Maximus BoltagonMaximus

A Mad, Fallen King

From his prison cell, Maximus began telepathically scheming against the throne with the Alpha Primitives, the slave class of Attilan that was specially bred to serve the Inhumans. Maximus arranged for a trio of Alpha Primitives to access machines that transformed them into the energy-based Trikon. While the Trikon assaulted Attilan, distracting the royal family, Maximus was freed from his cell and took many of the city?s leading politicians and scientists captive. Maximus then claimed the throne, and when Black Bolt returned, Maximus threatened to kill his hostages unless Black Bolt and their cousins Crystal, Karnak, Gorgon, and Triton all left Attilan for him to rule. The other royals set out to find Medusa, who had disappeared and been rendered amnesiac during the battle with the Trikon. After years of wandering, Gorgon returned to Attilan to arrange a deal with Maximus in which they would not challenge his rule if he allowed them to live at home in peace. Maximus agreed to allow their return and to free the hostages provided they returned with Medusa so he could marry her.

However, Gorgon learned his father was killed by Maximus? lieutenant the Seeker. When the royal family returned to Attilan with a memory-restored Medusa, the bargain was abolished. Black Bolt reclaimed his crown from Maximus, but Maximus activated an Atmo-Gun intended to send shockwaves to kill all humans, leaving the Inhumans to rule the Earth. However, the device found humans and Inhumans similar due to their shared ancestry and had no effect on either. Reversing the weapon?s energies, Maximus erected a barrier of so-called ?Negative Zone? energy around Attilan, sealing them off from humanity. Maximus? failure as king brought about a relapse of madness. Although the other royals tried to make him remove his barrier, Maximus behaved like a child and instead built tools such as a water-rebreather for Triton to supply him with a circulating source of water on land. Black Bolt eventually destroyed the barrier with his voice.

Maximus maintained a group of loyal ?evil? Inhumans comprised of Aiero, Falcona, Nebulo, Leonus, Stallior, and Timberius. With their aid and by manipulating the Hulk (Bruce Banner), Maximus sought an energy-absorbing substance from Attilan?s vaults, but Black Bolt thwarted him. Relying upon hypnotic potions, Maximus sapped the royals? willpower and again assumed the throne, designing a Hypno-Gun that he hoped would enslave all people on Earth. The royal family?s human allies the Fantastic Four came to their rescue, and Maximus fled Attilan with his associates.

The evil Inhumans attempted to conquer the Central American nation Costa Salvador using a robot that could control minds through hypnotic ray beams, but the Hulk again crossed their path and fought them. When the United States sent forces to drive Maximus out of Costa Salvador, destroying the robot, he and his followers fled again. Setting up a base on a deserted island, Maximus launched a missile attack on Attilan with materials that would make them think the Fantastic Four were the attackers. Black Bolt sent Triton to investigate Maximus? whereabouts, and he found the evidence implicating Maximus as their attacker. In another attempt to conquer Attilan with his followers, Maximus encountered the Silver Surfer (Norrin Radd) and briefly manipulated him into attacking Black Bolt.

Maximus was finally captured and placed in suspended animation by Black Bolt. When Black Bolt left Attilan on a mission to the United States, Karnak and Gorgon released Maximus from his prison, thinking it was inhumane treatment. As soon as he was released, Maximus unleashed a mental bolt which struck Black Bolt and gave him amnesia. Maximus? powers were at their peak as he drove out the other royals and reclaimed the throne, erecting another barrier around Attilan. Contacting the Kree, who were in the early stages of a resurgence of the age-old Kree-Skrull War, Maximus offered his subjects as foot soldiers in the battle, but the other royals eventually found Black Bolt with his memory restored and joined forces with the Avengers to storm Attilan and drive away Maximus? Kree allies. Maximus suffered another mental breakdown at his defeat.

