Target Takedown: A Breakdown of 2019 Assassins

THE OVERVIEW

The retrieval of a stolen backpack, a barricade and a payment of 13 dollars is the short version of the five hour venture of how senior Jet Semrick was eliminated by good friend senior Annabelle Cook in Assassins — the senior class tradition centered around going to extremes to hunt peers, or targets, with a water gun in hopes of being the last person standing and winning 1000 dollars.

Senior game makers Henry Diehl and Michael Perry raised the stakes by pitting friends against each other for the first round. In the first round, elaborate setups like this were more likely to happen because the pool of was not randomized like it had been in previous years.

Diehl and Perry took the 258 participants names and divided them into friend groups — determined by “stalkerly” going through Instagrams to see who hangs out with who. From there, they randomized the friend groups to get people “hyped up” for Assassins. Because there was no school directory this year, people wouldn’t have access to addresses of people they didn’t know which would result in more complaints.

“I think it’s fun it’s a good way to meet other people,” senior Ashley Grills said. “We all know each other but it’s one last shebang where you talk to people you don’t usually talk to.”

THE GLORIOUS

If senior Becca Heinz were to get out now, she would be okay with it because she had her “one glorious moment.”

Senior Ted Dalton’s target Alex Como agreed upon Dalton paying her 15 dollars to shoot her and stay in the game. However, Como set up an operation to have Dalton’s assassin, Connor Sawalich, come shoot him inside her house. Then, Como enlisted Heinz to kill Sawalich.

“Going into this plan I kind of knew it was going to be a set up because the person who had me, Becca, her and Alex are good friends so obviously Becca’s going to be there too,” Sawalich said. “In my mind, it’s like I want to get Ted so bad that I don’t really care.”

As Dalton entered the house to give Como’s father the 15 dollars, Sawalich came out from behind the wall and popped out at Dalton’s side with the water gun to Dalton’s head. Dalton is greeted with a “Hey, Ted” and a squirt of a water gun.

While Sawalich attempted to take the obligatory assassin’s selfie with Dalton, Heinz came downstairs to eliminate him.

“I felt terrible but that’s the way it goes,” Heinz said.

In retaliation for the betrayal, Sawalich squirted Como, and Dalton saw this as an invitation to shoot Sawalich, soaking him (and the living room).

The operation totaled two eliminations in two minutes.

THE INTRICATE

The long story of Semrick being eliminated involves a fake tutoring session as a ruse, a barricade operation at a park and, of course, the classic Assassins standoff.

Senior Carson Jones — Semrick’s target — texted his friends, asking if they would claim he was at dinner, rather than disclosing his true location: a fake tutoring session. Screenshots were sent to Semrick — Jones’s assassin — to let him know Jones’s true whereabouts, however, Jones was just using the house he usually tutors at to set Semrick up. Senior Annabelle Cook — Semrick’s assassin — was staking out in the driveway of the house waiting for Semrick to arrive.

Jones drives by the house and sees Semrick staked out, with Cook in the driveway unbeknownst to Semrick, and decides to station himself at the park behind the tutoring household. Jones pops out of the front door of the house — the inciting incident of the five hour Assassins escapade.

Semrick goes to park his car next to Jones, and Jones gets Cook to sneak through the backyard while Cook’s sister and friends move the car to block the exit of the park. The trio are in a triangular standoff for 30 minutes, until Cook tries to back away, prompting Jet to chase Carson, and then Cook starts to chase Semrick — who runs to a friends house.

With Semrick’s car left unattended and unlocked, Cook hops in the backseat and waits for his return. But, his mom came to get his car along with Jet and a second car, surprising Cook, however, she didn’t leave without taking some collateral: Semrick’s backpack.  

She goes up to Semrick’s car, trying to get him to surrender for his backpack when her assassin shows up to shoot her, and she narrowly escapes.

Semrick and Cook proceeded to sit in their cars and snapchat each other for two hours before Semrick decides to eventually pop a curb. They later struck up a deal for Cook to shoot Semrick for 13 dollars — plus the return of the backpack.

“I knew I wouldn’t be able to get Carson because he was going be at a track all the next day,” Semrick said. “So it was either make zero dollars and get out or make thirteen dollars and get out.”