Abram discovers a strange alien structure, and Feena's troubled past is revealed.
Teaser
Abram wakes Feena, who was having a nightmare in which she recalled finding Duncan critically wounded in the middle of a firefight during the Karik invasion. He brings her soup made from the plants the Sparks wove. He offers to listen, but she’s not ready to talk. He brings soup to Ezra, too, who is practicing archery using a bow he found in the settlement. The soup tastes bad, so Abram and Yellow Drone start searching the facility to see if he can find food stores that might have seasonings to help it taste better. They eventually encounter a door that’s been blocked up by the settlers, which Yellow Drone encourages Abram to open.Act 1
Feena begs Duncan to speak to her via Red Drone, and remembers her first life when she was released after over six years in prison for fraud. Upon release, she immediately went to the FBI and offered to help them capture her accomplice, Gregory Palmer. The agent who met with her turned out to be Duncan, and he told Feena that her help cannot undo the damage her crimes caused to numerous families. He advised her to see a therapist to cope with her guilt instead.In the present, Ezra shows Feena the bracelet he had found in the settlement’s courtyard, and tells her about the box in his parents’ cabin that had the same glyph. Abram shows up and brings them to the door he found and has now unblocked. Ezra is concerned about what might be behind the door, but Abram knows it’s not a threat, though he can’t explain why. Behind the door is a room a single, tall, irregularly-shaped object, clearly not made by humans. A sledgehammer on the floor indicates that someone may have tried to destroy it. Abram touches it, and the object, which Yellow Drone calls “the Obelisk,” immediately emits a blue glow. The drone expects Abram to understand its purpose, but he doesn’t. Suddenly, a glyph appears on its surface, and Yellow Drone says it’s “speaking.”
At the Skin Rider encampment, Duncan is put in a holding room until it is decided what will be done with him. Jax calls him a deserter, but Silas insists that it’s not his fault that his Companion is sick. Silas tells Duncan that making decisions alone brings pain and regret, but the Companion frees them from poor decisions and the resulting sorrow. Duncan responds that it’s the opposite of freedom. Silas tells him that he will heal his Companion to free him from his confusion.
Three more glyphs appear on the Obelisk, which Feena recognizes from the ring in the desert. One of them is the same one from the bracelet and the box, which Abram says means “knowledge,” surprising even himself. Upon the glyph’s appearance, its meaning appeared in Abram’s mind. The others have no such experience. Yellow Drone says that the Obelisk knows who is ready to hear it. More glyphs appear, and Abram says the message is directed at them. Feena thinks it's dangerous, but Ezra and Abram both think it’s important to know what it’s saying.
Abram eventually becomes tired and collapses, but insists that he’s fine. He explains that the Obelisk is offering them a contract from someone on the other end: Recover a weapon buried east of the settlement, and they will be granted more people for the settlement. Feena and Abram want to go retrieve the weapon. Ezra is worried about the Skin Riders and doesn’t trust the Obelisk, but is eventually persuaded.
Act 2
Ezra arms himself with the bow and follows Yellow Drone toward the weapon’s location. Yellow Drone explains that the Obelisk is designed to protect the Reborns; it’s not only a communication device, but also generates the settlement’s shield. Ezra wants to know more about those on the other end of the Obelisk, but Yellow Drone is evasive.Silas wakes Duncan and brings him outside, where Jax is sparring with other Skin Riders. Silas puts Duncan up against Jax, who soon finds that Duncan is fighting better than him. Silas says he had “enhanced” Duncan, and brings Jax and Duncan together for a private meeting.
There, he admits that he only said Duncan had been enhanced to spare Jax embarrassment in front of his men. In reality, he was conducting a test: Because thoughts must pass through two brains, a human joined with a Skin Rider has slightly slower reaction times than a normal human, or, in Duncan’s case, a human whose Companion is inactive. Correcting this disadvantage by rewiring the neural pathways to give the Companion complete control would require highly advanced surgery, something only a drone could do.
Feena finds Abram sitting before the Obelisk, struggling to understand how the communication with it works. He explains that he doesn’t know what a symbol means until it appears on the Obelisk, then the meaning appears in his mind. He can’t explain how he understands things the Obelisk communicates, and therefore has no way to convince Feena of what he’s saying. She could only find out by trying to communicate via the Obelisk herself. She puts her hand on the Obelisk, and it glows in response, but she gets nothing.
She returns to the work table, and finds that Red Drone has produced the Lynn hologram, who asks her to attempt to repair it again. Feena says that she thinks she’d work better with Duncan rather than Lynn, but Lynn says the drone believes the Duncan hologram would be a distraction. She recalls an encounter with Duncan in her first life, where he apologized for discouraging her from trying to do the right thing.
He told her he’d read her file and found she’d turned herself in and helped agents recover most of the money she’d stolen, and asked why she’d come to him instead of the agents she’d worked with previously. She replied that as her release approached, she’d communicated with nine agents before him but they refused to work with her. She also preferred Duncan’s less stuffy demeanor, and found that he had access to the required databases. Duncan agreed to help.
