As the Phoenix Force nears Earth, the Avengers fight the X-Men on the Blue Area of the Moon with Hope caught in the middle, while Iron Man and Giant-Man prepare a disruptor weapon to kill the Phoenix Force. Iron Man pilots the weapon against the Phoenix Force. But, when he uses it to blast the Phoenix Force, instead of killing it, the entity is forcefully altered and divided into five fragments that bond with Cyclops, Emma Frost, Namor, Colossus and Magik. They defeat the Avengers and head back to Earth with Hope. It has since been theorized that Scarlet Witch's spell of "No more mutants" angered the Phoenix, and to calm the entity, a new host was needed along, with five acolytes, to succeed at bringing about evolution (the acolytes were actually revealed to be the first five new mutants that have appeared around the globe since the decimation of the mutant population), and that was the reason the Phoenix came to Earth.