hi everyone, I'm back with a second chapter for you all! Thanks for all the reviews, they're much appreciated :)

Also, a certain sentence in this chapter might imply something that's a little higher-rated than the rating K. So for this chapter I'm raising the rating to a T.

Question 2 of the EQ test appeared on the screen. Sherlock scrunched up his eyes as he tried to comprehend it.

Question 2: You and your partner are in the middle of a heated argument and are beginning to say very nasty things to each other. Should you:

a) storm off and spend the rest of the day sulking and ignoring them

b) try to reason with them and come to a compromise

c) apologise and ask them to apologise too

d) spend the rest of the day annoying them greatly as payback.

Now this, thought Sherlock, is a question worthy of my mind-palace.

Closing his eyes and steepling his fingers against his head, Sherlock slowly entered his mind-palace.

Molly Hooper appeared first. Sherlock, it's simple. B and C are the best options.

Then Mycroft. Oh, brother dear, don't be so soft-hearted. We all know b and c are the compassionate options. And we all know where compassion leads us, don't we?

Next appeared John. Sherlock, I hope you don't think that I'm the partner in this question. How many times have I told you and Mrs Hudson, I'm not your partner? Has nobody noticed my string of girlfriends? Now there was Sarah, and then Jeanine, oh wait, there was someone before Jeanine, now...

Sherlock quickly made a swiping motion with his hand and John was swept aside, still blabbering on.

And then, to Sherlock's immense surprise, Irene Adler appeared and stepped forward. Oh, my dear Sherlock, what are you thinking? Obviously none of these options are correct. You know what I would do, wouldn't you, darl? To resolve this situation, you should just - oh, nevermind. You wouldn't understand, that's why my boss called you 'The Virgin', after all.

Sherlock replied with an absent-minded humph and cast 'The Woman' aside too.

Ruling out b and c- Sherlock focused on deciding between a and d.

Balance of probability, little brother. Mycroft's voice echoed inside his head.

Sherlock's mind raced back and forth. Reasons appeared, then disappeared in a flash. Images flashed by so fast Sherlock only caught a glimpse of them. He had almost reached his answer when-

"Sherlock Holmes! Come down here and get your lunch, right this instant!" Mrs Hudson's voice sliced through all of Sherlock's thoughts and his eyes snapped open.

The detective groaned. It had taken him all of ten minutes to try and find that answer, and now he would have to repeat the tedious and mind-boggling process all over again.

Grunting, he made his way down to 221A where Mrs Hudson had a tray of food waiting.

"I'm not your housekeeper, dear," admonished Mrs Hudson whilst handing over the tray.

"Tea?" remarked Sherlock, astounded. "Why is there tea here? There's never tea here."

"Oh, Sherlock, that's the tea from this morning, remember? You requested it a while ago, but you never came to collect it. Now, what am I always saying, if you want that cuppa, you've got to come-"

She was interrupted with the bang of the door, and when she looked around, Sherlock was already halfway up the stairs.

"Thanks, Mrs Hudson! You really are a darling!" called Sherlock.

Half-angry, Mrs Hudson muttered "oh dear."

Back upstairs, Sherlock happened upon Molly Hooper, who was waiting by his desk.

'Oh h-hi Sherlock," she began timidly, "I was just wondering-"

"Yes, yes, what? I'm busy," responded Sherlock, scattering papers as he looked for his phone. He needed to dial John and get his input on this question. The real-life John wouldn't be babbling as he had been in Sherlock's mind-palace, and maybe finally, Sherlock could get the blasted question 2 out of his way.

"Oh. right. Well, I was wondering if you-" stammered Molly, trying to find the right words.

"You've said that already. Were you just wondering or did you come up here to actually ask me something?" snapped Sherlock, agitated as he couldn't find that damn phone he had chucked away somewhere earlier that morning.

Flushing, anger finally seemed to get ahold of Molly and she responded indignantly, "Well, if you would let me speak, perhaps I could tell you! I was asking you if you would like to visit that nice Chinese restaurant with me. Maybe tonight?" she added, hopefully.

Sherlock seemed to miss the last sentence altogether. "Yes, yes, a Chinese restaurant. Sounds good. Let's go there in a month or three, I'll get back to you later." Waving a hand, he shooed Molly at the door, who looked at a loss for words at his answer.

"Oh. ok, then, sounds good, Sherlock," she responded, a little despondent.

Sherlock had completely forgotten about her already.

Deciding he could do without John's input, as that phone had seemingly decided to sprout legs and walk away, Sherlock turned back to the laptop. Logically, he deduced that since he had selected D on the previous question, the balance of probability was that the creators wouldn't put D again as an answer as that would simply be too easy to guess. Yes, Balance of probability. Solves everything.

Sighing in contentment at finally having an answer, Sherlock selected A and pressed Submit.

Turning back to his lunch, he was disappointed to find it had grown cold.

That took me 24 minutes and 29 seconds! That really was a disappointment. Even more disappointing than his cold lunch.

Sherlock braced himself for question 3. If all the questions were this hard, imagine how long question 10 would take him! This was possibly, the hardest test Sherlock had ever encountered in his life. And that was saying something.

Well, at least I've definitely got 2 questions right, he thought placatingly. That was a comfort, at least.

hullo! I hope you enjoyed this chapter. It was very fun to write, and I thought incorporating Sherlock's mind-palace would be a nice addition.

There were several surprise appearances in here. Poor Molly. And Irene Adler- I'm not sure if you understood what that sentence implied-I just thought it suited her character well and I meant it to be rather funny :)) if you didn't like that part-just let me know in the reviews.

Thanks for all your reviews and favourites. Please continue to review-let me know what parts you liked in this chapter or what parts you disliked. Also, I hope I got the characterisation right-this is set before John was married to Mary.

If you have any suggestions for next chapter, let me know ;)

I'll see you all soon.