I thought this was going to be a lark, but it went to a dark place.

OK, I guess when we start with five supervillains, working for freakin' Thanos, I shouldn't be surprised, but here we are. From 1994, Secret Defenders #14, "Escape" Written by Ron Marz, pencils by Tom Grindberg, inks by Don Hudson.

Thanos had brought back to life Geatar, henchman of his alleged grand-daughter Nebula; and conscripted a quartet of super-villains for a mission: we saw the first part of this three-parter, um, seven years back? Anyway, the team is the Rhino, Super-Skrull, Titanium Man, and Nitro. And by this point, Thanos has got what he wanted, and hung them out to dry; blowing up their ship and leaving them to face a planetful of angry religious zealots. The guys manage to stick together enough to get to their wrecked ship, and could probably get away in the Super-Skrull's force-field...if he wasn't clipped from behind and knocked out. With few other options, the Titanium Man offers to push their escape pod into space. Not to another planet or anything, just maybe low orbit? That's the least-worst option at the time, so that's it.

With power gone, atmosphere failing, and virtually no hope of rescue; Geatar still makes a final log entry: he had been what, Nebula's first mate in her pirate crew? Making that entry is just him keeping things ship-shape. He loses consciousness, but awakens, saved by the Silver Surfer! And some jerk. To Geatar, that's not so much 'saved' as 'captured,' and he still holds a grudge over what the Surfer did to Nebula. (I believe she was injured, then came away with closer to her modern look!) Still, with his teammates badly injured, he grudgingly accepts help, and the Surfer heals Nitro and the Super-Skrull. Nitro quickly recognizes the Surfer's travelling companion, Legacy; the son of Captain Mar-Vell! Infamously, in a battle with Nitro, Mar-Vell was exposed to nerve gas, which directly led to his cancer. Nitro relishes the twist, since neither the Surfer nor Legacy knew that; and hams it up, asking to shake Legacy's hand. (The Surfer was shown at Mar-Vell's funeral, but was still trapped on earth at that time; it was a Skrull!)

Geatar was a known criminal, and the Surfer was going to bring him in; despite the Super-Skrull pulling for him, Geatar gives himself up to stay close to his captain. While the Rhino and Titanium man can catch a ride to earth, Nitro asks for a little energy for his pod, so he can explore space. Nothing left for him on earth...and he would've been recognized as Mar-Vell's killer on Titan, so he opts out of that.

The Surfer would've encountered Rhino fairly recently, in Silver Surfer #54. This was also probably the last readable issue of the title: the next issue features Cage, Deadpool, and...Dr. Druid? Oof.