The Eugenics Wars: The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh

Did You Know?

• The novel mentions the phaser and tricorder left behind by Chekov in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
• The framing story involves Kirk, Sulu, Spock, and McCoy visiting Ceti Alpha V after the events of the second, third, and fourth Star Trek movies.
• The book includes a reference to the 1950s African American author Benny Russell from the Deep Space Nine episode Far Beyond the Stars.

Plot summary

The first volume follows Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln as they work to infiltrate and shut down the Chrysalis Project, a secret eugenics program hidden beneath the Thar Desert in India. The project has produced a generation of genetically engineered humans who are smarter, stronger, faster, and more resilient than ordinary people, with superior lungs, circulatory systems, reflexes, and senses. Khan, called Noon at age four, already shows remarkable charisma and leadership among the children. The scientists intend for their creations to take over Earth, and lead scientist Saurina Kahr, Khan's mother, secretly plans to release a flesh-eating biological weapon to eliminate normal humans. Roberta goes undercover as a scientist and discovers the program, while Gary Seven is captured trying to infiltrate the base.

Secondary plots

The first two novels include a framing story in which James T. Kirk undertakes a top-secret mission to the Paragon Colony on the planet Sycorax, which seeks to join the United Federation of Planets. The colony is inhabited by genetically altered humans, which conflicts with Federation law, so Starfleet Command has kept the request secret. Dr. McCoy questions the wisdom of considering the colony for membership, while Spock believes the Federation could accommodate it. Kirk must decide whether to recommend the colony. The Klingons also send a ship hoping to recruit the colony for their own genetics programs, but after incidents the colonists order the Klingons to leave. The Klingons plant a bomb that blows a hole in the colony's protective dome, and Kirk uses a shuttlecraft to extend its shields over the breach, leaving the shuttle vulnerable to the planet's harsh weather. Kirk saves the colony but does not allow it to join the Federation.

Historical notes

At the end of the first novel, a Historical Notes section states which events in the story are based on fact, though the novel presents their true causes as secret history. For example, a nuclear explosion beneath the desert in Rajasthan is depicted as being triggered by Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln to destroy the Chrysalis Project headquarters, while real-world history records it as the successful atomic test called Smiling Buddha. Other real-world events linked in the novel include the 1984 anti-Sikh riots after Indira Gandhi's death, the enlargement of the ozone hole above Antarctica in summer 1992, and the 1993 earthquake in Maharashtra.

Additional fictional characters

Cox also references Benny Russell, the literary alter ego of Captain Benjamin Sisko, and places a hardcover copy of Chicago Mobs of the 1920s in a scene. Characters from other sources include Jaime Sommers from The Bionic Woman, Robert McCall from The Equalizer, Vincent from Beauty and the Beast, and Hadji from Jonny Quest. Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln are said to have encountered the robotic housewives from The Stepford Wives and the pagan cult from The Wicker Man.