SANTI SARDINA

 

SANTI SARDINA

Real Name: Santi Sardina

First Appearance: X-Men Legacy (Vol. 2) #8, May 2013

Powers: Santi Sardina’s mutant power casts an instinctive psychic effect which causes people to praise him. Often times, this causes people to subliminally re-attribute any success or positive outcome in their environment as if it was Santi's doing, giving him the credit. No participatory action is needed from him for the effect to take place. If he's just walking by when someone receives a gift, enjoys a book of poetry, or is saved by a firefighter or super-hero, he gets the credit for the positive event. Even the general good feelings people might have for a given person are re-attributed towards Santi, without a specific event or act in mind.

The exact mechanism of Santi's power is unknown, but it has considerable range: The principal at his school attributed successes to Santi over the morning announcements, despite being unable to see or hear Santi at the time, and Santi's power could be expressed over live television. When Santi actively involves himself in the narrative, people find whatever he says to be positive as well. A group of anti-mutant activists suddenly found mutants to be great when Santi announced he was a mutant in their presence. The positivity effect is compulsive and can produce contradictory instincts: If people have to think about why they're praising Santi or a certain thing, it can causes headaches or make them just give up and move on to something else.