In contrast to “Nepenthe,” which took place mostly in a colorful, serene lakeside setting, “Broken Pieces” is a dense, monochromatic episode of Star Trek: Picard that delves deep into the show’s mythology to finally reveal most of the conflicting motivations driving so many of the series’ central characters and mysteries.

Answers are starting to come into focus regarding Captain Rios’ backstory, the origin of the Zhat Vash, Dr. Jurati’s nefarious presence on La Sirena, and the next steps in Soji’s journey to discover herself and her homeworld. All of these topics get addressed in detail in “Broken Pieces,” some more successfully than others.

At the core of this week’s action on board La Sirena is Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd), who leads an investigation that ties into all four of the big topics above, and begins with her immediately challenging Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) when he beams on board the ship with Soji (Isa Briones). Raffi doesn’t think anyone coming on board should be trusted without being vetted, because, as she points out to Picard, his last-second addition to their motley crew, Jurati, has not only be tracking them for the Romulans, but is also the murderer of Bruce Maddox.

Picard will deal with whether those accusations are “fact or theory” in a minute, but first he needs Cris Rios (Santiago Cabrera) to help him get in touch with Starfleet Command. Rios is in a daze, seemingly recognizing Soji, but gets Picard the secure subspace frequency he needs before locking himself in his quarters to ruminate on some dark corners of his past.

The plan to talk to Starfleet is a sudden but logical change for Picard, who knows at this point going it alone is not the best idea. So, he circles back with Admiral Clancy (Ann Magnuson), first seen in “Maps and Legends,” to tell her that he was right – the windmills on his Quixotic quest have turned out to be giants. Much to his surprise, she agrees and is sending a squadron of ships to meet him at starbase Deep Space 12 to assist.

One of those giants, of course, is the Zhat Vash, the secret division of the Romulan Tal Shiar, and the episode opens with details surrounding their long-awaited backstory. Under the leadership of Commodore Oh (Tamlyn Tomita), the centuries old Zhat Vash are trying to stop modern society from hitting a game-changing and supposedly dangerous threshold in the development of synthetic life.

Oh’s acolytes include both Narissa (Peyton List) and Ramdha (Rebecca Wisocky) — revealed to be the adopted ‘auntie’ who took in Narissa and Narek as orphaned children — and they’ve all been exposed to the “admonition,” a message beacon located on a planet at the core of the Conclave of Eight… which turns out to be not so much of a “who,” but a “where.” (Eight stars have been artificially relocated around a single planet as a massive signpost and warning to future generations about the development of synthetic life.)

When exposed to the “admonition,” most participants are driven insane to the point of suicide. Narissa is not one of them, which fits her unhinged character perfectly. Ramdha, however, was. She has been adversely affected by her experience, and her subdued madness will eventually lead to her “breaking” the Borg cube that now serves as the Artifact — answering one of the season’s big mysteries.

As for Commodore Oh, she has finally been confirmed to be a half-Romulan, half-Vulcan operative who spearheaded the attacks on Mars’ Utopia Planitia 14 years ago to push the Federation toward outlawing the existence of synthetics.

The Zhat Vash backstory is thick and complex, and only mildly rewarding at this point in the series. It also feels similar to the recent “end of times” technology tale recently told in Star Trek: Discovery — where artificial intelligence was threatening all sentient life.

The most interesting element of the Zhat Vash warnings about synthetic life terrorizing the universe is that our heroes are now on the opposite side of the equation (as compared to Discovery). Instead of trying to stop the AI infiltration, Picard is obviously fighting for the rights of synthetics to live and thrive.

It will be interesting to see how that juxtaposition plays out in the final two episodes of the season, where the soul of the show continues to reside in new characters like Raffi and Rios, and the journey of discovery for Soji, and of re-discovery for Picard.

One other character on an internal exploration is Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), who returns this week to answer the desperate hail of Elnor (Evan Evagora), who is stuck alone on the Artifact after the death of Hugh.

Unfortunately, we don’t get to see a protracted response from Seven to Hugh’s death, which is handled quickly as she arrives to answer the call — by blasting a few Romulans along the way — and then asking Elnor, “Where is Hugh?” His forlorn appearance and her subsequent hug to comfort him is the only moment of recognition we get from her that she understands the unraveling situation on the cube.

From the Queen’s Cell, Seven is hesitant to execute the plan that she knows will likely have the most success – creating a micro-collective that will allow her and the thousands of drones on the ship in stasis to fight back. She’s worried about what re-assimilating them without their consent would mean for them and her – and whether any of them, or herself, would even want to be released again after they dispose of the Romulans.

Eventually, Seven decides to activate Queen mode and is connected to the cube in a visual effect similar to previous incarnations of the Borg queen seen in Star Trek: First Contact and Voyager’s “Dark Frontier.” Her eyes go black, with a slight glowing glimmer of green, and she announces throughout the ship, “We are Borg!” The moment is chilling and quintessential Trek. Seven acting as a Borg queen just feels right.

