GUL DAMARSpace Station
GUL DAMAR
Space Station
Classification: Extraterrestrial (apparently Shi'ar) technology: Space station
Creator: Unrevealed; apparently Shi'ar;
Inhabitants: Grad Nan Holt (including the Janissaries and Friendless), Shi'ar (notably Commander Gemet, Lt. H'ral, and technician B'ket Imstari);
there were close to one billion inhabitants.
Visitors: Frenzy (Joanna Cargill), Gambit (Remy LeBeau), Magneto (Max Eisenhart), Sovel Redhand and his crew (Glitter, Horse, Jat-Vor-Thrul), Rogue (Anna Marie), Starjammers (Havok/Alex Summers, Korvus Rookshir, Marvel Girl/Rachel Summers-Grey, Polaris/Lorna Dane)
Location: Last seen in Earth's orbit, but it was PRESUMABLY relocated (see comments);First Appearance: (Minimal, unidentified) X-Men Legacy#250 (August, 2011);
(fully seen and identified) X-Men Legacy#255 (November, 2011)
Powers/Abilities/Functions: The Gul Damar Space Station was apparently large enough to be comparable to a planet in size.
By some accounts, it had a length of at least one hundred thousand miles.
Ships traveling to the Space Station were stored in its Dockyard. Some Shi'ar used transport shuttles within the station.
Shi'ar soldiers utilized R'Thil particle cannons against the Grad Nan Holt.
It's gravitic flux generator had
sufficient power that, once damaged, it could affect the sun's gravity,
pulling the surrounding planets into it. The whole gravity array could be separated from the rest of the space station as needed.
The flux array was a gravity
acculumator that facilitated the stream of energy from one end of the
space station to the gravitic flux generator, with the pathway being
known at K'ythri's Highway.
Freight-platform Ni'Thurr existed within the "Ochre radial," and it was apparently associated with a cargo bay that the Grad Nan Holt -- at least the clan/sept associated with Friendless -- made into their base.
At least one Woodlands environment exists on the station, and there is a non-ferrous robot stationed therein (although it was incapacitated by Frenzy and Gambit.
The Anathema Vault contains weapons -- such as the Null Cascade -- banned for use in normal conflicts.
History:
(X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) - BTS) <per Rogue with knowledge taken from the dying B'ket Imstari> - The Gul Damar space station had close to one billion inhabitants.
(X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) - BTS) - Despite the vast psychic power of the Grad Nan Holt known as Friendless -- disgraced due to his mother having been impregnated by a member of a worker cast/sect/nest -- he was banished from his home nest and sent to the deep station Gul Damar, where they needed a reader/sender.
(X-Men
Legacy#256 (fb)) - When the ruling tribunal of the Grad Nan Holt
on Gul Damar refused to accept a thing
without a clan and attempted to send him to the message vaults,
Friendless finally lashed out, psychically took command of the
tribunal, although they did not realize they were under his control.
(X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) / X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - Friendless took control of the Grad Nan Holt on Gul Damar, leading them to war against the Shi'ar.
(X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - The battle apparently damaged Gul Damar's gravitic flux generator.
(X-Men Legacy#255 (fb) - BTS) -
Answering a distress call on Gul Damar, the Starjammers (Rachel Summers/Grey, Havok, Polaris, Korvus Rookshir) ...
(X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) -
...crashed into Gul Damar's hull due to the local gravity going haywire and then...
(X-Men Legacy#255 (fb) - BTS) -
...walked into a civil war.
(X-Men Legacy#250 (fb) - BTS) -
The Starjammers battled the Grad Nan Holt within Gul Damar.
(X-Men Legacy#255 (fb) - BTS / X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) - BTS) - Friendless psychically rendered Rachel unconscious for a week (or, at least an extended period
of time), although he believed he had slain her. Friendless then placed the other Starjammers under his control.
(X-Men
Legacy#254 (fb) - BTS) - Fighting alongside the Grad Nan Holt, the
Starjammers did grave damage to the space station and slew many Shi'ar.
(X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) -
BTS) - Sovel Redhand
led his crew (Glitter, Horse, Jat) to the damaged Gul Damar, seeking to
salvage a large amount of technology during the existing
upheavals. However, the space station's distorted gravity caused the crew to lose control,
presumably crashing the ship.
(X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) -
BTS) - At least one planet (and presumably the first four in inner orbit) was pulled into sun, a result of the
damage to Gul Damar's gravitic flux generator
causing the sun's gravity field to spike.