Yellow Drone and Ezra arrive at the location where the weapon is buried. A Skin Rider observes him digging and contacts the others.
Act 3
Silas instructs Jax not to infect Ezra, as they need a human test subject, and to damage the drone as little as possible. Meanwhile, Lynn and Feena work together to repair Red Drone. Lynn tries to get to know Feena, who resists, but eventually starts opening up a little. Feena soon realizes that Lynn is Ezra’s wife.Silas tells Duncan that the Companion has a defense against the body’s immune system which tells it that it is part of the human, but that sometimes this protection doesn’t work as it should, and the immune system attacks the Companion. However, if the Companion is killed, the human dies, too. While Duncan says that death is better than slavery, Silas says it’s better to heal the Companion. He pours some water containing Sparks into a cup and offers it to Duncan, saying that it is the Sparks’ nature to heal all life that is fully formed. Duncan refuses, so the Skin Riders force him to drink it.
As Ezra digs, Yellow Drone tells him that the weapon is designed to kill Skin Riders. Ezra objects that he will not kill his brother, but the drone clarifies that it kills the parasite. Ezra asks if the parasite’s death would also kill the host, and Yellow Drone asks what he thinks Silas would want Ezra to do if the only way to free him from the parasite was for his human body to die. When asked if Silas could be remade after he died, Yellow Drone only says that “the deciders” would determine that.
Feena and Lynn are soon talking like old friends, with Lynn talking about what she loves about Ezra: his concern and dedication to others. Lynn disappears as Feena succeeds in activating Red Drone. It hovers off the table and thanks Feena. She recalls working late into the night with Duncan to try to find Palmer. Duncan asks what Feena ever saw in him to be his fianceé. She responds that he was kind to her, and she wasn’t used to that. Duncan says she deserves better.
Abram is still sitting in front of the Obelisk, and suddenly realizes that the glyphs for the contract are gone. When he touches the Obelisk, it displays nine more glyphs, and he speaks their meanings as they appear: knowledge, duty, labor, creation, self-mastery, peace, community, mercy, and justice. They’re the same glyphs that were on the rings. He recognizes that they represent a list of virtues, but is frustrated that he doesn’t understand the purpose behind what is being communicated.
Ezra unearths the weapon just as Yellow Drone detects Skin Riders nearby. As they attempt to flee with it, a net snares Yellow Drone, and Skin Riders, lead by Jax, quickly surround Ezra.
Act 4
Jax asks what Ezra’s holding; he feigns ignorance. One of the Skin Riders takes the weapon, and within moments it emits a pulse, killing him. Ezra takes advantage of the distraction to incapacitate the other Skin Riders, and Yellow Drone shoots a tranquilizer dart at Jax, knocking him out temporarily. Yellow Drone orders Ezra to grab the weapon, but Ezra wants to know more about it first. Yellow Drone explains that the Skin Rider parasite was killed by a defensive mechanism on the weapon’s housing, not the weapon itself, and that this mechanism is harmless to humans. Ezra grabs the weapon, and they depart.Red Drone meets Feena on the settlement’s tower. She accuses it of lying about the settlers, but it says that it only knew that they’d lost contact with the settlers, not that they were dead. She asks if it’s true that some of their memories have been withheld, and if so, why she has the memories she does. Red Drone is evasive, saying only that her memories are part of who she is. When asked if it will bring back Duncan, it responds that it doesn’t decide that. She asks, “Will he remember what I did to him?” It responds that if he doesn’t, it’s sure she will tell him.
Flashback: Feena has discovered that Palmer is in Singapore, and gives Duncan his location, along with contact information for someone at the Singapore Security and Intelligence Division that owes Feena a favor. He offers to put in a good word for Feena to hire her at the FBI, but she declines, thanks him for his help, and leaves.
Ezra and Yellow Drone arrive back at the settlement, and the Reborns and drones meet at the Obelisk. Erza asks Abram if he can ask the Obelisk what to do next, but Abram responds that he doesn’t know how. He says it has just been showing him the same virtue glyphs repeatedly. Ezra wants nothing to do with the weapon, but Abram reminds him that humanity is an endangered species, and they absolutely require the help of whoever is on the other side of the Obelisk. Suddenly, a woman’s voice behind them agrees: It’s Lynn.
Act 5
Lynn disappears, and Feena updates Ezra about the brain states in the drones. Ezra asks if the drones have Kylie’s brain state, too, and Yellow Drone says they do. The meaning is clear: If Ezra wants his family back, he has to do as he is told. Abram doesn’t wait for Ezra’s answer: he’s willing to comply.Flashback: Four months after Feena gave Palmer’s location to Duncan, he finds her to let her know that Palmer’s being extradited to the US. She points out that an email would have sufficed, but he replies that it wasn’t for him. He asks to walk with her, and she agrees.
As the Reborns sleep at the settlement, Red Drone hovers near Feena. Feena dreams of finding Duncan dying during the invasion. Red Drone arrives, tranquilizing her and recording her brain state. Feena awakes, touching her neck where she was tranquilized. Meanwhile, the weapon, sitting next to the Obelisk, suddenly lights up.
