Apocalypse (comics) - Fictional Character Biography - Further Schemes

Further Schemes

After a long healing slumber, Apocalypse, fully restored, awakens with Ozymandias at his side and quickly learns of the present danger: Onslaught. He observes the conflict between the psionic entity and Earth's heroes with Uatu the Watcher, who suggests to Apocalypse a course of action; an alliance with the one who hated him the most, Cable. Apocalypse surmises that Onslaught would be most vulnerable through the astral plane, and that he needs Cable for actual physical transportation to this realm. Once on the astral plane, Apocalypse would remove the captive Franklin Richards, greatly weakening Onslaught. The plan succeeds, but is interrupted by the Invisible Woman, who had invisibly accompanied the pair, having suspected Apocalypse's motive in wanting to actually kill her son. However, the reprieve in battle gave Onslaught the time to escape, prolonging the conflict.

Following the events of the Onslaught saga, the gamma-spawned powerhouse, the Hulk and his human alter ego, Banner, are split into two separate entities; Hulk now draws upon energy derived from Franklin Richards' pocket universe; Apocalypse recruits the Hulk to become his Horseman, War, with intentions of using the Hulk's nexus-energy to overcome the Celestials. To test this newest recruit, Apocalypse set War against the New World Order, a shadow cabinet organization that intends to conquer the world. The New World Order in turn set the Juggernaut and the Absorbing Man against War, but both are easily defeated. However, Hulk comes to his senses after injuring his friend, Rick Jones. Despite this apparent setback, the incident was still a victory for Apocalypse as it was a successful testing of newly understood Celestial technology. Apocalypse activates the self-destruct mechanism on the sword of War, which the New World Order had obtained, destroying their headquarters.

The Hellfire Club later awakens Apocalypse's long-hidden Harbinger from its deep sleep; originally a normal man, whom Apocalypse in the 19th century once left to incubate for 100 years. Apocalypse releases his Horseman (Caliban) and his scribe Ozymandias from his possession, to fend for themselves, if they were to survive the coming events. Cable with the Avengers battles the Harbinger, but are unable to stop it. Apocalypse then appears, activating a bomb inside the Harbinger which would destroy all of New York, but Cable manages to prevent this disaster.

When Magneto is disrupting Earth's magnetic field, Apocalypse sends a Skrull impersonating the mutant Astra (having dealt with the original Astra) to stop the Master of Magnetism.

Intending to start an all-out war between the humans and the subterranean-dwelling Deviants as part of his plan to test the strong, Apocalypse sets off nuclear warheads at Lemuria, causing the Deviants to further mutate (which also restores Ikaris' father Virako to life). Apocalypse launches an attack at San Francisco, using a mentally controlled Deviant, Karkas, now a gigantic monster, that the Eternals are forced to battle. Apocalypse is confronted by his centuries-old foe, Ikaris, who now is a Prime Eternal. Although, Apocalypse defeats Ikaris, the Eternal still succeeds in destroying his ship and thwarting his plan.