The Series Story
AS told across four 13-episode seasons
Individual episodes are not noted in this season-summary.
Click on blue character names and organization titles for backstories and further details. Links to these are also at the top and bottom of each page.
SEASON FOUR
LUNALPHA DETAILS COME OUT AND DERASMO DEVELOPS A RASH PLAN
In 2063, Oklahoma and Kansas dissolve into the now massive singular state of Nazarene, and border skirmishes with Texas heat up. President Mengsei is still hesitant to send in federal troops on either side, thinking that to do so would ignite a full civil war. Besides the Supreme Court keeps supporting Nazarene's right to self-determination, and Texas' right to protect its borders.
Biyu has now come to the United States, and is almost secretly living in the White House for her own protection. This is causing major opposition from members of the Administration who still see Biyu as a threat.
The battle heats up between Nazarene and the Texas led resistance. Under Wescott's orders, Nazarene begins public beheadings of captured spies, followed by drone-couriering of the heads to the victims' families in Texas. But this barbarity is a bridge too far, so President Mengsei finally orders in U. S. Army Rangers to force a cease fire. But key senior military leaders in Washington are Nazarenes themselves, and as such they drag their feet on carrying out President Mengsei's orders.
Meanwhile the continuing FBI investigation into the Lunalpha Disaster has finally discovered evidence that both Rose and Mengsei intentionally set the fire in the CIEX Agricultural Research Unit of Lunalpha. The damning info is kept private—for now.
President Mengsei decides he must admit the truth to the public about the Lunalpha Disaster—yes he was doing his job by starting the fire, but he never intended for anyone to get hurt. And President Mengsei knows he will need to resign.
President Mengsei tells this to Secret Service Director Derasmo and others in the White House, but they all disagree strongly with President Mengsei's plans—the situation with Nazarene is far too dangerous right now—President Mengsei must put the country first. If President Mengsei resigns, VP Johnson will be the President, and she (being the ex-Governor of Nazarene) will surely side with Nazarene against Texas. That will spark a full civil war.
The solution, Derasmo thinks, is to first capture Wescott, reveal him to be who he is, and thus undermine the whole of Nazarene. Then President Mengsei can do as he wishes, and VP Johnson will not have the power that she might have otherwise.
But the worry is that the damning information about what happened on Lunalpha will get leaked anyway, before Wescott can be captured. After all, no effort to get Wescott has been successful over the prior six months.
Biyu has an idea. Biyu tells Derasmo that there is one possibility, and that it's something only Derasmo can do. We don't hear the plan, but Derasmo is stunned by the idea.
Derasmo knows she must decide quickly, and thus agrees to Biyu's radical idea—both swear to not reveal it to anyone else, certainly not President Mengsei—lest they be stopped from proceeding. Biyu contacts her Chinese connections. Derasmo contacts EON and asks to meet with Wescott, one-on-one, unarmed, and that Derasmo will allow an EON plane to pick her up in Washington D.C. and fly Derasmo to St. Louis.
Marcia cannot shake the thought that the threat from a 15 is still lurking, so long as President Mengsei is in office. Marcia dives back into her numbers, but this time Marcia will come at it from a direction Marcia considers ridiculous—keying her algorithms off of numbers found on an ancient Viking carving—an idea one of her Truth in Numbers members has been laboring Marcia about for almost three years. To Marcia, the source of the random numbers is meaningless, but she finds it curious nonetheless.
Marcia and Paul reconcile. Paul has come to understand that Marcia's OCD issues led Marcia to think of Paul as the possible future-assassin on a purely logical way, not as a matter of heart. Marcia is also apologetic.
Paul decides to help Marcia with her new efforts. This is the first time Paul has paid much attention to Marcia's 'scientific' numerology. Up till then Marcia did her thing on her own. Now with their combined intelligence and scientific intuitions, a new algorithm for predicting the 15 is achieved—they keep it a secret that their new approach is based on some Viking carving.
