Marvel Database
Register
Advertisement

Quote1 With my phasing power, there's no way I can be harmed. Quote2
Kitty Pryde, famous last words

Appearing in "Demon"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • N'Garai demon (First appearance; dies)

Other Characters:

Races and Species:

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:

Synopsis for "Demon"

Flashback - The X-Men's first battle with the N'Garai, specifically Storm's destruction of the obelisk which was the nexus of the gateway between their world and ours.[1] The X-Men believed that, with the obelisk gone, the gate was sealed, but a lone demon slowly crawled from amidst the rubble, free in our world.

In the present day, a couple is out looking for their first Christmas tree. Quickly, their happiness becomes ashes - the N'Garai demon kills them swiftly and then feasts upon them, body and soul.

Meanwhile at the X-Mansion, Kitty is learning how the Blackbird's contorls, backwards and forwards, when, to her relief, Angel interrupts to let Xavier know that it is time to be going. In the entrance-way, Logan introduces Mariko Yashida to Professor X. A mistletoe prank of Kurt's with Mariko draws Wolverine's ire, but things are soon set aright, although the mood is tense. Kitty lightens it by playing a similar trick on Colossus, who blushes deeply. Then most of the X-Men depart: Wolverine and Mariko leave together, Angel flys off to see Candy Southern, and Professor X, Peter, Ororo, and Kurt take off in the Rolls. Kitty Pryde is left in the mansion alone.

Kitty, feeling lonely, tries calling her parents with no luck. Scott calls to wish everyone a merry Christmas. Finding only Kitty in the mansion, he promises to call tomorrow. He then finds Lee Forrester to see about taking a job as a sailor. He is a little surprised to find that Lee is a woman when he was expecting the ship captain to be a man.

Still at loose ends, Kitty decides to work out, using a Danger Room exercise program. However, her work-out is interrupted by the intruder alarm activating in Ororo's room. Not wanting to disturb the police over what may be something as simple as a fallen branch, Kitty decides to investigate only to discover the N'Garai demon.

Kitty leads it on a merry chase through the mansion, phasing through walls with it fast on her heels. Losing it briefly at one point, she tries to make it to a phone to call the other X-Men. The demon is waiting for her, however, and while she phased in time, she still feels the claw as it slices through her incorporeal form.

She escapes to the Danger Room, air-walking up to the control booth to use the room against her adversary. The demon takes its time to show, however, and Kitty starts to wonder just how smart it is. the N'Garai bursts into the control booth instead of the room below. Kitty backpedals into the Danger Room and it pursues her through the 'unbreakable' glass. The Danger Room comes alive, and Kitty manages to barely keep just ahead of it and not get nailed by the room. Of course, the demon just tears through everything the room has to offer, but it delays the invader long enough that Kitty gets a good head-start, out of the Danger Room and to the rail-car towards the hangar. Halfway to the hangar the demon ruptures the rail, forcing Kitty to travel the rest of the distance on foot.

Weary from exertion, Kitty gets into the Blackbird, its turbine engines pointed down the tunnel, the only realistic path for the demon to follow into the hangar. She starts going through the ignition checklist. At the last second, she ignites the engines, crisping the demon but wrecking the Blackbird. She exits the plane, air-walking, confident nothing could have survived, when a burned claw arcs towards her.

The X-Men return home to a darkened house, having encountered police earlier warning them of gruesome murders that had occurred in the area. Wary, and with Professor X's telepathy somehow foiled, they enter cautiously. Kitty is curled up watching TV with a fire, and is overjoyed that the X-Men have returned. Kitty's parents were also with them.

It turns out that last swipe was the creature's dying attempt to kill Kitty. It made the supreme effort and it failed.

Trivia

  • This issue's story is a homage to the movie Alien, this is particularly noticeable in how Kitty Pryde kills the N'Garai demon, which mirrors the way in which Alien protagonist Ellen Ripley incinerates the Xenomorph using the engines of the space shuttle she's boarding. Byrne has recalled that "We wanted to do an homage to the movie Alien, and I don't know whether I was demented or what in those days, but I honestly thought when I was drawing it that people wouldn't instantly realize where we got it from. I thought I was being really clever, how I was making little twists and turns to change it. Only the ending where she used the Blackbird (jet) to blast the N'Garai to death was the same. And then Chris kind of wrote [the script] even more like the movie. By the time I actually read it, it was like, 'Oh, well, wait till the lawsuits come...' But they never did."[2]

See Also

Recommended Reading

  • X-Men #96 - first appearance of the N'Garai
  • X-Men #118 - Wolverine and Mariko meet for the first time
  • X-Men #123 - Mariko and Wolverine's first 'date'
  • X-Men #129 - first appearance of Kitty, Carmen, and Theresa Pryde
  • X-Men #139 - Kitty Pryde officially becomes an X-Man.

Links and References

References

  1. Originally told in X-Men #96
  2. Cronin, Brian (25 December 2017) Comic Legends: The X-Men X-Mas Story John Byrne Feared a Lawsuit Over CBR.com. Retrieved on 25 December 2017.


References[]

Advertisement