Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Grootfall has taken over the Manifold Territories planets, killed the inhabitants including the Guardians Of The Galaxy, and transformed that region into Grootspace. However last issue when Hulkling and Wiccan came from the Kree/Skrull Empire that they head to investigate they found that the GOTG had been reborn as the Guardians Of Grootspace, and all the other 'dead' are to be reborn as well in this ancestral home of Groot's species the Flora Colossi. The new Guardians asked the 2 heroes to persuade the rest of the Galaxy to leave them alone.
The Guardians are happy as they fly around in a Groot-wood space ship, knowing that their missing compatriots (like Moondragon and Phyla-Vell) will soon be with them (when Groot flowers). Peter Quill calls them to a briefing on their next mission. Gamora is no longer a drunk and is getting along with her sister Nebula. Mantis is being mysterious, investigating 'weird sounds from the cosmic fabric'. Rocket Raccoon talks over plans with the facet of Groot that is their ship. He's building a special project that will help Groot flower but he needs more space and especially more time, and he doesn't believe Hulkling and Wiccan will be able told the rest of the Galaxy off for long. They meet at the 'stump' on which Drax sits meditating and claiming that his daughter Moondragon is with the woman she loves, Phyla, but they are impatient to return to life. But he also claims that he still can't find his soul (because he is a clone created by the Universal Church Of Truth in the GOTG(2019) series after the original Drax died in the Infinity Wars event).
So Star-Lord joins them and tells them they're going to deal with the Whitecaps (1 of the 2 factions fighting over the Territories in earlier issues) who are the only group not yet assimilated by Groot, and are now holed up in their last fortress. Pete doesn't think they'll be open to negotiation because they have no known language (and Nebula adds because the GOTG stole their mysterium in #2), so he intends that the GOG will have to drive them out of Grootspace.
The Guardians attack the Whitecaps (who are robotic bodies with unconnected globular 'heads' floating above them. The team destroy both parts as they rampage through the fortress. Behind them they don't notice plant tendrils emerging from the bodies. Nebula selects 1 body and invades its innards to interrogate its operating system. She is surprised to find no sentience just looping algorithms. But they do have ancient memory which provides an even bigger surprise.
The Elder Of The Universe known as the Gardener created 5 Branchworlds (actually I believe each a collection of star systems) overseen by his greatest creation Groot and he created pollen to seed them, and we see that the Whitecaps are the pollen. But all 5 Branchworlds died. So then he arranged the Rotation. 1 Branchworld would thrive while the other 4 lay dormant. When that BWorld withered Grootfall would arise and lead the Whitecaps to 1 of the other barren Branchworlds to quicken it anew. This was the wasteland of the Manifold Territories.
Now the team see 1 globe head floating over a spire of wood which Rocket somehow recognises as the Granopy, Groot's dying grandmother (who we learned in #6 turned our Groot into the Grootfall asteroids). Nebula reasons that the Whitecaps brought it here because it is a sacred relic of the previous 'garden'. Peter Quill realises that they have been killing the 'pollen', but Rocket reminds him that Groot arranged for them to be here. So Pete decides that shooting the Whitecaps mus be a good thing (and we saw the tendrils emerging) and so he shoots the Granopy-globe ... which spews out tendrils. The remaining Whitecaps follow suit and the fortress is soon enveloped in greenery. Drax declares "This is Groot".
Nobody really noticed that Mantis had slipped away during the battle but now she's back and won't tell Quill what she's been doing. But she does get a message (on a *really* old-looking telephone she's been carrying around) from Hulkling to say that he stalled them for as long as he could but now Peter's sister Queen Victoria of Spartax has sent her Imperial Armada to burn the Grootworlds (in revenge for the Spartax vessel Peter destroyed in #3).