The game was called battleship. That's what Sam told him. Jack frowned in concentration. He'd set up his "boats." Sam told him they were boats, but to Jack, they looked like grey blobs. He'd circled them directly in the center of his "board," and when the game started, he asked Sam to go first, so he might see how it was done.
"A one."
"Don't you mean one? Or 'just one'?"
Sam laughed, smiling crookedly. "No, I mean... A 1. On your board, there are numbers and letters that correspond. If you have a ship on that spot, and I hit it, you put a red marker on your ship, and once all the holes are filled... I sank your ship, and vice versa."
"Oh! I see. You missed."
Sam nodded, and put something on the TOP of his board screen.
"What're you doing now?"
"When you miss, you mark out your miss up here..." he tapped the screen, "...with a white marker."
"Ah. I see. So you never guess the same place twice, and waste a turn."
"Right, right. You go."
"A one." He guessed what Sam had.
"Nope."
And as Sam had instructed, he marked a white peg in the spot where he'd missed.
****** (TEN MINUTES LATER)
Jack had discovered a grid pattern. And it was working. Sam, on the other hand... was grumbling under his breath.
"D five!"
"Nope."
"How? How is this possible? I CAN'T be missing."
Jack smiled. "C seven."
"Crap." Sam grunted and put a red peg—his third—into a ship. "You sunk my sub."
Jack beamed, proud of himself. "Are all board games this violent?"
"Huh? What? No... C 6."
"No."
"Where are they?" Sam all but yowled.
******Another Ten minutes)
"That's it... You sunk my battleship."
"What does that mean?"
"It means you sank all my ships..." Sam frowned contemplatively. "Did you—did you... get it? I mean, where are your ships?" He'd hit them all of three times, but didn't sink ONE.
Jack paused. "Am I allowed to show you now?"
"Yeah, the games over, you won."
Jack spun his board around with a grin. "Right there."
Sam smacked a hand over his eyes. "The middle. They were in the middle. I should've seen that coming."
"If you had seen, then you would've been cheating," Jack reminded him.
"Yeah...I mean..." Sam smiled wryly. "Never mind." Laughing quietly, Sam added. "Good job."