Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters to Stargate Atlantis, nor am I making any type of profit from this story. It is a work of fan fiction, for enjoyment only.
AN: Thanks to all the wonderful reviewers, and the warm fuzzies provided. I've had a lot of people ask me about the questions - no, I'm not clever enough to create them myself; most are actual MENSA test questions or riddles on lateral thinking I've gotten off the web. (sorry, Queen, but no probability - still, good luck on your test!) I've occasionally reworded or modified them a little, and this chapter will include one skyla3 suggested a couple of chapters ago. (Thanks, Skyla3!). Now, on with the story…
Puzzles
By KerrAvon
Chapter 4 - A Puzzle for McKay"Hah! I win. I told you that you couldn't stay awake!"
"It's not a competition, McCay." Sheppard had lost track of the number of times he had nodded off, only to be jarred by Rodney's persistent elbow. He was beginning to feel rather guilty about it, despite the fact he had a concussion. McKay had one, too, as well as 'bruised ribs', yet he seemed to have no problem with the wakefulness issue. It didn't help either that the scientist was looking decidedly the worse for wear; his face was pinched and drawn in the tight way that only total exhaustion can cause. Sheppard examined his companion critically. The impact of the stone on the back of his head had caused a nice contra-coup contusion that was beginning to shade his forehead in rainbow varieties of violet. Of course, the color was a nice contrast to the gray tone his skin had taken on, presumably from decreased oxygenation; his breaths were coming in shallow, rapid bursts whenever he wasn't talking, and he was visibly splinting his ribs.
"McKay, you look like shit." The Major wasn't known for his subtlety.
"Thank you so very much for that astute observation. Perhaps that's because I feel like shit." The acid on McKay's words could etch steel. "You could help by just staying conscious for me."
'Pick your battles wisely' was another old military saying that Sheppard firmly believed. This was a battle he couldn't win, so he wouldn't fight it. Besides, for once the arrogant astrophysicist was right; it would help if he stayed awake. Nodding carefully in agreement, he shifted to sit more upright. "I know, McKay. Help me out here. Talk to me."
"About what?" McKay sighed in defeat as well. He had outright lied about his ribs; they weren't 'bruised' - he'd bet money on at least one or two being cracked. And while he didn't think that he was short of breath enough to have punctured a lung, the chest pain still made breathing difficult. His head pounded abominably although not, he suspected, as badly as Sheppard's. From what he could glean from the pilot's somewhat disjointed account, he'd only been out a few minutes. John had lain deathly still for well over an hour, and still seemed unable to stay conscious for more than a few minutes at a time. This weakness in a man he'd watched stay in total control while a life-sucking Wraith prototype was firmly attached to his neck was disheartening. As bad as he felt personally, he was still he 'strong one' in the current situation, and it was terrifying. His heart had caught in his throat as he saw Sheppard struggle towards him during the aftershock; he'd barely managed to shove the soldier to relative safety before Sheppard could be knocked out a second time. If a headache was the price he had to pay to keep the man alive, so be it.
"I don't know. Who do you like best in Atlantis?"
McKay waggled a finger at him. "Oh, no you don't. I don't let my guard down that easily. That is on a need-to-know basis, Major, and you don't need to know!"
"Alright then," replied John placatingly. He actually didn't care what they talked about, as long as it helped him stay awake. "Who do you like least?" He smiled ferally. "I'll bet it's Bates. You hate the way he's treated Teyla and the Athosians."
McKay smiled. "Too bad that couldn't be an official contest question, because you'd be wrong." As Sheppard's eyebrows tried to crawl up into his hairline, McKay hurriedly continued. "Not that I like him, but the man knows his job and does it well, if overly-enthusiastically for my tastes. No, I hate incompetence above all else, and there is only one truly incompetent man on the base…"
Sheppard nodded. "Kavanagh." He smiled to himself as he recalled his conversation with the chemist the previous day…
As he strode down the hall towards McKay's lab, the major felt the disbelieving stare at his back before he actually halted and turned to greet it.
"Can I help you with something, Dr. Kavanagh?" The man had kept a watchful distance ever since John had beaten him in the chess tournament, and had half-convinced himself that Sheppard's winning had been a series of flukes. Now half the science team was proclaiming the Chief Military Officer some sort of genius. It clearly grated.
Kavanagh silently huffed up and thrust a folded paper scrap at the Major, then crossed his arms defiantly. "I've got a problem for you." He obviously didn't think Sheppard up to the task of answering his riddle, and stared smugly as the Major unfolded the note.
