A/N: And so we come to the end of another story. Thank you all for reading, following, favoriting and reviewing, you're the best! Warnings for violence.

Everything goes so smoothly during the following week that Khan fears at first that he's being led into a trap. But no; if it was a trap, then he would surely have been stopped before going so far. He gains access to the ship he's been building for Marcus and transfers his sleeping brethren into one of its many cargo holds without incident. The substitute cryochambers are placed in the seemingly-abandoned bank vaults with no one seeming to be the wiser, and Molly plays the part of a cowed Omega terrified of her mate but unable to leave him to a tee. She even 'secretly' begs Marcus to help her free herself, confessing that aside from the sex Khan is indifferent to her unless he thinks they're being watched, but Marcus just laughs and tells her she's too useful a tool to be allowed to leave.

They snatch what little time they can together during those hectic seven days, but it's never enough. It never will be enough, not until they're out from under Marcus' thumb and free to live their lives as they choose. Molly convinces Khan that his view of Starfleet as an entity has been entirely distorted, perverted by what Marcus and Section 31 have forced on him, and he reluctantly concludes that she's correct. The higher ups may be blind idiots, but they are indeed innocent of the crimes Marcus commits in their collective name, and so he will be sure to spare as many Starfleet lives as he can when they make their escape.

That day finally comes; his sleeping crew is waiting for him, the work on the Vengeance is completed, and the time for the final part of the plan to be enacted has come. Khan gives Molly one final chance to extricate herself, since it will be clear to anyone that she was coerced by both himself and Marcus if she chooses to present herself as a victim, but she scorns that role, just as he'd secretly hoped she would. He kisses her passionately as they prepare the final move, then watches with no outward signs of anxiety as she hurries to find Marcus and play her final role as a Section 31 puppet.

Once the doors have whooshed shut behind her, Khan returns to his official work, creating new photon torpedos to be retrofitted into existing Constellation-classstarships. The group of engineers normally assigned to work alongside him have been sent off on Marcus' command, leaving Khan alone in the vast workspace where he designed the Vengeance, Starfleet's first - and if all goes to plan, last - Dreadnaught-class starship.

The ship he and Molly, with the assistance of a highly classified transwarp beaming device, are about to steal.

Minutes later the doors whoosh open and Molly stumbles in. He refrains from attacking the android that pushed her into the room, but only barely. She is trembling and smells of fear and excitement. "K-khan," she stutteres as she comes to a stop more than two meters away from him. "The Admiral...he knows. I told him everything." She drops her head into her hands as if crying, and he moves forward quickly, grabbing her by the arms.

"Molly, how could you betray me like this?" he snarls, whipping his head up to face the door as it opens again. The second android enters the room and stops next to its immobile counterpart, followed immediately by Marcus. He's taken the extra precaution of bringing along a phaser rifle, which he holds casually in his arms as he regards the carefully-staged tableau before him. "Well, well, Khan, Lieutenant Hooper has been tellin' me some very interesting stuff about you. Very interesting indeed."

"Has she now," Khan replies, keeping his voice neutral as he releases his grip on Molly and pivots to face his nemesis.

Molly inches away from him, shoulders shaking, slowly backing toward Marcus as if for safety. The androids completely ignore her, as does the Admiral, their eyes and attention completely focused on Khan. He takes a single step forward, fists clenching at his side, and Marcus immediately aims the phaser rifle at him. He snaps out a command to the androids, who move to flank Khan. They hold no weapons of their own, but Khan knows it's only because their combined strength more than matches his own.

He snarls as one of the androids reaches for him, feints as if about to grapple with it...and watches in satisfaction as the two automatons collapse to the floor, utterly lifeless.

Marcus wastes valuable seconds gaping at the scene before him; as he raises the phaser rifle and starts to depress the trigger, Molly springs into action. If Khan feared that she might quail at her part in all this, that fear is laid to rest as she uses the blade she's been concealing in her uniform sleeve, pulling it out and jamming the end of it into Marcus' wrist. He howls and drops the weapon even as he fires it, the blast going wild, easy for Khan's superior reflexes to avoid as he drops to the floor, rolls, and then springs back to his feet.

Marcus attempts to grab Molly, to wrench the blade from her grasp, but she is a trained Starfleet officer, and he is many years from the field; she easily avoids his grasp, kicking one leg out from under him while simultaneously stabbing him high in the abdomen.

Marcus gapes up at her, his life's blood pooling beneath his body, one hand groping for the handle of the blade protruding from his stomach. "You...you're just an Omega…" he rasps disbelievingly even as she pulls out the knife she just plunged into his body.

She gives him a dark smile and says, "Your mistake was in thinking that Omega means weak." She leans closer, so that her breath mingles with the last ones he will ever take. "You were wrong."

She and Khan watch with equal dispassion as their enemy dies, then spring into action. Khan rattles off a series of commands that bring the androids back to life by reversing the dampening field he had set into place. There is no time to properly reprogram them, but he has infiltrated their coding so that they will remain passive while he and Molly finish what they need to do, then at a set point in time, report the Admiral's death - and, more importantly, transfer the downloaded files Khan has placed in their memory cores to Starfleet Command, the Federation Council, and the Klingon High Command.

The Admiral's plans for a war must be foiled, and any co-conspirators flushed out. It is the least Khan owes Molly, to protect her beloved Federation even as they flee it forever.

As he races to program the trans-warp beaming device, he spares a moment to drink in the sight of her, working calmly and quietly next to him. The woman Marcus thought to use as a tool, a weapon against his prisoner, has proven to be his undoing, and it is an irony Khan greatly enjoys. But not as much as he enjoys the small smile his mate gives him as he finishes programming in the coordinates for their destination, the bridge of the Vengeance.

He pulls her to his side and plants a passionate, promising kiss on her lips before the energy of the transporter beams carries them away to a future he is determined to be as bright as the love he feels for her - and she for him.