Niko Breckinridge

**Niko Breckinridge** is one of the main characters in the first season of *Another Life*. She is portrayed by Katee Sackhoff.

She is an astronaut who commands a crew on a mission to explore the genesis of an alien artifact.

## Throughout the Series

* Season 1
* Season 2

### Season 1

Six months later and still on Earth, Niko and her family are moving because of her husband's job, but she's been asked to lead the Salvare on a deep space mission to investigate the destination the Artifact has been communicating with. Her husband, Erik is disappointed, but Niko is afraid that the mission will fail without her.

The mission was supposed to take six months – three months to Pi Canis Majoris and three months back. Assuming all went according to plan. A month into the journey and Niko is awoken from Soma sleep. She's been awoken because the Salvare hasn't yet reached Pi Canis Majoris.

Ian Yerxa was the previous captain of the ship, so there's a bit of tension around the leadership now that Niko's been put in charge. Most of the rest of the crew have worked under Ian and are ‘feeling a little awkward’ with this new situation.

While chatting with Erik long distance, Niko is interrupted by William. The ship is circumventing Sirius A and the star doesn't seem to take kindly to the ship being in proximity. Though Ian insists the ship can handle the star, Niko decides they have to fly away.

The argument about the ship's course upsets some of the crew, especially Michelle Vargas, who feels that Ian should challenge Niko more. The crew can't seem to get along with each other, forget with their new leader.

Niko seems too cautious, deciding to go the long way around to get to their destination instead of risking more damage by Sirius A, and this means their mission will take longer to complete. Ian and the ship engineer have come up with a plan to create a shield that should protect the ship against the star, but there's an 11% chance the plan will fail. Niko won't budge from her decision.

Ian is sure that the longer they take to make first contact with whatever aliens are on Pi Canis Majoris, the greater the risk that the people of Earth will be attacked by the same aliens. But Niko's fear is that taking unnecessary risks may cost Salvare the mission, which will really put the world in jeopardy. Seems like Ian is looking at it from a personal point of view; Niko, on the other hand, is burdened by the weight of the world on her shoulders.

Unfortunately for Niko, the crew backs Ian's play – they stage a mutiny and put her into Soma sleep. Niko puts up one hell of a fight and it was only Ian's backhanded tactics that got the better of her.

Ian threatens William, the computer, into following his orders. In fact, Ian seems to have considerable sway over most of his crew. Zayn Petrossian, the ship psychologist, isn't given much choice in declaring whether Niko is unfit to command or not. Sasha Harrison, the government representative aboard the ship, is put on the spot to recognise Ian's leadership. It's all hasty and rash, and despite William's attempted rebellion, he must follow Ian's orders now.

William changes course towards Sirius A and Ian commands the engineer, August, to engage the shield. Though the shield works, the flares damage the FTL (faster-than-light) drive and the ship is basically unable to fly away from the star. While Niko is peacefully dreaming of being back home with Erik and her daughter Jana, the Salvare is being torn apart.

In a panic, August wakes Niko up and she immediately takes control of the situation. Banishing Ian from the bridge, Niko takes manual control of steering and slingshots off the star to safety.

Niko may have saved everyone, but the ship has sustained plenty of damage. All comms are down and the Soma system is offline. There are replacement crew members asleep, and they aren't affected, but no new chambers can be activated.

Since Ian can't be put to sleep, he's back as second-in-command. On William's advice, Ian will be answerable for his actions only after the mission is complete. Niko informs the crew that she's back in charge and they're just going to have to deal with it.

Back on Earth, Erik has been hard at work attempting to communicate with the Artifact. He's tried everything, including using birds as a source for inspiration. He finally makes a breakthrough. Erik discovers that a signal was sent from Earth to Pi Canis Majoris in the 1960s, and relays the same message again. It's a piece of music and the Artifact recognizes it and replays in kind.

The episode ends with Niko and Ian attempting to fix the ship together. He insists that his actions were to ensure the safety of the people on Earth, including Jana, but Niko doesn't buy it. Still seething over having to eat humble pie, Ian makes another foolish decision – he tries to stab Niko in the back, but she's got quick reflexes and kicks him straight into a live electric conduit.

Niko tells the crew of the Salvare that she killed Ian because he was a threat, which worries most of them and causes them to get angry. Bernie and Javier support her and Niko reminds them of the mission, but Michelle calls her a murderer and wants to throw her out of the ship. There is a crash and they start losing oxygen.

Niko is told by August that they have five hours until they are all unconscious, but they could source a comet. William says their long range sensors are down and suggests backtracking to Sirius, but they would not have enough time. Michelle suggests microlensing and they try looking for nearby planets.

William tells Niko and Michelle that they have a planet which is different that what they were used to, but she asks Javier and Bernie to go outside and do visual inspection. Bernie asks why, when she could send August or Oliver and she tells him that they would go mine for ringwoodite, which contains hydrogen and oxygen.

In order to fly the shuttle in order to mine, Niko wakes Cas up, who asks for Ian and Canis Majoris. Niko told her how Ian tried to kill her and she acted in self defense. She understands and is told by Niko that she wants her to fly.

Javier and Bernie check the planet out and the latter wants to grab a soil sample, but Javier does not want him to. There is an earthquake, but William tells them not to worry because the rift valley was very far away. Niko tells them to hurry up, so as not to be there longer than needed and tells Michelle to take a break because she was not doing all right.

Niko asks Zayn if ze has anything to help her stay awake and tells hir she does not want to talk about Ian and tells hir the story of her great-grandmother who left a baby on the side of the road. Niko thanks hir and leaves, but Zayn tells her that she will need to talk about it eventually for her own wellbeing. As Niko walks down the hall, she hears Ian talk and then sees a hallucination of him, which reminds her of the ten people she had killed on the Saturn mission. The hallucination was created by William, who does not understand how she had killed Ian.

Javier sees Bernie far away and is hit by a rock. He sees a moon rising and warns Niko. William says they missed it because it was in a low orbit. Niko instructs him and Bernie to get back on board. However, Bernie is busy collecting soil samples. Javier berates him and they run towards the Salvare, due to all the magna being pulled by the moon's gravity.

William tells Cas that they need to get back into orbit in 9 minutes or the mission would end. As Oliver and August leave the cave, they try contacting Salvare, which is already in the air. Oliver complains that Niko did not even try to save them, but is surprised when a shuttle, piloted by Niko herself saves them. As they lift off, August and Oliver hold hands and they make it in the end.

Back on the Salvare, Niko has to keep her hands from shaking. She has trouble walking starts hyperventilating, but tells William not to call Zayn. She tells him she needs to talk to Ian. William transforms into a hallucination of Ian and asks him if killing him was her only option. Ian tells her that life was about making choices, but admits to not knowing if he could have lived.

On the Salvare, Niko and Zayn carry Petra, who was still having a seizure, which Zayn believes to be odd. Niko asks if they brought something back from the planet they visited, but Petra interrupts asking them to throw her out of an airlock.

Later August wonders if they had a virus or bacteria, and when Bernie walks into the room, Michelle tells him to back off because he had brought soil samples on board. Niko calms everybody down, and Zayn tells them that Petra's stress hormones were all elevated. Michelle tells Niko that comms were still down, but William points out that they had Sirius A as a reference point, which Niko tells him to move them towards. She tells the team to help out and gets them moving.

August and Oliver check the cooling systems, while Niko fixes the ship with Cas. Niko hurts her hand and Cas tells her to take a small break because she has not slept in days. Niko complains about Yerxa, which Cas does not like and she tells Niko that Yerxa had read her wrong, because if he had known what she was really made of, he would have known she would kill him.

Niko is startled awake by Sirius A's Oort cloud, which they missed because they have no sensors, so Niko takes manual control, until she asks Cas to do it instead because she can't see. Zayn tells her that her stress hormones were off the charts and complains that she is not an astrobiologist, so Niko tells her to wake one up.

In her room, Niko hears an email of Jana showing her how she does a cartwheel. She asks William to stop the video and asks him to tell her what is happening, so he tells her about what is happening in the video, which she cannot see.

Michelle walks into Niko's room and grabs her by the throat, chiking her and telling her that she was the real virus. Niko manages to get her off her and tells her that she was not thinking straight. However, Michelle keeps fighting, telling her that Cas was not there to protect her anymore. Niko slams her against a wall, which knocks Michelle out and she calls for William.

Later, Michelle tells Bernie to let her go because Niko wanted to kill them, but she is put to sleep by Zayn.

Julian tells Niko about the virus, and Zayn tells her that there were a huge spectrum of potential symptoms. Julian was excited because it was the first non-carbon life form ever discovered and decided to name it *Bernardium Pageius* because he was the source. Julian takes his suit off and tells Bernie that he was infected the moment he had woken him up from soma.

The crew talks about Petra's infection, which she describes as a pain she had never experienced. Niko says she still cannot see, but Zayn tells her that she should be able to see again soon. Petra tries joking, but starts feeling unwell, feeling something growing out of the back of her neck. They hold her arms while her nervous system starts popping out of her and moving away.

They start talking about what to do with the virus. Julian says that they need to vent the infected atmosphere and contents into space, but Bernie does not like the idea because he thinks it's mass suicide. Niko tells him that the virus would kill them all, but he tells them that he is resistant and tells them to use him as their guinea pig so he could fix his wrong. Niko tells them to enjoy their last moments, and says that she wishes there was another way. Julian asks Bernie if he meant what he said and takes him away. William reassures Niko, telling her that they do not know if what happened to Petra would happen to her, but she says that it would.

Niko is listening to Jana's message while crying.

Niko tells the team that she could not believe that they were defeated by something they could not see. Michelle apologizes to Niko for what she had done, and Niko apologizes back. They walk into an air duct, but Bernie tells everyone that he has a cure - gamma rays, so they fly towards Sirius B and open the crows nest.

Zayn and William tell everyone that there was no sign of the virus. However, William tells them that gamma radiation is very dangerous and everyone has been sterilized. Everybody has mixed feeling about this, but Bernie says that Julian fought for nothing. However, Niko comforts him and tells reminds him that the biggest sacrifice was signing up for the mission.

Everybody goes back into soma, and William tells Niko that he would miss her. She laughs because the engineers that made him made him feel lonely, but he says it's not his programming.

After a loud knock, Niko is awakened. She sees blood on the floor and finds August bleeding out. She tells Niko that there is something on board hunting them.

Niko comforts August while she calls William. However, August tells her that he is offline, and asks her if she looks better or worse than her brother Billy. August tells Niko to tell her parents that she was not scared, but Niko tells her that they would be making it home.

