N'Garai

N'Garai
250x450px A N'Garai demon surprises Kitty Pryde in Uncanny X-Men issue 143.
Publication information
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First appearance	X-Men vol. 1, #96 (December 1975)
Created by	Bill Mantlo, Chris Claremont, and Dave Cockrum

The N'Garai are a fictional race found in the Marvel Comics universe.

Publication history

The N'Garai first appeared in Uncanny X-Men #96 (December 1975), and were created by Bill Mantlo, Chris Claremont, and Dave Cockrum.

The N'Garai subsequently appear in The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #22 (March 1976), #24 (May 1976), Marvel Premiere #7 (June 1976), Marvel Team-Up #79 (March 1979), Doctor Strange #42-45 (August 1980-February 1981), The Uncanny X-Men #143 (March 1981), Ka-Zar the Savage #13 (April 1982), Uncanny X-Men #159 (July 1982), Magik #1-4 (December 1983-March 1984), Incredible Hulk #308 (June 1985), Darkhold #3-4 (December 1992-January 1993), Marvel Comics Presents #145 (December 1993), Wolverine Annual '95, X-Men Unlimited #9 (December 1995), X-Men #75 (May 1998), X-Men: Soul Killer (1999), Avengers #28-30 (May–July 2000), X-Men: Black Sun #1-5 (2000), and Free Comic Book Day 2008 X-Men (2008).

Fictional history

The N'Garai are a race of demons created by Chthon, and have come into conflict with the Midnight Sons, the Hulk, and the X-Men. The N'Garai are ruled by Kierrok the Damned.

The N'Garai once lived on Earth, but left for another dimension roughly a million years ago and are now intent on returning to Earth. Their extensions into the physical world tend to take the form of small, stone towers. Destruction of these towers has, many times, harmed the N'Garai, though the towers sometimes regenerate over time.

One of these towers has appeared time and time again on the grounds of the X-Mansion. Cyclops accidentally blew open the top of the cairn in anger over Thunderbird's death. While Cyclops and the other X-Men fought Kierrok, Storm was able to seal the tomb again later in the fight with a massive electrical discharge. In the same issue, the long-running supporting character Moira MacTaggert was introduced, making a memorable first impression by attacking the demon with a machine gun. One of the first incursions involved a larger demon confronting Shadowcat, who was alone in the mansion at the time. She eventually destroyed it with the jet engines of the X-Men's plane.

Further incursions have been met with resistance from, notably, Wolverine, Marrow, Cecilia Reyes, Maggott, and Nightcrawler.

In one incident, a subset of demons had taken to kidnapping various members of Earth's dimensions, such as people from the nearby town of Salem Center and Russian oil refinery workers. They were submitting them to various forms of dissection, suspect by Salem police as murders. Maggott was suspected of causing the murders, but he was cleared when Reyes, a doctor, saw that Wolverine, who was able to heal from his injuries, had been classically autopsied.

The fight was taken to the N'Garai dimension, where the X-Men rescued many innocent people and seemingly stopped the wave of current infections. Several of the demons had escaped to the forest around the X-Mansion. A squad involving Cecila, Marrow, and Beast faced them down and defeated them. The X-Men and the rescued civilians returned in another location on Earth. One of the men showed signs a powerful N'Garai demon had in fact made the return trip inside of him.

Wolverine has entered the N'Garai dimension on at least two different occasions. It is difficult for him, as the creatures are hostile to Earth and the fact time passes slower there makes it easy for him to lose himself in long stretches of slaying. In both occasions, it took the presence of other X-Men to help bring him back from the brink.

In the Free Comic Book Day X-Men special released on May 2008, the former New X-Man Pixie encountered the N'Garai in her hometown after the X-Men were temporarily disbanded. In a mine just outside the city, Pixie fought the demons alongside Cyclops, Wolverine, Emma Frost, Beast, Colossus, and Nightcrawler and actually tricked the demons into causing a cave-in which sealed their gateway to Earth.

They once revealed to Satana when they were hunting her for revenge, that their invasion of Earth in prehistoric times was repelled by her father, Marduk Kurios, who was at that time the head of Heaven's army, claiming that he was actually the biblical Lucifer.

In the graphic novel Apocalypse vs. Dracula, it is said that Apocalypse once "cut a whole tribe of N'Garai demons to pieces" with his bare hands.

External links

• N'Garai at the Appendix to the Handbook of the Marvel Universe