Xavin

Xavin first appeared in Runaways vol. 2 #7 and was created by Brian K. Vaughan and Adrian Alphona. They are introduced as a Skrull prince, the child of De'zean of the Skrull Royal Family on the planet Tarnax VI and they are meant to marry Karolina in order to bring peace to their two warring, alien species.[7]

As member of the Runaways, they appeared in the comicbook Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers, it involves both the Runaways and Young Avengers teams.[8]

In the short lived third volume of the Runaways, she forced to leave the team and was last seen being taken from Earth in Majesdanian custody.[7]

Xavin, being a Skrull, has the Skrull natural ability to shape-shift.[2] Xavin was a Super-Skrull in training, meaning they can manifest the powers of the Fantastic Four: Mr. Fantastic's ability to stretch and contort his body into any shape imaginable, Invisible Woman's power to render herself invisible and the ability to create force fields, the Human Torch's fire-control and flight and the Thing's superhuman strength and resistant rock-like hide.[5] The Super-Skrull K'lrt is one of Xavin's idols.[15] As stated by Xavin, they are still a Super Skrull in training, so they can only use their Fantastic Four abilities one at a time; at one point, when Xavin was bombarded with high frequency sounds, they lost control of their powers and burnt up the Griffith Observatory.[12] Finally, in vol. 3, #2, they used all their powers at once in anger.[13]

In 2008, Xavin was named the fourth (out of ten) best Skrull characters in an article published on Marvel's official Web site.[18]

Due to Xavin often changing through their three main forms, (human female, human male, and true Skrull form) both characters within the series and fans[19] question the nature of their gender. As a Skrull, a race of shapeshifters, Xavin stated "for us, just changing our gender is no different than changing our hair color",[2] implying that Skrulls have fluid gender identities. When asked by Molly about why they don't stay in female form all the time, Xavin replied that it was simply their nature to do so and doesn't see a problem in it,[20] though it causes Xavin to start questioning their own nature. Although Karolina does truly love Xavin, even so much as to deny Xavin disguised as Nico due to loyalty,[21] she does become depressed when Nico questions Xavin's true gender. In Civil War: Young Avengers/Runaways, Xavin is mostly male, but female briefly.[15] In vol. 3, #1, Xavin is only male, but in vol. 3 #2, Xavin is only female.[13][22] Karolina is fixed on the idea that Xavin is female, and that Xavin isn't pretending to be a woman, just learning to be human.[3] During an argument with Karolina, Xavin loses control and changes form into their female form, and Karolina takes that to mean Xavin's true form is a female.[4] However, on his blog, the artist Humberto Ramos notes that he was instructed to draw Xavin taking different genders depending on the situation, even when not plot-necessary.[23]

Due to their war-like, yet rash attitude,[16] Xavin often irritates the other Runaways.[5] They often believed that Victor was supposed to be hardwired to know everything, being a cyborg. In their first appearance, they called Victor a "toy".[2] Xavin met Karolina after Karolina suffered rejection from Nico, her crush for some time.[1] When Xavin expressed no concern of changing physical appearance from male to female to please her, Karolina began a relationship. Xavin once took the form of Nico in order to please Karolina, but Karolina rejected them as Nico because they had earned her loyalty and reassured Xavin that she loves them as they are.[21] At times, they still suspect Karolina has lingering feelings over Nico.[24] Later on, during an argument, Xavin subconsciously reverted to female human form, which both surprised and pleased Karolina, who had earlier expressed some lingering doubts about Xavin's true gender.[24]

Besides Victor, Xavin strongly infuriates Nico and often questions Nico's leadership decisions.[16] Xavin grew to respect Nico's leadership telling her how much they've learned much from her.[25][14]

Xavin appears in the second season of Runaways played by Clarissa Thibeaux with other actors and actresses occasionally portraying them.[26] Instead of being a Skrull, they are Xartan, a being with the ability to shapeshift, presenting as numerous people before adopting a female body.[27][28] They are first named in "Last Rites" as one of the aliens on Jonah's ship, before it is blown up by Pride.[29] They begin telepathically conversing with Karolina before adopting the appearance of a charitable stranger and briefly interact with her while shopping.[27] Xavin fully reveals themself to Karolina at the end of "Earth Angel" as her betrothed.[30] They tell Karolina they stowed away on a ship that carried Karolina's biological father, "Jonah", and his family of exiled Gibborim royal magistrates for the purpose of fulfilling an uncertain prophecy that she believes they are a part of that will unite two worlds and bring peace to the universe. Xavin stays at the hostel where she speaks with Leslie Dean and reveals to her that she is pregnant with Jonah's heir and that he and his family have inhabited other bodies, later revealed to be Stacey Yorkes, Tina Minoru, Victor Stein and one unknown party. They try rescuing Karolina from Victor/Jonah, but they are overpowered. They regroup at the hostel with Leslie, Alex, Molly and Nico to plan out how they will rescue their friends from Jonah.[28]

• Xavin on Marvel Database, a Marvel Comics wiki