As the comic opens, the Never Queen gives a quick recap of the Ultimates' recent adventures. She explains that the team, led by Carol Danvers, helped Galactus evolve into Lifebringer so he would stop eating planets. They then discovered that Eternity, an entity that embodies the multiverse, had been infected and corrupted by First Firmament. Two of Eternity's aspects named Lord Chaos and Master Order respectively had been warped and compelled to murder Avatar of Law and Justice before merging into a creature called Logos. As the new Avatar of Law and Justice, Logos executed the Celestials, then tried and failed to kill Galactus (but did weaken him as well as kill his herald Anti-Man.) Meanwhile, the Ultimates returned to Earth to fight the Chitauri invasion, but after fighting it for a long while so they were stopped from returning to Earth by the planetary shield.
Danvers directs the other Ultimates, including Monica "Spectrum" Rambeau and Adam "Blue Marvel" Brashear, to get ready for the next wave of Chitauri. Gamora says they're ready to die but Danvers tells her to calm down, since once America Chavez gets back from her own mission she'll be able to get through the shield and save them all. In the meantime, they have to survive the Chitauri. Each Chitauri will fight their way through anything that gets between itself and Earth, and there are so many Chitauri that the heroes can't get out of the way of all of them, so they'll have to fight until the wave passes them over.
The aliens then arrive and Danvers directs her team to defend her nearby satellite (which has new, untrained recruits onboard) as well as themselves. Brashear is almost driven into a dragon-like monster but Rambeau alerts him in time and he's able to fight his way out. Aliens also attack Brand, one of Danvers' colleagues in Alpha Flight who is piloting a fighter spaceship, but even though Danvers tells him to eject he refuses and keeps shooting the ship's weapons at Chitauri attackers. Then at last the wave moves past them and the Chitauri smash into Earth's shield, destroying themselves. This horrifies Brashear, and even though Danvers says the Chitauri are non-sentient drones, he says it's still awful to watch millions of them destroying themselves.
Danvers reflects that she should have seen this coming. She was a huge proponent of the planetary shield because of all the recent major threats to Earth, and even though Rogers said he was against the shield, that just made Danvers argue more strongly in its favor (which Rogers knew would happen because Rogers knew Danvers was a contrarian). But in retrospect, she thinks, it should have been obvious that the shield could keep heroes on its outside from attacking villains on its inside just as easily as the reverse. She punches the shield in rage, but Rambeau stops her, saying they've already tried everything and can't find a way through it. Danvers agrees, noting that their only hope to breach it is to find Lifebringer (formerly Galactus) and get him to help them punch through; this is what America Chavez was sent off to do. Brashear says they can do it in time, but Danvers says they don't have much of that before the Chitauri drone waves wear them down and kill them.
Rocket Raccoon gripes to Peter Quill about being stuck in space as Monica Rambeau uses her cosmic awareness abilities to try to integrate herself into the shield and identify a weakness. She doesn't find one, but does become aware of America Chavez entering Galactus's realm. Galactus tells Chavez that Owen Reece (also called Molecule Man) built the realm for Galactus before leaving for parts unknown, and Galactus intends to rest and recover his strength there since Logos can't seem to sense him while he's in it. He then notes that Logos may be able to find him despite everything simply by following Chavez's path, and observes that he now senses Rambeau's presence, though he can't identify her. He asks why Chavez is there and she tells him, but he says he can't help, playing a recording of Maria Hill boasting to Danvers that the shield could stop even Galactus from entering Earth.
Galactus does grant that he might have been able to breach the shield before Logos drained him, but for now all he can do is recover his strength for the upcoming fight against Logos; he won't waste his energy and power on a futile battle to save Earth. An enraged Chavez says that helping Earth wouldn't be a waste. Galactus just responds that he's readying himself to fight Logos, an awesomely-powerful enemy who threatens the entire cosmos; compared to that Earth is an insignificant spec. Chavez chews him out and leaves, saying they'll save Earth on their own since nobody will help them. At that point, Rambeau feels herself being pulled away.
Danvers pulls Rambeau out of the shield, saying almost an hour passed since she phased into it and she was afraid Rambeau had died. She begs Rambeau to keep it together for a little longer until Chavez gets back with Galactus. Rambeau tells Danvers that Chavez did find Galactus, and Danvers is overjoyed, believing the cavalry is on its way. Rambeau, however, looks away, and Danvers realizes that no help is coming. Then another Chitauri wave appears and Danvers, unable to even face the others, manages to order them to get ready for battle once more.
Tropes:
- Cavalry Refusal: What Chavez sees Galactus as doing, although Galactus protests he couldn't help in his weakened state even if he wanted to.
