Citadel Season 2 Ending Explained: Does Nadia Leave Citadel?

Prime Video’s espionage thriller series, ‘Citadel,’ returns for a second season, bringing a lot of unresolved things from Season 1 to their conclusion. The last season ended with the shocking revelation of Mason being the mole who helped Manticore bring down Citadel. Now, he and Nadia have gone their separate ways, though both of them are on the run. Manticore is still hunting for them, and it is clear that they will not stop until they have succeeded. However, this isn’t the only thing on their mind. Bernard is still being held captive and is forced to do something that could change the world for the worse. SPOILERS AHEAD.

Citadel Season 2 Plot Synopsis

After surviving the events of the first season, Dahlia washes her hands of Bernard and gives him to Paulo Braga, one of the billionaires behind Manticore. Braga forces Bernard to make a chip, which, when installed in a person’s head, can force them to do whatever he wants. Bernard succeeds in making the chip, but he puts a barrier in the program that prevents Braga from going forward with his nefarious plans. When the opportunity arises, Bernard finds a way to escape captivity, and he is helped in it by a former CIA assassin named Hutch. He and his associate, Celine, join Bernard’s mission to kill Braga, but for that, they need some more help. So, Bernard reaches out to Mason and Nadia.

Nadia is on the run with her daughter, Asha, though she is starting to get tired of all the constant moving around and looking over her shoulder. When Bernard’s call arrives, Nadia entrusts the safety of her daughter to her mother, Honey, and leaves to deal with Manticore, hoping to destroy the organization once and for all. Meanwhile, Mason is on the run with Abby. He has left their daughter, Hendrix, with Bernard’s family, who are also in hiding. As Abby gets impatient to reunite with her daughter, she reaches out to Carter, which tips off Braga’s people. They find and abduct her, forcing Mason to come out of hiding. He, too, answers Bernard’s call, but while the team is focused on Braga, his only goal is to get back Abby.

At the same time, there is the elephant in the room. Nadia, though her friend, Francis, has discovered that Mason was the mole who brought down Citadel. Mason, on the other hand, has discovered, through his mother (who is still alive and also on the run), that Bernard is the one who messed up the coordinates and ordered the drone attack that killed his father and hundreds of other innocent people. Hutch and Celine have their own reasons for joining the squad. With the complications between them and the secrets they still keep from each other, the mission to stop Braga and his nefarious plans becomes even more challenging.

Is Abby Dead? Is Joana Dead?

The initial mission was to stop Braga from unlocking the mind control tech. This meant that even with Braga’s death, the mission wouldn’t stop, because he knew that Joana would see Braga’s plan through. That is exactly what happens. With Edison’s help, the glitches in Bernard’s program are removed. He knew that this would inevitably happen, but that still left the question of the assassin. The program wouldn’t work without installing the chip in someone, and then sending that person all the way to Scotland, and infiltrating the meeting meant that Joana might miss the window of killing the President. He knew that she was smarter than that, which means that she must have already sent her assassin into the field while Edison worked on the program.

Bernard suspected that Joana, who had spent a significant time in Joana’s captivity and had been returned rather easily, might be it. It would also be easier to turn her because of the backstop chip already installed in her brain. And that’s exactly what happened. Once Edison succeeded, the chip was activated immediately, turning an unsuspecting Abby into a killer. With her previous skills, she proved to be deadlier than any normal person could be and ended up killing Mason. She makes her way to the meeting, where she poses as a journalist to enter the building and find the spot to target the President. Nadia, Hutch, and Celine are sent to find and stop her. They locate her, but Aparna blocks their way.

After a trying fight, Hutch manages to hold back Aparna long enough for Nadia to find Abby. At first, Nadia tries to hold back. This is, after all, her former friend. Moreover, with Mason dead, Hendrix has no one else left, and Nadia knows what it’s like to grow up without one’s parents, even though her mother is alive. However, the chip prevents Abby from giving up on her mission, and in the end, Nadia is forced to kill her. At the same time, Bernard makes his way into Joana’s house. While things may have been difficult between him and Mason, Bernard still loved him. He wants Joana to pay for what she did to Abby, who then killed Mason. With Abby dead on the other end, he avenges Mason by killing Joana as well.

Why did Bernard Have the President Killed? Who Gets the Satellites?

When Bernard got the gang together, he told them that the mind-control chip was their biggest threat. He also told them that Braga meant to kill Russia’s nationalist president, who would be succeeded by a more easily bought man. From him, Braga would get his hands on the country’s latest satellites that would give him unencumbered access to every single person on the planet. So, not only did the team have to save the world from a dangerous mind-control chip, but stop Braga from having the power the Russian satellites would give him. So, the team goes in, expecting that they have to stop the assassination from happening. But that was never Bernard’s plan. He wanted to stop the assassin, but not the assassination.