With ”We are Borg” echoing through the Artifact, Narissa — who has been actively slaughtering the xBs — immediately moves to eject the activating drones into space before departing the Artifact with her fleet to find Soji’s homeworld.

Seven tells Elnor that the Romulans are gone and the cube is theirs again. He asks, in absolute candor, if that means she is going to assimilate him now, and she disconnects and announces, “Annika has work to do.” The moment is not insignificant, as Seven chooses her human persona to plot her next move, which hopefully will involve commandeering that Borg cube and somehow putting it to good use for Picard.

On board La Sirena, Raffi’s investigation leads her to an important revelation about Captain Rios. To get there, she collects all five of the ship’s holograms in the holo-chateau to figure out why Rios has gone into isolation after first seeing Soji on his transporter pad.

The five holograms now include the new Emergency Engineering Hologram (or “Ian”), who naturally features a brilliantly-thick Scottish brogue. During her questioning, Raffi learns that when he first activated them, Rios chose a “self-scan” mode which based each hologram on his physical template, and tied in his own personal knowledge into the database — though he later made some ‘careless’ deletions from each duplicate’s memories.

Those deletions range from events on board the ship to data files inside their own specialized matrices — Mr. Hospitality lost his recipe for Yridian tea (along with his respect for personal space!), and navigational hologram Enoch has no access to Medusan astrogation techniques.

Ultimately, the five broken pieces of Rios start to put the picture together with Raffi’s help, beginning with the nine-years-past tragedy of his former captain from the USS ibn Majid — Alonzo Vandermeer — who committed suicide. That event led to a mental breakdown and eventual discharge from Starfleet for Rios, who had revered Vandermeer like a father. Raffi tries to research exactly what happened, but information related to the ibn Majid has been designated classified.

Armed with that information, Raffi gets Rios to open up his quarters, where he has been going through some of his belongings from the ibn Majid, including a drawing of himself and a girl that looks just like Soji. The girl in the drawing is called Jana, one of two passengers that the ibn Majid picked up randomly in space about nine years prior. After welcoming them on board, Vandermeer received a black flag directive from Starfleet and was forced to execute the two travelers… or else sacrifice everyone on board the ibn Majid.

Rios couldn’t believe it at the time and went after his captain hard, which he believes helped push him to suicide. At the time, Rios held it together long enough to cover it all up and protect the ibn Majid, but within six months he was out of Starfleet based on his post-traumatic dysphoria. Looking back now, he believes Vandermeer knew the two passengers were synths when he executed them.

“Small world” syndrome definitely gets tested a bit in this backstory for Rios, which is still both tantalizing and satisfying — if not a bit convenient, as it relates to the central mystery of Soji, who is spending her initial time on La Sirena talking with Picard.

In a continuation of the Data deconstruction that began on Nepenthe and that is becoming a focal point for the entire series, Picard tells Soji that she has a past and a story related to Data that is waiting to be claimed, regardless of how empty she feels in thinking her memories aren’t really hers. He tells her that Data was brave and curious and had a child’s wisdom.

When prodded by Soji about the mutual love and respect they obviously shared, Picard poetically compares his lifelong limitations of showing his feelings to the android commander. “Data’s capacity for expressing and processing emotion was limited. I suppose we had that in common.” It’s another brilliantly revealing moment from Picard showrunner Michael Chabon, who wrote the script for “Broken Pieces,” his sixth writing credit of the season.

Following that healing moment with Soji, it’s time for Picard to confront Jurati with her crimes — to which she takes full responsibility — telling Picard that Oh had put poison in her mind. She basically believes she has seen hell, and explains to Picard that Oh showed her a history that took place a thousand centuries ago of a society reaching a tipping-point threshold in synthetic development that brought about – Soji enters the room and finishes their thought – “Seb Cheneb. The destroyer. Me.”

In the only real moment of happiness in this hour of Picard, Jurati gets to finally meet Soji, the product of her lifelong work with Bruce Maddox. And she is happy. Finally. She laughs excitedly when Soji tells her that she drinks when she is thirsty, and she marvels at the work of art that her beauty marks and crooked pinky toe represent.

She calls her a wonder, and the same can be said of Alison Pill’s staggering performance as Dr. Jurati. She portrays the weight of anguish and the lightness of joy in effortless ways. It’s a masterclass in acting. Soji eventually ends their meeting by making sure Jurati knows that she would never let her kill her. The cyberneticist understands and responds by saying that despite everything she has seen, she would never kill her now that she has met her. (So that’s nice!)

It’s a very, very small bit of redemption for Jurati, who obviously still has a lot to pay for. Together with the entire crew, she tells everyone that she is done murdering people and will turn herself in when they reach Deep Space 12. She adds that it’s the first time in her life she had a crew, and she’s sorry she ruined it. (Yeah, well, so is Maddox!)

