The Acanti herd

Communication between Acanti appears to be a form of energy transmission akin to telepathy, necessary due to the lack of a medium for sound in outer space. Acanti speech cannot be picked up by humans or mutants, though in truth no telepathic mutant has ever been near one to try communicating. However, when a human is bonded to an Acanti, as happened to Storm, the human gains the ability to use Acanti telepathy to communicate with other humans.

The Acanti have a herd mentality, which is reinforced by the fact that they are led by a "Prophetsinger," an elite Acanti that carries the "soul" of its people. The Prophetsinger is identified at birth, and can receive the soul of its predecessor when its ascension takes place. They are benign and peaceful creatures, with little or no offensive capabilities. They have remarkable stamina and healing abilities, which help protect them against predators.

Brood ships infect Acanti with Slaver virus

Possibly the most intriguing aspect of the Acanti is that they have the innate ability to fly faster than the speed of light, without technological assistance. How the Acanti circumvent Einsteinian physics is still unknown. What is known is that this trait made the Acanti even more attractive to their most dangerous predator: The Brood.

Many years ago, the Brood discovered the Acanti and developed a Slaver virus that allowed them to subsume the Acanti's will. The Brood converted the Acanti they captured into living starships, adding weapons banks and other technology where necessary, and using the Acanti's flesh for living quarters and for food. Acanti thus captured became a kind of living dead, awake and aware, but unable to act in any way other than as programmed.

The biggest blow to the Acanti came when their Prophetsinger was infected by the Slaver virus. Worse, he was not allowed to die when his usefulness as a starship ended, but was instead grounded on the Brood homeworld and turned into a kind of capital city. Though his body soon died, he was never able to pass the Acanti soul on to his successor. As a result, all the Acanti were stuck in the vicinity, unwilling or unable to leave without the Prophetsinger's soul.

The Prophetsinger's mother is enslaved

Salvation for the Acanti came when a new Prophetsinger was born. However, without transferring the soul to him, the Acanti were still stuck near Sleazeworld. Enter the X-Men, who had been abducted and infected by the Brood and brought to their homeworld. Carol Danvers (formerly Ms. Marvel) became linked with a white hole and transformed into Binary. The process made her temporarily insane, and she blasted out of Lilandra's yacht, causing an explosive decompression that sucked Storm into space. Fortunately, Storm was found by the newborn Prophetsinger, whose mother had just been enslaved by the Brood. The Acanti saved Storm, entering into a symbiotic relationship in which the Acanti healed Storm's body, purging it of the Brood embryo, and Storm's experienced mind provided a source of focus and strength for the baby Prophetsinger. The Acanti then swallowed Liliandra's yacht, masking it from Brood sensors while the crew effected repairs.

At this point, Storm was able to use the Acanti's telepathy to generate her own astral form, which she used to find Binary. Together, the X-Men and Binary planned to find the Prophetsinger's soul and release it. The X-Men went down to the planet, while Storm and Binary fought Brood ships in space. Storm was able to trigger the equivalent of lightning bolts while still in her healing cocoon, though the difficult action nearly destroyed her.

Eventually, the X-Men captured the Brood Queen and brought her to the soul, which appeared as a room of pure white crystal. The foul nature of the Brood Queen and the embryos within the X-Men immediately resonated as black pools throughout the chamber. The effect caused the Brood embryos to gestate, and Wolverine would have killed his teammates then rather than allow them to become Brood. Fortunately, Binary arrived and stopped Logan, then carried out a process dictated to her by Storm and the Acanti, which collected all the energy in the dead Prophetsinger's soul and fired it into space, to be caught by his successor. The soul chamber became black, the X-Men were healed, and the Brood Queen was turned to crystal. The new Prophetsinger used his power to heal Storm, and the Acanti and the X-Men parted ways.

Recently, however, the Brood attempted to invade Earth using a fleet of Acanti ships, though ones without external domes. It is unknown whether these were leftovers from before the X-Men freed the Prophetsinger, or whether the Brood have continued their depredations on the Acanti even afterwards. The fleet was scared away from Earth with a telepathic illusion of the Phoenix Force and Galactus.