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Onslaught
Saga
During a battle between the X-Men and Magneto's Acolytes, Xavier used
his telepathic powers to shut down Magneto's mind, rendering him catatonic. Also during the psionic contact, Magneto's anger,
grief and lust for vengeance entered Xavier's consciousness; commingling with every long-suppressed negative feeling Xavier
had endured during the last 30 years. This aggregation resulted in the being known as Onslaught.
Onslaught remained dormant for some time. Gradually, Xavier's frustration with his dream of
mutant-human harmony began to increase, exacerbated by the daily growth of anti-mutant hysteria, the deaths of dozens of mutants
from the lethal Legacy Virus and his own failed attempt to rehabilitate the mutant sociopath called Sabretooth. Xavier reached
his breaking point when anti-mutant humans killed a young mutant near the grounds of the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning,
the secret base of the X-Men. It was at this point that Onslaught awakened within Xavier and began to manifest himself to
others.
Following an encounter with the mystically empowered criminal called the Juggernaut,
Xavier's stepbrother, Cain Marko, Onslaught invaded a government-sanctioned Sentinel base. He downloaded the current specifications
for the mutant-hunting androids and erased portions of the memories of the employees working in the clandestine factory. Soon
after, while hiding in Xavier's mind, Onslaught encountered the telepathic, telekinetic X-Man. Young Nate Grey pulled the Professor's body from the astral plane, a feat never before achieved.
Through X-Man's actions, Onslaught was able to escape Xavier's mind and move independently. After taking full possession of
the Professor's mind and body, Onslaught-as-Xavier called together the X-Men. When they resisted his plan to turn them into
soldiers fighting a total war against humans, Onslaught revealed himself to the X-Men and attempted to destroy the outlaw
adventurers. The time-tossed mutant soldier called Bishop, who remembered childhood stories of a traitor betraying and killing
the X-Men, and began to realize that the guilty party was Xavier as Onslaught, rescued his teammates. Taking Xavier's body
with him, Onslaught escaped.
Once free, Onslaught created a childlike psionic projection named Charles to gain the
trust of young Franklin Richards, a mutant possessing the latent power to alter reality. Onslaught succeeded in capturing
the child despite a rescue attempt by Franklin's parents, Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman, members of the
legendary super-team known as the Fantastic Four. Now carrying Franklin
and Xavier, Onslaught captured Nate Grey a.k.a. X-Man, intending to use his raw psionic power to fuel his plans to transform
the human race into a collective consciousness. Onslaught returned to New York, reprogramming
the Sentinel robots to obey his commands and form a protective circle around Manhattan,
sealing off the island from the rest of the world.
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