DERASMO GOES TO ST. LOUIS AND FINDS THE TRUTH
Derasmo travels to St. Louis on a CIEX jet, and is taken into house arrest deep within EON's headquarters, the replica of the Vatican Basilica. Derasmo is not given permission to see Wescott, who has become somewhat of a god to the Nazarenes. All communication devices are removed from Derasmo and her BWS is blocked by keeping her underground. They scan Derasmo's body and find no other tracking devices.
Derasmo is submitted to a series of brainwashing efforts, each seeking to further bring her to the Nazarene ideology. Derasmo seems to be giving in, changing. Eventually Derasmo is taken to Wescott.
Initially Wescott thinks Derasmo is faking, and refuses to talk with her.
Eventually Wescott gives in. But to test Derasmo's loyalty, her "conversion", Wescott requires Derasmo to reveal all the secrets Derasmo knows about President Mengsei. Derasmo tells Wescott about the Lunalpha Disaster, the one thing that will bring down President Mengsei's presidency and install the Nazarene VP Johnson as the new President.
Wescott is convinced Derasmo is converted, that she is a Nazarene.
Eventually Wescott shares with Derasmo his Grand Opera: LE POREM. It was called that because of the phrase, "third time's a charm." Wescott regrets that it was never completed, but now that Nazarene has grown so strong, and with President Mengsei soon to have to resign, then the final act is unnecessary.
Derasmo questions the name, as it shouldn't be Le Porem, but rather the Latin translation of "charm" is one word: leporem. But this insolence alarms Wescott. Has Derasmo been faking her "conversion"?
What Wescott doesn't know, is that before Derasmo went to St. Louis, Derasmo allowed the Chinese PLA to imbed her with an undetectable artificial cochlea in her left ear, rendering herself deaf in that ear. But the new bio-cochlea biologically records all that it hears, from the moment it is inserted to the moment it is removed.
Wescott demands to know if Derasmo is truly Nazarene. Derasmo assures Wescott that her beliefs are authentic.
Of course Derasmo's 'conversion' was not real, and now that she has heard (bio-recorded) enough from Wescott, there is only one thing left for Derasmo to do—only one way to get the bio-recording out of Nazarene undetected.
Derasmo kills Wescott with a simple heavy object—then she waits. As Derasmo knew they would, soon the Nazarene guards rush in and kill Derasmo—she falls across Wescott's bloody head.
EON AND PRESIDENT MENGSEI ARE BROUGHT DOWN
The body of the ungodly murderous "spy" Derasmo is butchered, with her torso dumped in the Mississippi, and her head drone-shipped to President Mengsei.
It is now clear what Biyu had suggested, and Derasmo had agreed to do—going to see Wescott was a one-way, suicide mission.
In St. Louis, there is a massive state funeral for Wescott, and he is laid to rest in a magnificent tomb under the Resurrection Arch.
But the battle between Nazarene soldiers and Texas Home Guard, on the Texas border, gets more intense, and the Nazarenes are being defeated.
In Nazarene, there is open talk of civil war against the whole of the United States, if the United States military doesn't come to Nazarene's aid against Texas. But this is a step too far for many in the Nazarene government. Talk of change is stirring within.
Biyu must now tell her brother, President Mengsei, not only what Derasmo did for the Nation, but must admit that it was Biyu's idea, as only Biyu could get the Chinese to secretly help as they did—it had to be secret lest word would get back to President Mengsei who would clearly have stopped it. President Mengsei is overcome, but understands.
Derasmo's head is taken to Walter Reed Army Hospital where the bio-cochlea is removed from it. Now the evidence provided by Wescott, in his own words, is given out worldwide.
But in that recording the world also hears Derasmo tell Wescott about President Mengsei's role in the death of the four astronauts 20 years earlier in the Lunalpha Disaster. President Mengsei realizes Derasmo was ever-faithful to the truth, all the way to the end—Derasmo was not only being sure that President Mengsei would come clean, Derasmo was giving President Mengsei a lighted path to do so.
One person listening to the awful revelations about the Lunalpha Disaster is Ben Bell—the son of one of the four who were killed in the Lunalpha explosion—now known to have been intentionally set by none other than President Mengsei in his twenties, and covered up ever-since.