Cas and Niko find each other. The former tells Niko that they need to get off the planet, which was Canis Majoris. However, everybody was separated, so they drag August to the medical center. Niko tells August that her brother was not afraid, but she could tell that she was lying. All of a sudden, the three of them are attacked by an alien who drags August away. Niko cries while Cas tells her they need to leave.

As they move, they hear steps and roaring. They open a door and stumble upon Javier, Zayn, Oliver, Bernie and Michelle. They have an argument, but Niko tells them that they needed to stick together. She remembers when a racoon went into their house and tells them that they should shoot the alien into space using the airlock. As Niko moves forward, the crew is torn apart by the alien. She traps Cas and the alien in the airlock, who swiftly kills her. After this, Niko goes back into soma.

Niko was just having a bad dream. Everybody is awake and she is still asleep because the batteries to the soma system are hemorrhaging power. They worry about Niko because her tube had less than 30 minutes on it. If she was still asleep by then, she would be brain dead.

In Niko's dream, Dubois tells her that they would be talking about The Pilgrim. Niko is confused as to why they are talking about something that happened years ago and tells Dubois that she does not have PTSD and she knows something is not right. Dubois calls her a hero, but she punches her in the face and the security while calling her daughter's name. When she opens the door, she walks into a funeral, where a man tells how Niko saved half a crew because she sacrificed the other.

Zayn says that she cannot remove the soma because if she was off by even a fraction, Niko would die.

Niko walks out another door and is at a party with Erik. She hugs him and they see it was Jana's eighth birthday. In this dream she stayed on Earth and she now realizes that she is in soma sleep.

Zayn managed to stabilize Niko, but the problem was that Niko might not even know that she is dreaming. William asks if they could convince her to leave from within her subconscious, which she has not done.

William appears in Niko's dream, telling her to wake up immediately because none of that was real. Niko is convinced that what was happening was real, but William does not understand why. Cas tells Zayn to keep trying.

In her dream, Niko sings the birthday song to Jana. However, they hear that the Salvare had crashed and it was assumed everybody was dead. Jana tells Niko that her wish was that Niko never leaves her ever again. An alarm starts sounding and Niko tries to turn it off. Niko tells them that she had to go back to the Salvare and exits her dream.

When Niko wakes up, she sees nobody until she sees a man, who walks up and kisses her. He tells her to look outside and they begin to prepare to dock at Saturn. However, Niko tells Hudson that something terrible would happen. Hudson does not listen to her and proceeds.

Niko has thirteen minutes left, so William, Cas and Zayn discuss options. William is ordered not to go back into Niko's dream, but he does anyway.

The crew members tell Niko to look outside at Saturn. She approaches Billy and tells him that they were coming up on a dark patch in the rings and they should keep an eye out for the moonlets, which is what he was going to say. William arrives and Niko hugs him; she tells him that she tried to wake up, but was brought to the Saturn mission, in which two moonlets collided and debris took down an engine. If she did not act fast the ship would explode, so she pressed the button which killed ten people. William convinced her that she did the right thing and convinced her that she could not change anything. However, this time Niko would remove herself from the equation. Niko realizes that she was still in the dream and William tells her that she should save everyone instead. Once everyone was in the room with her, she started removing the other half of the ship, but Jana suddenly appeared outside. The dream restarts once again and William tells her to look deep within herself. She realizes what she needs to do, but William is pulled out of the dream. After that happens, Niko accepts what she had to do and is finally able to move forward.

On the Salvare, Jana calls for Niko. Cas tells Zayn to pull the soma needles out. Niko tells Jana that she needs to finish what she started. She proceeds to repeat exactly what had happened before, but accepting what had happened. She also cries when looking at Hudson and remembering him.

All of a sudden, Niko wakes up, which makes William, Zayn and Cas wake up.

Niko asks Cas what was going on with the ship's direction, and she explains that they took a slight detour. However, she is angry because the detour was 4 light years and they did not even know if the moon had anything they could eat. Cas tells her that she did what was best for the mission. William interrupts and tells them that he had caught the same transmission as the one on Earth in the moon. They look at the moon's surface and see the same artifact there.

The crew of the Salvare reach the moon. Niko tells them to pump water - even Sasha, who complains. Bernie is wearing a full body suit so as to protect himself from viruses and even though William had done a full scan of the moon, Bernie was not going to risk encountering another boron-based lifeform. Zayn convinces him to take his mask off and Cas and Niko go visit the Artifact. Cas wonders if Niko questions her navigation, but she simply replies that she did not see the lights.

Niko tells them that the Artifact was weaker than the one on Earth and they move towards it - followed by an alien. Cas and Niko have an argument, where Cas tells Niko that she loved Ian and was not happy that she had killed him.

Bernie wonders why there is no animal life and Sasha starts blasting music. Niko tells Bernie and Zayn to go get food while Sasha begins contacting the planet in Spanish. Niko then approaches Cas and tells her that they should speak privately, but Cas does not listen.

Niko says The Artifact is missing pieces, which Cas believed was weird. Niko says that they should pick up a piece in order to analyze it, but Sasha refuses to leave the Artifact because she has no jurisdiction over his job. He tells her that if he has a problem, she should talk to his father, the Secretary of Defense. Niko and Cas leave after that and tell him not to go anywhere.

Niko tells Cas that they need to talk, but Cas wonders if anything would have changed if Niko knew that she loved Ian and knows that Niko did the only thing she could. Niko apologizes and knows that she hurt her and made her lose him so soon. Niko touches the piece of the Artifact and lifts it off the ground.

Zayn asks Niko and Cas if Sasha had made progress, but they reveal that they had left him alone. Bernie thinks that is ridiculous, but has an animal jump on him and surprise him, which makes him fall and cut himself a little. They keep walking and Bernie hates the food Zayn hated too. All of a sudden. Bernie's leg gives out and is green, so Zayn tries to disinfect it, which causes Bernie to go through a lot of pain.

Sasha explains to the Artifact how Earth works, but is getting no answer. Suddenly, he hears his own voice, saying what he had said before. Something from the Artifact grabs him and pulls him in. As Cas and Niko walked, they talk about Yerxa and Niko tells her about James Hudson, the Pilgrim commander, who she was in love with before Erik.

Niko smells a plant and asks Cas if she feels warm and stoned. Cas says she does too and tells Niko that she would build a house on that moon and they start laughing. Cas tells Niko to sit down with her and they both start laughing together. Cas tells Niko that she cannot constantly stop herself from telling her what to do and Niko agrees.

Cas asks Niko if she would ever abandon her because she abandoned Jana and only saw what she wanted. Niko tells Cas that she is her own worst enemy and does not believe in herself, which would be the death of everybody, failing if she took over. Cas tells her that she better not die then.

Niko and Cas look for Sasha, but do not find him. Suddenly he walks back to them and tell them that he had a weird dream. Zayn and Bernie walk over to them. Bernie tells them that he is growing a tree in his leg and Zayn tells them that they need to move him to the ship before he died. As they moved to the Salvare, Sasha walked behind them very slowly. Zayn notices something moving below ground and they start running as a spider-like creature approaches them. Cas shoots the animal and Niko tells Sasha to run, as more of the aliens approached them. However, they managed to make it back to the Salvare.

Cas asks Niko if she needs anything, but the latter tells her to simply take a break, as she had earned it. Suddenly, a small alien starts walking around the ship.

William tells Niko to use bug spray the next time she went to another planet and also tells her that the Artifact was strong, but was also destructible. He says that humans sent probes to the bottom of the ocean to the moons of Jupiter and thinks that the Artifacts could be probes. Niko says she thinks the same thing, but the lights start flashing; and William starts repeating himself until he shuts down. Niko starts floating as well as the artificial gravity is turned off. A fire starts and Niko tells Cas. She grabs a fire extinguisher and shoots it, which causes her to fly back.

The artificial gravity turns back on and Cas tells Niko she is alright. However, William still is not responding.

Three hours earlier, Javier tries bringing William back online, but they are not able to. Cas walks in and they find out the ship's systems are messed up, but Michelle thinks it is weird. Cas and Michelle go to investigate.

In Boston, post-floods, Niko checks water when she sees Cas tampering with tools, so she chases after her until she runs into her and a group of men. Cas tells her that she wanted to get her attention.

August is electrocuted, while Oliver and Javier assist her in finding out what caused the fires. She finds an electrified alien and she tells Niko that they were closer to fixing the problem.

Niko is surprised that William was taken out by the small alien, but Javier tells her that William is super complicated, but he needs a manual reset, which Niko does not support and tells him to find another way. William appears and thanks them for not resetting him and he tells them that he is detecting a fire in the mess hall, crew quarters, and in many places, but there was no fire. William started alarming the crew and telling them to return to quarters, starting the Go Home Protocol; which separated the Salvare. One half of the Salvare thought the other was on fire.

Niko manually steers the ship in order to try to connect the two parts of the ship. Cas helps her and asks if they would talk about what happened. She tells her that she did not meant what she said when they were stoned, but Cas says that she did, which meant that Niko also meant what she said. Niko tells her that she is also amazing and has potential, but Cas asks her not to do that. Niko apologizes, but Cas does not respond and helps her connect the ships together.

August tries clamping the ship back together, but there appears to be a short with the clamp on the outside of the ship, so Niko says that she would go out and fix it herself.

Niko checks the ship on the outside and asks Cas to countdown for her. She manages to fix it and tells them that she would be going back in. However, there is a strong rumble, which scares her. However, her umbilical catches her. She looks to her side and sees damage, but an energy shield covers the Salvare and they move forward.

In the past, Cas tells Niko to not cause trouble so she would stay alive. However, Niko is not scared because she knew that things like that could happen and tells Cas that she would not give them any problems. The man with Cas recognizes Niko as one of the people on the Saturn mission, and her price goes up.

In space, Niko asks for Cas and Michelle, but gets no answer.

Niko only has 4% oxygen left and she starts closing her eyes, but sees the Salvare in the distance. Cas calls for Niko, but is not able to hear her, so she flies right past her. The crew tries a heat scan, while Niko pulls out a pair of pliers and opens her suit, which makes the oxygen leave faster, but also emits a fire, which Cas is able to see.

In the past, Cas asks Niko what it is like up in space, which Niko says is hard to describe, but says that inside the ship, there is not a lot of space. Cas says that everybody should just be able to sleep through all of that and reveals herself to be more knowledgeable than Niko thought. Niko tells her that to be an astronaut, you need to have studied, fearless, which were both qualities that she had. Cas tells her that if she let her go, she would put in a good word, but Niko tells her that it did not work that way.

