Grifter and Midnighter are in it up to their necks as the City of Lights becomes Beachhead Francois for a deadly extraterrestrial invasion. What started as a routine covert op turns into an intergalactic bloodbath with no mission objective other than survival.
Picking up immediately from the end of last issue, Grifter, Midnighter and Zee face off against a seemingly endless flood of aliens in Paris, France. Grifter, as usual, jumps, guns blazing, straight into battle leaving Midnighter with Zee. The time alone (well, not alone, the monsters are still attacking) gives Zee a chance to drop cryptic clues about what's going on. She tells Midnighter that he is at the center of a synergy and the tentacled creatures seek him for the same reason she does. Midnighter again asks her who she is, but her reply is simply, "I am Zee." Midnighter promises to hunt down Jenny for the rest of her unnaturally long life if he finds out that she's connected to any of this. Before he can attempt to pry more answers from Zee, a helpless woman is attacked by an alien and he is forced to save her. While Midnighter fights more monsters, Zee, who had jumped away and is now perched safely atop a building, talks to him. She tells Midnighter that he is an enhanced being, but even he has limits. He was kidnapped (read issue 1) to assess those limits. The master of the creatures he's fighting has studied him. This prompts Midnighter to ask Zee which side she's on but she tells him that it's not that simple. Midnighter insists that it is but Zee goes on to talk about something seemingly unrelated: Midnighter's powers. She explains that his neural upgrades allow him to work through a million scenarios a second and he sees each possible encounter and reacts with the best option. Midnighter says she's right and she responds by saying that's only true if he processes probabilities faster than his opponents. If the enemy is one second faster, can find the one scenario he hasn't reached yet, his enhancements are useless. As she says this, Midnighter is outmaneuvered by an alien and struck. She tells him that his ability has created a necessary level of confidence, but confidence leads to arrogance, and arrogance leads to complacency. While she's speaking, two more aliens grab Midnighter from behind and the original attacker shoots a tentacle through Midnighters torso and beats him mercilessly. Zee tells Midnighter that only one thing can save him, a significant variable. Grifter.
The red-masked, gun-wielding Wildcat jumps over the alien attacking Midnighter and kills all the monsters around him. After they die, green "brain bugs", smaller, ghost-like bugs inside the aliens, scuttle out of the dead bodies and teleport away. With Midnighter now relatively safe and Grifter holding the bugs back with his guns, Zee decides to step in. She pushes Grifter away and tells him that the two of them will serve. Zee, rapidly losing her normal form and turning into something with skin like the aliens, is seemingly destroyed when a giant tentacle smacks down directly on her. The few remaining aliens all run away and Grifter drags Midnighter away from the battlefield.
Soon after the duo are gone, Apollo, Swift, The Engineer and The Doctor arrive on the scene. They can find no sign of Midnighter (and they're not looking for Grifter) but they find a giant hole in the ground. Apollo flies down inside of it but finds nothing.
In the sewers some distance away, Midnighter heals the hole in his chest along with his broken jaw and arm while Grifter annoys him. When they get up they see Zee and she tells them there's a planet to save.
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