Jennifer Goines

Jennifer Goines is a character on 12 Monkeys. As a Primary, Jennifer is connected to time and as a result has visions of events that are destined to happen in the future.

Background
Jennifer Goines was born August 28, 1985. She was brilliant but mentally unstable from an early age. When she was a child, her mother, who called her a monster, attempted to drown her in a bathtub; a maid intervened. Jennifer's father, Leland Goines, had Jennifer's mother committed to a mental institution. As an adult, she worked as a scientist at the Markridge Group.

2011
Jennifer saw the Night Room for the first time.

She interrupted one of the Markridge Group's investor meetings, repeatedly muttering "Everything's changing, green to red."

2013
Jennifer saw her co-workers murdered in a Markridge laboratory by the Pallid Man and soldiers of the Army of the 12 Monkeys; only Henri Toussaint escaped. She was blamed for the murders and institutionalized at J.D. Peoples Mental Hospital. Jennifer was twenty-seven years old at the time she was admitted under court order to J. D. Peoples Mental Hospital.

2014
Leland Goines came to visit her in the hospital. She claimed she was doing better and that she was innocent of the murders. She asked him to get her released and boasted that she had kept all his secrets, including the Night Room. Goines reacted angrily, telling her never to speak of these things, not even to him. He then said it was better for her to remain institutionalized and left.

2015
Jennifer was told of her father's death, which caused her to laugh and draw pictures of monkeys on the wall of her room.

Jennifer met James Cole in the hospital. He asked her about the Army of the 12 Monkeys, but she did not give him any coherent answers and triggered the alarm to summon the guards. Later, she came to his room and told him about the Pallid Man murdering her colleagues and the existence of the Night Room. The Pallid Man then came to the hospital and kidnapped her. He drugged her with a hallucinogen, causing her to see the Witness.

Jennifer was taken to the Night Room by Pallid Man, who told her to give him access to the vault which supposedly contained the sample of the Kalavirus. When she refused to tell him, the Pallid Man tricked her into disabling the vault's final failsafe by pretending to leave. At Cole's urging, she began to deactivate the failsafe, but stopped when he told her the Pallid Man was still there. The Pallid Man then returned and forced her to finish by threatening Cole at gunpoint. Afterwards, when the Pallid Man kidnapped Railly, Jennifer witnessed Cole being shot and then splintering away.

She was later found by the Army. Olivia took her under her wing and the two bonded over their difficult relationships with their fathers. During their meeting, Olivia was wearing a round object on a chain that resembled the Amulet. She asked Jennifer if she wanted to be a "daughter" again, and Jennifer agreed.

Jennifer was released from J.D. Peoples after the Army proved she had not killed her fellow colleagues. She staged a hostile takeover of the Markridge Group, using the money and share of the company she had inherited from her father, and installed herself as the new CEO.

Jennifer gave a speech to Markridge shareholders about cloning the dodo and the unicorn and giving the Earth back to the animals, which was poorly received. Later, Cole and Railly came to her for information on the Army of the 12 Monkeys. She told them that José Ramse had invested in Markridge and in Raritan Valley National Laboratories, under the pseudonym of Ethan Seki. Afterwards, she embarked on a plane trip to 12 cities around the world, carrying what appeared to be the M5-10 virus, saying she had "work to finish."

2016
Jennifer traveled to New York, where she walked the streets debating with herself whether to release the plague virus. By chance, she ended up at a speed-dating event. She frightened her partner by talking about the end of the world and putting a vial of the virus and then a gun on the table; he called the police to report her. Cole caught up to her on a rooftop during a Chinese New Year's celebration as she was getting ready to open a vial of the virus, and tried to persuade her not to do it. Members of the Army of the 12 Monkeys found them, holding Cole at gunpoint and urging Jennifer to release the virus. Railly then splintered from 2044, killed the Army men, and then got ready to kill Jennifer to prevent her from bringing about the plague. However, Cole interceded, resulting in a standoff.

Jennifer ultimately decided not to release the virus, and watched as Cole and Railly destroyed it. After Railly abandoned Cole in 2016, Jennifer led him to the Emerson Hotel. After choosing not to release the virus, she felt purposeless and became unstable, alternately attacking and seducing Cole, then cutting herself, muttering that hurting herself was the only way she could get Cole's attention. Cole soothed her and advised her to find a new purpose in life, and she left him, presumably to look for it.

2017
Jennifer appeared outside the Baltimore CDC, preaching to a group of refugees about "daughters" and an "army."

2043
Ramse saw a group of Daughters passing by an abandoned amusement park. He followed the group to their camp and had a conversation with an aged Jennifer about Cole and friendship. She told him that he would be a good friend and gave him the Amulet, telling him he would need it.

2044
Jennifer ordered the Daughters to kidnap Jones and force her to send Railly to rescue Cole from 2016. She gives Railly a note for him saying "I found my purpose," alluding to his advice to her 2016 self.

Jones asks Jennifer to help her learn more about the nature of time. Jennifer replies that Jones is "looking at it wrong," and offers her a draught made from a red hallucinogenic herb. When Jones drinks the hallucinogen, she experiences a vision where Jennifer explains how the Primaries are linked to time, and how the Witness plans to destroy time.

Trivia

 * One of the drawings made by Jennifer Goines is a lion on the top of a building, a reference to the 1995 film Twelve Monkeys (S01E11).