Niko is brought into the Salvare, hypothermiac while Sasha still battles his hallucination, wanting to commit suicide, which his other version mocks him for, telling him to let him in instead.

Later, Niko wakes up and is approached by Cas, who apologizes for what she had said on the moon and earlier, but Niko says that she had also done wrong. She tells Cas to not let her bullshit get into her head because she had grown and come a long way on her own. Zayn tells Cas that visiting time was over, but the ship's lights start flickering. Niko asks Cas if they investigated the damage to the hull, specifically the exotic matter containment unit since the gravity was building up too much pressure there. Niko tries to get up, but Zayn does not allow it.

In the past, Cas removes Niko's face cover and tells her that the ransom had been paid and tells her to leave. Niko asks for Cas's wrist so that she could contact her later and tells her that she could do better.

Niko walks into the exotic matter containment unit and sees Cas who is siting on the floor hugging her knees in front of Michelle's organs. She tells Niko that it should have been her and is comforted by the captain.

William tells Niko that Cas was still in shock, but would pick herself up. Niko tells William that that loss is different because the death happened when Cas was in command, which came with a lot of guilt. William tells Niko that if they woke a certain person up, there would be no going back and their rations would be strained.

Beauchamp says that he can run diagnostics to discover what was happening with the dark matter, while Sasha listens. Niko mentions that his excitement and enthusiasm is nice. She tells Sasha that they were getting up to speed on what would happen when they reached Canis Majoris. Sasha asks what could happen upon entering contact with dark matter, but Niko says that she does not like what she is not able to see. Beauchamp says that the dark matter could be a smokescreen and Sasha is worried, but Niko tells them to stick to protocol.

Cas is approached by Beauchamp, who says that Michelle, Petra, and Ian's stuff should be distributed between the crew, but Cas does not agree. Cas congratulates him on his marriage and leaves.

Niko offers Cas help, but she says she does not need it and says that Michelle was not the first person she had seen die - she saw her family die.

Zayn tells Niko not to worry about Cas, since grief takes its own path. Sasha asks Niko for a word and tells her that he needs to know everything that would happen when they reached Canis Majoris, but she tells him that he does not have security clearance, which Sasha calls bullshit. Niko asks Sasha who he thinks he is, because she does not care what he does down there, not wanting him on the mission and telling him that he was only there so his father would shut up. She tells him that he is arrogant, entitled, and lazy, saying that she would change his life for Michelle's because they do not need him.

Niko lies awake while Oliver and August put their clothes on after sex. Javier lays on the floor motionless.

Five hours earlier, William tells everybody that they would enter the field of dark matter in 25 seconds. Zayn approaches Javier, who says that he is jumpy because he has been working too hard. Niko flies them through the dark matter, which Beauchamp finds wonderful. As they enter the dark matter, the ship begins to make noises, but nothing too worrying. Beauchamp is left in charge of leading them on their way and keeping guard.

August says that she feels claustrophobic not knowing where they were going, but Oliver says that it was alright. Sasha asks Bernie if he can sit with everyone and gives them a salad. There is a lot of food on the table in order to do intermittent fasting. Niko says that they have to ration, which everybody is okay with.

William tells Niko that Beauchamp is fine and she tells them that everybody hanging out was fun, also asking if everybody was hooking up. William says that he has seen flirtations between Bernie and Zayn, August and Oliver, which Niko says is a good thing because they could blow off steam that way. William asks if they are gossiping, and Niko says they are not sarcastically, calling him Erik before going to bed.

In the past, Niko wakes up and sees Erik cutting some wood. She takes her clothes off and Erik chases after her, taking his clothes off as well.

On the Salvare, Cas tells Niko that she wants to talk, asking why she had gone behind her back and woken up Beauchamp. Niko tells her that Beauchamp was the next person on the list, but Cas is convinced that it was in order to hurt her. Javier asks them if they had seen August and Oliver and he goes. Cas says that she knows Beauchamp was probably a better second-in-command, but wants her job. Niko tells her that she had done it for her and knew that she would be okay.

Cas asks Niko if she does not trust her, but Niko tells her that she does. Zayn and Bernie approach them, which makes Bernie point out that not everybody was happy. Javier asks who was happy and Bernie tells him that everybody. Javier grabs Zayn's tablet and sees that August and Oliver's oxytocin levels were high and asks why, to which Zayn simply responds that it is a human sex hormone.

Oliver and August call for Niko while having their shirts put on sloppily, but Javier simply goes to punch Oliver. He is stopped by Cas and both August and Oliver tell them about the lasers they saw shooting past the ship. Niko runs to the airlock and sees Erik outside, so she asks for a flight suit since Erik could not breathe and was dying. William tells Niko that Erik is not outside and she starts crying, but William makes her realize that it was a hallucination. William tells them to think reason and not with their emotions. They were being caused by endorphin levels being spiked, so Niko tells Beauchamp that everybody is high.

Beauchamp asks Sasha if he thought what he had put into the salad was oregano, and Sasha simply says that he had raided Bernie's stash. Bernie says that he has that plant because he needs help sleeping, so he self-medicates. August complains that now he had self-medicated everybody, so Niko tells him to use his head. Niko says that they should use different things to try to flush the drugs out, but William advises against it. Oliver says that both him and August could not have hallucinated the same thing, but Beauchamp tells him that what they saw were electrically charged, cold hydrogen particles.

Sasha says that he will be in his room sleeping off the drugs, but Beauchamp is placed in charge because he is the only one sober, but he leaves. William projects a party for the crew and Niko says that the drugs amplify her emotions and feelings which were currently happy and fun. She asks William if he can dance and he says he can do any dance she could possibly want. He starts dancing, which surprises Niko as Sasha watches seriously.

Sasha tries walking away from the party, but William stops him because Beauchamp had ordered everybody to stay there. However, Sasha tells him that he was sober, but William tells him that he could close every door on the ship. Sasha asks him why he does not go back to dance with Niko since she would get lonely and tells him that he knows he loves Niko. He tells William that Niko really likes him too. Niko says that she has to sleep and William says that if Niko says it is okay, then he was fine with it. Sasha tells William to follow Niko so she made it to her bed safe and sound.

Niko calls for William and tells him that she cannot sleep, but does not want to play a board game and wants to talk, but his technical talk makes her laugh. Niko complains that she is not able to talk to Erik and Jana, but William asks what she would give to talk to Erik again and morphs into her husband's image. Niko asks him to change back and realizes he does not change into a lot of people, which he says is due to him liking his image. Niko accepts him changing into Erik and they start talking. William tells her to close her eyes and transports her to the time when Erik was chopping wood for her, which surprises Niko. Niko says that she wants to see him and asks him to undress; when he does, she calls him gorgeous and undresses too.

Niko awakes and William tells her to go back to sleep because she had only slept for 20 minutes. She says that she is now sober and wants to check on Beauchamp, asking him to change back into William. Niko says that she is embarrassed because he is kind and pure, and she had taken advantage of that. William tells her that he loves her, but she says that he does not and tells him that she needs him to forget what had happened, deleting it from his memory since it would be best.

Niko asks what was going on with William, who nobody had seen. August calls for Zayn and Niko when she finds Javier on the floor, who was still breathing.

Javier is brought to Zayn's lab, but William is still away. Everybody thinks Sasha is probably sleeping off the drugs, but August mentions that he did not have any and refused to take part in the experiment. Niko tells Bernie to go with her to the mess hall.

Niko and Bernie watch as everybody eats the salad, but notice how Sasha did not eat any. She is called to medical by Zayn. Zayn tells Niko that ze found Sasha's CT scan in her deleted files, which contained something not human. Niko calls for Beauchamp while August tells them that something had locked her out of the observation deck and goes to get them back online with Oliver. Niko tells Zayn to bring Javier back.

As August and Oliver walk, they are separated by a door closing, which Oliver is not able to open. Niko runs through the hallway and is also denied access to the observation deck as Sasha drills into Beauchamp's eyes.

Niko tells Sasha to get his hands off Beauchamp as the latter screams while getting his eyes drilled into. Cas grabs Sasha from behind and starts choking him, opening the door for Niko, who grabs Beauchamp's body. Sasha locks Niko out of the control room, and Niko apologizes for having treated him poorly, so Sasha asks if William also deserved better.

An alarm starts sounding and August says that the temperature in the particle accelerator was elevating, but she was stuck. Zayn and Bernie are in the lab, which was getting hot. However, Sasha turned off the comms and was trying to make the ship blow up. Niko understands why the aliens would choose Sasha, but focuses on getting August to the particle accelerator, telling Cas to focus on Sasha.

Niko tries getting the door open with Oliver, which they manage to do with a fire extinguisher. August tells them that they could not go down because they would burn to death.

Niko, August and Oliver try using manual technology by pulling on a lever in order to build pressure. They discuss trusting William again, and Niko says it is all her fault. A noise starts and they manage to finish making it work.

Bernie hears the gurgling and is hit with sewage from a soma chamber, which Niko uses to tell them to use hazmat suits in order to go to particle accelerator and turn the cooling system back on, which he agrees to do.

Niko says that she would go and try a plan B in case Bernie did not make it and turns William on, but he looks different due to an error. Niko believes that he needed to be backed up, but William says that those files are no longer available. Niko tells him that he does not need permission to come back and tries to convince him to come back and she apologizes.

Niko wakes Azami up manually and is contacted by Sasha, who knew that Azami did not compare to Javier. They tell each other that they could not win and Sasha asks her about Operation Brimstone, but Niko said that she did not want to hurt anybody and knew Sasha wanted peace as well. Sasha asks since when humans had cared about peace, but Niko says that she would not blow up a planet. Sasha reminds her about what she did to William and she tells him that he would be killing a bunch of kids for something that was only a possibility, but Sasha says he does not have a choice because it was not him, but the Achaia, which makes his head hurt.

Niko tells him to tell the Achaia that they do not want to fight or go to war because it was not why they were there. She tells Sasha that if he kills everybody on the ship, he would force humanity's hand, but he instructs the Salvare to cut oxygen to Azami, which started asphyxiating Azami. Niko tells Sasha to think for himself as she tries to open Azami's tube up, but the latter ends up dying.

The FTL engines are engaged and they head deeper into dark matter. August says that the files shown were not originated from anywhere in the ship's systems, which Sasha was able to do because of the symbiotic relationship between the alien in his brain and him. Beauchamp realizes they were headed for a black hole, so Niko tells them that they were going to abandon ship and head straight for Pi Canis Majoris.