Turning their attention to Soji, Rios kicks off their group discussion by offering her French Fries and peppermint ice cream, something he knows she is fond of because so was Jana, her older sister that he had met nine years prior.

Raffi goes on to explain to the group about the Conclave of Eight, the admonition and the fact that the Zhat Vash believe there is a threshold of synthetic evolution that can’t be crossed. She tells them that Data’s creator Dr. Noonian Soong pushed that threshold so hard — with the creation of Data — that Oh was tasked with leading the Romulan incursion of Starfleet, which ended with a burning Mars and a ban on all synthetic research. And now the Zhat Vash is trying to end it all once and for all, by getting to Soji’s homeworld and destroying what they find there.

Upon hearing that, an enraged Soji quietly takes control of La Sirena and decides to open a Borg transwarp conduit (because she can!) and jump to her home. At this point, Picard is hard pressed to argue against this plan, noting that she has been forced to do it Maddox’s way, and then his way – it’s probably time to let her do it her own way now.

Rios isn’t thrilled with the idea of having his ship at risk and on the front-lines of this plan, but Soji implores him to please take her home, and he agrees.

As the ship approaches the jumping off point for the Borg transwarp conduit, Picard and Rios share a quiet moment on the bridge that begins with Picard reminiscing about his time on the night shift as a young ensign aboard the Reliant. He’s forgotten how much he liked the emptiness and silence.

With Rios shook by everything that’s happened he wonders aloud, what if the Romulans are right about the destroyer? That moment cues the Picard we’ve known and loved for 30 plus years. He dismisses the notion and says that they might be right about what happened a few thousand years ago, but not about the future.

He laments that the Zhat Vash set a trap for the Federation, and instead of side-stepping it, we gave way to fear. “We have powerful tools. Openness, optimism and the spirit of curiosity,” says Picard. “All they have is secrecy and fear, and fear is the great destroyer.”

It’s a beautiful sentiment, reflective of our current times and the reductive politics that weigh down so much of the public discourse today. The moment is classic Picard. And the next moment is classic Star Trek. As Soji makes the final calculations to jump into the transwarp conduit, she reaches into her pocket and pulls out the broken compass Kestra had gifted her to help guide her to her homeworld… and to both her synthetic sisters and brothers. (Could we have already met Maddox’s male synthetic this season?!)

The moment is as strong as Picard’s speech and seems to signify the two do indeed have each other, as Kestra had hoped. As the ship jumps toward Soji’s homeworld, one final cliffhanger moment is in the offing, as Narek has somehow caught up to La Sirena and is seen darting into the conduit right behind them in hot pursuit.

Here’s a few more observations that fell out of this week’s projected chronoton field:

• The planet located inside the octenary system is called Aia, or “the grief world.”
   
• Narissa boasts she’d be a much better Borg than the impaired Ramdha before she’s taken down by a hoard of xBs; who’s taking bets that the Romulan will end up an assimilated drone before the season concludes?
   
• The Rios-shaped holograms are named Emmet (tactical), Enoch (navigation), Ian (engineering), Mr. Hospitality (per “Absolute Candor” closed captioning)… while the Emergency Medical Hologram remains appropriately nameless (for now, anyway).
   
• Enoch references the famed Medusan astrogation techniques previously seen in “Is There In Truth No Beauty.”
   
• Picard’s reference to time aboard the USS Reliant refers to a deleted scene from “The Measure of a Man,” restored in the episode’s extended edition on Blu-ray.

• One of the books in Rios’ philosophy library is Surak and Existentialism, by an author with the last name “Notabene” — a pseudonym used by Søren Kierkegaard.
   
• Captain Vandermeer once served as first officer to Marta Batanides, one of Picard’s Starfleet Academy pals introduced back in “Tapestry.”
   
• Vandermeer may be named for author Jeff VanderMeer, contemporary author of Michael Chabon, who recently released the well-received sci-fi novel Dead Astronauts.
   
• Along with his old Starfleet uniform, combadge, and rank pips, Rios’ box of personal effects include a “monster maroon” uniform rear shoulder disc — matching Spock’s uniform design — which the Anovos costume replica company calls a “security device.”

“Broken Pieces” is a heavy, exposition-laden episode that serves predominantly as a set-up for the two-part season finale that kicks off next week.

The episode is directed beautifully by Maja Vrvilo, who used majestic lighting techniques, as well as interesting camera angles and movements, to pump life into the episode, which was shot almost entirely on cold, dark metallic sets with little variation. It’s impressive work from Vrvilo, cutting through the prose and uniform set designs to give each scene a life and vitality of its own.

Is there a chance the Zhat Vash are right, and the message from the “admonition” should be heeded? What will La Sirena’s crew find on Maddox’ homeworld? Who is Soji’s brother? What’s the work Annika has to do?

Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Star Trek: Picard returns next week with “Et in Arcadia Ego,” debuting March 19 on CBS All Access in the US and CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada, and following globally on Amazon Prime Video on March 20.

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.