In his next scheme, Maximus took advantage of his people?s dislike of the Alpha Primitives by constructing Omega, an immense android fueled by their feelings of guilt. When the Fantastic Four realized Omega?s nature, they informed the Inhumans, who rendered Omega inert by controlling their emotions. Maximus subsequently sought an alliance with the robot Ultron, using a tractor beam to bring his head to Attilan for repair, attaching him to Omega?s body. However, Ultron had no interest in an alliance and turned on Maximus once he was operational, only to be subsequently defeated by the Inhumans, Fantastic Four, and Avengers.

When the Royal Family briefly left Attilan on business, Maximus took Crystal and her mutant husband, Quicksilver (Pietro Maximoff), hostage, forcing Black Bolt to again grant him the throne when he returned. Maximus revived his alliance with the Kree, offering Shatterstar (Arides) the Inhumans? most powerful members for use in the War of the Three Galaxies, but Triton defeated Shatterstar. Black Bolt was driven to such despair by Maximus? apparent victory that he unleashed his voice on Attilan, virtually leveling the city.

Maximus joined forces with the Enclave, a team of genius scientists, allowing them to kidnap Medusa so she could be used as an agent in the conquest of Attilan. However, when the Enclave threatened Medusa?s life, Maximus turned against the Enclave and was killed when his gun overloaded and exploded. Maximus survived, but remained in a death-like coma. Black Bolt soon relocated Attilan to the Blue Area of the Moon to aid his brother?s failing health. When an extraterrestrial crystal beneath the city caused the population to hallucinate, it inadvertently awoke Maximus? mind. Before the crystal was destroyed, Maximus used the confusion to psionically exchange bodies with Black Bolt. Maximus reaffirmed his ties to the Enclave and aided them in building devices that would launch meteorites from the moon to the Earth?s surface. When the Avengers were dispatched to Attilan to investigate the Inhumans? possible culpability, Maximus made the royal family attack the Avengers. In his excitement, he spoke out loud. Instantly realizing he was not Black Bolt, the Inhumans retrieved Maximus? body from its crypt and restored the two brothers to their rightful bodies. The Avengers quickly rounded up the Enclave, ending the scheme.

Imprisoned again, Maximus experimented with means to alleviate his madness and fashioned a device that he believed would transfer his madness to Quicksilver. Quicksilver?s madness soon drove him into villainy, allowing Maximus to easily take control of his mind for his next plot, in which he hoped to transfer the mental powers of young Franklin Richards into his own mind, increasing his own formidable telepathic gifts. However, the royal family and X-Factor came to Franklin?s rescue, and Quicksilver regained control of his faculties. When Medusa became pregnant with Black Bolt?s son, the Inhumans? Genetic Council threatened to have the pregnancy terminated for fear that their offspring might combine Black Bolt?s power with Maximus? insanity. After Medusa escaped to Earth to bear her son, Maximus escaped from his cell so he could monitor Medusa?s progress, seeing the newborn Ahura as potentially being like him. Although Ahura was allowed to live, he was taken away from Medusa by the Genetics Council.

When Ronan the Accuser came to Attilan to conscript the Inhumans into service for the Kree, Maximus and the Alpha Primitives evaded capture and hid while the entire city was transported into space and the other Inhumans placed under Kree control. Maximus and the Alpha Primitives attempted to retake the city, only to be defeated and exiled into the Negative Zone by Ronan. Maximus found many of Reed Richards? inventions, which had been hidden there by Nathaniel Richards when Reed was believed dead. Maximus plundered the devices for himself and soon encountered the Fantastic Four when they were trapped in the Negative Zone by their foe Janus. Maximus and the Alpha Primitives aided the Fantastic Four and their Negative Zone-based allies Gornkai and Hellscout as they joined forces against Annihilus and Janus? N-Explorers.

