STAR TREK: KHAN
Episode 3

Do Your Worst

Series: Khan - (2025)
Season: 1
Episode #: 3
Original Airdate: 09/22/2025

Teleplay: Kirsten Beyer and David Mack
Story: Nicholas Meyer
Director: Fred Greenhalgh

Podcast Length: 38:39

Starring
Naveen Andrews as Khan Noonien Singh
Wrenn Schmidt as Lieutenant Marla McGivers
Sonya Cassidy as Dr. Rosalind Lear
Tim Russ as Ensign Tuvok
George Takei as Captain Hikaru Sulu

Also Starring
Tina Ivlev as Erica
Maury Sterling as Ivan
Juliette Goglia as Sylvana
Unknown Performer as Richter
Mercy Malick as Ursula
Zuri Washington as Madot
Olli Haaskivi as Delmonda
Maxwell Whittington-Cooper Paolo and Additional Voices

Co-Starring
Hayden Bishop as Additional Voices
Paul Castro Jr. as Additional Voices
Ethan Dubin as Additional Voices
Cynthia Hood as Additional Voices
Alina Khan as Additional Voices
Jeremy Maxwell as Additional Voices
Hamish Sturgeon as Additional Voices
Juan Francisco Villa as Additional Voices
Maxwell Whittington-Cooper as Additional Voices

Synopsis

The colony has reason for cautious celebration: Marla and others learn of the first pregnancy under their new life on Ceti Alpha V. But that joy is tempered by loss, fear, and the creeping presence of something poisoning both mind and body among them.

Richter, once a promising young voice among the augments, begins acting strangely. Khan disappears into the wilderness to find him after the hunting trip. Meanwhile, at camp, the group tries to process Joaquin’s death, and Ursula diagnoses Sylvana’s injury as likely the work of Ceti eel larvae—an indigenous menace of which only the audience (with future knowledge) knows the full horror.

Khan tracks Richter to find him in a visible panic: Richter spews something about things inside his head, voices, commands. He panics, flees up a tree; Khan follows. In the chase, Richter jumps, breaks his ankle, and Khan hauls him back to camp, trying to soothe him. But the illness is worse than just rabid fear. Richter, in a delirium, kills Sylvana believing himself bound by what he takes as Khan’s orders. Ursula confirms that Richter is beyond help: some toxin—or alien parasite—is corrupting his mind. With no cure, Khan makes the mercy-kill. He kills Richter himself, solemnly, hoping that the autopsy might reveal what ravaged his protégé’s mind.

Meanwhile, news comes that Ceti Alpha VI (neighboring planet) is emitting unusual radio waves: its iron core is unstable. Even as Marla and others try to dismiss longer-term disasters (thinking they’ll take millennia), the shadow of an inevitable catastrophe looms.

Back in the framing device, Dr. Rosalind Lear aboard the Excelsior continues to sift through Khan’s logs. Through static and broken recordings she hears the younger Khan’s voice, the echoes of his promise, and the weight of what Ceti Alpha V demands. Khan tells Richter—and implicitly himself—that “this world shall take no more of my people.” That promise now carries a price: grief, loss of innocence, and moral compromise.

 | Scheherazade (Episode #2) | ~ | Star Trek: Khan Episode List | ~ | Magical Thinking (Episode #4) |