(X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) -
BTS) - Finding the unconscious form of Rachel/Marvel
Girl,
Redhand and his crew picked her up (see comments).
(X-Men Legacy#253 - BTS) - Rogue -- having absorbed
a teleporter's power from Legion/David Haller -- locked on to Rachel's location and transported herself, Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto thousands of light years to reach Rachel Grey.
Rogue was split from her allies, who arrived on a different part of the Gul Damar space station.
(X-Men Legacy#253 - BTS / X-Men Legacy#254 - BTS) - Rogue allowed herself to be taken as a captive/hostage by Redhand's crew.
(X-Men Legacy#254) - Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto arrived in a forested environment, after which they were swiftly confronted by a giant robot. As Frenzy took a blast, Magneto appreciated that the robot was non-ferrous, and that even the pilot did not have an ounce of iron in its blood. As Magneto searched further afield for metal, Frenzy tore open the robot's external armor and had Gambit blast its internal components, causing its upper body to drop down into range where she could punch it. The resultant impact knocked out the pilot.
As Magneto detected metal close by, Gambit appreciated that they were not in any wild woodlands, as it was maintained, lacking in weeds, moss, and fallen trees. Gambit and Magneto both appreciated the vibrations they felt to be like engines, after which Magneto pointed out that they were within an enclosed environment within a space station that was very near to a blazing star.
(X-Men Legacy#254 - BTS) - Soon after, the planet
Xanthimi (fifth from the sun) was pulled into the
sun.
(X-Men
Legacy#254 / X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) - BTS) - The Grad Nan Holt captured a number of Shi'ar.
(X-Men
Legacy#255) - Magneto intimidated
Shi'ar Commander Gemet into allowing himself, Frenzy, and Gambit to
negotiate the prisoners' release and then only resorting to force if
they failed to secure the prisoners' release. Friendless forced the deaths of the Shi'ar prisoners, concluding with technician B'ket Imstari, who could have repaired the gravitic flux generator.
(X-Men Legacy#255 - BTS / X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) - BTS)
- Meanwhile, Lt. H'ral informed Commander Gemet (who was also
apparently influenced by Friendless) that the walls to the cargo bay in
which the Grad Nan Holt were based were already heavily damaged. After
they considered that a full salvo would probably breach what was left
of its shielding, punch through the vacuum and empty them all out into
space, Commander Gemet ordered the gunners to fire all weapons on maximum aperture.
(X-Men
Legacy#256) -
Friendless located and assaulted the revived Rachel, who read his mind, learning his history
and his goal of destroying the Shi'ar, Grad Nan Holt, and the Gul Damar
space station. She released her telekinetic control of the breach,
causing Friendless to be pulled into open space.
Frenzy subsequently shared half of her powers with Rogue to allow them to survive as they used the station's flux array to swiftly travel to the generators
(which were 10,000 miles
away) in the hour before Gul Damar would hit the sun's corona, which
would overwhelm the space station's shields and destroy Gul Damar,
killing everyone aboard it. 
Comments: Created by Mike Cary, Steve Kurth, and Tom Palmer & Craig Yeung.
I don't recall a resolution to
returning Gul Damar to Shi'ar space, but it seemed like it was so big that it's gravity might have been a problem with
it being in Earth orbit?
In X-Men#256, Rogue noted Gul Damar to be "as close to a planet"
Per X-Men Legacy#257, the K'ythri's Highway conduit was a hundred thousand miles long. The distance from the flux array in one portion of the space station to the gravitic
flux generator in another portion was 10,000 miles according to Rogue
(that is the distance that she and Frenzy traveled via the highway).
For reference, Earth's diameter is
about 7900 miles (12,700 kilometers)). Even Jupiter's diameter is about
43,500 miles (69,900 kilometers).
Damnit, Jim, I'm a surgeon, not an
astronomer (or engineer, etc.), but I am going to conclude that putting
something comparable to Jupiter (I appreciate that it's not a solid
mass, but still giant nonetheless), would be problematic.
Where was the Gul Damar Station originally located?
X-Men Legacy#254 described the
location within Gul Damar where Rogue encountered Sovel Redhand's group
as "Vector, Spinward 30/715, Distance 3.2 Standard Units."
X-Men Legacy#255 notes the location of the Grad Nan Holt cargo bay base as "Vector, Counter-Spin 40/720, Distance 3.2 Standard Units." This location is also described as "Ochre radial, in freight-platform Ni'Thurr."
