Synopsis / Summary / Plot
This issue has a voiceover from what turns out to be the Machine that supervises Eternal resurrections among other things. Now it watches 1 of them awaken naked and tests his mental state by asking "Ikaris, what are the principles?". Ikaris replies "Protect Celestials. Protect the Machine. Correct excess Deviation." which the Machine finds satisfactory. Ikaris remembers his latest death as all the Eternals killed each other (committing group suicide in Avengers (2018) #4). Now he awakes in the Exclusion, an Eternal base under the South Pole 'sealed between 6 artificial molecules'.
The Machine wants to run further tests by getting Ikaris to use his powers, starting with his eye-beams. But as his uniform forms around him the hero doesn't want to waste time. The Machine says he's as brusque as ever, but Ikaris comments that the AI isn't usually this talkative, and the Machine has to admit to itself this is true and may indicate a problem. Ikaris learns that he is the last to return because he was the last to die. And he proves 1 of his powers works OK by flying into the air.
The Machine connects Ikaris to the Eternals' ruler in far-off Olympia, and Zuras tells him that his fellows have decided that 'she' must be freed from her prison in the Exclusion. Ikaris isn't happy about that but will obey. As the hero heads off, the Machine ruminates about Exclusion. Sometimes an Eternal makes a mistake, and as a punishment is mindwiped and allowed to restart their life (maybe by destruction and reassembly like Ikaris has just been through). But a severe mistake questions the very essence of the Eternal, who as a result is condemned to Exclusion (actual imprisonment? or destruction without reassembly?).
The Machine further recalls some of those who are now referred to as Excluded with a code letter. Excluded U was the 1st, who wanted to wipe out all non-Eternals on Earth. (The Marvel Fandom Wiki identifies him as Uranos, brother of Kronos, which is reasonable but he and his followers were exiled to Uranus and Titan where he died.) Another was guilty of apocalyptic auto-deification. (This would be Kronos, father of Zuras, whose experiments destroyed the original Eternal city Titanos while raising himself to godhood - so he's presumably Excluded K.) A 3rd sired a son who killed half the Galaxy with a finger-click. (The son is obviously Thanos, so the guilty party is his father A'Lars/Mentor, brother of Zuras - hence Excluded A. But he left Earth for Titan.)
And we now find that Excluded SP is Sprite (who used to be male but is now female, probably to align with the COVID-delayed Eternals film). Ikaris tells her she's been restored to her last safe backup (hopefully avoiding what got her Excluded last time) so she's going to find the world has changed a lot. Trickster Sprite uses her illusion power to create multiple copies of herself who dodge around the hero. Ikaris blasts away with his eye-beams but isn't quick enough to stop her escaping via Machine's teleportation system. He asks Machine to send him to the same place.
We get a digression about Eternal teleportation. They can disassemble and reassemble their bodies at will and can use that to teleport short distances, but long distances take too much out of them. So Machine has a network of subdimensional threads across the globe which an Eternal can use for long distance teleportation. (This still involves disassembly and reassembly, like Star Trek's system.) (The map of the Eternals' 6 global bases accompanying this bit suggests that Machine's links are only between *them*, but logic and the action in this issue dictate more targets.)
Sprite and Ikaris land in Manhattan (with electronic billboards displaying some X-Men battle or other). Sprite is gleefully astonished at everything (it seems her safe backup goes back to when humans were apemen). But it makes her ask Ikaris what she did that was so bad. He tells her she grew bored of eternal childhood and 'almost destroyed the Machine' (a not totally accurate description of the 2006 series).
Iron Man shows up to see what's happening. Machine's commentary tells us that IM found Ikaris dying among the bodies of his fellows (Av#4 above), and Machine further says that the suicide was because they discovered that the Celestials only created them to protect the humans they were *really* interested in. Tony Stark is glad to hear they're all OK now and asks after Sersi. But he's confused about Sprite being female (he was there when male Sprite was killed in the 2006 series). Ikaris tells him it's the kind of change Eternals go through every 25,000 years or so.
Then Machine contacts the duo to warn them about excess Deviation. The contact seems to double them up in pain, but they assure Iron Man everything's OK and the problem is an Eternal 1. So Shellhead leaves them to it. Ikaris has to explain to his companion that Iron Man isn't made of iron. She'll hear about lots of such beings here, like Spider-Man who isn't part spider. It's like he himself isn't the mythical Icarus, and Zuras isn't Zeus. It annoys the gods that the humans keep getting them mixed up.
As they descend into a sewer Sprite says that even with most of her memories missing she still knows what they're going to do now. Machine explains (seemingly to us) about the 3rd principle - Correct excess Deviation. The Deviant species are all different, but they usually keep within an acceptable range of size and are usually friendly (!?). The Eternals deal with the outliers, like the enormous beast they now come across with tentacles and teeth menacing a hapless tourist. As the Eternals beat it up Machine tells us not to judge the Deviants so harshly, after all some of *us* are serial killers.
Afterwards they have to explain it all to the police, etc. Sprite is told she's too young to be a superhero. (So this is set within the Outlawed event.) She continues to be fascinated by everything from hot dogs to the idea of television. But Ikaris is concerned about what their purpose is now that the Celestials have discarded them.
Their next teleportation stop is Olympia, in an echo dimension behind Mount Olympus in northern Greece. They are met by Phastos and Domo, Zuras' administrator, with bad news. Zuras has been killed by 5 powerful fingers pressed into his skull. The assassin arrived and left via the teleportation network but without leaving any trace of his identity. They are joined by Druig (a Polarian Eternal from Siberia) who advises them to wait. With no other Eternals queued up for resurrection Zuras will be back soon to tell them who killed him.
Devious Druig and the impatient Ikaris display their usual antagonism. But when Druig suggests they re-Exclude Sprite Ike has to agree because it was Zuras who killed Sprite last time. Even the accused has to agree with that logic but points out that *her* hands couldn't have inflicted that damage. Druig suggests she probably tricked simpleton Ikaris into doing it. So Ikaris nuts his nose and the duo leave.
Machine tells them that someone unknown to him is traversing the network inside a distortion. And he has tracked that distortion to Titanos in western Canada, 'superimposed between 3 seconds from now and 2 seconds ago'. The pair go there, and Machine tells us that when Kronos destroyed it, and killed all the Eternals for the 1st time and nearly destroyed the Machine, he was investigating time. As a result the ruined city is now a mishmash of times past and future, always changing. They see 1 image of Ikaris at the grave of 13 year old Toby Robinson apologising for not saving him. Ikaris tells Sprite that hasn't happened yet, but swears he *will* save this unknown boy.
But they are interrupted by a voice saying that it is *his* intention that the only eternal being left will be Death. Enter Thanos, looking somewhat the worse for wear.