The passage continued beneath Alzoc's frozen surface.
Khan followed it away from the ruined botanical chamber, listening as the door closed behind him. The artificial light disappeared with it. Thin strips along the floor provided the only illumination, revealing another corridor built from the same undecorated metal as the rest of the laboratory. No markings identified where it led. No control panels offered another path. Plagueis had left only one direction open.
The corridor ended inside a wide chamber.
Khan stopped near its center. Four closed doors occupied the surrounding walls, each positioned at an equal distance from the next. Lines divided the floor into concentric circles, while small sensor lenses watched from the ceiling. Nothing waited upon the raised platform ahead of him.
Plagueis's voice entered through the hidden speakers.
"You will now help me test what a droid enhanced by the Force can accomplish."
Khan looked toward the nearest sensor. "A droid has no connection to the Force."
"I did not say it did."
The four doors opened.
A machine emerged from each passage. They were taller than ordinary security droids, with narrow armored frames constructed around reinforced joints. Their heads possessed no recognizable features beyond a single horizontal photoreceptor. Each carried a long kinetic sword whose dark blade vibrated beneath a pale energy field.
The doors closed behind them.
One droid raised its weapon above its shoulder. Another held its sword low beside its right leg. The third presented the blade directly before its chest, while the final machine turned sideways and drew its weapon behind its body.
Four different stances.
They began moving around Khan.
He remained still as the circle tightened. Metal feet crossed the floor without falling into the same rhythm. One moved while another slowed, their positions changing continuously as they searched for an opening.
The droid in front of him attacked.
Its kinetic sword descended toward Khan's head. His golden lightsaber ignited and caught the blade. The energy surrounding the sword flared beneath the impact, but the weapon did not break.
Khan turned his wrist to carry the attack aside.
A second blade came toward his ribs.
He stepped back and blocked it, only for the third machine to sweep its weapon toward his legs. Khan jumped over the strike. The fourth droid was already waiting where he would land.
Its sword thrust toward his chest.
Khan twisted in the air. The blade passed beneath his arm before his boots touched the floor. He attacked the machine's exposed shoulder, but it rotated away before the golden blade reached it. The first droid entered behind him, forcing Khan to abandon the strike and defend again.
Metal surrounded him.
Every time Khan created an opening, another machine occupied it. When he shifted his weight for a thrust, one moved beyond its reach. When his shoulders turned for a wider strike, two attacked from the side the movement
The passage descended farther beneath the frozen surface of Alzoc.
Khan followed it until the light from the botanical chamber disappeared behind him. The walls returned to bare metal, broken only by narrow lines of white light running along the floor. No markings identified where the corridor led. Nothing moved ahead of him. Even the machinery beneath the walls had become quiet.
The passage ended at another chamber.
Khan entered and looked around. The room was wider than the one containing Plagueis's hologram, but almost completely empty. Four sealed doors occupied the surrounding walls. Dark observation windows watched from above, their surfaces reflecting the lights beneath them.
Plagueis's voice emerged through the chamber.
"You will now help me test what a droid enhanced by the Force can accomplish."
Khan looked toward the observation windows. "A droid has no connection to the Force."
"I did not say it possessed one."
Locks disengaged around him.
The four doors opened together.
A droid stepped through each entrance. Their bodies were narrow and armored, built with longer limbs than common security machines. Dark plating protected their joints while reinforced sections covered their chests and heads. Each carried a kinetic sword. Blue energy moved along the edges of the weapons, gathering around the dark metal in a field strong enough to resist a lightsaber.
The droids separated as they entered.
One raised its blade beside its head. Another held its sword low, with the point angled toward Khan's legs. The third turned its body sideways and extended its weapon before it. The last kept its blade close to its chest while remaining several steps behind the others.
Four different stances.
Khan remained at the center of the room.
The machines began circling him. Their feet struck the floor in a slow, measured rhythm. None rushed. None allowed the space between them to widen enough for Khan to isolate one without exposing himself to the others.
The first attacked.
Its sword descended toward Khan's shoulder.
Gold light appeared in his hand. The kinetic blade struck his lightsaber, and blue energy spread across its edge as both weapons stopped. Khan turned his wrist to carry the attack aside.
The second droid was already moving.
Its blade entered from behind him, aimed beneath his ribs. Khan stepped around the first machine and lowered his lightsaber in time to intercept it. Metal passed near his back. Before he could drive his elbow into the second droid's head, the third swept its sword toward his legs.
Khan jumped.
The fourth machine had been waiting for him to leave the ground.
It thrust toward the place where he would land.
