Daagon

The **Daagon** are an ancient, noble, and honorable amphibian race from the cosmic ocean of Varuna. They were entrusted by the Utrom with the task of guarding the second piece of the Heart of Darkness after it was separated and hidden to keep it from being used again. The male soldiers of the species were nicknamed **Merdudes** by Michelangelo.

## History

Sometime in the past, Hiidrala and her Daagons were entrusted with the second piece of the Utroms' doomsday weapon, the Heart of Darkness, and Hiidrala kept it locked within her palace vaults until someone proved themselves worthy of being given the piece to destroy as she was told by the Utroms that the Heart of Darkness was indestructible.

### **The Cosmic Ocean**

After some time, Hiidrala meets Professor Zayton Honeycutt, friend of the Utroms, and his allies in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, April O'Neil, and Casey Jones, who have come bearing the Utrom symbol and a request for the second piece to destroy it and save the Turtles, April, and Casey's home world of Earth, even warning her that her kingdom will be torn apart by the Triceratons if they don't get the piece first. Hiidrala decides to test them by sending them to the lair of the Cthugga, saying that if it deems them worthy, it will give up the piece without a fight, but will devour them if it does not. When she receives a call for help from Prof. Honeycutt saying they are under attack by the bounty hunter Armaggon, she sends her Daagon warriors to help and apprehend Armaggon. When they return, she is furious at Armaggon's actions, but also, because the Cthugga deemed them unworthy, she refuses to hand over the second piece of the Heart of Darkness to the Turtles, who plead for another chance before Armaggon begins laughing as his own reinforcements have arrived in the form of several Vreen drones and their hive mind, Lord Vringath Dregg, who threatens to devour all of the Daagon unless he gets the second piece. Hiidrala refuses to hand it over, and when the Turtles come to her defense to aid her, she sends her Daagon into battle with them. Leo saves Hiidrala from a point-blank fatal attack from Lord Dregg, who repays the favor as, now furious, she summons Cthugga to devour Dregg and Armaggon. With the loss of their hive mind, the Vreen withdraw, and in gratitude for saving her life and proving that his earlier reasons for why they wanted the second piece were true, Hiidrala gives Leo the second piece, adding on that if the Turtles can destroy the infernal device, they are honorable heroes of the Daagons, and have their full support and respect for it.

## List of Known Daagon

* Hiidrala
* Daagon Guards
	+ Daagon Captain

## Trivia

* The names Daagon and Cthugga are based on Dagon and Cthulhu of H.P. Lovecraft's writings.
	+ Cthugga's appearance was based on Dagon's.
* The Daagon are based and nicknamed after Merdude, a character from the 1987 TV series. The Daagon however have legs, as opposed to Alim who had a single fish-like tail.
	+ The Captain of the Daagon guard has an eye-patch on his right eye, as a reference to the Merdude action figure released in 1992.
* The character Hiidrala seems to be inspired by Hydras, not the many-headed serpent in Greek mythology, but the genus of small, fresh-water animals.
	+ Much like Hiidrala, the Hydras have multiple tentacles and are generally sedentary or sessile, but do occasionally move quite readily.
	+ Biologists are especially interested in Hydra because of their regenerative ability – they appear not to age or die of old age.