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Lukas worked on computers and devoted his nights to charting stars from the cafeteria, hoping an apprentice might continue observations he expected to take lifetimes. Twenty-five when he grew close to Juliette, he watched the sky with her, visited her in confinement, and told her he had intended to ask her out. After her cleaning, he preserved keepsakes from her belongings rather than let them be dispersed.
Bernard drew Lukas into training for leadership and revealed the other silos, the Order, and the Legacy. During the fighting, Lukas shot an old woman preparing to throw a bomb and continued firing while crying. Confined beneath the servers, he secretly called the neighboring silo and developed a close connection with Juliette. He resisted her suggestion that he kill Bernard, questioned the silos’ origins, and eventually learned that their own side had deliberately destroyed the world. Formally selected as the next leader of Silo Eighteen, he became increasingly troubled by the sacrifices expected of him. His investigation of George’s records led him to conclude George had been murdered.
After Bernard discovered his contact with Juliette, Lukas was condemned to cleaning. He considered jumping from the stairs, but hearing her voice over Peter’s radio helped him decide against it. He survived the threat and was beside Juliette when she woke after her return. He comforted her, told Peter he had evidence of Bernard’s killing, pressed Juliette to help fill the leadership vacuum, and kissed her. As head of IT and her lover, he carried some of the mayoral burden while she dug, warning of unrest and fearing that saving a few people could endanger hundreds.
Lukas studied the Legacy and learned to access server records with Donald’s help. He believed Donald was taking personal risks to help them, eventually told him the digging must continue, and supported Juliette’s outside sampling expedition by radio and in the decontamination team. He noticed the disappearance of one of her scars. Though the couple argued about secrecy, danger, and leadership, his support remained central to her work.
An unexpected call from Silo One brought the crisis. Lukas concealed Bernard’s death and recruited Sims to impersonate him, then tried to escape with Sims as mist spread. His code would not open the server-room exit. Reaching Juliette by radio, he said the silo was being shut down and urged her to seal herself off. In their last contact he was coughing and wheezing, said he could not return to the pantry, and told her he loved her. His death left her grieving. Under the stars outside, she remembers that he imagined worlds around distant stars and supported her work despite knowing its dangers.
Appearance
Lukas was twenty-five when he grew close to Juliette, with light brown hair and eyes that seemed older than his face. She considered him handsome.
Role
He served as head of IT, studied the silos’ hidden history, and became Juliette’s partner and supporter. His ideas about the stars remain part of her hopes after his death.
Relationships
Juliette — Juliette is his lover; he sustains their connection through radio conversations, supports her dangerous work, and declares his love in their last contact.
Donald — Donald helps Lukas explore the server records, and Lukas believes he is trying to help at personal risk.
Sims — Lukas recruits Sims to impersonate Bernard and tries to escape the spreading mist with him.
Earlier in this series
Also appears in books you've already read — spoiler-safe to their endings:
Sources — 83 recorded facts, by chapter
Chapter 1
- Lukas reports that numerous reassignments have left his workplace short-staffed.
- Lukas reports that normal routines have resumed without another uprising.
- Lukas has reached volume C of the books he is reading.
- Lukas questions whether the material in the books is real.
- Lukas refuses to disclose the mayor’s current project to the voice on the call.
- Lukas has tried to persuade the mayor to abandon her project.
- Lukas believes the voice on the call wants to help.
- Lukas fears that the mayor’s project will have a bad outcome.
Chapter 3
- Juliette wants to tell Lukas about the discovery beyond the wall.
Chapter 5
- Lukas Kyle, head of IT and Juliette’s lover, visits her in Mechanical.
- Lukas complains that he is doing the mayor’s work while Juliette digs.
- Lukas warns Juliette that dissent in the Up Top resembles the previous uprising but is now directed at them.
- Lukas asks Juliette to stop digging.
- Lukas has heard a rumor that Juliette’s cleaning was an election stunt.
- Lukas fears hundreds will die if Juliette tries to rescue a few people.
- Lukas suggests keeping the digging secret if Juliette insists on continuing.
Chapter 8
- Juliette privately agrees with Lukas that she should leave the excavation site.
Chapter 9
- Juliette tells Hank that Lukas has reported complaints about her work below.
Chapter 11
- Lukas waits for Juliette after a porter tells him she is approaching.
- Lukas opposes telling residents about the other silos because he believes disbelief and trouble would follow.
- Lukas asks Juliette to postpone discussion of her plan so they can spend a night together without working.
- Lukas says a small star-shaped pattern of scars has disappeared from the crook of Juliette’s right arm.
