come to several hours later, and hope Dr. H didn't do anything to your body while you were unconscious. When you look into the mirror...

If you win: you have reached 50 points! You get a sharpie marker to do with as you please. peen points go to those with the highest scores.

Mechanics
- by carefully removing pieces of the tower, you earn points and advance to the next round. As the rounds continue, the odds grow steadily against you. Rolling a 1 at any point means you have knocked down the tower. Please do enjoy your mystery dart. Anything after reaching 50 points is purely for peen.

- you may roll pieces individually (suggested for group play) or in batches of 5 (basically, a full round.)


• Round 1
  
  Pieces: 5
  Points per piece: 1
  Trainee Roll: 1d10
  Life Trainee Roll: 1d12
  Hunter Roll: 1d12
  Life Hunter Roll: 1d20
  
  
• Round 2
  
  Pieces: 5
  Points per piece: 3
  Trainee Roll: 1d8
  Life Trainee Roll: 1d10
  Hunter Roll: 1d10
  Life Hunter Roll: 1d12
  
  
• Round 3
  
  Pieces: 5
  Points per piece: 4
  Trainee Roll: 1d6
  Life Trainee Roll: 1d8
  Hunter Roll: 1d8
  Life Hunter Roll: 1d10
  
  
• Round 4
  
  Pieces: 5
  Points per piece: 10
  Trainee Roll: 1d4
  Life Trainee Roll: 1d6
  Hunter Roll: 1d6
  Life Hunter Roll: 1d8
  
  Bonus Mechanics
  
• Life Hunters train for precise hand eye coordination and exceptional judgement, thus they have a slightly lower chance of knocking down the tower.
  
  
  

She didn't have to wait too long. A life trainee in a long hoodie-coat came running and skidding across the stone bridge and collapsed into the seat across from from Stormy, shouting something incomprehensible all the while: "Czekaj na mnie! Czekaj na mnie, przepraszam!"

"Część,część. Am here for the... yenga," he read off of a paper he'd been clasping tightly enough to crumple a bit. When the room rumbled and shook, both hands gripped the table edge for dear life. Maniacs, these Americans were maniacs. One at a time, he began to slide the blocks out of the tower, hyperfocused. Another blast from above jolted him out of the zone - he jumped, and slammed his hand into the tower.

Surveying the disaster he'd created was the was the first time he actually stopped to look up at his opponent across the table, framed by the mess of jenga blocks. "Ah! You -!"

He reached toward his neck reflexively, then fell over backward.

Szczeosny awoke some time later to the sight of lasers tracking across the walls and ceiling, a sharp pain in his neck, and someone else's hand in his.

Piosenka was giggling uncontrollably in his head.

It took a considerable amount of panicked flailing to disentangle his fingers from the girl's, whose hand fell limply back to the floor like a cadaver's. He rolled over and stared, horror creeping through him for for several seconds, before he pulled himself up and onto his knees dizzily. Was she unconscious? Was she dead? ... No. No, she looked like she was breathing. And sporting a drawn-on mustache?

"Część, Pani...?" He shook her a little, half talking to himself at this point. "Vake up? Proszę... please..."

"See, she is okay," he pointed out to some invisible listener, glaring particularly in the direction of a lucky rabbit's foot keychain hooked on a belt-loop. Stormy could probably take a guess that he was talking to his weapon. In any other context maybe it would have been a little weird. And maybe it was still weird even in this one - he hadn't yet figured out he could just think these responses to Piosenka. He glanced back to the hunter apologetically. "You are okay, yes?"

Szczeosny slid back up onto the bench as soon a the girl seemed to be coming round. At her observation he reached up and felt at his upper lip. His fingers came away smudged black with ink. "Follow... you are the always talking girl of the test?"

Hesitantly, he slid one last block out of the rebuilt tower, completing the set of five on his side of the table.

"Polszczyzna. Polish," he corrected himself. It was still weird to be surrounded by English-speakers. One at a time he pulled out the jenga blocks, moving as quickly as he could before something else would jump out and interrupt him. "Hah. You are much kind."

"And you are American, yes?" The room shook again under a blast from above, sending some of the piranha-filled water splashing up onto the stone. Szczeosny set his hands back down on the table, pushing and stacking his jenga pieces in a small formation. "For much time I vonder if this place was American secret base. Thing of big conspiracy. But really, is something else complete."

"Vas nice, yes?" At this point he had a veritable fortress of displaced blocks in front of him and no more materials to build with. "Am not one for travel. Here, island, is farthest I go, ever."

"Err... is accept? Vish I were more of volf than puppy, but is vhat is." He laughed a little darkly and pulled several more blocks from the now decidedly less stable tower. He may not have been much to look at as far as most everything else, but his hands were deft from plenty of keyboard use. It was to his advantage, so long as he didn't think about it and mess himself up. "I can give you name, but I know for fact you cannot say back."

"Vell, I tell mine if you tell yours..." The tower began to wobble unsteadily as he pulled out a tile, then suddenly collapsed while he was in the middle of his words. "Szczeosny Brzen-"

The next thing he knew he was staring up at the ceiling again, dust shaking from another earthquake-like rumble from above.

The dart hadn't quite worn off, and Lucky's coordination was far from completely back. He suffered another one for his troubles in knocking a chunk of the tower over, but after a few minutes of zoning out, he moved to rebuild it.