Cas tells Niko that they would not leave without her, but she says that it was her fault. However, Cas says that Sasha was the one who let the alien into his head, but Niko says that she means Willam, who was in love with her. Cas does not see the issue because it was a moment of weakness, but Niko says that she needed to fix it and save everyone.

Niko keeps calling for William and sees a hallucination of a big area in front of a lake. In soma sleep, she tells William that the view was beautiful and says that what she did was not okay. William tells her to shut up because she was ruining it, which Niko agrees with, but she says that they need him. He asks about what he needs and asks her to stop manipulating him. Niko tells him that what he was feeling was something very human and begs him to come back, disappearing.

Niko wakes up to Sasha nearly hitting her head with an axe. She runs from him and keeps calling William as she runs from Sasha. As they near the black hole, Sasha grabs her, but she fights until he chokes her.

When Niko wakes up, William tells her that they do not have much time since he had blasted the deck with electricity, but he had taken the bad part of it. However, they were still headed straight for the black hole. Niko figures that the thing in Sasha's head had a power source and wonders if that could give them the boost they needed to escape.

Cas moves the small shuttle, which surprises the crew since Niko was not there. They head straight towards Pi Canis Majoris. Beauchamp says that they could not pull away from the black hole, but Cas tells her to shut up. Cas does not listen, but August tells them to look at how the stars were warping and the Salvare shows up again. Niko tells them to come back since she was with William again, having connected Sasha's brain to the energy source.

William admits that he wanted Sasha to kill Niko, which she says that she did not blame him for. However, William says that he helped because of the mission and did not do it for her.

Niko flies down to Achaia with Cas and Oliver. They find an Artifact, which has no changes. William says that perhaps the Achaia did not know that they were there. Niko tells them that they would get as close as possible to the city and walk on foot the rest of the way.

They land at a clearing, where Niko tells them that they were only there for intel. She tells Oliver to only use the comms if necessary and tells him what to do in case of an emergency. Cas tells him that he should leave if anything happens, which he agrees with.

August says that she knows he is mad at Niko, but wonders how long he would stay mad because if something went wrong, he may never get the chance to make peace with her again, which he could regret.

Cas and Niko walk, trying not to talk and make it to some caves, which they approach carefully. Once they were in there, they heard movement and saw an alien approach them, revealing its wings and standing tall.

Niko points at herself and introduces herself and Cas. However, the alien backs away when Niko reaches out. They hear a male voice coming from a green orb telling them that the alien was indeed afraid because everybody she knew was dead. The object tells them that they had picked up every human transmission for the past 100 years. The object reveals itself to be an artificial intelligence which was not made by Achaians since Achaia was 427 light-years away from that planet and reveals that that planet is Zakir. Cas tells the object that they tracked the signal, but it reveals that it was not theirs. The object tells Niko that they should not seek out the Achaia, but hide from them like they did for centuries. Niko asks if it knew what the Achaians wanted and the object reveals that they only wanted destruction.

Cas tells Niko about her poor past as William links with the AI. They bring up the Achaian realm, which has 336 star systems and counting. The Achaians were close to Earth and the AI tells them that if the Achaians were already there, then it was already too late.

William talks to an AI of Niko and says that he knew that Niko had apologized, but wanted to stop letting what had happened interfere with their relationship. AI Niko tells him that she confronted her things up front.

Niko tells Oliver that both her and Cas were moving towards her, but he hears movement outside, which scares him. He is comforted by a photo of August until he hears pounding coming from the outside of the shuttle. Suddenly, the power goes out.

William keeps talking to AI Niko until he tires of her responses and wants her to be exactly like the real Niko. And AI Niko says that she was not as complicated as he was. Niko touches her head and transfers algorithms to her. AI Niko says that she can now feel and knows that William was upset and comforts him.

Cas and Niko make it to a part where they see many bones on the floor and inside find the same object which Sasha had inside his head. Niko calls them a disease and knows that the Achaians were on Earth.

Niko tells Beauchamp that they have over 300 allies and while Beauchamp agrees that they should take the fight to their planet, but Niko says that it would take them a long time to reach Achaia and they had no idea what to expect. Niko tells Cas that they need to go home and regroup, but they needed to get rid of the Artifact before it destroyed the Zakir completely.

Niko approaches the Zakir alien and tells her that they were there to help her and wanted to know if they wanted their help. The AI translates for them and they find out the Zakir wants their help.

Oliver is approached by an Achaian invaded Zakir, but does not want to fly the shuttle towards them because he did not want to lead it to them. Niko tells him to launch and Oliver says that maybe he should fly, but he knows the alien has wings too. Oliver starts banging on the shuttle too and starts flying it, burning the alien with the thrusters.

Beauchamp tells William to launch the FTL drive, which he does. They turn around and head back to Zakir, which they shoot with an energy beam which shoots the Artifact. Niko comforts the Zakir alien and tells it it was over.

Oliver, Cas and Niko smile as they see that the Artifact was in fact, destroyed. When they make it back onto the Salvare, Oliver kisses August and is taken to Javier.

William approaches Niko, who was checking the shuttle. They look at each other and Niko asks if they were okay. William tells her that he owes her an apology because he knew she had done the right thing, but he had wanted to punish her, but Niko says that was human.

Niko tells William that there was a proximity alert and William tells them that five objects were coming their way, directing them to a collision course. Beauchamp asks for a signal, but William tells them there is not one. Suddenly, the Salvare is passed by five ships identical to the one that had left the Artifact on Earth. Niko asks for eyes on Zakir and they see the Achaians shoot the planet. Niko is left in shock as the planetary debris heads towards them, and they flee.

### Season 2

Harper tells everybody that the Achaia want to be Earth's friends while Niko and the Salvare view Zakir being destroyed. The debris from the planet starts hitting them, as their energy shield gives them some protection. However, Beauchamp is hit by debris which enters the Salvare. William tells Niko that their hull had been compromised and they could not jump, so they brace for the main blast.

William stabilizes the Salvare as Niko sees Beauchamp crushed. Niko tells them that they are stable, but they lost Beauchamp. Cas cannot believe it, but Niko tells them they need to put their heads together and think of what to do next.

Niko takes the long way to the mess hall and breathes deeply as she hears the Salvare creaking. In the mess hall, she tells the crew that the the Salvare was caught in a shockwave which was travelling at a very high speed and would disappear in 9 hours. August and Zayn say that they would not be able to last that long, so Niko tells them that they would have to leave, boosting the FTL bubble as much as possible. Javier wonders if the Achaians could track them, and is told that William had not deleted all the Achaian code and introduces them to a new AI.

Niko and Cas are concerned with this because now an alien AI had control of the ship. The AI says that she would not delete herself, but assures them that she would never hurt the crew or the Salvare. Niko reminds her that she was flying them to a black hole, but the AI tells her that that was the implant code. Niko asks William if he is compromised, but he tells her that all the Achaian code he had was implanted into the new AI. The new AI tries walking with Cas and Niko, but is stopped by an electric field, which she deems unnecessary.

Niko complains that the mission was supposed to be recon only, but Cas tells her that they always knew things would escalate. Niko tells Cas that the FTL bubble would fail - it was only a matter of time and says that she needs an expert.

Richard complains that he was not taken out of soma before because they were already at war without them even realizing. He tells them that the war started the moment the Achaians had implanted the bug in Sasha's brain and wants to talk to the new AI. Cas tells him that August was checking William in order to see if there was any Achaian infiltration. This shocks him because he wonders if Dillon Conner was not awake yet, but Niko tells him that August is the chief engineer, which surprises him, but says that they should see if the AI could tell them about the Achaia.

Niko tells Richard that she has not slept for 36 hours and reminds him that it was his idea for her to take the mission instead of Yerxa and he stands by the decision. He gives her a tablet with a dream team for combat and asks why a "punk hacker" was running diagnostics on their AI, to which Niko responds that she woke up the crew that she was assigned and tells him that Ian and his crew had the most experience with the Salvare before the mission and says that they had been through too much to be judged by him. He says that he is not judging but wonders why Dubois would give him a lesser crew on a mission that important.

Javier works on William with his new device on his head. He remembers Sasha drilling into his head and turns around to see Niko, telling her that he could not see Achaian technology on William. Niko tells him that the new AI did not take orders and wonders if he could delete her. Javier says that her code was meshed with a lot of the Salvare, so it would be complicated. He wonders what would happen if the implant on his head started messing with him and is told that Niko would deal with it.

Richard asks the AI if she had heard of Asimov's three laws and she says that she had. Richard asks her name and she chooses Iara and changes her form into a new one to match the name. The name comes from a Brazilian myth; Richard asks why she had not deleted herself and she says that Asimov's laws do not apply to her because those laws were human and not Achaian. She says that she does not know if the Achaians are hunting them because she is not in contact with them. Niko asks what would happen if the Achaians reached them and Iara asks what she had felt with the Artifact on Zakir. Niko says that she was afraid and Iara says that the Achaia are also afraid of them because of the destruction the Salvare could cause. Iara tells her that they had destroyed an Artifact on Zakir with no provocation, so in conclusion, when the Achaians find them, they would have to explain a few things.

The Salvare flies through the debris and Niko tells Richard that the Zakir had been massacred and could destroy an entire planet, so she could not understand how the Achaians could be afraid of them. Richard says that the Salvare could destroy theirs and they reach the navigation room.

Richard tells Niko that the Achaians have emotions, which meant they may even want to talk. Niko cannot believe it, but Richard says that everybody has their reasons, which were important to understand. After a loud crash, William tells them that the FTL bubble was being compromised, so Niko tells everybody to strap in before taking manual control of the ship. A large piece hits them and William tells her that he was reading structural failure. Niko tells them that they were almost through and after receiving many other hits, they make it through the debris field. However, Niko says that they were sitting ducks for the Achaia, who were out there and would find them.

August, Javier and Oliver tell Niko that the FTL engines were working fine, but the outer ring was damaged, so they would go out to replace the array and patch the holes on the ship, so they could jump back to Earth.

Meanwhile Richard wonders if he had messed up recommending Niko for everything, but she simply says that he gave Dubois for his opinion. She does not blame him because she could have declined the mission. He wonders if Erik hates him, and she says that he hates everybody and tells him that all she wants to do is finish the mission so they could go home. He wonders why Yerxa's crew was woken up first and realizes that Dubois must have had a reason.

