Give a quick stream of consciousness before answering the following question. 2 44 4 41 6 38 8 - Look carefully for the pattern, and then choose which pair of numbers comes next.
Options:
(A) 35 10
(B) 12 10
(C) 9 34
(D) 52 10
(E) 34 89
Here, there are two alternating patterns, one addition and one subtraction. The first starts with 2 and increases by 2; the second starts with 44 and decreases by 3.
The answer: (D).