The Qowat Milat way might sound potentially annoying, as our resident cyberneticist quips, but it’s not — it’s an enlightened episode of Star Trek: Picard that moves at breakneck speed in introducing new characters, new worlds, and new mythology about the ever-secretive Romulan civilization.

Bolstered by an intelligent and ambitious script from writer Michael Chabon, “Absolute Candor” is literally filled with, well, absolute candor. From the introduction of the Qowat Milat, a sect of Romulan warrior nuns being revealed for the first time, to the crystallizing motivations of Narek’s manipulation of Soji on board the derelict Borg cube, there’s no shortage of truth-telling in this dynamic episode.

For the third week in a row, the narrative begins with a flashback: this time to a visit from Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) to planet Vashti during the years of the Romulan evacuation efforts. The colony world is home to a “relocation hub,” a crossroads of sorts where displaced Romulan evacuees have made a temporary home pending their journey to their final new destination.

Vashti is home to an order of the Qowat Milat, a group of warrior nuns who believe in the communication of emotion without any filter between thought and word. That practice, of course, runs counter to the modus operandi of the normally secretive Romulans (making them the natural opposition to the Tal Shiar).

Making what seems to be a regular visit to their compound — to coordinate with the local leader, Zani (Amirah Vann) — to work on details of the Federation’s Romulan relief efforts, we see the man has come a long way from his I-don’t-feel-comfortable-with-children days aboard the Enterprise.

Picard excitedly catches up with a young Romulan boy — who the Qowat Milat has taken in after he was orphaned during the relocation crisis — sharing with him a well-worn copy of The Three Musketeers and playacting a sword fight together…

…and that’s when a call comes in on Picard’s combadge, with word of the synth attack on Mars bringing a quick halt to the pair’s fun. With barely a moment to make his goodbyes, Picard urgently beams back to his ship, leaving the young boy — Elnor (Ian Nunney) — in the dust.

Now, as the story jumps ahead to the current-day journey of the starship La Sirena, we learn that Picard has directed captain Cristóbal Rios (Santiago Cabrera) to make a stop at Vashti — a plan with which Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd) is not on board.

Musiker, of course, served alongside Picard during his last visit to the planet, and urges him not to divert from their course to Freecloud — where they hope to find the elusive Bruce Maddox — reminding him they need to keep their focus on “one impossible thing at a time,” a familiar phrase to readers of the Star Trek: Picard — Countdown comic series.

Vashti has changed since Picard’s last visit: the once-thriving colony of refugees has eroded into a sullen place and Picard is saddened to see rampant poverty, degradation and ethnic strife. The decline is an obvious byproduct of the Federation’s withdrawal, and a societal choice not to help brothers and sisters in need.

Despite not being welcomed by the general populace upon his arrival, Zani remembers the former admiral, and is both understanding and accepting in seeing him again — though, in the way of absolute candor, immediately tells him he has gotten old since their last meeting — and the pair are soon joined by a lithe young man carrying a sword.

That swordsman turns out to be none other than Picard’s once-young pal, Elnor (Evan Evagora), now grown to become a “truly formidable” fighter skilled in the techniques of the Qowat Milat… but as a male, Elnor is forever out of place among the female-only tribe of warriors.

Surprised that Elnor never found a more suitable home in the years that have passed — something Picard had hoped to assist with before being called away after the attack on Mars — the reunion with the young Romulan does not go well. Elnor says his story only tells him why he needs someone, not why he needs him. It’s yet another setback for Picard, who hoped to recruit the swordsman to his cause.

Dejected, Picard heads into town while waiting for a transport window to return to La Sirena. With nothing to lose, Picard defiantly throws a “Romulans Only” sign to the ground as he enters a local cantina, and is soon embroiled in a war of words with a former Romulan senator who can’t help but throw all of Picard’s broken promises back in his face.

Through the expert guidance of Jonathan Frakes, making his Star Trek: Picard directorial debut, the energy in the scene ratchets up quickly — and before you know it, Picard is in a sword duel with the Romulan. Just as he throws his sword on the ground, refusing to continue to fight, Elnor appears out of nowhere to assist his former teacher. In another brutal moment of absolute candor, Elnor tells the former senator, “Please, my friend. Choose to live.”

The elder Romulan turns to attack Picard once again, and in a split-second Elnor has decapitated him while calmly saying, “I regret your choice.” It’s a beautifully-scripted scene and a defining moment for Elnor, illustrating the swift and impactful decision-making — and methodical killer precision — he now possesses.

Elnor announces to the shocked onlookers and to Picard that he has bound himself to Picard as qalankhkai, meaning any attack on Picard will be answered by him — incensed at the death of the Romulan, once the pair beam aboard La Sirena Narek (Harry Treadaway) feels the pressure as Narissa (Peyton List) expresses her displeasure. (CBS All Access)[/caption]

Over on that big Borg cube, Soji (Isa Briones) is finally starting to question exactly who her new pointed-eared boyfriend is — and what his true intentions towards her may truly be.