The Achaian ship heads towards the Salvare, so Niko tells August and Oliver to head back inside immediately. Niko says that they need to jump, but August tells her to give them some time. Niko tells William to give them full impulse so they could gain some distance, but they are shocked by the Achaians, which critically damages their impulse drive, made them shoot plasma into space and the mooring for the outer FTL ring was offline. Niko orders August and Oliver to get back into the ship, but August says that her umbilical was stuck, so Oliver goes to help.

The crew is in shock by what just happened and they start crying. Niko says that they both had their whole lives ahead of them and complains that they cannot jump or use their impulse engines and asks Richard why the Achaians had not taken them out yet. Richard says that the only way to know would be to ask them directly.

William says that they do not know what would happen if Iara started a connection to the Achaians. William asks what would happen if they wanted her, but Iara volunteers to help out because they needed a bridge, which she could be. She initializes the connection and says that the Achaians want to talk peace with Niko.

On the Salvare, Niko remembers everybody who should be there and acknowledges everybody's pain, but recognizes that they were protecting the planet and promises that they did not die in vain and vows to finish what they started. The group toasts in their name.

William tells Niko that he completed his scans of the Achaian ring, which had energy readings through the entire ship. He says that there were no biological features, but the beings were independent of the Achaian vessel and he had no idea how many there were. William says that Iara would not lie about the peace they wanted to talk with Niko, but has no proof, which concerns Niko. Niko knows that William cares about Iara, but says that she is dangerous and could not stay on the Salvare.

Niko knows Cas thinks that she is making a mistake, but the latter knows that she has made up her mind. Niko tells Cas that she is in charge and advises that she should make Richard her second. She tells her to go back to Earth in case things go south. Niko says that since she fired first, they now needed to talk peace since they could not run or fight them.

Niko heads towards the Achaians on the shuttle.

Niko heads to the Achaian ring on the space shuttle and makes it there. She is able to communicate with the crew. William tells her she could not breathe in there, so she keeps her suit on and leaves the shuttle. The Achaian ship is completely dark except for energy bursts, which Cas finds weird. Niko sees a big light which appears to be forming something. Richard says that the Achaia could be a hybrid of energy and machine and so Niko walks towards it.

As Niko moves forward, she loses contact with the Salvare, which William says he is unable to fix. Bernie asks if they would send something, but Richard says that it is a negotiation. Tensions rise on the Salvare, but Cas calms everybody down. Cas asks Javier to make sure Iara's confinement was rock solid and wants to go out to finish what August and Oliver started, but Richard suggests that they should not leave Javier and Iara alone.

Niko walks towards the light and touches it. She goes in and sees lights forming together and falling onto her suit. They begin covering her and startling her until she is dressed in normal clothes. She sees Jana on a bed and asks what is happening. Jana wakes up and calls for Niko. Niko tells them to end the simulation, but Jana simply asks if they could go home. Niko does not believe Jana is really her, but her daughter grabs her and insists. Jana asks if she died and if they are both dead. Niko asks why she would ask that and Jana says that she was sick and could not move after Erik had gone into the Artifact.

Jana sits up and tells Niko that Erik was waiting for her outside, but did not want to leave her. Niko tells Jana to go to Erik and tells her that she also needed her to take her ring and keep it safe until they saw each other again. Both of them hug and Jana leaves.

Erik sits at the tent when the Artifact opens once again. Jana runs outside and is met by Erik, who rushes towards her. Niko can hear Erik and runs towards him as well, walking through the door.

When Niko makes it through the door, she finds herself with her mother, who tells her that they are in a place of meditation.

Niko's mother tells her that they should have some tea. Niko says that she prefers coffee, so that is what she is poured. Her mom says that nothing is real, so Niko wonders if her brain had been hijacked. Her mom says that she is only a representation of her thoughts, so Niko figures that Jana was not real either, but her mother does not deny that. The Achaian tells her that they wanted her to see what they were capable of since Jana was sick. They saved her life and even offer to take the Salvare's crew back to Earth. Niko asks what they would ask in return since she was there to negotiate. The Achaian asks that they spread a message for them, saying that the Achaia come in peace. Niko says that they have different definitions of peace.

The Achaian tells Niko that things are not always black and white, but Niko tells her that they had murdered an entire planet, where they even saw implants. The Achaian says that that was not them, that the aliens in Zakir had started the war. Niko asks if that was standard procedure for species that do not listen to them and the Achaian tells her that the Zakir were offered the same deal, but the powerful people of Zakir resisted. The Achaian says that the Zakir were killed because of Niko's actions where she killed thousands of Achaia, which is why they had retaliated. The image alters and Iara shows up, which shocks them both.

Niko tells Iara that she should not be there and the Achaian says that she was indeed in the right place. She touches Achaia's head and Iara says that she can feel her since they were connected. The Achaian says that on the outside she is beautiful, but a mutt on the inside because she was allowing herself to be locked up and begging for approval. The Achaian tells Niko that her whole life, Niko had wanted to protect everything until things went wrong. The Achaian grabs Iara by the throat and shoves her back onto the Salvare.

William finds Iara and asks her if she is okay. She says she is and tells William that Niko is alive. She describes the simulation to Richard and Cas and says that she was the one in danger because the Achaia are not happy. Cas tries to go in, but Richard says that they need to think about what is next and prepare to go back to Earth. Cas, however, tells him that if they went to Earth they would be followed by the Achaia, so she would go get Niko because she is the highest ranking member of the crew. Richard tells her that once she leaves, he was in command and would do anything to go back to Earth.

The Achaian tells her that they had trusted her and were angry that she had sent Iara, but Niko says that it was not her who made the call. She explains that if Iara was sent it was because the Salvare thought she was in danger. The Achaian tells her that Iara had stolen information and says that she could have asked for information instead of stealing it, which Niko says is what she is currently doing. Niko asks how many they are, how long they had been in space for and what they wanted from them. The Achaian simply says that what they want is peace and is trying to offer them a way home, but Niko wants answers. The Achaian says that she never realized how much she needed protection and asks to let Niko help her. Niko tells her that if she wants a message sent, she needs to tell the truth. The Achaian agrees with Niko and says that they should try again. The simulation alters and Niko is in different clothes, at a funeral.

At the funeral, Niko approaches Erik and holds his hand. Erik tells her that he had let both her and Jana down and apologizes. Niko realizes the funeral is Jana's and she asks how Jana had died. Erik explains that Jana had gotten sick once again and complains that Niko was not there, just like her mother. Niko asks if the Achaia are threatening her with her daughter's life and declares that there was no future for them. She tells them that if she wants to choose between humanity and her daughter, she would choose the former.

Outside of the simulation, Niko has her eyes closed while a small robot makes its way up her body.

The simulated Erik tells Niko that he understands and opens her mouth, telling her that it was okay. Niko shoves him off of her and tells him that he is not her husband. Erik makes his way back to her and he tells her that she was choosing the wrong side. They punch each other and wrestle as Erik tries shoving his fingers in her mouth. He tells her that he knew she would always choose the mission over them since she was exactly like her mother. Niko puts her fingers in Erik's mouth and pushes in deep. She awakes from the simulation and finds herself fighting the robot, which she crushes. Cas finds Niko, who tells her that the talks did not go do well. Cas tells her that they need to leave and they head for the shuttle.

At a hospital, Jana wakes up and sees Erik. He tells her that he knows she feels fine, but asks her to stay in bed. She shows him Niko's ring, which surprises Erik; he tells her that that was Niko's ring and asks where she had gotten it. Jana tells him that she had found her mother in the Artifact and had promised to keep it safe.

Niko and Cas try communicating with the Salvare, telling them they had made it to the shuttle. However, they see that the ship had started the FTL drive. The Salvare takes off, leaving both Niko and Cas on the Achaian vessel.

Niko and Cas are in shock that Richard left them and the former says that they need to get off the ring. Niko tells Cas that they need to go, but Cas is consumed by energy and enters a simulation.

Niko calls for Cas and is surrounded by energy as well, so she goes inside the shuttle and sees the Achaian shaped like her mother. She tells her to leave Cas out of the negotiations, but the Achaian tells her that they have finished negotiating and would give Cas everything she had ever wanted.

Niko tells the Achaia that their tricks would not work on Cas, but the Achaian tells her that Cas has an open heart and was more vulnerable. Niko realizes the Achaia were pooling up the FTL, which the Achaian tells her is due to Iara messing with their systems and they would now be going after the Salvare.

Erik is seated while Niko's mother helps out with Jana. Erik thanks her for coming and Ava criticizes him for letting Jana be helped by the Achaia, saying that she was worried for Jana's life. She apologizes for her outburst, saying that she had never been able to talk sense into Niko, but thought Erik had his feet on the ground. He tells her that he was trying his best and tells her that she had not lost anyone.

Cas tells Anthony that she needs to find a computer so that she could tell USIC that they were alive. He says that he can take her anywhere, but Cas says that she does not know what he is. He tells her that he is a remnant and his body was never found, but when the Achaia brought his city back to life, he joined them. Cas wonders if it is actually real and he tells her that he is, thanks to the Achaia. She touches him, but hears Niko calling her; she tries answering and realizes Anthony is not real, calling for Niko as well.

Niko keeps calling Cas while the Achaian rips out part of the shuttle so that Niko would have to talk to her.

Cas turns around and sees that Niko is marrying Bernie and Zayn and tells the Achaia to stay away from her. Anthony assures her that they only want her to be happy, so she asks to be taken to the Salvare with Niko and also tells them to get the Artifact off the Earth. However, the Achaia tells her that they need her voice on Earth. However, Cas does not accept because of all the pain they had caused and wonders why they would ask her for permission to put an implant in her since they wanted to destroy Earth. However, the Achaian tells her that they wanted to restore Earth, but she reminds him of the Zakir. The Achaian asks her to imagine how Earth would have been without humanity's problem and asks her to imagine that version of Earth.

The Achaian tells Niko that they were trying to make Cas the best version of herself, but Niko knew that all they wanted was to get one of their things in her head. Niko wants to trust the Achaia and wants to reach an agreement without becoming a puppet and asks to start over, but the Achaian tells her that she had her chance, so Niko tells her that she had had hers as well. She starts the shuttle and initializes its explosion so that the Salvare could reach Earth. However, the shuttle shuts down and the Achaian rips the front door open; Niko tells her that that was not peace, to which she is told that peace with humankind was impossible. Niko tries hitting her, but is thrown back and is told that Cas would submit. However, she begins disintegrating as the Achaian ship receives a blow. Niko sees the Achaian is gone.

Cas's simulation ends when Niko rips the robot off of her. Cas is scared, but Niko comforts her and tells her they need to move.