"What 6-letter word is missing from the following sequence?
Direct
Role
Occidental
Dare
Shadow
Amused"
Sheppard stared at the series for a few moments, searching for a pattern, then smiled as he found it. Oh, it would be a pleasure to wipe that smirk from the chemist's face.
"The answer is… 'Answer'," he replied, handing the note back to the scientist.
"And how did you come by that?" Kavanagh demanded in disbelief,
Sheppard lifted an eyebrow. "Don't you know?"
Kavanagh grimaced. "I'd like to know exactly how you came up with it."
That man needed to get the rod out of his… Sheppard squelched that thought uncompleted. "The middle two letters of one word become the first and last letters of the next. Therefore, the first and last letters of the mystery word are 'a' and 'r'. Since the next word is 'shadow', then the middle letters of the mystery word are 's' and 'w'. A SW R; it's pretty easy to fill in the banks."
With a 'Humph', Kavanagh narrowed his eyes, shot Sheppard a disparaging glare, and hurried off. The Major, watching the retreating figure, just shook his head in disbelief and smiled, then resumed his trip to McKay's lab.
As he entered Rodney held up a hand for silence without looking up from the control console he was working on. "Give me a minute…." He deftly manipulated a tiny screwdriver over a microscopic connection until a particular wire slipped into place with an audible snickt. He puffed out the breath he'd been unconsciously holding, then turned to face his visitor.
"Oh, Major, I have something for you." He rummaged around the components on his desk until, with an 'Aha!', he produced a folded scrap of paper. "Doctor Rasheed sends his regards," he announced, handing over the paper with aplomb.
Sheppard stuffed it into his pocket. "Rodney, I need to speak to you about the mission we've got scheduled for the morning."
McKay waggled a finger. "Ah-ah-ah….Doctor Rasheed can be quite…vindictive." He nodded towards the pocket with the puzzle. "I'd finish that, if I were you.
Rolling his eyes and grimacing, John pulled out the paper and unfolded it.
"You have a five by five grid, with twenty-five squares. You have three sheep and five wolves. The wolves can move in the grid in any straight line - vertically, horizontally, or diagonally. If a wolf encounters a sheep, it eats it. Place the wolves and sheep on the grid so that you protect all your sheep."
Sheppard looked up into Rodney's bemused face. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me. This is a chess problem. The wolves are queens and the sheep pawns." Rodney shrugged expressively.
The Major narrowed his eyes. "All right then." He mentally made a grid and began placing 'wolves'. After a few moments he nodded to himself and turned to the astrophysicist.
"OK, if you label the top row 1 through 5, the next 6 through ten, etc., the wolves would be in positions 2, 3, 11, 16, and 17. The sheep would therefore be at 10, 24, and 25."
McKay jotted the answer onto a grid as Sheppard was speaking , nodding to himself. Sheppard folded his arms and leaned on the doorframe as McKay checked his results, with an 'I told you so' expression plastered on his face.
Rodney finally looked up with narrowed eyes. Without admitting to the correctness of the answer, he demanded, "With your now-obvious problem solving abilities, why don't you ever contribute constructively to solving the problems we keep encountering on this base?"
"I contribute!" John protested.
Rodney snorted. "Right. If it involves potential heroicself-sacrifice, you're all over it. I want to know why you never contribute intellectually. Why aren't you sitting in on our brainstorming sessions?"
Sheppard shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm lazy," he said, as if that explained everything.
Rodney stared at him in disbelief. "You have got to be kidding me! You haven't taken more than a minute or two solving any of the problems given to you today. I don't buy 'lazy' from a guy who runs at least two miles a day."
"Running is easy. 'Brainstorming' is not." Sheppard tried to return the conversation to their impending mission. "I didn't come here to discuss my mental prowess; we're heading to PXS-4J6 first thing in the morning to look for a ZPM, and Weir wants a complete rundown at the pre-mission briefing at 0600."
"We don't know much about it, but I'll scan the Ancient records and find out what I can."
Sheppard turned to go. "See you in the morning, then."
"Yeah, sure." Rodney's gaze remained on the Sheppard's back as he strode rapidly down the hall. "'Lazy' my foot. What's the real reason you don't want to use the brains God gave you? You're a puzzle yourself, Major, but I'll figure it out. I just need to define the parameters." With that, he turned to get prepared for the morning.
TBC…