Somewhere higher up in the bleachers, Hadrian had felt a jolt run through him as Laren picked up the card.  The Page of Cups had been the card he'd left lying there, knowing that the only no-striper they had would pick it up.  He'd obviously made a good choice.
	He unconsciously tugged at the three blue stripes on his sleeve as he got up with the others, drifting toward where Ashlyn was.  The stripes indicated that he was part of a specific program and one of their non-controlled variables in that particular experiment.  Which meant he only had to deal with a couple of the "staff" at the Institute rather than all of them - not that it made much difference any way you sliced it.  He was still involved in their tests.  He could quite recall when he'd begun to hide exactly how ill the drugs made him, but he remembered that he'd done it just so they didn't isolate him from everyone else.  It had certainly been back before Kyle had left the Institute.  He knew that much.  As he climbed down to meet Laren, he wondered what Kyle was doing now.
#
	Kyle Ann Monroe dodged one last person as she brought her bike up in front of the local federal investigator's precinct.  Since she'd escaped the Institute, she'd found that the only person in the outside world she could trust sat within the walls of the building before her.  That was because John Thatcher had taken it upon himself to investigate a case that the government had tried to bury, because in investigating the case, a great and terrible truth was revealed:  The Institute was not under the control of the government.  It remained in existence only because those in power feared it and what it could do.
	She locked up her bike and jogged up the stairs.  She made her way to Thatcher's office and rapped on the doorjamb.  The dark-haired, athletic man looked up from his paperwork to see her.  "Come on in, Ky.  Close the door behind you."
	Kyle stepped inside and closed the door behind her.  "How's it coming?  Have you found a way to shut them down yet?"
	Thatcher shook his head with a sigh.  "I wish I had.  Got something new for me from your friends on the inside?"
	"New student came in yesterday.  She's rooming with one of my friends.  I don't have a name yet, but I'm hoping to get one shortly."
	Thatcher stared at her for a long moment with a grim expression before leaning back in his chair, shaking his head.  "You have no idea how much this means to me, Ky.  The Institute killed my brother, and I...I owe it to him to make them pay."
	"I know, Detective.  Remember, I was there when they killed him."
	Thatcher shook his head.  "I have to find a way to shut them down."
	"That's why I'm here, Detective.  I know together we can do that."