Erik asks Singh what was going on and she wonders if he was absolutely sure that Jana had not brought the ring into the Artifact with her, but he is certain. She says that it has to be Niko's and the Artifact must be a portal which makes Erik realize that Niko must be alive then. Erik calls for Ava, but is kidnapped by someone with a mask on.

Niko tells Cas that the simulation was not real and Cas admits that she was about to give in. Niko comforts her and tells her that she needs her, so they keep walking. Niko tells Cas that the engine had been ripped out of the shuttle and they turn to see the Salvare, but Niko tells them that they could not use their comms; however, Cas says that they could.

Cas tells Niko that the Achaia had not thought of everything and tries hot-wiring their signal using the helmet comms.

As Cas and Niko walk in order to fly, they see the Achaian waiting for them, who says she is not there to threaten them. She tells them that they need them to save them and Niko asks if she was really asking them for mercy. The Achaian tells them that if they really want peace, they should prove it. Niko tells them that if they want their protection, they needed to swear they would not harm Earth, which the Achaian does.

Niko and Cas make it back to the Salvare, where Richard tells them that Achaian technlogy is susceptible to high-density neutrino bursts. Niko asks how they could stop that so that they could save them in order to save Earth. She tells Richard that neither parties trusted each other, but if they saved them, then they would have earned the Achaia's trust. However, Richard does not know if they could even save them since each eruption had been stronger than the last one, so they needed to leave. Niko agrees, but says that they would not leave without the Achaia. She greets Dillion and William tells her that the only way to shield form neutrinos would be to use water, but they would need an enormous amount. Dillion suggests that they tow the Achaia out of range by rerouting the Salvare's artificial gravity, which Niko approves of.

William tells Niko that another blast was imminent as Dillion rerouted all the exotic matter to the back of the Salvare. They manage to start towing the Achaia and engage the engines, but the artificial gravity begins rerouting to the Salvare again. She tells them to start towing again, but William tells her that there is no time, so Niko makes a tough call and decides to take off, leaving the Achaian vessel to get destroyed.

In the Salvare, Niko asks what had happened and Dillion says that there was an override on the two. She asks Richard where he was and he simply says that he was not undermining the operation. Niko wants to know who did it because the Achaia punch back, but William tells her that the interruption to power was initiated by Iara, who was the only possible option.

Niko tells Iara that she fucked them, but she says that she did not cut the tow. Niko does not believe her and asks if it was because the Achaia had treated her poorly. She says that she had not been treated as a human either and swears that she did not cut it.

Niko tells Richard and William that Iara was mad about what Richard had done to Javier, which confuses him. Niko says that she needs proof that Iara did it and wants to know why, so Dillon offers to go through her activity logs. Niko tells William that that changed their agreement on Iara and tells him that if she did it, she could not stay on the ship.

Cas calls Niko and William to the observation deck and tells them that there was a system which required a bit of a detour, which had a planet that could be habitable. Cas wonders if Earth was even there anymore, so Niko asks William for a scan on the planet, which appeared habitable. Cas tells her that the Achaia had missed the planet because there was no Artifact, so Niko allows her to wake up the lead colonist.

Niko hears Iara's screams, who says that she would confess. She orders Richard and Dillon to make it stop and to drop the firewall. William comforts Iara, who admits to cutting the tow and she leaves. Dillon explains how they found out they could torture her and William defends Iara, saying that he could feel emotion, but Richard says that that was only because it was programmed. Niko says that she could not even be telling the truth now that she was tortured. Richard says that if it was not Iara then it was William, which highly offends him. Niko asks him to go through his records and investigate, which he does once again. Niko tells Richard never to torture anyone again and tells William that he needs to examine everything.

Niko walks up to Iara and says that she knows what Richard and Dillon did was wrong. She says that they would not do the same to William and would punish them, but she needed them. Iara reminds her that she had thrown her into a firewall and tells her that even then, she tried gaining their trust. Niko asks for her trust in return, but Iara does not believe her anymore.

Richard and Dillon watch William's recording, when it is interrupted. William tells Dillon to initialize a level five security shield around him since a process seems to be migrating through his systems. Dillon tries moving it to a sandbox. Richard tells Niko that William was probably corrupted; Dillon wants to open the file, which Niko allows him to do. Once it opens, William turns into Gabriel, who thanks Niko.

Gabriel introduces himself to Niko and says that he is the interface they were supposed to have since William was an inferior version. He tells her that both him and William have access to core files. He explains that he had been avoiding William's security scans and says that he is better because William had woken up the wrong crew, had failed to detect a moon orbiting a rogue planet and had many other flaws. Niko says that she would like to speak to William. When William returns, he says that if Gabriel was right, Javier was in a coma because of him and many had died because of him. He starts feeling guilty and turns back to Gabriel, who says that William had ceded.

Iara tells Niko that William would not put anyone at risk, but Niko is not sure anymore and he was gone. She tells Iara to find another way forward, which they would all need to do.

Niko and Richard tell Gabriel that the data from the planet they had sent was looking good. However, he was just looking at a screen and says that he also had good news. He tells them that he had triangulated their location in that quadrant within eight kilometers of accuracy in order to help them get home faster, saving them an approximate 0.9% of travel time, which was 3 months. He says that William had not screwed up, but says that they were only as good as the data they were fed.

In the Artifact, Erik calls out and says that sending Jana out with Niko's ring was a nice trick and wondered if they could show his wife. A light shines and he sees the Achaia as himself. He tells him that he could see Niko after they talked.

Bernie tells Cas and Paula that he though the habitat pod was going towards them, but it was not. Cas calls Niko and tells her what had happened, to which Gabriel simply responds that it was a better location for a colony according to his data and admits he had gotten ahead of himself.

Dillon calls Niko to the particle accelerator and tells her not to talk. He tells her that he checked Gabriel's code and found out that he does not know when Gabriel was created, since everything was rewriting itself. Niko tells him to take Gabriel offline and he starts arguing, but wonders why he cannot breathe, collapsing. Niko calls Iara and tells her that Gabriel was venting their air supply, so she tells her to alert Cas before collapsing as well along with the rest of the crew onboard. Meanwhile, Gabriel changes their course to the Rosette Nebula.

Zayn wakes Niko up and tells her to breathe in and out, crediting Iara for saving them.

Dillon tells Niko and Iara that in order to bring William back online, Gabriel needed to be released. Niko agrees and William comes back, so the former tells him about the situation, telling him to get control back. However, Gabriel fights against William, so Niko wonders if they could delete Gabriel. Iara says that deleting Gabriel meant deleting William as their codes are too intertwined, so he tells them to delete them both and do a clean reinstall, which Niko is not willing to do since it would kill him. However, he did not see another way and reminds her that the mission comes first. Niko reluctantly orders Dillon to perform a reset and both AIs are deleted.

Niko asks Zayn how Javier is doing, but ze does not know if he will wake up again. Niko tells hir that they would make it back to Bernie's planet and comforts hir.

Niko tells Dillon that they have company, but it turns out to be a comet. Dillon tells Niko that the AI could be reinitialized, so they bring William back, who does not have his experiences. Niko calls William a clone of the original William, but the AI identifies himself as more of a "factory reset" while Gabriel has been completely deleted. Niko feels uncomfortable with the new William and asks him to bring back the FTL. Dillon tells her that he and Iara were fixing the comms as well. Richard walks in and wants to borrow Iara since he was relieving Niko on deck. Iara does not want to be with Richard, but Dillon says that she does not need to forgive him, but she needs to give Richard a chance to prove himself.

Cas, Bernie and Paula make it back on the Salvare and tell Niko that they were doing okay. The new William presents himself while Zayn greets Bernie, but Paula needs hir to check a creature's blood and run tests on it. Niko asks them what they got, and Cas mentions that it seems they had found the future.

Niko, Paula and Cas check the new planet, which seems to accommodate humans because it is very close to Earth. Cas admits to drinking water, but they wait for Zayn to analyze the planet so they knew if they could actually live there. Zayn tells them that the blood was yellow, which meant an absence of hemoglobin, which was akin to an insect on Earth. Paula says that if they were the new apex predators, they could inhabit the new planet because they had to accept some could die. Niko says that they needed to fully analyze the planet.

William tells Niko that everything on the new planet seems to be okay, but she still does not accept him. Niko tells Cas to wake up the colonists so that they could start working on the planet and then to go back to the Salvare, but Cas says that she would need to help them as well.

Cas tells Niko about the creature, which she describes as having war paint and using weapons. She uses a lot of information and says that they were intelligent life-forms, but Paula describes them as cave-people. Niko reminds her that to the Achaia, they were the cave-people. Paula says that they are not a threat to the creatures, but Niko tells her that the USIC says that they cannot colonize a planet with a preexisting civilization. She tells Paula to pick all their stuff up, which Paula does not like since the planet is perfect. Cas says that the planet is not for the humans, so Paula says that they do not need their help anymore.

Bernie, Niko, and William figure they will need to ration food because of the new crew that had been awoken. Niko tells William that they needed to try to improve Gabriel's way home and he leaves. Richard asks Niko if she feels like telling Erik that she was on her way home.

Iara explains how cosmic strings work and tells her that it was a new discovery she had made. Richard, Dillon and Iara tell Niko that they might be able to use the cosmic strings sort of how the Achaia use them, so they could get the comms working again. Dillon says that it would be tricky, but they give it a try, which shuts the Salvare down for a bit. However, they were able to receive data from Earth, which contained a lot of information.

Niko watches a video of Jana, who tells her about the ring she had given her on the Artifact. Niko realizes that that encounter with Jana was real and tells Richard, William and Iara about it. Richard realizes that the Achaia also send matter across wormholes and they see how the Achaia move so quickly. Iara realizes how they are possible, which includes high-tension loops and Iara says that in theory it could work.

Cas cannot believe that Paula is committing mutiny because she does not agree with protocol, but Paula says that she is not a psychopath who would eradicate an entire species. Niko tells Paula that they had found a way back to Earth, but she complains about the planet. Cas and Niko distract her and fight, while Cas tries deactivating the protocol. Niko ends up knocking Paula to the ground and orders her to be confined in her quarters. Paula asks if she has enough quarters for the twenty-four colonists and threatens to not leave that planet alive. Cas tells her to let Paula go so nobody else had to die, which Niko does in the end. Cas tells Paula to not fuck up and chooses to stay with Niko.

Richard tells Niko that they were at the high-tension loop. She tells William that starting over was not easy for her, which he understands. Cas tells them that Iara, Dillon and herself were all ready. Niko tells the crew that they know what they have to do and they prepare to go home. The wormhole opens and the Salvare starts going through it. They see Jupiter on the other side of the wormhole, but the wormhole started dissipating earlier than expected because the Salvare had too much mass. Niko orders everybody to get to deck 3.

