Avengers Academy (2010 series) #33

The Phoenix Force has returned to Earth and gave fractions of its power to 5 X-Men at the end of Avengers Vs X-Men #5. In AvX#6 they started turning the world into an utopia. Emma Frost in particular has been wiping out the mutant-hunting Sentinels and last issue she came to Avengers Academy for the 1 that is Juston Seyfert's pal. She was deaf to Juston's pleas that he'd given the robot better directives. But eventually the whole Academy rose up to defend them, including the mutant X-23 who had also overcome her own assassin brainwashing to become a better person.

But we go back 2 weeks to where Juston had a holographic conversation via the Sentinel with his dad Pete who wanted him to come home to him and other son Chris. But J feared that if he left the Academy with his robot the Government would take it and destroy it or use it to hunt mutants. And he wouldn't agree to come home without him. After the call is ended J and the giant robot settled down to sleep outside in the fine night. The Sentinel repeated its current prime directive not to abandon Juston no matter what. And J pledged the same to him.

Now Giant-Man and the students face Frost who asks them 'nicely' to stand aside and let her destroy the mutant-killer. Wolverine-clone X-23 extends her claws and says "He's 1 of us".

Finesse desperately calls teacher Quicksilver (who she has a 'close' working relationship with) for help. Although a mutant he's on the Avengers' side in the AvX conflict. When he learns that Emma Frost is attacking them he's fired up, but when told that all she wants is to destroy the Sentinel Pietro Maximoff says "Let her". The Avengers and his sister Wanda need him more than a robot that was created to kill. Jeanne Foucault reminds him that his father was Magneto and her parents are criminals so should *they* be punished for their accident of birth. Pietro ends by saying that the Sentinel is an emotionless machine. After the call Jeanne tells us that she and Pietro are both emotionless machines, but this 1 will stand up for something.

Ms Frost damaged the Sentinel last issue and now it warns Juston to keep away because of the dangerous energy levels involved in its self-repair. But J insists on getting in the cockpit to help. Emma continues to use argument while simultaneously blasting people. She says the robot is an abomination. Striker responds that some would call him that for being gay but would that be an excuse for her to use her mental powers to make him straight. She repeats that its only purpose is to kill, but X-23 leaps off the head of Reptil-as-a-dinosaur to remind her that she was created to kill as she slashes her - but it has no effect as Frost turns to diamond and blasts both her and Reptil. Hazmat says that her radiation could kill a city (if she wasn't wearing a containment suit to stop it). So unless Frost can cure her (which she would definitely like) then presumably she ought to kill her too.

Frost has had enough and uses the Phoenix power to corral the students and keep them out of the way. Then the Sentinel attacks her and she summons all her power to smash it down again. Giant-Man rushes forward horrified and she repeats that it wasn't a living being. But Henry Pym opens the cockpit to reveal battered Juston inside. Now it's her turn to be horrified because she didn't sense any life - but Hank says that's because the campus has blocks to prevent mind-reading (and -control). He picks Juston up and they're both relieved when he can report that the kid was just stunned - because the Sentinel protected him

The robot states 1 of its directives to protect Juston and staggers to its feet to face the foe. Juston screams at it to run away before she kills it completely. He reminds it of directive #1 to never abandon Juston, but it *chooses* to put the protect Juston directive higher and flies up to meet Frost in midair. There's an enormous explosion ending in a rain of metal components and Frost holds its CPU and says it's over.

Emma claims that she didn't just blow the Sentinel up she carefully dismantled it so that Juston can reconstruct it and Dr Pym can give it a new CPU that doesn't include killing mutants in its instructions. Hank says he knows there's nothing they can do now but he points out strongly that the Sentinel overrode its prime directive in favour of a lower ranking 1, and as a robotics expert he knows that was *not* the action of a mere machine. Frost just says it was obviously a faulty machine. But she turns to Laura Kinney and invites her to rejoin the mutant base on Utopia Island. But X-23 says she won't go anywhere with *her*, and the next time they meet will end with 1 of them dead. Frost just flies off levitating the CPU behind her.

Henry Pym tells Juston that he truly believes Juston lost his best friend today not just a robot, and he'll never forgive himself for failing to stop it happening. But the voice of Quicksilver interrupts all this sickening emotion, and he's holding a robot's CPU. He explains that when he saw Frost levitating it he superspeeded in and swapped it with 1 from a training robot, and the Camp's defences prevented her detecting his presence mentally. He returns the Sentinel's CPU to the extremely grateful Juston but warns him *not* to thank him. But he's caught by surprise by a hug from Jeanne.

10 minutes later with Pym's guidance Pietro has rebuilt Juston's Sentinel. And its list of directives is intact. Pietro warns Henry that things are getting bad outside, before speeding off there.

The next day teacher Tigra's back from wherever she's been since last issue. She reports that what Pietro said was true. Headmaster Pym tells them that Quicksilver's gone back to his sister and Hawkeye's with the other Avengers and they're planning to invade Utopia. He doesn't think he and Tigra are enough to run the Academy, and they themselves might get called away. So to avoid the students becoming a target because this is the *Avengers* Academy they intend to close the school and the kids should return to their families. (Or if that's not an option they'll be given some money to start a new life with.) Reptil asks if they can come back when the war is over, but Pym says he doesn't know what the world will be like then.