Marvel Presents #12 (1977)

On the heavily-armed planet of Arcturus-IV, the Guardians of the Galaxy have been unable to save Starhawk's three kidnapped children from being destroyed by their own powers but they have recovered a weakened Starhawk. Leaving the deranged High Commander Ogord behind, pawing at the ashes that are all that is left of his grandchildren, the Guardians carry Starhawk back to the Arcturian air field, easily routing the elite Reaver home guard who try to stop them. Once aboard the Kammar, the Arcturan scout ship that they had commandeered to reach Arcturus-IV, the Guardians quickly leave the Arcturian system without the Arcturian fleet, which they had decimated on their inward voyage, making any attempt to stop or pursue them. Once in space, the Guardians set course for Sol at their fastest speed. Since Starhawk is still fading, the team sends out a wide-band distress call. When they later receive a response, the Guardians initially believe that it's coming from a planet but soon discover that the actual source is a giant space station orbiting the planet. A shocked Charlie-27 recognizes it as Drydock, the Federation's starship-yard where he had spent most of his basic training and which had been reported as lost during the war with the Badoon. After the automatic docking cycle activates to pull the Kammar into a docking bay, the Guardians disembark, bringing Starhawk with them on a gurney. Although Charlie assures his friends that the space station must be a derelict, operating on automatic programming, the large number of uniformed soldiers who greet them in the docking area seemingly proves him wrong. After Lt. Kirtley assigns some men to escort Martinex, Yondu and Starhawk to Sick Bay, he personally guides the other Guardians to a meeting with the base's C.O. Once all the Guardians have left the docking area, all of the soldiers vanish in flashes of light. Near the commander's office, the trio are briefly left alone to freshen up, allowing Charlie and Nikki to use auto-valet chambers to acquire new clothes. They are then escorted into the office of Drydock's commander, Hollis-12, who turns out to be a Jovian. Commander Hollis reveals why Drydock is out in the middle of nowhere, explaining that the space station had been developing a new warp-drive when the Badoon attacked in the early days of the war. Rather than letting the warp-drive be captured, the crew had used it to blast Drydock out of the solar system but the drive was defective and burnt out, stranding them at their current location. When Hollis ends this statement with a joke, Charlie finds it funny and attempts to give him a friendly clap on the shoulder but his hand passes through the other Jovian's body. As Charlie realizes that "Hollis" is just a hologram, a giant metal claw from the ceiling grabs him and dumps him down a central utility shaft while anesthetic gas quickly knocks out Vance Astro and Nikki. After stopping his fall down the shaft, Charlie punches his way through a bulkhead and is confronted by the Hollis hologram who reveals that another fault of the new warp-drive was that it had caused a radiation overload that killed everyone aboard. Having been designed to take orders from people, the central computer couldn't handle that situation so it reacted by creating holograms through which it could give itself orders. Hollis then reveals that Yondu, Martines and Starhawk are now in cold storage but that Nikki and Astro will soon be dissected to that they can be cloned in order to give the computer thousands of companions. After "Hollis" reveals that he's actually Drydock and that he plans to kill Charlie to prevent him from interfering, the Jovian is targeted by a number of Drydock's systems, including lasers from the internal defense systems, a giant metal roller and a construction press that each try to crush him, and electrical cables that try to electrocute him. Although he overcomes all of these obstacles, Charlie realizes that he won't make it so Sick Bay in time to save his friends if he has to fight his way through the entire space station so he decides to go outside. However, as he's donning a space suit, Charlie is attacked by four construction-robs. Realizing that the Guardians don't have the time for him to waste fighting the robots, Charlie slams them into the outer hull with enough force to cause a hull breach and the depressurization sucks both he and the robots out into space. Having sealed his helmet just in time, Charlie uses his magno-boots to get back on the outer hull. Knowing that the computer will think that the depressurization had killed him but that this would change once the sensors on the hull pick him up, Charlie hurls a hull fragment at and through the sensors, destroying them and giving him 13.5 seconds to reach the other end of Drydock before the back-up systems are activated and Drydock will be able to shoot him off into space with its meteor deflectors. In Sick Bay, the surgeon-robot is about to start cutting Nikki but Charlie arrives in time to smash it with a single punch and free her. Leaving Nikki to free the others, Charlie heads down a corridor to the central computer core where he begins to trash the circuits. Having no defenses in that room, the computer tries to stop him by claiming that his actions will knock out the life support systems and kill his friends but Charlie knows the base and that nothing he's damaging will affect life support. Desperate, the computer tells Charlie that it can be anyone he wishes and the Hollis hologram transforms into the image of Charlie's father. In this form, the hologram states that all of his records from his time in the militia are on file and that their whole family can be together again. Although seeing his father again after so long brings him to tears, Charlie reminds himself that the hologram isn't his father and completes the mission, deactivating the insane computer. Charlie is soon joined by Nikki and Vance who tell him that everybody is fine and that Starhawk will be back on his feet in no time. As the trio heads off to check on their friends, Charlie mentions how Drydock could be used to build them a whole new starship.