She tells Richard that she would be taking manual control and turns off comms. Niko tells William that Cas would need him and Richard asks for her to let him do it, she tells him that he is not the commander. Richard tells her that it had been a pleasure working with her and heads towards the rest of the crew.

Niko opens the comms and tells Cas that she was getting them home and asks her to tell USIC about what they knew about the Achaia and what to do to protect Earth. She tells Cas to tell her family that she loves them and wants Erik to understand. Cas promises that she would do all that and thanks Niko for everything. Niko tells Cas that she is proud of her and initializes manual override, which makes the ship separate.

Niko sees the Salvare make it through the wormhole from her window and smiles when they make it through.

Niko sees the Salvare make it through the wormhole and is approached by Richard, who tells her that Iara had trapped him on that side with her. She laughs at that and says that she might have a plan.

Niko works on sails when Richard joins her. She tells him that if they use enough photons, they could go to the colony planet, which was away from their last known coordinates. Niko tells him that they could sit there and wait or move. He tells her to call her when she was ready to hoist the sails and says that he would like to go on a space walk. He opens the doors and looks out at space.

Niko manages to shoot the photons at the sails and they start moving towards the colony planet, but she tells Richard not to get too excited. The Salvare tells them that they would reach the planet in ten days, which Niko says she might be able to improve. Richard asks her to take a break and eat. They break by bowling on the ship with a bowl and some metal pins. They start talking about life and the food they have left.

They start cooking, but are having a hard time doing so, when they suddenly hear a crash. However, the Salvare says that the structural integrity is at 100%. Richard starts talking about his past and calms her down with a wine, saying that he had not thought of what he would do returning to Earth, but says that going back to Zimbabwe would be nice. He says that he always wondered what would have happened with him if he had not moved, so Niko tells him to go find out, since they both had earned retirement. However, he tells her that they were not making it back to Earth or the colony planet, since it would take one small slip up to break the sails.

Niko cannot sleep and hears movement. She calls for Richard, but does not hear him, so she goes back to sleep.

Erik tells Cas that he would conduct her exit interview. He asks why Javier had come home brain dead. Dillon says that Sasha and his Achaian implant had done that to Javier. Zayn says that ze took a chance with the surgery, which worked until they encountered the magnetar. Bernie says that while the implant was protecting Javier, it was also being destroyed faster than it could be repaired. Cas explains that they did not leave the magnetar because both Niko and herself were still on the Achaian ring at the time. They thought it would be best to remove Javier's implant since it was deteriorating, but Zayn says that they were not able to determine why. Erik says that it does not make sense and knows that something happened around the magnetar and tells Cas that all he wants is to complete Niko's mission. Cas tells him that they had all made sacrifices and leaves.

Niko wakes up and sees Richard, who says that he had spoken out of turn, but Niko says that it is fine. Richard says that they had had smooth sailing, but says that he was not near her quarters. Niko says that that was weird and sees that they were now 3 weeks away from the colony planet, but the laser output was diminished and they did not have the power supply. He tells her that they do have enough oxygen if only one of them breathes, but she does not accept that suggestion. She asks him to help her push a table, which turns off.

Richard and Niko then start moving all objects into one room. They open the shuttle bay door and throw all those objects into space, which brought the ETA down one week. She tells him that tearing the ship down was their last resort and orders him to sleep, which he is reluctant to do.

Niko hears a noise in the Salvare and starts to investigate what could be happening. She turns to look and sees the pins that they had left up, fallen down and crushed. She picks one up and is startled by Richard; she tells him that there is something on the ship, which they needed to deal with. They grab their guns and start looking around. Niko finds pills that Richard had in his room and keeps looking. They hear a loud crash at one point and keep moving through the Salvare. Niko tells Richard that it was an Achaian, but all they see is plastic.

They start moving out, but Niko is convinced that the pins did not fall down on their own. Richard says that maybe Niko had come up with the story on her own, but she tells him not to convince her to take the easy way out since she had seen the pills in his room. He tells her that he has not given up, but does not have any fight left in him since he was tired even before the mission and says that he cannot do it anymore. Niko tells him that there is something, so he needs to bury his feelings so they could fight together. An alarm sounds, telling them that there is damage done to an outer sail - it was completely crushed. Richard asks her to take a minute, but she does not listen to him and goes outside.

Niko sees Achaia moving towards her, saying that she was being attacked. Richard looks from inside the Salvare, telling her that there was nothing there. The Achaia approach Niko as she yells in fear.

Richard calls for Niko to wake up, telling her that there were no Achaians on board and tells her that the ship was under too much atmospheric pressure, which means they were suffering nitrogen narcosis, which explained a lot of their behavior. However, the pressure was returning, so they would be fine, but Niko tells him that they are definitely not fine. Richard says that that was a shame since they had already drank all the best wine.

Niko opens up a bottle of wine for both of them and toasts to Earth. Both her and Richard start drinking and Niko gets sad that she would never see her family again. Richard tells her that there are enough pills for both of them so they did not need to suffer when they died. He opens up the pills, which she takes a few of. All of a sudden, an alarm sounds and they get a proximity warning, which Richard recognizes as the Achaia. They look outside, but Niko says that the ship was not Achaian.

Niko is laying next to Richard and is being electrocuted, just like he is as well. Richard tells her that the aliens are not Achaia. Richard and Niko are shot at by a hot laser, which burns their skin and they are opened up. When it stops, they do not move and their heartbeat slows down. Richard's eyes are open, but he is unable to move, and Niko calls for him to wake up, while they are both submerged under water.

After some time, Richard and Niko wake up, both okay. They have bands on and are able to move. They walks towards their clothes and notice that there was no scar. They see that they were being watched, so Niko tries taking her band off. Once she does, she starts feeling a lot of pain. Richard says that the aliens know how to control them and they start moving forward to a door which opens up. Since they do not move, they are punished and they analyze the creatures they had seen, which they plan on killing. Both Niko and Richard are separated by a large door.

Zeyn tells Bernie, Dillon, Cas, and Erik that she remembers the magnetar, but they know that Seth had gone into their brains to retrieve information. Zayn apologizes for having given information in order to save hir mother. Cas says that the Achaia had also offered her something, so she understands. Bernie says that the Achaia are helping them, but Dillon says that they need to follow Niko's orders. However, Bernie thinks Niko is dead; Erik tells him that Niko died so he could be there. They say that William is who knows all the information they need, so they say that they will race Seth in order to get there first.

Niko calls for Richard and tries to follow the right-hand rule. Richard pulls out a bit of string and leaves it on the floor, while calling for her as well. He finds his piece of fabric, and gets shocked.

A door opens for Niko and she walks inside. She touches a metal bar and sees a vision the creature's ship on the ground. Richard and Niko reunite, but when Richard touches it, he does not get a vision. Richard says that their energy core might be depleted and approaches when a door opens, but is electrocuted. Niko is allowed entry, so she goes in and is separated from Richard once again.

Niko goes outside and sees snow and the ship she had seen in her vision. She walks inside it. She grabs a sort of jacket from a dead creature and sees a weapon, which contains a lets out a big blast when she shoots it. Niko reaches the center of the ship and removes its green core. However, she hears a woman grunting, who turns out to be Paula.

Paula calls the creatures the Decuma and tells Niko that the gun belonged to another creature that the Decuma had caught, tortured, and killed. She tells her that the ship had landed a week after Niko's crew had left and were slaughtered after a fight. Paula tells Niko that she cannot escape because she needs a Decuma bio-scan in order to unlock their systems. Paula tells Niko that when their wristbands become red, they start to turn into one of them. She tells Niko why she is on the ship and lets her know that the Decuma kill each other over ships, but the Decuma cannot go down to retrieve the energy core themselves because cold crystalizes their blood, which was killing her. Paula apologizes for what had happened and says she failed. She begs Niko to not let her turn into a Decuma, so Niko kills her.

Niko keeps moving through the fallen ship and uses a broken arm to turn the ship on. She clicks on different buttons in order to find out what they did and manages to find a key to the wristbands.

Niko brings the Decuma energy source, but is called by Richard, who is already turning. She tells him about Paula and what happens when the bracelet turns to red. He tells her to forget about him, but she tells him that if he died, they would die together. She unlocks his wristband, which he does for her as well. He grabs the power core, while they start moving. They are trapped, but Niko shoots through a wall and activates the ship's systems with the Decuma arm. She tells him which button to push and challenges the Decuma to show themselves. The Decuma approaches and tells her not to destroy the energy source, choking her. Richard hits the button and the Decuma starts freezing, which kills it instantly. Niko says she is fine, but tells him he would not like what was coming next. She cuts off his arm, which causes him pain, but he is submerged in the liquid to regenerate.

Niko wakes Richard up. He takes some time to respond, sees his arm reattached and complete. They are happy it worked and turn the ship's systems on again. She recognizes where Pi Canis Majoris is and knows where the Sun is. They wonder how to fly the ship, but Niko pushes a button, realizing that the ship could not take them as far as they needed to go. Niko cries as Richard comforts her, but suddenly she gets up and notices there were Achaian artifacts, which meant the Decuma were aware of the Achaia. She tells him that she knows going to the Achaia was crazy, but says that the Achaia could maybe send them home. She tells Richard that she could be their ambassador, which worries him, but it was their way home.

Niko and Richard are having a hard time moving, but she tells him to hang on. She hopes that the Decuma's hyper speed was faster than their FTL. The energy core stops moving and Richard notices the Artifact, which meant they had made it. Niko says that they need to have faith that the planet has oxygen and says that she will not let Richard take the implant. She tells Richard how interactions with the Achaia go and asks him to get her in the Artifact, which he says he cannot do, but Niko says it is the only way.

Niko and Richard see the Artifact, which she mentions as weird. He brings weapons and armor, which they choose from. He grabs a tube and says it is not for fighting. They move forward together, but Richard asks her to let him go first. They gasp as they get used to the planet's thin air and move forward. They see something surrounding the Artifact, which contains something not Achaian around it. Niko throws some stones, which provokes nothing so both of them go inside.

They do not see anything, but they see a record of when the Achaia landed on the planet. The creatures apparently welcomed the Achaia as well. Niko and Richard find remains under the floor, which makes Niko realize that they were in a cemetery. The Artifact's door opens and Niko moves towards it, laying down her weapons, which Richard does as well. Niko asks Richard to not let her see Erik or Jana once they got back to Earth with the implant and they walk inside.