Khan twisted in the air. The kinetic sword passed beneath his cloak as he caught the droid with the Force and pushed it several meters across the chamber. Its feet scraped against the metal, but it did not fall. The other three moved between Khan and the displaced machine before he could follow.
They began circling him again.
Khan adjusted his grip and moved into another stance.
The droid opposite him changed with it.
Its shoulders lowered. Its sword moved closer to its body. The other machines shifted around Khan, each taking a position suited to the openings created by the first.
He advanced without warning.
The nearest droid met his first strike. Its sword turned just enough to redirect the golden blade while the machine beside it attacked his exposed side. Khan changed direction and struck from below.
The second droid was already there.
Their weapons met.
A third blade passed above Khan's head as he lowered himself. He drove his shoulder into the droid before him, but the machine moved with the impact and recovered before his lightsaber could reach its chest. The fourth entered behind the attack, forcing Khan to withdraw.
Every opening produced an answer.
Khan watched them move. Their mechanical bodies crossed distances faster than their joints should have allowed. An invisible pressure moved with them, gathering before every attack and disappearing when their blades became still. It never settled within the machines. It passed around them.
The droids closed in again.
Khan lowered his golden blade.
Pale-blue light moved across his fingers and entered the hilt. Electricity followed the lightsaber upward, curling around the gold without escaping it. Thin arcs gathered along the blade until its glow changed beneath them.
The first droid attacked.
Khan parried.
Lightning crossed the point of contact.
It entered the kinetic sword and traveled through the droid's arm. The machine's fingers locked around its weapon. Its shoulder jerked, and the speed carrying it forward disappeared.
Khan cut through its knee.
The droid fell. He turned his blade before it reached the floor and drove the point through its chest. Blue electricity spread beneath the armor as the golden blade passed through its back.
The remaining three attacked together.
Khan pulled his lightsaber free and caught the first two weapons against it. Lightning divided between their blades. Both machines shook as electricity entered their systems, but the third continued toward his back.
Khan released one hand from his lightsaber.
The damaged droid upon the floor lifted between them.
The third machine struck its fallen companion. Its kinetic sword entered the ruined torso and remained there for the fraction of a second Khan required.
He extended his fingers.
The droid flew backward, still carrying the wreckage upon its weapon. Both struck the wall hard enough to bend the metal behind them.
Khan stepped between the remaining machines.
One attacked high. The other aimed low.
He turned between their blades. His lightsaber passed across the first droid's weapon, sending another current into its arm, before continuing through its neck. The head separated from the body.
Khan did not allow it to fall.
The Force caught the collapsing machine and threw it into the last droid. Both struck the ground together. The surviving machine forced the wreckage aside and attempted to rise.
Khan's lightsaber left his hand.
The golden blade rotated once across the chamber. It passed through the droid's chest, continued through the machine still pinned against the distant wall, and returned to Khan's hand.
The last two bodies became still.
Silence returned to the chamber. Electricity moved across the ruined droids before fading beneath their armor. Khan extinguished his lightsaber and looked toward the observation windows.
Plagueis spoke.
"Impressive. Your technique has become less predictable."
Khan waited.
"You once depended heavily upon the lessons of your master. Now you alter them without hesitation." Plagueis sounded pleased. "Grief has improved you."
One of the doors opened.
Khan did not move toward it.
"Continue," Plagueis said.
"No."
The open doorway waited.
Khan turned toward the wall opposite it.
"You entered this laboratory to find me," Plagueis reminded him. "The path is before you."
"I have followed enough of your paths."
Khan raised one hand.
The air crossed the chamber toward him. Pieces of the destroyed droids lifted from the floor. The observation windows shook within their frames as pressure gathered against the wall.
Khan pushed.
The metal collapsed.
Its center folded inward before tearing away from the surrounding supports. Armor plating, conduits, and sections of machinery erupted into the space beyond. The impact continued through another wall and opened a path into the corridors behind it.
For several seconds, Plagueis said nothing.
When his voice returned, the amusement had left it.
"Fine. Then so be it."
Red lights activated throughout the facility.
The floor vibrated beneath Khan as hidden machinery awakened. Panels opened along the corridor he had exposed. Defense emitters lowered from the ceiling and turned toward him.
The first lasers fired.
Khan stepped through the broken wall. His golden blade moved beside him, deflecting one beam into the ceiling and another into the emitter that produced it. The machine exploded. Two more weapons fired from the walls.
He closed his hand.
Their metal housings crushed around their internal mechanisms.
Security doors began descending ahead of him. Khan continued walking. The first reached the floor before he arrived. His lightsaber passed through its locking points, and the Force tore both halves from the frame.
Droids entered from the corridor beyond it.