- Lukas remembers three scars crossing into a little star in the crook of Juliette’s right arm.
- Lukas suggests having Juliette’s father examine her apparent scar change.
Chapter 12
- According to Donald, Lukas has cracked another server containing detailed records of silo residents.
- Lukas asks Donald many questions about how the world used to be.
Chapter 14
- Lukas urges Juliette to attend the first monthly town hall since her election.
- Lukas warns that Juliette’s successor could return the suit workshop to its former purpose.
- Lukas wants the books in the Suit Lab secured because their paper is valuable.
- Lukas returns to the servers to answer a call before unanswered-call lights attract attention in the offices.
Chapter 15
- Lukas considers transferring from IT to Mechanical so he can stay with Juliette if she loses the mayoralty.
- Lukas is learning to access the servers’ contents with Donald’s help.
- Lukas now studies the human-behavior passages he was forced to read during his Rite.
- Lukas believes the accounts of past revolutions are real and that conditions eventually improve as people learn.
- Lukas believes Donald is trying to help at personal risk.
- Lukas tells Donald that the digging must continue.
- Lukas asks Donald why he calls every day to discuss the books.
Chapter 16
- Lukas persuaded Juliette to leave the digging and attend the meeting up top.
Chapter 20
- Lukas maintains radio contact with Juliette during her outside sampling mission.
- Lukas tells Juliette they intend to use flames when she returns because airlock readings suggest the flames may be necessary.
- Lukas reports that the spectators are being moved while staff try to keep them calm.
- Lukas jokes that Juliette could have cleaned the sensor while outside if they had supplied pads.
Chapter 21
- Lukas counts out the airlock burn for Juliette over the radio.
- Lukas takes the place Juliette expected Sophia to occupy in the decontamination team.
- Lukas returns to lead Juliette out of the new airlock into the former jail cell for more washing.
Chapter 25
- Lukas helps Juliette carry the lead-lined trunk down the stairs.
- Lukas believes that people simply cease to exist when they die.
- Lukas believes that actions endure forever because the past cannot be changed.
- Lukas listens to the sample examination by radio from outside the lab.
Chapter 26
- Lukas is helping Donald investigate the contents of the servers.
- Donald admires Lukas’s curiosity and study of the Legacy.
Chapter 28
- Lukas holds a flashlight while Juliette investigates beneath the server-room floor.
- Lukas interrupts the investigation after receiving a radio call from Juliette’s father about a child going over the rails.
- Lukas reports that the child fell twenty levels.
Chapter 33
- Lukas receives an unusually timed call from Silo 1 during dinner.
- Lukas identifies himself to the caller as head of silo eighteen.
- Lukas conceals Bernard’s death by telling the caller he is indisposed.
- Lukas initially plans to have Nelson impersonate Bernard to buy time.
- Lukas cannot find Nelson in the Suit Lab.
- Lukas recruits Sims to impersonate Bernard instead.
- Lukas lowers Juliette’s radio volume to prevent the caller from hearing her.
- Lukas tells the caller that he is Bernard’s shadow and has passed the Rite.
- Lukas covers his mouth with his undershirt and tries to escape the spreading mist with Sims.
- Lukas cannot unlock the server-room exit with his code.
Chapter 34
- Lukas’s initial radio transmissions convey only boots and breathing or static.
- Juliette recalls that Lukas warned her something bad was about to happen.
- Lukas finally reaches Juliette through the portable radio.
Chapter 35
- Lukas explains that his radio volume was turned down.
- Lukas reports falling down a ladder and injuring his nose.
- Lukas says the silo is being shut down.
- Lukas cannot get radio reception inside the pantry.
- Lukas urges Juliette to seal herself off.
Chapter 36
- Lukas contacts Juliette again while coughing and wheezing severely.
- Lukas says he had to hear Juliette’s voice one last time.
- Lukas tells Juliette that he cannot return to the pantry and declares his love for her.
Chapter 41
- Juliette believes Lukas has been lost in the destruction of her silo.
Chapter 42
- Juliette imagines Lukas dead in his apartment below the servers with a radio in his hand.
Chapter 48
- Lukas’s death leaves Juliette struggling with grief.
Chapter 56
- Juliette recalls falling in love with Lukas because of the support he gave her during her isolation.
Chapter 59
- Juliette remembers Lukas explaining that the servers were arranged like the silos.
Chapter 61
- Juliette says Lukas noticed the disappearance of one of her scars before she believed it herself.
Chapter 65
- Lukas once told Juliette that the stars might have worlds of their own.
- Juliette remembers that Lukas supported her work despite knowing it was dangerous.