If the nationalist president were not killed, the satellites would remain in Russia’s hands, giving them the scale of power that would change the world for the worse. Eventually, the president would die anyway, and then, someone else like Braga would try to get their hands on the tech to be able to rule the world. With him gone, Bernard decided to get the satellites for himself. Following Braga’s death, he got Dahlia to work her magic and get his billions of dollars of wealth transferred to herself. Meanwhile, he entrusted Francis with assassinating the president, in case Abby was killed before she could go through with it. As expected, the new leader was easily bought. While Braga was going to pay him $12 billion, Bernard offered him $24 billion, thanks to Dahlia.

Once they had the codes to the satellites, Bernard ordered Celine to decommission them all immediately. If he wanted, he could have used it to further his own plans at Citadel, but he knew that no one should have that kind of power. As long as the satellites were up and about, someone would always try to take control of them. So, it was best to just destroy them and be done with the problem once and for all. Of course, the rest of the team, except Francis, didn’t know about this. The fact that he had decided it early on is proven by the fact that when he called his wife for the last time, he told her to look at the sky and, when the stars fell down, she would know that everything had worked out for the best. And that’s exactly what happened in the end.

Does Nadia Leave Citadel? What Does She Give Bernard?

In the previous season, Nadia walked away from Citadel after she got her daughter. However, she was forced to be on the run because Manticore wouldn’t stop looking for her. Eventually, there came a point when she started thinking about killing all Manticore agents so that she could finally stop running. This is why, when Bernard sent out a call, she answered immediately. She hoped that with his help, she could get her freedom back. By the end, she realizes that no matter what, the cycle of secrets and lies will never stop. She is particularly disillusioned when, after Mason’s death, she discovers that Bernard knew Joana had turned Abby into the mind-controlled assassin, but he didn’t say anything.

So, when Braga is killed and the satellites are destroyed, she decides to call it a day and walk away. If she continues down this road, she will end up spending the rest of her life fighting Manticore and lose out on the time she could be spending with her daughter. So, even when Bernard is ready to rebuild Citadel, she decides to walk away. With Mason and Abby gone, she also takes Hendrix under her wing. This is confirmed by the fact that when she visits their graves, she puts a drawing on each, suggesting that at least one of them was made by Hendrix. At first, Bernard respects her decision to leave, but he still reaches out to her. And two months later, he finds her visiting Mason and Abby’s grave.

He asks her to return, pointing out that Manticore is still out there and they will never stop hunting her. She is aware of this fact, and she will continue to be with her daughter, despite it. She has lived in the shadows long enough to know how to protect her daughter. However, it wouldn’t hurt if Manticore were destroyed, and because Bernard is already working on it, she decides to help him. She gives him the list of all the Citadel agents who survived the agency’s fall and who are still out there. Bernard can reach out to them and rebuild Citadel, continuing the fight against Manticore, and perhaps even bring it down once and for all. Nadia, however, will not be a part of this fight. At least not until she has no other option.

Why does Nadia Meet Aparna? Does Nadia Kill Her?

One of the highlights of ‘Citadel’ Season 2 is Aparna, the assassin sent to find and kill Nadia by Braga. She and Nadia fight each other in the first episode, where Aparna proves to be exceptionally skilled. She would have killed Nadia if it weren’t for little Asha stepping in to help her mother. But even then, when Nadia ties a rope around her neck and leaves her for dead, Aparna finds a way to survive. Her hunt for Nadia continues, and we see Aparna becoming obsessed with Nadia, something that even Joana warns her against. Even as Aparna is put on a different mission, it becomes clear that she is a force to reckon with. Not only is she very difficult to fight against, but despite everyone’s efforts, she refuses to die.

In the final fight, when Hutch pushes her from the stairs, she falls a couple of floors down. But even then, she walks away from the fight. Even Hutch exclaims at the fact that she cannot seemingly be killed. In the end, when Nadia walks away from Citadel, Aparna is the only loose end. Braga and Joana are dead. Bernard and her friends will not come after her. The only person, for now, who has their mind set on finding her is Aparna. Because she is still alive, Nadia decides not to delay the inevitable and pays the woman a visit herself. Because Aparna wasn’t expecting it, Nadia could have easily caught her off guard and killed her. But that’s not what she wants to do anymore. She shows up at Aparna’s place, but puts down the gun, suggesting that all she wants to do is talk.

With Aparna’s employers dead, Nadia assumes that the assassin has no reason to chase after her and her daughter. They don’t have to engage in a fruitless game anymore. Rather, they can both move on with their lives towards better things. Most likely, this is what Nadia tries to explain to Aparna. Considering everything, it seems she may already be on that path. This means that the conversation wouldn’t have been too long. If anything, Nadia may have suggested Aparna to join Citadel if she wants to do some good. Or she might even have suggested that the young woman stay away from the world of espionage and live her own life. That’s what Nadia is doing anyway. In any case, her and Aparna’s fight is most likely settled now, and they don’t need to cross paths ever again.