***
With Bradley it was a completely different story. He was the only one out of the three, who genuinely did not know how to fly. The Tenacious came in and started on a boring lecture about how important it was for Bradley to learn to fly, how many new capabilities would be opened for him when he did, and finally, how could he tolerate to be so far behind his sister and his friend! Bradley, who was listening to the entire talk nonchalantly, jumped up at the last words of the Tenacious. Had John broken down so quickly and learned how to fly in such a short time after they departed yesterday?! Bradley did not want to admit that he was aware of Megan’s capability to fly, either.
“Nonsense!” he exclaimed, clutching his fists. “Flying’s impossible. You’re making it up.”
“Not at all,” the Tenacious objected and waved his arm in the air. “Watch.”
And the images of Megan and John flying appeared in front of Bradley’s eyes.
“You’re still making it up,” he said in disbelief, frowning at the images. “For starters, I’m not seeing how these images are projected. From how this looks, they appear to be hallucinations. And if you have an ability to cause other people to hallucinate, you can make them see anything you want.”
The Tenacious did not reply. He insisted that Bradley kept trying and that without flying he would be stuck in this room forever, and what good does that do to anyone? With that he left, and Bradley ran towards the wall connecting to John’s room and banged on it.
“Have you indeed learned how to fly?” he demanded, his voice stern.
Bradley hoped that the Tenacious lied and John had not in reality fallen to that temptation. He had not heard a sound from John’s room for a while, which made him worried. It appeared that John was not in the mood to talk. This could only mean that he indeed learned to fly and was now sorry that he’d blatantly ignored Bradley’s diligent warnings yesterday.
“Yes, stupidly enough I have,” he heard John finally. “But be careful. Today I realized that they have a way to detect anything you do. Have you noticed that they show up immediately after you wake up? I haven’t thought about it before I started to fly, and they right away found out. I’m not sure whether they actually can hear us, too.”
“You are right, I have not thought about that. The Tenacious showed me some images of you and Megan flying, but I didn’t believe him. They were silent images in the air, not projected from any device. I don’t trust what’s going on here. Flying without an aircraft, projecting images without a projector… Can you understand that? I can’t.”
“Yeah, it’s fishy,” John agreed, but Bradley caught a glimpse of excitement in his voice. John continued, “But nevertheless, it’s not impossible. Since I’ve actually tried flying, I believe that in this world they somehow can project without a projector, and we would probably learn that, too, after we have completed our flying prerequisite.”
A big question mark appeared in Bradley’s mind.
“But…” he started and did not finish. He was going to say that they should not and were not going to master flying and take the flying test, had John already forgotten? Or because he actually experienced it, he was hooked up on it and could not help himself but go all the way through? What if all of this were true? But Bradley held himself from speculating out loud. He was scared that everything they said between themselves was overheard by the Unknowns. Therefore, by articulating it he might let out the fact that he, Megan and John were aware of the danger of learning how to fly.
“Yes, of course,” John replied, as if agreeing with Bradley’s unfinished thought. But Bradley was not sure anymore whether John was on their side or was completely taken up by the idea of flying and anything he could supposedly learn after that. He did not know what the Adventurous told John in the morning. As if responding to his thoughts again, John said, “I’m resting today. The Adventurous didn’t mind.”
“Lucky you,” Bradley continued on, creating an appearance of an innocent conversation for the Unknowns who were potentially eavesdropping. He hoped that they would take their conversation for simple sharing of the news of the day. “And the Tenacious spent so much time trying to convince me that I have to start flying! It was so boring.”
On purpose or by accident, Bradley was not sure, but John played along, “Yeah, they can indeed be boring. I wonder who they actually are and how they all got here. Have you noticed when we first arrived in that assembly room they all appeared to be our age?”
Bradley agreed. That was another thing he himself was wondering about. Could it be true that this entire country had only people of this age and nobody else? From the beginning he was hoping to see some adults and ask for help to get back home. Or was it possible that they SAW only people of their own age? At this point he would believe anything. Of course, he would never admit this in front of the Tenacious, but he’d seen enough strange things to be able to accept existence of yet another strange thing.
“Of course I noticed they appear to be the same age,” he replied to John. “This is yet another mystery of this place. I wish there were a way to get out and explore everything without having this restriction of flying… Come on, John, you always had ideas. Can you come up with one about this?” Saying that, Bradley was hoping to get his old friend John back, the one who would have ideas about getting out, not ideas how to utilize the skills of the Unknowns. He felt like it did not take much time at all for John to change. What would happen to Megan and himself if they were not careful? And how to help John when he was not seeing the problem?
But John sounded like a defeatist, “I think we have tried it already. But we ended up wandering around for ages in some dark corridors that led us back into the hands of the Unknowns. They are pretty tough about not showing us anything around here. We have seen the world outside of this building, but we are stuck inside in these corridors, and there is no apparent way out. I bet flying is truly the only way out of here.”
Bradley could agree that there were too many strange things and too many questions that they needed answers for. But their discussions concluded by acknowledging the fact that unless they flew, there were no options to learn or be able to do anything else. And since they knew how dangerous it was to learn to fly, they were stuck. Bradley heard that John on the other side of the wall began to complain and to express his doubts that they would not be able to leave the country should they learn to fly. According to him, they should be getting much more freedom to move around. Bradley wished John did not talk about this at all. Had he just let the cat out of the bag for the Unknowns to hear? Bradley gave a couple of really loud bangs on the wall, hoping that John would understand his message and shut up. Apparently, the message came through, because John went silent.
Bradley returned to his bed. He had many other questions besides the ones he dared to discuss with John. Were they the only prisoners in this world, or were there other kids in rooms next to them, going through the same dilemmas and having the same questions? Or have they learned to fly, got freedom to move around this country but shut the way back to their homes? While Bradley was pondering these things in his room, Megan started to find some things out.
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