It’s Saturday afternoon and three Quincy House residents are relaxing in the House courtyard, playing wiffleball and relishing the last bit of quiet before the shots begin again.

As 4 p.m.—the time the amnesty is scheduled to end—approaches, students begin to crowd the courtyard, readying themselves for the shootout scheduled between a member of the Quincy House assassins team Anaconda and a member of the team Public Privates.

With their guns in hand, the two opponents move to opposite corners of the green. They soon begin to circle slowly toward each other, sizing each other up and wondering who will make the first move.

Suddenly, one student rushes toward the other and slips on the grass. It appears that he is about to die, but as his designated enemy stands above him, a spray of darts flies through the air. In a shocking turn of events, his opponent is dead.

Overjoyed by his victory, he runs to his teammates and grabs a bottle of gin—the game is back on.

The Rules of The Wild West

Saturday’s dramatic death in the Quincy courtyard is part of Assassins, a springtime House ritual that pits different groups of students against each other with the goal of eliminating the other teams’ members.

Each group, which consists of three to six students, is assigned an opposing team to hunt and “kill”—by shooting someone with a dart or nerf gun.

The hunt defines many students’ day-to-day lives. Some skip classes, choosing instead to map out their enemies’ days and follow them to class.

Quincy House has even established an Assassins website, posting news of the day’s kills and rumors of opponents’ whereabouts.

Participants in Quincy House’s Assassins game can only be killed when they are within the House or the sidewalks around it.

At Quincy House, where this year’s Assassins game follows a “western” theme, with a “ranger” who monitors the events and teams called “posses,” seven teams are currently left standing out of the original 12.

For six Quincy House residents, who compose the team MI6, named for the British intelligence agency, the Assassins game has brought a level of drama and excitement to a sometimes mundane House life.

Since last Thursday, MI6 has lost four of its six members, and the remaining two say they are just trying to enjoy the rest of their time in the game.

When the hunt ends with a mass shootout between the remaining posses within the next week, the winner will take away prize money and a sense of glory.