Some carried blasters. Others possessed heavier bodies with weapons mounted along their arms. They filled the passage in front of Khan while additional machines approached from behind.
Blaster fire crossed the corridor.
Khan raised one hand. The first bolts stopped before reaching him, suspended within the pressure gathered around his body. More joined them, filling the air with red light.
He moved his hand forward.
The bolts returned.
Several droids fell beneath their own attack. Khan advanced through the smoke while the heavier machines continued firing. His lightsaber remained low beside him. Each movement of the blade turned away another shot without slowing his pace.
One of the larger droids charged.
Khan looked toward it.
The machine's chest folded inward. Its feet left the floor, and its body struck the droids behind it. Metal collapsed together until the corridor became blocked by their wreckage.
More machines appeared beyond the next turn.
Khan swept his lightsaber across his body.
Pale-blue energy separated from the golden blade. It spread through the corridor in a widening wave and passed over every droid ahead of him. Their photoreceptors flashed. Weapons lowered. One after another, the machines collapsed as electricity moved between their joints.
Khan walked among them.
The alarms continued. Defense emitters emerged wherever he passed, but none remained active long enough to stop him. He followed the largest power conduits deeper into the facility. They gathered behind the walls, joining other systems as the corridors narrowed around them.
After several turns, the alarms stopped.
Khan entered a circular room.
A single figure stood before the central computer.
The hood of a dark cloak concealed its face, but not the long shape of the head beneath it. The figure was taller than Khan and narrow across the shoulders. One hand remained hidden beneath the cloak while the other held a silver lightsaber hilt.
Khan became still.
The figure did not speak.
Its red blade ignited.
Khan's golden lightsaber rose beside him.
The hooded figure moved first.
It crossed the room with a speed that carried the cloak behind it. The red blade entered low before turning sharply toward Khan's neck. Khan met it with gold. Both weapons collided between them, filling the chamber with light.
The figure withdrew and attacked again.
Khan recognized the turn of its wrist.
The same movement had opened his shoulder during their battle six months earlier.
He intercepted the strike and drove forward. Their lightsabers crossed three times before the figure moved away. Khan followed, cutting toward its chest. The red blade caught his attack and carried it aside before turning toward his stomach.
Khan stepped beyond the point.
His elbow struck the figure beneath the hood.
The impact felt wrong.
There was no breath. No movement of bone beneath cloth. The figure gave ground without making a sound and brought its lightsaber around again.
Khan blocked.
Red and gold passed across the chamber. The hooded fighter yielded beneath the first strike, redirected the second, and answered the third with a thrust toward Khan's heart. Khan twisted away. The red blade burned through part of his cloak but did not reach his body.
The figure continued.
Every movement resembled something Khan remembered. A low cut beneath the rain. A delayed thrust used after drawing him forward. The sudden change from careful defense into enough strength to drive him backward.
Khan met all of them.
He forced the red blade away and struck toward the figure's head. It lowered itself beneath the attack before rotating behind him. Khan turned. Their lightsabers collided near his face.
Nothing waited beneath the hood.
No anger answered his own. No satisfaction. No hatred.
Only the same pressure he had felt moving around the four droids.
Khan pushed harder.
His attacks came without pause. The figure blocked the first, then the second. The third forced its red blade against its shoulder. The fourth drove it backward into the central computer.
The hooded fighter raised one hand.
The Force struck Khan in the chest.
He slid across the floor but remained standing.
The figure recovered before he stopped. Its lightsaber turned beside its body and entered the same stance Plagueis had used when she layed dead between them.
Khan tightened his grip.
He crossed the chamber.
The figure attacked. Khan caught the red blade and forced it upward. Gold and red shook between them. The hooded fighter attempted to turn away, but Khan released one hand from his weapon and drove the Force against its chest.
The cloak pressed against something hard beneath it.
The figure struck the computer.
Khan pulled it back before it could recover. Its body crossed the space between them, carried by the Force directly into the path of his lightsaber.
The golden blade passed through its neck.
The head separated.
Its body fell upon one side of Khan. The head struck the floor upon the other and rolled until the hood slipped away.
A dark metal skull looked back at him.
Sparks rose from the severed neck. Wires moved among broken internal supports while the light behind two narrow photoreceptors disappeared. The red lightsaber extinguished beside the body.
Khan stared at the remains.
His fingers closed.
The droid rose from the floor. Its chest compressed beneath the Force. Arms folded into its body, and the metal skull shattered before joining the collapsing mass. Khan continued until the droid became a single knot of armor, wires, and ruined machinery.
He released it.
The remains struck the floor.
No laughter entered the chamber. Plagueis offered no final remark. Only the damaged computer continued operating behind the wreckage.
Khan turned toward it.