X-Men Legacy#256 identifies the location containing the airlock through which Friendless re-entered Gul Damar as "Vector, Spinward 120/70, Distance 14.8 Standard Units."
X-Men Legacy#257 identifies
the location containing the site in which the Grad Nan Holt and Shi'ar
met to unite against the Terrans and their allies as Anti-Spinward 80/130, Distance 17 Standard Units."
#257 also identifies the location of
the end of K'ythri's Highway, which is the location of the gravitic
flux generator, as "Vector, Spinward 20/20, Elevation 187,000 levels."
- I
don't know exactly what these designations means, but spinward means moving in the same direction of the space station's rotation...seems to be more of a direction than a location?
Gul Damar is presumably an homage
to Star Trek Deep Space Nine's Gul (and Legate) Damar of the Cardassian
Empire (not to be confused with the terrestrial Cardassians!).
I
watched the series back in the day, but I haven't watched any TV Stark
Trek in a couple decades now.
Thanks to Ronald Byrd for pointing this
out to me!
I had gotten the impression that the
Grad Nan Holt were a servant race created by the Shi'ar on Gul Damar,
but Friendless' flashback makes that seem a lot less likely. There are
not strict contradictions, and it certainly could be that Friendless
fomented misinformation, either to the others on the Space Station, or
even to Rachel Grey when she read his mind.
See the Grad Nan Holt profile for further discussion.
Additional images of various portions of the Gul Damar station can also be seen in that profile.
If you enjoy the character of Joanna Cargill, aka Frenzy, this is good story for you. She is consistently tough, powerful, cool, and kick-ass.
Profile by Snood.
CLARIFICATIONS:
The Gul Damar space station should be distinguished from:
 .. The site on the Gul Damar space station in which the Shi'ar stored weapons banned for use in normal conflicts but still available in times of direst emergency. Seeking to stop the X-Men and their allies from preventing the destruction of Gul Damar and/or from escaping the space station, Friendless manipulated Commander Gemet into opening the Anathema Vault. Therein they obtained and subsequently used the Null Cascade, an anti-matter weapon. --X-Men Legacy#257 |
 Where spaceships were docked (prior to the gravitic flux generator being damaged and causing ships to crash).(X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - Friendless commanded those under his influence to destroy the ships in the dockyard to prevent any from escaping the space station. (X-Men Legacy#257 - BTS) - Magneto, the Starjammers, and Redhand's group worked to build a working ship from the remains of the ships in the dockyard. With aid from Magneto, Havok and Glitter, Jat located a Sylvari freighter with holes and a Shi'ar scout ship missing its wing assembly, and he began building a working ship. (X-Men Legacy#257) - Manipulated by Friendless, Commander Gemet and the Janissaries located their enemies in the dockyard, and Gemet had the Null Cascade, a factory for anti-matter, set up and activated. Redhand used the teleport shunt device reach the station's flux array. Catching the weakened Rogue and Cargill off guard, he stunned them both with his blaster, after which he began to float free the entire gravity array with the intent of selling it for seven hundred million credits. (X-Men Legacy#258) - Rachel helped Rogue recognize the nature of the teleport shunt, and she transported the rest of the X-Men and Starjammers to the generator alongside herself. --X-Men Legacy#257 (258 |
  The flux array was essentially just an accumulator associated with the gravitic flux generator. K'ythri's Highway was the pathway from the far end of the station to the gravitic flux generator, apparently covering a distance of one hundred thousand miles. Gravity in the shaft fluctuated from fifty to twenty-thousand times Earth normal. Dynamos in the walls converted those variations into raw energy to power the station. One could step into the stream and fall straight up at one hundred times the speed of sound, right to the gravitic flux generator. However, even the low end of the scale was beyond human tolerance. Superhumans with enhanced durability, such as Joanna Cargill, aka Frenzy, could tolerate this. Splitting her power with Rogue, Cargill enabled them both to reach the end, although both were significantly weakened upon arrival. --(Flux Array) X-Men Legacy#256; (K'ythri's Highway) X-Men Legacy#256 Note: K'ythri's Highway is obviously an homage to the Shi'ar goddess K'ythri. |
 It's gravitic flux generator had sufficient power
that, once damaged, it could affect the sun's gravity, pulling the
surrounding planets into it. The whole gravity array could be separated from the rest of the space station as needed. (X-Men Legacy#256 (fb) / X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - Friendless took control of the Grad Nan Holt on Gul Damar, leading them to war against the Shi'ar. (X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - The battle apparently damaged Gul Damar's gravitic flux generator. (X-Men Legacy#255 (fb) - BTS) - Answering a distress call on Gul Damar, the Starjammers (Rachel Summers/Grey, Havok, Polaris, Korvus Rookshir) ... (X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - ...crashed into Gul Damar's hull due to the local gravity going haywire and then... (X-Men Legacy#255 (fb) - BTS) - ...walked into a civil war. (X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) - BTS) - Controlled by Friendless and fighting alongside the Grad Nan Holt, the Starjammers did grave damage to the space station and slew many Shi'ar.  (X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) - BTS) - Sovel Redhand led his crew (Glitter, Horse, Jat) to the damaged Gul Damar, seeking to salvage a large amount of technology during the existing upheavals. However, the space station's distorted gravity caused the crew to lose control, presumably crashing the ship. (X-Men Legacy#254 (fb) - BTS) - At least one planet (and presumably the first four in inner orbit) was pulled into sun, a result of the damage to Gul Damar's gravitic flux generator causing the sun's gravity field to spike. (X-Men Legacy#254 - BTS) - The planet Xanthimi (previously fifth from the sun) was pulled into the sun. (X-Men Legacy#255) - Friendless forced technician B'ket Imstari, who could have repaired the gravitic flux generator, to mortally wound himself. (X-Men Legacy#256 - BTS) - Rogue subsequently encountered the dying B'ket Imstari and absorbed his knowledge -- at the cost of losing the teleporter's power (the means by which she and her allies would return home) but in hopes of saving the billions on Gul Damar -- of how to repair the gravitic flux generator. Frenzy subsequently shared half of her powers with Rogue to allow them to survive as they used the station's flux array to swiftly travel to the generators (which were 10,000 miles away) in the hour before Gul Damar would hit the sun's corona, which would overwhelm the space station's shields and destroy Gul Damar, killing everyone aboard it. Feigning a desire to protect his captain, Redhand gave Rogue a "stun baton" in case there was anyone waiting for her by the generators. (X-Men Legacy#257 (fb) - BTS) - The stun baton was actually one end of a short-range teleport shunt, the other end of which Redhand kept for himself. (X-Men Legacy#257) - Redhand used the teleport shunt device reach the station's flux array. Catching the weakened Rogue and Cargill off guard, he stunned them both with his blaster, after which he began to float free the entire gravity array with the intent of selling it for seven hundred million credits. (X-Men Legacy#258) - Rachel helped Rogue recognize the nature of the teleport shunt, and she transported the rest of the X-Men and Starjammers to the generator alongside herself. Jat deactivated Redhand's force field, and Glitter punched out Redhand.  After Jat found the space station too massive to move away from its sun, Rachel gave Magneto and Polaris the location of the Null Cascade, and they transported it to the array, ripping through perhaps one hundred bulkhead walls to get to to. Friendless accompanied the Null Cascade, but Rachel joined with her to enslave Friendless' mind and force his genius-level intelligence to solve her equations.  Using this, they arranged things so that when the Null Cascade was fired into the already-gravity-afflicted sun, it caused the sun to collapse into a wormhole with the far end pointed at Earth. The entire Gul Damar station and the Gravity Array were then transported to Earth orbit. --X-Men Legacy#257 (258 Note: As the array was 10,000 miles away from the site in which the Starjammers were active, it seems less likely that the generator was damaged by their battles, and perhaps more likely that Friendless had it directly sabotaged. |
 Freight-platform Ni'Thurr existed within the "Ochre
radial," and it was apparently associated with a cargo bay that the
Grad Nan Holt -- at least the clan/sept associated with Friendless --
made into their base.This is the location from which Friendless had the Janissaries conduct a mock trial of captured Shi'ar, whom they executed despite the intervention of Magneto, Gambit, and Frenzy. (X-Men Legacy#255) - Lt. H'ral informed Commander Gemet (who was also apparently influenced by Friendless) that the walls to the cargo bay in which the Grad Nan Holt were based were already heavily damaged. After they considered that a full salvo would probably breach what was left of its shielding, punch through the vacuum and empty them all out into space, Commander Gemet ordered the gunners to fire all weapons on maximum aperture. X-Men Legacy#256) - The weapons used in this assault were R'Thil particle cannons, which were being fired at full aperture, and which weren't properly anchored. This indeed caused a hull breach, which Rachel temporarily closed. (X-Men Legacy#256) - Glitter led the rest of her crew to confront the Shi'ar soldiers working the weapons. Not wishing to participate in a firefight in an external freight bay, the commander of the group ordered all gunners to stand down, allowing Magneto and Polaris to repair the rent in the spacewall. --X-Men Legacy#255 (X-Men Legacy#256 |
  This giant robot was completely non-ferrous, and neither it nor its pilot contained a single gram of iron.(X-Men Legacy#254) - After Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto were teleported in Gul Damar's forested environment, the giant robot's pilot directed it to attack them. As Frenzy took a blast, Magneto appreciated that the robot was non-ferrous, and that even the pilot did not have an ounce of iron in its blood. As Magneto searched further afield for metal, Frenzy tore the robot's external armor off of one of its lower limbs and had Gambit blast its internal components. This caused its upper body to drop down into range where Frenzy could punch it. The resultant impact knocked out the pilot. --X-Men Legacy#254 Note: Why did neither the robot nor the pilot contain any iron? The
Shi’ar had no idea Magneto was coming there…they may or may not have known
that the Starjammers had crashed there and fallen under the control of the
Grad Nan Holt known only as Friendless, but they really had no reason to
suspect Magneto would be there.
