Luke Ellis awoke from deep sleep to loud knocking and momentary confusion, thinking he had overslept for school. Gladys, the staff member who previously took him to get his ear chip and told him he was there to serve, entered cheerfully, announcing he had missed breakfast but offering fresh-squeezed orange juice to drink while they walked.

Luke noticed the green power light on his new laptop and worried that if Gladys checked it, she would see the image of H. G. Wells’s Invisible Man he had been viewing. He reasoned that she might report his activity to superiors who would be curious about his browsing, especially outside news access.

Asking for a moment to dress, Luke hurriedly put on jeans and a T-shirt, checked the time, and was surprised to find it was nine o’clock—late for him. He briefly wondered if he had been drugged, then concluded he was likely in shock from recent events.

Luke shut down the laptop, recognizing that any attempt to hide his searches would be useless if the Institute was monitoring or mirroring his computer. He tried to reassure himself that if they knew, they would have already confiscated the machine, and noted that the wrong name on the welcome screen had not drawn attention. Still, he worried they might be letting him “have more rope,” reflecting his growing paranoia under confinement.

When Gladys returned, Luke was tying his sneakers. She praised him in a patronizing tone, which intensified his dislike. He drank the orange juice as instructed, and the scene ended with him being shepherded along, underscoring the staff’s control and Luke’s careful, anxious calculations about surveillance.