The wide media speculation is that though President Mengsei may have to leave office, it is unlikely that he will face any criminal charges. No one is more outraged than Ben as he recalls his father's funeral where Ben, at six-years-old, tried to give his father's folded flag to the "hero" astronaut, Chen Mengsei.
With the already simmering tensions inside Nazarene, the evidence of Wescott's horrible plans against President Mengsei tips the scales. Now internal factions break out in the power structure of EON, and the Nazarene Force falls into disarray.
President Mengsei agrees to resign, but first relieves from duty any hesitant officers, and orders the U.S. military into St. Louis.
In St. Louis, many CIEX and EON leaders are arrested. A new, temporary government is put into place, and someone cuts down the cross hanging in the Arch, smashing both it and Wescott's tomb below. The next day someone has installed a massive Texas flag hanging from the top of the arch. (The flag is quickly taken down.)
A constitutional ballot initiative goes forward in Nazarene to withdraw to its original borders.
The date for President Mengsei's resignation is set for Saturday, August 23, 2064, the day after Derasmo’s funeral.
Marcia and Paul input all the new revelations into their Viking carving-based-algorithms. At the top of the new resulting list is Benjamin Lou Bell: a U.S. Marine, a 15, a Southerner, and the son of one of the men who died on the Moon in the Lunalpha Disaster.
Marcia and Paul try to get the Secret Service to take notice, but are rebuffed. With Derasmo dead, Wescott's plans aired, and President Mengsei resigning in three days, no one is concerned any more about 15s, or such threats or ideas.
Marcia and Paul decide that they must track Ben on their own.
PRESIDENT MENGSEI IS ASSASSINATED BY A 15 LETTERS MAN
On a cloudy, dark evening in August, President Mengsei and the First Lady attend the funeral of Secret Service Director Derasmo, at Arlington Cemetery, where Derasmo is given full military honors. President Mengsei gives a speech in which he honors Derasmo for giving the ultimate sacrifice for her country. President Mengsei breaks into tears when he speaks about how Derasmo was so much more honorable than he was. Biyu is there too, standing near her brother.
Marcia and Paul learn that Ben has recently been moved to the Joint Base at Ft. Myer, where he has inexplicably joined the US Army Military District that conducts funerals at Arlington Cemetery. They race to Arlington Cemetery.
At Arlington Cemetery, we see Ben in the Honor Guard's twenty-one-gun salute. His rifle comes up. He fires each time. Are those really blanks? Will he turn and fire on President Mengsei? He doesn't.
The funeral continues, and Marcia and Paul are getting close to Arlington. They are using a drone car (flying vehicle).
Ben is now near President Mengsei, as the flag is being folded from the top of the casket.
President Mengsei and the First Lady sit at the graveside memorial, with Biyu nearby, as the bugler plays taps.
One Honor Guard brings Derasmo's folded flag to present to Derasmo's daughter. Ben formally picks up another pre-folded flag to be presented to President Mengsei—a flag from the ceremony to be flown at half-mast over the White House.
Marcia and Paul are nearly shot down before they can land, due to them coming in so fast toward the location of President Mengsei. But they manage to land safely and run to the gates. Nevertheless, the Secret Service will not let them in. They shout but...
As Ben approaches President Mengsei, Ben whispers something in President Mengsei's ear. President Mengsei looks surprised, but can do nothing before Ben pulls a simple, old .38 pistol from within the folded flag, and calmly shoots President Mengsei point blank in the forehead, killing the President instantly. Ben is immediately jumped upon by Biyu who snaps his neck, killing him. The Secret Service swarm, protect VP Johnson, and take Biyu into custody.
On Friday, August 22, 2064, Chen Mengsei, the President of the United States, with a seven letter last name, having entered Congress in 2046, and having had a son die while he was in office, is assassinated by Benjamin Lou Bell, a young, Southern white man with 15 letters in his full name. The assassin is murdered before he can be tried for the assassination. Vice President Johnson, born in 2008, is then sworn in as the 53rd President.