Fantastic Four #74
When Calls Galactus
Ben Grimm pays a call to his girlfriend Alicia Masters and is shocked to see that the Silver Surfer has already paid her a visit. He quickly learns that the Surfer is depressed because Galactus has summoned him. When Ben acts dismissive of this the Surfer loses his temper and attacks the Thing, having grown tired of Ben's jealousy over the larger issue. He commands Ben to look in his eyes and he sees an image of the Punisher coming to Earth. They quickly arrive at the Baxter Building where Johnny is helping a clean-up crew with repairs to their headquarters following their battle with Daredevil, Thor and Spider-Man. When they tell Johnny what is going on, the youth is not very sympathetic, opining that maybe the alien should go back to his master so that he can end his exile on Earth. The Silver Surfer states that he could never be a herald again, as he doesn't want to help Galactus destroy any more planets. The argument does not go much further as the Punisher arrives outside the building. While he is not as powerful as he has been in the past, the Surfer exerts all his strength and fires an atom-compacting thrust to try and stop the invader. The work crew makes a run for it as Johnny and Ben prepare for battle.
Ben ventures out to the rubble to see if the Punisher was destroyed and is attacked. The two begin battling it out as Johnny enters the fray as well. Elsewhere Reed and Crystal begin trying to convince Sue that she needs to get out of the city until the baby is born because it's the only way she will remain safe. Suddenly they hear the battle raging outside with the Punisher and Reed rushes off to help. He arrives just in time so save Johnny after he knocks the Punisher into the river and the resulting splashdown douses his flame. As Reed begins to battle the Punisher, Galactus draws ever closer to Earth, his hunger growing he is fully prepared to rescind his oath to spare the Earth if his former herald refuses to return to the stars as his herald once more.
Back on Earth, Ben pulls himself out of the rubble and takes a cab out to the waterfront to rejoin the battle with his friends. When the three male members of the Fantastic Four begin to pile on the Punisher, the robot is overpowered and is suddenly teleported away, leaving them to ponder their next challenge -- Galactus himself. Just then the ship carrying Galactus appears over the Earth and a search beam is trained on the planet to search for his exiled herald. In the aftermath of the battle, the FF realize that the Surfer had disappeared when the fighting started. Johnny suddenly remembers what the Surfer had said before he vanished, that there were "worlds within worlds."
Recurring Characters
Fantastic Four (Mister Fantastic, Invisible Girl, Human Torch, Thing), Silver Surfer, Galactus, Punisher, Crystal, Alicia Masters
Continuity Notes
The Silver Surfer has been exiled on Earth since Fantastic Four #50 for betraying Galactus. He will remain trapped until Silver Surfer (vol. 3) #1.
Sue is not an active member of the team as she discovered she was pregnant in Fantastic Four Annual #5, and was pulled from active duty in Fantastic Four #71
Next issue it is revealed that the Silver Surfer escaped into the Microverse.
