Stardate 1834.2: On the ISS Charon, Lorca frees his followers from the agony booths, among them the parallel version of Landry. A fight with the loyal troops of Emperor Georgiou for the control of the ship ensues. Lorca apprehends the parallel Stamets, who betrayed him and apparently ruined his coup. Stamets has to agree to help Lorca, for a chance to stay alive. He launches a bioweapon that kills many of Georgiou's soldiers. Lorca makes a shipwide announcement that his people are taking control of the Empire, but he advises them not to touch Michael Burnham, to whom he is still attached. Burnham escapes from the throne room and tries to find a way to contact the Discovery. On the Discovery, Stamets and Tilly are concerned about the state of the mycelium network that is dying because the Charon's engine core, the "central orb", taps it for power. Without the spore network, all life in all universes may perish. Lorca and Stamets set up a trap for Emperor Georgiou, in which all of her guards are killed and she can only escape by means of an emergency transport. In the throne room, Lorca celebrates his victory and kills Stamets, as he doesn't need him any longer. Acting Captain Saru and his crew seek a way to repair the spore network, but the only viable method would be to target the heavily shielded central orb of the Charon with a photon torpedo, boosted by the whole mycelium supplies of the Discovery. This would not only cost all the spores that Stamets would need to take back the Discovery to its universe, the ship wouldn't survive the blast in the first place. Saru is not content with this no-win scenario. He motivates the crew to come up with something better. Contacting the Discovery and learning of the plan, Burnham agrees to take down the shield around the central orb. She finds Emperor Georgiou in her hiding place and convinces her to work together to defeat Lorca, by giving him what he wants. Meanwhile on the Discovery, Stamets and Tilly come up with the idea to use the ship's warp drive as an additional protection against the explosion. They prepare to attack and wait for Burnham to disable the shield. Burnham appears in the throne room with Georgiou as her "prisoner" for Lorca. As the Discovery approaches, Burnham and Georgiou assault Lorca's people. When only Lorca is still alive, Burnham spares his life, but Georgiou does not hesitate to kill him with her sword. Burnham takes down the shield. Georgiou vows to stay behind to allow Burnham to escape, as Lorca's troops are about to storm the throne room. But Burnham arranges for Georgiou to be beamed back with her. The Discovery destroys the central orb, the mycelium network begins to regenerate but Stamets does not manage to control the spore drive. Only when he remembers Culber's words from his stay in the network, he intuitively finds a way out. The Discovery arrives in its own universe. But it is nine months too late, and the Klingons appear to have won the war.

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