So, that’s an ability of the Shi’ar scientists to add for future profiles, I
think, rather than taking this statement to mean that the Shi’ar don’t have
iron in their blood.. |
 
Used to transport Shi'ar around the immense space
station, this shuttle, at least appeared to be able to carry a couple
dozen passengers.(X-Men Legacy#254) - Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto observed as a number of the Grad Nan Holt ambushed and blew up a vehicle carrying some Shi'ar and then attacked the surviving Shi'ar. One of the Grad Nan Holt apparently teleported away with Shi'ar technician B'ket Imstari who protested that he was trying to save the...<he was teleported away before finishing the sentence, but presumably was going to say either the space station or the gravitic flux generator>. Magneto then entered the battlefield, apparently forming a field to block their blasts. One of the Grad Nan Holt spoke to him, but he noted that while he did not speak their language he would be happy to speak his again (presumably implying he would use his power against them), at which that leader(?) said something to the other, and the Grad Nan Holt retreated. -- X-Men Legacy#254 |
. . . At least one wooded/floral environment existed on Gul Damar, maintained within a closed environment. Flora included grass and trees, and fauna included multiple (3-4?)-eared lagamorph (rabbit-like) and crane-like birds, presumably with long feathers extending back from their heads (but possibly with thin, sharp horns). (X-Men Legacy#253 - BTS) - Rogue -- having absorbed a teleporter's power from amongst the personae of Legion/David Haller -- locked on to Rachel Grey's location and transported herself, Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto thousands of light years to reach Rachel. Rogue was split from her allies, who arrived on a different part of the Gul Damar space station. |  .. . |
|
|
As Magneto detected metal close
by, Gambit appreciated that they were not in any wild woodlands, as it
was maintained, lacking in weeds, moss, and fallen trees.
|
. .
|
images: (without ads):
X-Men Legacy#250, pg. 29 (Starjammers vs. Grad Nan Holt);
#254, story pg. 1, panel 2-3 (woodlands, bunny and bird creatures);
pg. 2, panel 1 (giant robot in woodlands);
pg. 7, panel 4-5 (woodlands in relation to space station);
panel 6 (Gul Damar in front of sun, with planet approaching sun);
pg. 13, panel 1 (interior, outside woodlands);
pg. 14, panel 2 (Shi'ar ship);
#256, pg. 12, panel 4 (Rachel releasing force field to cast Friendless into space);
pg. 17, panel 1 (Flux Array);
#257, story pg. 1, panel 1-3 (K'ythri's Highway);
pg. 2 (Gul Damar, full, close to sun);
pg. 6, panel 1 (Anathema vault);
pg. 7, panel 2 (Dockyard destroyed);
pg. 18, panel 3 (Rogue and Frenzy adjusting gravitic flux generator);
pg. 20, panel 1 (Gravity Array separating from space station);
#258, pg. 14, panel 4 (Friendless assaulted by Rachel and Rogue's astral selves)
pg. 16, panel 3 (Gul Damar and gravity array in proximity to Earth);
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
First posted: 04/01/2023
Last updated: 04/01/2023
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(X-Men Legacy#254) - Frenzy, Gambit, and Magneto arrived in a
forested environment, after which they were swiftly confronted by a
giant robot, which Frenzy and Gambit incapacitated. 