The Institute

Doctor Hendricks suspects Luke developed telepathy and has the sadistic technician Zeke take him to “the tank” to force a confession via near-drowning. Luke resists, and the men give up, convinced he has no telepathy. One of the staff, Dave, is sympathetic during the ordeal—but slaps Luke hard enough to knock him down when he says the Institute has no idea what they are doing.

Later, Maureen slips Luke a note. In the note, she tells Luke she spoke to the lawyer he suggested and she will have enough money to provide a college fund for a child she had to give up for adoption. However, just as she feared, she has cancer and only a short amount of time to atone for her complicity and help him escape.

Luke works out a plan to communicate with Maureen. A few days later, Mrs. Sigsby shows Stackhouse a recording of Luke and Avery (who occasionally pulls his own nose) telling Maureen that some of them are planning a hunger strike. Sigsby and Stackhouse are amused, as they doubt the children will succeed.

Mrs. Sigsby and Stackhouse don’t realize that the three are communicating aloud and telepathically. Maureen arranged an escape plan for Luke, and every time Avery touches his nose, she proceeds to the next step of the plan. That night, Avery repeats the plan to Luke: Maureen found a spot in the playground where Luke can dig his way out under the fence and marked a path that will lead him to a boat he can use to go downstream to a train station.

Luke has no tests the following day, meaning he has at most a day before he is transferred to Back Half. That night, he waits and listens to the newer arrivals run up and down the hall. After the others are asleep, Luke reaches under his mattress and finds a paring knife and flash drive that Maureen left when she made his bed. Putting them in his pocket, he takes the scoop from the ice machine and goes out to the playground. Luke finds the spot where the fencing doesn’t meet the ground and uses the scoop to expand the opening. The scoop’s handle breaks, but he keeps digging, wielding the scoop itself despite getting cut. He eventually squirms his way out, scraping his back and legs bloody.

Finally free, Luke uses the paring knife to cut off his earlobe with the tracker in it. He throws his earlobe over the fence, so he still appears within the perimeter. Following Maureen’s instructions, he finds a boat that carries him to a rail switching yard. He considers looking for police but decides they will likely return him to captivity. He finds a train headed south to Massachusetts and squeezes into a boxcar where he falls asleep. He briefly wakes when the boxcar is switched to a train headed south toward DuPray, South Carolina.