Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Someone is putting Avengers through scenarios that will give them a chance to defeat an upcoming mega-menace. This time it's Black Widow, Captain Marvel, Hawkeye and Spider-Woman on an alien planet, and as usual we start in the middle of the action.
Black Widow is falling into the gaping teeth of a Grexxle that lives in a hole in the ground. She is being hunted by Drahls on skymobiles. 1 of them dives after her because he needs her head for a trophy. Bad move because Natasha Romanoff kicks him into the Grexxle, takes his ride, destroys 2 others and leads a bigger craft towards Captain Marvel who wipes that out.
They get a message from Spider-Woman who warns them of the approach of lots more Drahl warriors. And she also calls Hawkeye back to base where we see that she and some AIM troopers are defending 2 spacecraft. We learn that the Drahl are a peace-loving cultured race apart from their hunting season. Most of them are hunting honourably with low-tech weapons but 1 fires a big gun at the approaching women wrecking BW's mount, but she drops down to take part in the combat. Jessica Drew gets wounded by a spear and an AIM guy named Dave leaps to her defence. Carol Danvers lands with a thunderclap that bowls over many of the foe. Clint Barton turns up to take out more with arrows. No-one apart from the omniscient narrator notices a woman watching them.
It turns out that the Avengers have been here for a few days and somehow in the interim Hawkeye has lost most of his uniform. BW has been on a scouting mission and has found the force-field emitter that is preventing them from leaving the planet. CM could go to destroy it but when they detect her approach all the Drahl warriors will come in for the kill here, and Hawkeye's own scouting mission estimates about 4,000 of them. So Carol suggests *she* stay to guard AIM and the ships while the other 3 go dismantle the shield.
AIM tech Dave offers to come with them because they can't just smash it. We now learn that 1 of the spaceships is the Sinnarian Scalpel (from #1) whose wormhole generator is damaged. The lead AIM guy says they've nearly got it working but without Dave it will take them half an hour to finish rather than 10 minutes. Carol makes a command decision and agrees to Dave's plan.
While they prepare the 3 AIMers have a private chat. The leader Anatoly really doesn't want Dave to go because they may not be able to keep the Scalpel working for long and they should leave as soon as they can, ie abandoning the Avengers. Dave is very much not happy with that because the Avengers came to rescue them when their own organisation wouldn't.
The omniscient voiceover watches the mystery woman watch the 3 Avengers and Dave leave in their quinjet. He recognises her uniform as that of the Kharradun Royal Guard but the Kharradun Empire was wiped out 20 years ago, and he can't find any trace of her existence. En route Jessica and Natasha comment that they're suffering from a memory lapse again so they assume they're in 1 of the recent scenarios that T'Challa calls 'teachable moments'. And the Drahl's planetary defence shield is at least as good as the 1 the Red Ghost designed.
They land and start breaking in to the emitter facility, and Captain Marvel is already fighting off a horde of Drahls. But suddenly the mystery woman attacks her. Hawkeye and Spider-Woman are holding off other Drahls at the facility while Black Widow takes Dave to the core which he deduces is powered by some crystals. He takes a gamble and pulls 1 out. He survives and the force-field is down, and he takes some of the crystals with him.
Meanwhile Captain Marvel is fighting the mystery woman and asking who she is. The voiceover is interested to hear that she claims to be the emissary, right hand and wrath of an equally-mysterious master. But the 2 AIMers have repaired the Scalpel and now take off without Dave and the Avengers. Carol notices them leave and head for the wormhole they've created. She tells the others to hurry before it collapses.
The 4 at the emitter site head for their quinjet. While running Dave asks Jessica if she'd like to grab a coffee sometime, but he gets shot in the back. Widow fires up the engines while Hawkeye gives covering fire to SW carrying Dave in.
CM's still fighting the mystery woman who claims not to be on the Drahl's side. Her master doesn't care about them or the humans - he's only interested in justice and retribution. Carol breaks a hand punching her in the face, a symbol of their impotence against the inevitable future. But the quinjet arrives and blasts the mystery foe. It then heads towards the closing wormhole with CM close behind ...
... and they all make it through back to Avengers Mountain HQ on Earth. AIM and the Scalpel have gone but Tony Stark has the crystals and can integrate them into the planetary defence shield making it even stronger. Enough he claims to hold back gods. The general consensus is that they were 'supposed' to get the Scalpel as well as the crystals but Carol has another theory. Maybe they gained the Scalpel (in #1) so that AIM could take it and they'd follow. And the whole purpose was so they'd meet the 'emissary'.
Finally we see the 'emissary' joined by her large heavily-armoured master, face hidden by a full helmet. And the voiceover says the improved defence grid might 'delay' him.