Eventually returning to Earth?s dimension, Maximus found Attilan relocated again to the Blue Area of the Moon and he was given mental blocks called ?Pacifiers? to inhibit his mental powers, then returned to his cell. However, Maximus had spread a virus through Attilan that granted him subtle control over virtually all of its inhabitants. Using this resource, Maximus again controlled Quicksilver, causing him to steal the Terrigen Crystals both to restore his then-lost mutant powers and to bestow powers upon his daughter Luna.

After regaining full use of his powers, Maximus had Luna release Ahura. Attilan was soon besieged by U.S. Marines mutated by the stolen Terrigen Crystals, and one of them detonated herself like a bomb, devastating the city. Maximus used the moment as his opportunity to reclaim the throne, pointing to Black Bolt?s war with the humans as a failure. Maximus hoped to claim Medusa as his wife and even take Ahura as his son.

When the Skrulls attempted to take over the Earth in SECRET INVASION, Maximus finally teamed up with Black Bolt against a common enemy. Shortly after Black Bolt was deposed, he was captured by the Skrulls and replaced with an imposter. This imposter was later exposed and slain shortly before an entire invasion force of Skrulls revealed themselves to Earth, including Attilan among their invasion targets. While Maximus tried to maintain order in Attilan, the other royals, no longer under Maximus? control, found the real Black Bolt and restored him to the throne. Rather than punish Maximus, Black Bolt welcomed him as a royal to share his scientific genius. Humiliated by the Skrulls, Black Bolt brought Attilan into space to pursue their escaping fleets and destroy them using weapons Maximus had designed. He remained loyal to the royal family ever since, even helping Black Bolt save the Inhumans from Thanos and spreading Terrigen Mists across the whole world.

Soon after the failed Skrull invasion, Black Bolt sent the Inhumans to Kree space and forced Ronan to turn the Kree Empire over to him. Maximus was quickly assigned to an uplift program in the hopes of ending the Kree?s evolutionary dead end using the Terrigenesis process. When the territory-hungry Shi?ar emperor Vulcan (Gabriel Summers) went to war with the Kree, Maximus? genius was called upon to supply a variety of weapons, including redesigned Kree Sentries, which would use Black Bolt?s power, and their ultimate weapon, a Terrigen bomb designed to transform the Shi?ar into Inhumans to end the war, which was known as the War of Kings.

The bomb was ultimately detonated during a battle between Black Bolt and Vulcan, causing the deaths of both men. The explosion also caused a tear in space/time called the Fault, bringing a variety of dangerous extra-dimensional threats into the territory. Maximus remained with the royals to maintain their control over the Kree and support Medusa as reigning queen. Under Medusa?s orders, Maximus arranged attacks on the Kree using the invader Devos the Devastator, Alpha Primitives and malcontent Kree such as Zarek. By defeating these threats, the royal family maintained favor with the majority of Kree. The other members of the royal family were upset to learn of Medusa and Maximus? plot, but Maximus retained Medusa?s esteem.

At the close of the War of Kings, when the Guardians and the Inhumans joined forces, Maximus showed that he could understand the usually impenetrable Groot. He was also a member of the society of Super Villains and antiheroes known as the Cabal. With the Multiverse threatened by a series of cosmic incursions caused by the enigmatic Beyonders, Earth-616?s secretive Illuminati came together to destroy alternate Earths before they could collide with their own. When it came time to destroy the inhabited Earth-4290001, only the Atlantean King Namor was willing to follow through. He then spurned the group and secretly formed a new one, joined by Maximus and several Illuminati prisoners: the death-worshiping Titan Thanos, Thanos? generals Corvus Glaive and Proxima Midnight, Terrax the Truly Enlightened (the herald of Earth-13054?s Galaktus), and the enigmatic Black Swan. Dubbed the Cabal, the new group devastated and destroyed Earth-9004 before it could collide with Earth-616. Unlike the Illuminati, who had intended to destroy worlds humanely, the unscrupulous Cabal ravaged Earths, slaying their citizens and their superhuman defenders, before destroying the planets with the Illuminati?s world-killing anti-matter bombs.