While her suspicions paint Narek (Harry Treadaway) as a member of the Tal Shiar, only the audience — along with his sister, Narissa (Peyton List) — knows his true alliance is to the ultra-secret Zhad Vash, and he’s being pushed to accelerate his efforts to use Soji to find a “nest” of Dahj-like synthetics.

Narek’s slow burn with Soji gets kicked up a notch when he plants the first seeds of doubt into her programming, challenging her assertion she traveled to the Beta Quadrant three years ago prior — about the same time Jurati estimated Dahj’s first activation — aboard a starship that has no record of Dr. Asha’s transit.

The gambit is a risky one for Narek, who is trying to avoid triggering her activation protocols (like Dahj, when she was threatened in her apartment) — but lucky for him, the agitated Soji doesn’t leave, thinking he can help satisfy her insatiable curiosity about the fate of assimilated Romulan vessel Shaenor, and all that “destroyer” talk from Ramdha last week.

Their storyline is rather dense, and even a bit repetitive across the last four hours, but it does seem to be heading somewhere — albeit slowly — as Soji’s research on “the destroyer,” or the Seb-Cheneb, is apparently responsible for bringing about Ganmadan: the day of annihilation for all life, when the “shackled demons break their chains.” That can’t be good.

Before we leave this week’s story behind, the last few minutes of La Sirena‘s time at Vashti brings us a thrillingly-staged battle, as our heroes face off against an Original Series-era antique Romulan Bird-of-Prey, flown by a local warlord who terrorizes the system in the power vacuum left behind by the Federation’s retreat.

As the two ships battle each other — while each trying to avoid the weapons fire from Vashti’s planetary defense system — a third ship joins the fray, helping to fend off the Bird of Prey, but not before getting critically damaged itself. Moments before that ship implodes, the lone pilot calls for a beam-out…

…and Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) materializes on La Sirena’s flight deck, to the stunned surprise of Jean-Luc Picard. “You owe me a ship, Picard,” says the former Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix Zero-One, moments before she collapses to the floor. It’s an emotional wallop, and an iconic moment, that long-time fans could never be fully prepared for (though the surprise was slightly undercut by Jeri Ryan’s name flashing up in the episode’s opening credits).

Exactly how did Voyager’s resident Borg end up flying through the former Romulan Neutral Zone, fending off space pirates all by herself… and how will the first conversation between Star Trek’s most famous 24th century characters play out?

We’ll find out next week when Ryan — and director Jonathan Frakes — return for the fifth episode of the season.

Here are a few stray observations we picked up en route to Vashti:

• Santiago Cabrera debuts two more of the ship’s holographic crew: a hospitality coordinator (“Mr. Hospitality,” per the closed captioning) with a nebulous North American accent who’s in charge of programming the on-board holodeck, and a Spanish-speaking emergency tactical hologram (EMT, or Emmet) who manages the ship’s phaser array.
   
• Soji’s (supposed) journey to the Beta Quadrant was by way of the starship Ellison, likely named for the famed science-fiction writer who, of course, wrote the classic Original Series episode “The City on the Edge of Forever.”
   
• We learn that the massive fleet of ships built for the Romulan relocation effort were Wallenberg-class transports, likely named for Swedish humanitarian Raoul Wallenberg, who lost his life saving tens of thousands of Jews in Hungary while the country was under Nazi control in the 1940s.
   
• La Sirena has an armory station to the port side of its wide transporter pad.
   
• Picard repeats the Romulan greeting “Jolan Tru” several times while visiting Vashti, a native phrase first introduced to the man when he visited Romulus itself in “Unification.”
   
• The Vashti system is one of many patrolled by the Fenric Rangers, a freelance group working to keep the peace in the formerly-Romulan frontier.
   
• Starfleet combadges apparently have built-in Bluetooth by 2385, as Picard learns about the attack on Mars from a message received by earpiece (as his combadge and jacket lay on the ground).

“Absolute Candor” is an astute title for an episode of Star Trek: Picard that moves rapidly and is filled with clever quips from showrunner Michael Chabon. It’s heart, emotion and thrills perfectly sets up next week’s continuation of Seven of Nine’s astonishing return to Star Trek in “Stardust City Rag.”

Star Trek: Picard returns next week with “Stardust City Rag,” debuting February 20 on CBS All Access in the US and CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada, and following globally on Amazon Prime Video on February 21.

Jim Moorhouse is the creator of TrekRanks.com and the TrekRanks Podcast. He can be found living and breathing Trek every day on Twitter at @EnterpriseExtra.