Fabio Medina

Fabio Medina is a teenaged mutant whose powers first appear when he was the victim of an attempted robbery on the streets of San Diego. After manifesting his abilities, the bouncing balls emanating from his body frighten onlookers, and he is taken into custody by the San Diego Police Department. However, Cyclops and his group of X-Men arrive just in time to rescue him. A squad of different-sized Sentinels attack the new mutant and Cyclops's team, who manage to destroy the Sentinels. Fabio is then invited to join the X-Men when they depart San Diego. Although Fabio is reluctant, he decides to follow them. Fabio then joins the X-Men during their visit to Eva Bell's home and the encounter with the Avengers, before being dragged into limbo during Dormammu's attempt to kill them. In the aftermath, Fabio demands to be taken home, where his family questions his disappearance and is befuddled at his claims of being a mutant.^{[volume & issue needed]}

When S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Alison Blaire (Dazzler) arrives and questions him about Cyclops's location, Fabio loses control of his powers. He is taken into S.H.I.E.L.D. custody but is again rescued by Cyclops' team and rejoins them. He later assists in the battle against the Blockbuster Sentinel by concentrating the emission of his gold balls to topple them. He then assumes the mutant nickname "Goldballs".^{[volume & issue needed]}

After many adventures under the guidance of Illyana Rasputin and Shadowcat, Goldballs and his teammates express uncertainty about continuing as students anymore.^[1]

Goldballs next appears in Spider-Man, where he is seen attending Brooklyn Visions Academy, where he becomes the classmate of Ganke Lee and Miles Morales, aka the second Spider-Man.^[2][3]

During the "House of X and Powers of X" storyline, Fabio would make his home on the new mutant homeland of Krakoa where the true nature of his seemingly mundane mutant powers would be revealed. Working in conjunction with Proteus, Elixir, Tempus and Hope Summers, he uses them to resurrect Cyclops, Jean Grey, M, Nightcrawler, Warren Worthington III, Husk, Mystique and Wolverine under X's instruction.^[4][3][5] After becoming a member of The Five, he changes his codename to "Egg".^[6]

During the "Judgment Day" storyline, Krakoa was attacked by Jack of Knives and those with him. Wolverine found that Egg was wounded by Jack of Knives before the attackers retreated.^[7]

Goldballs is a mutant with the superhuman ability to project at high-speed gold-colored non-viable ball-shaped eggs made of an unknown substance and of different sizes from any part of his body, which can be used as a concussive weapon. Goldballs can summon an infinite number of them, which are able to bounce, emitting a "poink" sound when they hit something. If he concentrates, he can project them in a straight line or direct them to a specific area. Normally the balls can be reabsorbed into his body, though when Goldballs is calm, he can cause them to disappear.^[8]

It is later revealed that his abilities, while relatively unimpressive, have the capacity for vast genetic application. The golden spheres made from his own biological matter are a kind of nonviable unfertilized egg. Working as a unit with the mutants Proteus (who makes the eggs viable), Elixir (who brings the eggs with introduced DNA to life), Eva Bell (who speeds the incubation process), and Hope Summers (who links and enhances their abilities), Egg becomes a crucial part of rebirthing deceased mutants using their preserved DNA.^[4][3][5]

In a 2016 discussion on rating X-Men characters at ComicsAlliance, Goldballs received a total of 18 out of 50. Elle Collins rated the character highest (at 7 out of 10) and viewed him as "a fun character, who has really silly powers and got stuck with a nickname to match. There is absolutely a place for characters like this in the Marvel Universe, and Goldballs is a good addition as far as I'm concerned".^[9] However, the other four gave him much lower ratings with Steve Morris commenting, "I like that he opposed his own nickname, but he feels like a very panicky character, one who exists mainly so Bendis can go full-Mamet and fill up word balloon after word balloon with stammers and half-sentences. I think there's likely a fun character in there, like you say Elle, and another writer may well coax that out at some point in future. But right now he feels like a lot of potential that'll stand by in the background of crowdscenes forever more".^[9]

In 2019, Alex Abad-Santos of Vox highlighted that Medina's abilities during Uncanny X-Men are "largely played for laughs, as he was unable to control the balls he was making in the heat of battle" and that he was part of a team organized by Cyclops which was "largely forgotten".^[10] However in House of X, Jonathan Hickman's interpretation of these powers shift them to sustaining life which is "much more useful than plain gold spheres".^[10] Abad-Santos commented that "Hickman has turned Goldballs and his crew of forgotten X-Men into full-fledged characters with intriguing powers. He and his cohort, along with other forgotten mutants, have seemingly become more powerful, but not to the point where their existence breaks storytelling. To do what Hickman did with these esoteric characters offers fidelity to the larger X-Men canon".^[10] In 2020, Carter Burrowes of CBR similarly highlighted how the Krakoan Age was giving "Marvel's last generation of junior X-Men, the former students of the Jean Grey School of Higher Learning, continued meaningful roles in Marvel's wider mutant world".^[11] Burrowes stated that "from the outset, Fabio has been a very likable character, but he's often served as the butt of jokes since his ability to emit golden balls from his chest isn't the most impressive. [...] He is now one of – if not the most important member of – The Five, which makes him one of the most important mutants on Krakoa and in the Marvel Universe. It's safe to say that Fabio won't be disappearing anytime soon".^[11]

• Uncanny X-Men, vol. 3, no. 1–12, 16–32 (Various dates). Marvel Comics.