After the more emotional and character-based episode “Atari” last week, 12 Monkeys returned to throw a huge monkey wrench (jokes!) into the mythology of the story so far. The episode started with the threat of the West 7 held off for now and not only managed to dig a little deeper into may of the characters backstories, but unlocked one of the biggest mysteries of the series so far: that of the elusive Night Room.

We begin in 2011 watching Jennifer Goines being transported under heavy security to the secret location known as The Night Room. She is of sound mind, so clearly The Army of the 12 Monkeys hasn’t massacred the scientists quite yet. We then immediately fast forward to 2015. Goines has lost her marbles and is the clutches of Tom Noonan’s Pallid Man. He is trying to get her to reveal the location of the virus but she won’t budge.

Back in 2043, Cole explains to Jones that Cassie has found The Night Room using records from the CDC. The damage from the siege of the West 7 has messed up the machine, but Jones is confident that it can be repaired. Cole invites Jones to have a pre-jump drink with him, Max, and Ramse before the big day. Now that Cole knows the location of The Night Room, the team is sure they’ll be erased from existence and the mission will be over. Since it’s their last night on Earth, Ramse asks Jones where her name came from since “Jones” isn’t the most German of surnames. She reveals that it was her married name and begins to get uncomfortable. She tells the group that she has to get back to work, only to hear chaos coming from the splinter room. The core is running out of energy which means jumping with the machine is risky… but they don’t have time to spare. Cole and Jones decide to push through to have Cole jump immediately. Once he gets back to 2015, he and Cassie track down The Night Room. They enter inside but The Army of the 12 Monkeys has beat them there and takes them captive.

Back in 2043, Max and Ramse are frustrated that they haven’t been erased yet and Ramse is getting a little irritated with Jones. Max reveals that while she was with the West 7, she heard stories of a German doctor whose experiments went terribly wrong and their subjects met a grisly, inside-out end. She wonders given the current state of the world how many German doctors are running around anymore, strongly suggesting that Jones is the infamous doctor… Later in the episode Ramse begins to poke around in Jones’ room. He finds a baby blanket with the name “Hannah” stitched on it along with a child’s jewelry box. He also finds photos of previous jumpers who were dead, their bodies torn apart, just like Max said. The stories were true and Jones was willing to risk Cole’s life to make the jumps work. Ramse confronts her and she defends her actions for the future of humanity. Ultimately, it seems like Ramse trusts that Jones has Cole’s best interest at heart, but not by much. That said, he can’t bring himself to confirm Max’s stories to her when she asks him what he found in the doctor’s room.

Inside The Night Room during 2015, Cole and Cassie are put in the same holding room. The Pallid Man suggests that perhaps Henry told Cole how to get inside the vault during their conversations in Haiti but no one could ask him because Henry is dead and Cole killed him. This is news to Cassie and she is clearly upset with Cole. How can she trust him now? The Pallid Man also reveals that a mysterious figure called “The Witness” believes that the natural order of the world is no longer doing its job and that’s why they have to release the virus. The Pallid Man and The Army open the vault to reveal a deteriorating half of a body encased in liquid that Jennifer explains is the origin of her father’s virus. As the soldier tries to reach for the case to retrieve the body, he discovers an invisible force that melts his arm. Jennifer has known this the entire time and enjoys the small victory of tricking The Army into getting melted “like Raiders.” (Awesome.)

Jennifer is taken away and The Pallid Man tries to get inside her head. She reveals that she has an affection for Cole and The Pallid Man tells her that Cole killed her father. However, this leverage proves to be useless as Jennifer basically hated her dad. Meanwhile, Cole and Cassie have a heart to heart about Henry and all of the lives that have been lost so far in their pursuit to save humanity. Ultimately, Cole is looking for redemption while Cassie realizes that maybe she’s not cut out for this mission; that she doesn’t have the stomach for the individual sacrifices along the way. Jennifer bursts in on them and they see The Army leaving and they believe that the security team for The Night Room are en route. The three go downstairs to destroy the origin body except Cassie has to leave the group and return upstairs to get a mask incase the virus becomes airborne. Jennifer opens the vault, something she says she would only do for Cole, and of course as soon as she punches in the codes, The Army reveals themselves to Cassie upstairs. They never left. This was their plan.

Fortunately, there’s a Code Red Torch It All button and Cole signals to Cassie, hides himself and Jennifer in the vault and Cassie, watching from a control room, throws the switch. The virus is nuked but Cole is still there. How? Why? Naturally Tom Noonan isn’t too happy about all this and The Army of the 12 Monkeys take Cassie out of The Night Room and throw her in the back of a truck. Cole and Jennifer follow only for Cole to splinter at the wrong time back to 2043 to find the facility taken over by the West 7 and everyone he knows gone thus altering the future but NOT in a good ways. Jennifer is left by herself and appears to be scared and confused. Holy moly!!!

If you missed the President’s Day marathon you can watch all of 12 Monkeys for free on the SyFy website. 12 Monkeys, starring Aaron Stanford, Amanda Schull, Emily Hampshire and Tom Noonan, airs Friday nights at 9PM on SyFy.