Part of the display had been destroyed during the duel, but the central archive remained active. He approached the controls and opened the first directory. Security denied him access.
Khan removed a data cylinder from beneath his cloak and connected it to the console. The device began moving through the remaining protections while he searched the files still available without authorization.
A botanical image appeared.
The plant Khan had destroyed filled the display. Its roots extended across a diagram of the chamber while measurements changed beside them. Images recorded the moment it had been pulled from the soil and the lightning entering its roots.
Khan moved to the previous file.
Smaller plants rested inside transparent containers. Some possessed leaves. Others had formed uneven masses around root systems that led nowhere. The records moved backward through their growth until the plants became collections of cells suspended within nutrient fluid.
The first image contained no seed.
Khan opened another directory.
The four combat droids appeared. Lines of energy surrounded their bodies, tightening around their limbs before every recorded movement. Beside them waited designs for other machines. Some resembled soldiers. Others possessed bodies shaped like people.
One carried the outline of a tall head beneath a dark hood.
Khan looked toward the crushed remains upon the floor.
The data cylinder broke through the first security layer.
More files opened.
A series of living subjects appeared upon the display. Their bodies differed, but each record contained the same measurements. Blood samples. Neural activity. Cellular structures. A separate reading remained empty beside most of them.
Later experiments showed faint changes.
The empty line began producing small responses.
Most disappeared within seconds.
The subjects beneath them did not appear in another file.
Khan continued.
A new image formed above the console. A body rested inside a medical chamber. Light gathered around the shape of its brain before passing into a crystalline container. The body became still.
Another chamber opened beside it.
The light entered a second body.
Its eyes opened.
The recording stopped.
Khan selected the next trial. The bodies changed. The pattern of light did not. It passed from one form into another, carrying the same neural structure each time.
Lines of results appeared beside the recordings.
MEMORY RETENTION: PARTIAL.
PERSONALITY COHESION: UNSTABLE.
HOST REJECTION.
NEURAL COLLAPSE.
Another file replaced the organic bodies with a mechanical frame. The pattern entered it. One metal hand moved before the recording dissolved into static.
Khan returned to the directory containing the created organisms. New diagrams placed the same pattern beside them. Empty bodies waited beneath measurements that had not yet been completed.
His hand became still above the controls.
The plant grown without a seed.
The pressure moving around lifeless machines.
A mind carried from one body into the next.
The data cylinder signaled that it had entered the central archive.
Khan selected everything.
The transfer began.
Thousands of files passed into the cylinder. Shipping records joined biological reports, recordings, test results, and incomplete designs. Several directories remained encrypted even after they were copied.
Khan watched the transfer until it reached completion.
He removed the cylinder and closed his hand around it. The last image remained above the console: a row of empty bodies beneath a single suspended pattern of light.
His lightsaber passed through the computer.
The image vanished.
Khan activated his communicator.
"R3."
The astromech answered immediately with a rapid series of tones.
"I am coming out."
R3 continued.
"No. Nothing is following me."
The droid released another question.
Khan looked at the ruined machines covering the corridor behind him. "Nothing operational."
He ended the transmission and left the central room.
The path back through the facility remained marked by broken doors, crushed defenses, and droids scattered across the floor. Nothing else attempted to stop him. Plagueis's voice did not return.
Cold air reached Khan before he arrived at the outer entrance.
The massive door stood open.
Beyond it, the Delta-7 rested upon the landing pad. Snow moved around its landing struts while the engines remained active. R3-T9 waited inside his socket with his dome turned toward the entrance.
Khan crossed the platform and climbed onto the wing. The cockpit opened before he reached it.
R3 began speaking the moment Khan lowered himself into the seat.
"I found Plagueis's records."
The droid became quiet.
Khan connected the data cylinder to the navigation computer. Directories spread across the display until their number exceeded what the cockpit could show.
"Go through everything. Find other facilities, shipment routes, financial records, and any location connected to these experiments."
R3 released a quieter tone.
"I do not know what all of it means yet."
The cockpit closed above him.
"But we are not leaving it here."
Khan took control of the starfighter. The Delta-7 lifted from the landing pad and climbed between the walls of the ravine. Wind caught the vessel as it rose above the frozen surface, carrying snow across its dark hull.
The masking system activated.
The starfighter crossed the white wasteland and became a fading shape beneath the clouds.
Far from the ravine, a tall figure stood upon an ice-covered ridge.
Dark clothing covered his narrow body. A finely made cape rested over one shoulder, its edge moving in the wind. Their covered face watched as he watched the Delta-7 climb through the clouds. They remained there until the starfighter disappeared. Then they turned toward the buried laboratory.