WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Star Trek: Lower Decks Season 1, Episode 4, "Moist Vessel," now streaming on CBS All Access.

In Star Trek: Lower Decks' latest episode, Captain Freeman assigns new tasks to the crew of the U.S.S. Cerritos. She starts by giving her daughter, Ensign Mariner, the most tedious and grossest jobs on the ship in the hopes that she will transfer away. As for Ensign D'Vana, she is tasked with observing the upcoming ascension of a member of the crew.

Starfleet officer Lieutenant O'Connor is in the process of achieving inner peace, something that will allow him to become a being made of pure energy that transcends both time and space. The proceedings aren't without their complications, but by the end of "Moist Vessel," the Lieutenant gets his wish -- and this allows him to make a startling discovery about the known universe.

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When Lieutenant O'Connor first performs the ceremony that he hopes will enable him to reach ascension, D'Vana's presence throws a wrench into the whole process. Despite her best intentions to help, D'Vana seems only to further agitate and aggravate the Lieutenant, and because of this, it seems like he'll never be able to become a being of pure light. However, he gets another opportunity when the ship becomes overrun with a terraforming fluid that endangers the lives of the entire crew. O'Connor and D'Vana are trapped together, and the Lieutenant ends up putting his life on the line to save the Ensign. This act of self-sacrifice is all that was needed for him to achieve ascension.

During the process, which is longer and more painful than what D'Vana expected, O'Connor narrates everything that's happening to him. As he begins to transcend time and space, he reveals that the entire known universe is actually being carried around on the back of a giant, cosmic, smiling koala. The Lieutenant is freaked out by the koala's unnerving smile, and before he can divulge the secret of life, he then disappears, his transformation fully complete.

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The notion that the entire cosmos is carried by a smiling koala is most assuredly a massive revelation about the entire universe. Even with everything we have seen across all Star Trek television series and films, the universe remains a mysterious place. But now, we apparently know what lies beyond it: a koala. But what is it smiling for?

Star Trek: Lower Decks stars Tawny Newsome as Ensign Beckett Mariner, Eugene Cordero as Ensign Rutherford, Jack Quaid as Ensign Brad Boimler, Noël Wells as Ensign Tendi, Dawnn Lewis as Captain Carol Freeman, Jerry O'Connell as Commander Jack Ransom, Gillian Vigman as Doctor T'Ana and Fred Tatasciore as Lieutenant Shaxs. The show premiered on CBS All Access on Aug. 6.

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