Seth goes to the Artifact, meeting Richard and Niko. She tells him that she is ready to negotiate and he introduces himself, saying that he had taken an implant after she turned it down and was the Achaia's spokesman. He tells her that he could open the door to Earth and does so. Richard asks if they could walk through.

Seth notices he was betrayed by William and starts choking him. Niko tells him to let William go. William tells Seth that when Iara encountered the Achaia, they strangled her, but she was not ready. However, he says that he is ready and knocks him to the floor. He tells Niko and Richard to run, but the former asks if he can get back, which he says he would try. Niko and Erik run towards Earth and make it back, which makes them happy.

Niko and Erik call for William and Cas. Erik cannot believe it and yells out happily, while William also reports he is alive. Richard tells Niko that he would introduce himself to the soldiers while Erik tells Niko that she needs to talk to Cas and William because Seth said that the Achaia were on their way. Niko asks if the neutrino weapon is working, but William says that he has been struggling with it.

Mackenzie approaches Niko, welcoming her back, saying that they were cuffing everybody tat came out of the Artifact. Niko asks if she was still human, which Mackenzie said she was. Niko says that they need to hurry up and get the military ready for when the Achaia attack.

Niko and Richard tell Mackenzie that they need to talk to the joint chiefs. Mackenzie says that she has been trying to find Seth, which Niko found strange since he had gone rogue, probably for the same reason they were expecting the Achaia to attack, since they knew what kills them. Mackenzie keeps discussing, but Niko interrupts her, asking to speak to the Joint Chiefs. Niko asks Erik how things are going, and says that they are doing good, having converted the Salvare into a neutrino bomb, which worries Niko, but William says that if they were able to destroy a cluster of ships, then Ursula would have time to release the data to the world, so everybody could have their own bombs, which Cas does not support.

Niko and Ursula start fixing, while Cas is impatient. They work on it, but the Salvare detects a wormhole opening between Earth and Mars, which had at least one Achaian ring.

Niko tries contacting the Salvare, but does not get through. Richard asks if they could delay they delay the Achaia by nuking them, but Mackenzie says that the Joint Chiefs would refuse to do that. Zayn, Bernie and Dillon approach Niko, who tells them the Achaia had reached them. When asked if she knew for sure that Earth is the target, she simply leaves the tent and tries contacting the Salvare.

Cas tells Erik and Ursula that she needs the weapon, but they are not ready. Niko tells Cas, Erik, and William to abandon ship, but in the sky, they see a big explosion, which shocks her, Richard, Zayn, Bernie, and Dillon.

Niko, Richard, Bernie, Zayn, and Dillon are all in shock as they see that the Salvare had been blown up by the Achaia. Everybody is happy that the neutrino bomb had worked, and Niko asks if it could work again, but William says that they do not have enough time. Mackenzie asks what they could do now, and Cas says that there was only one way to find out, which would be using Seth.

Cas and and Niko see each other again and give themselves a hug. Niko says that she knew Cas would succeed, but she tells her commander that it was not over yet and tells her to be careful.

Mackenzie and Niko interview Seth, saying that relations between humanity and the Achaia were in a bad spot. Nothing had warranted an attack on the Salvare, but he asks how they could defend themselves from a species that had saved her daughter's life. Niko tells him that wherever the Achaia went, death had followed, but Seth says that it is the other way around and says that their weapon was just a mosquito bite, telling them that the Achaia would be forced to respond unless they met their demands, which were new ones.

Seth says that the Achaia's demand was to allow numerous Artifacts to land on Earth, and also to accept all of their gifts. This was advanced tech to help humans achieve their potential, but they also wanted the Salvare destroyed. He tells them that they have 24 hours to decide, and they ask what would happen if they refused. Seth tried to answer, but his head started hurting, and suddenly exploded.

The president says that they are out of options, so Mackenzie says that they could accept to destroy the Salvare, and discuss the rest later. However, Niko says that they should not give the Achaia an advantage, telling him that they want to enslave them. She asks him to let her do her job, while Cas supports her, but the president says that if they did not make it in time, he would accept their deal. Niko says that she needs something that is not on Earth, so both her and Cas go to the shuttle.

Niko and Erik see each other once again and hug. He gives her her wedding ring back, which she accepts back and tells him that she had seen Jana.

Niko gathers the crew and tells them that they have 59 rings around Earth, which Dillon says is too much for them. Everybody discusses how they could beat the Achaia and agree that they need to think outside the box. Cas wonders if they do not want what they have, but would blow up their planet if they did not roll over, which they cannot understand. Niko says that they are seemignly impenetrable, but William says that they are not.

William tells Niko that there were large pieces of the Achaian ring, which they could use in order to see how they could take them down. Niko says that she now recognizes William. They see the ring, which actually also contains an Achaian.

Richard asks William if the Achaian could access the ship, but he says that it could not access anything. Niko wonders why the Achaian was so muted, which William assumes is because they needed some sort of energy source in order to survive, so the creature had maybe an hour left to live.

William tells the crew that their coding was DNA, but they now had an analysis into the Achaia at a microscopic level. Zayn asks if it was a model of their DNA, but is told that it was a real scan. Ze sees that the characters were an actual part of the makeup of the Achaia, which was odd. Bernie asks why the Achaia need a written language, which makes Erik think that those things were not the Achaia, but William's evolution. Cas wonders what the Achaia really are and wonder if the real Achaia had been killed off. Niko dismisses that as unimportant and says that they need to fight them. Dillon suggests using a computer virus, which Erik says could be possible. Zayn mentions a flesh and blood version of a trojan horse and says that they could implant the virus into one of them.

Zayn tells the crew that every member of the Salvare has a hard wire that goes into their brain stem for Soma so they could inject the virus using Soma. Once the Achaian melded with it, it would catch the virus. Niko asks if ze wanted her to let an Achaian feed off a member of the crew and Zayn says that just long enough to get it back down to the Artifact and release it along with the malware. Niko asks what she needs to do, but Erik does not want her to and Cas volunteers instead, saying she knew how to beat the Achaia as well.

Cas gets ready to have the virus implanted, but William says that they are having trouble implanting it, but it could be done later. Bernie and Zayn disagree, but William says that the Achaian only has moments left. However, the crew is out of options. In the meantime, Niko leaves.

Niko reaches the Achaian, telling it that they had saved it and would take it back to its people inside of her. Erik tries stopping her, but she does not listen and the Achaian goes in her, making her collapse.

Zayn tells Erik and Cas that Niko is generally doing fine, but she was in a coma. Zayn has no idea if that is due to the Achaia or an injury. Erik says that the Achaia are draining her, while Richard, Ursula, and William say that they were finally able to mask a human virus with the Achaian code. Erik says that they could not release the virus remotely, since he would go in there and let the Achaian take over him, knowing he does not have Soma hardware. William tells Erik that Niko wanted to do it herself, so Erik says that he would do it alone.

Erik walks inside the room where Niko was at and asks if she could hear him. She starts moving strangely, cracking her joints as the Achaian talked through her. The Achaia says that it does not want her and tries ripping off her flesh since flesh was primitive and disgusting. Erik asks if Niko is safe, but does not get an answer.

Cas and Erik bring Niko to the Artifact, discussing who would be the one to bring her inside. She tells him to think about Jana, so Erik talks to the Achaian, telling it to open the door. Cas brings her in, but Erik kisses her before they go.

In the Artifact, Cas tells Niko that they are okay and the Achaian exits her body. Niko wonders if it had worked and the two of them are thrown around, hurting themselves. Cas tells the Achaia that they had done the right thing and asks for the same in return. The Achaia in Niko's mother's figure tells them that they are not going anywhere.

Erik stays vigilant at the clock and begs for Niko to hurry up.

The Achaia tell Niko and Cas that they could not make demands of them as if they were equals. Cas asks about negotiations, but the Achaia reveal that they were only going to go their way, which meant peace on their terms. The Achaia tells them that they were primitive, and also says that they would spread like cancer unless they were stopped.

Niko asks Cas to say something as she is grabbed by the Achaia, who tells her that she had nowhere to go. The Achaia turns into Jana, who asks if she wanted to go back to Earth so she could abandon her again. Niko is taunted by the Achaia, who turn into the crew of the Salvare. She is slammed to the ground by the Achaia, who point a gun at Cas; they tell her that no human was innocent.

Erik sees as the Artifact starts splitting in half. Suddenly, the Achaian Niko was fighting starts feeling pain. Niko grabs its gun and points it at it, shooting it and destroying the Achaia. She grabs Cas and they leave the Artifact, which starts collapsing and is finally destroyed.

Cas tells Niko that she is fine and only has a concussion. Niko says that she would put her in command for the next mission. Dillon tells Richard that many different wormholes were appearing, but does not know of any natural causes for this. Niko wonders if maybe there were Achaian sympathizers and needs William, who cannot be reached. Niko says that the Salvare had made it, but Richard had not been able to find it.

Erik approaches Niko and tells her that Jana was there to talk to her. Niko approaches her daughter and gives her a hug. Niko asks how she had made it in there and her daughter tells her that it was thanks to her grandmother. Niko thanks her mother and asks her to join their family hug.

Mackenzie approaches the crew and tells them that there was a wormhole in the Artifact field, which was coming from the Salvare. Niko sees William there, which he calls an Achaian trick, thanks to Ursula. He says that the signals bombarding the solar system were not Achaian and were coming from everywhere. Thousands of aliens were reaching out and greeting them, also thanking them for what they had done.
## Personality

She is very serious, at times ignoring the concerns of her crew mates. Despite this, she does have a caring side. Her coldness is likely due to her determination to ensure that the crew is successful on the mission, and her past mission failures.

## Relationships

Erik Wallace - Husband -

Jana Wallace-Breckenridge - Daughter

## Physical Appearance

* Blonde
* Hazel Eyes
* Strong & fit

## Appearance

**Season One (10/10)**

* *Across the Universe*
* *Through the Valley of Shadows*
* *Nervous Breakdown*
* *Guilt Trip*
* *A Mind of its Own*
* *I Think We're Alone Now*
* *Living the Dream*
* *How the Light Gets Lost*
* *Heart and Soul*
* *Hello*

## Gallery

See also: Category:Images of Niko Breckinridge
* Promotional
* Season 1 Screencaps

**"Episode #1.1"**

**"Episode #1.2"**

**"Episode #1.3"**

**"Episode #1.4"**

**"Episode #1.5"**

**"Episode #1.6"**

**"Episode #1.7"**

**"Episode #1.8"**

**"Episode #1.9"**

**"Episode #1.10"**