Agatha Heterodyne

''This article is about a member of House Heterodyne. For others in the lineage or other uses, see Heterodyne (disambiguation).'' ''This article is about a member of House Mongfish. For others in the lineage or other uses, see Mongfish (disambiguation).'' ''This article is about a member of the Clay Family. For others in the family or other uses, see Clay (disambiguation).''


 * "I have a lot of things to do. If I drop everything to make
 * a girly fuss over him, we could all wind up dead."

Agatha Heterodyne is the main character and eponymous Girl Genius. She's a strong Spark and the last known member of the famous Heterodyne family. As the main character, a summary of every event in which the protagonist is involved would be impossibly long. This article is mostly limited to events that Agatha is aware of, that affect her deeply, and that are likely to come up again as the narrative unfolds.

For a more in-depth analysis of her character, see Agatha's mad page.

Early Life
Agatha is the daughter of Lucrezia Mongfish and Bill Heterodyne. She was their second child, the first being Klaus Barry Heterodyne, who died while still very young. The circumstances of her birth are a mystery. The only clue we have is that, according to Lady Vrin, she is the holy child long sought by the Geisterdamen and later stolen by. Wherever and however Agatha first appeared in the world, no one expected that there was a second Heterodyne heir.

Agatha was raised by her Uncle Barry until the age of seven. During her earliest years, he in order to stay hidden. One day, Barry on a secret mission, entrusting Agatha to the protective and tender Adam and Lilith Clay, and never returned. Adam and Lilith (in reality, the famous pair of constructs, Punch and Judy) raised her in Beetleburg under the name "Agatha Clay". Agatha remained unaware that she was either a Spark or a Heterodyne throughout her early life due to a locket given to her by Barry. What became of her natural parents or her Uncle Barry is anyone's guess.

Lab Assistant
When the story opens, Agatha is and a student at Transylvania Polygnostic University, where she works under the  of Doctor Tarsus Beetle, who is the only other person besides the Clays who know Agatha's true identity.

That day turns out to be exceptionally bad. She is by a foreboding electrical anomaly, her locket is  by Omar von Zinzer, Dr. Beetle is  by Gilgamesh Wulfenbach, and she is expelled from the university. Later, she builds her first working clank in her sleep, which results in her  and taken aboard Castle Wulfenbach.

On the castle, Agatha  to be Moloch von Zinzer's girlfriend, until he threatens her. She also meets the students and gets to know Gilgamesh Wulfenbach, but cannot reconcile her of his company with his having killed Dr. Beetle (accident or no), nor with his harsh treatment of the initially charming and heroic Othar Tryggvassen, Gentleman Adventurer. It's on Castle Wulfenbach that Agatha Dingbot Prime,  her first ally, Krosp I, and is  to the Jägergenerals.

It's also here where she has her first real adventure. The hive engine that was in Dr. Beetle's lab is activated by the sleeper revenant Mr. Rovainen and from Agatha. With help from Agatha's Electric Foils and Dingbots, Gil and Agatha destroy the hive engine together. Euphoric, Agatha Gil. He is instantly smitten and makes the Agatha has ever heard. Agatha takes umbrage at the idea of getting married just to annoy Klaus, but never gets a chance to answer Gil since Othar "rescues" her from Gil and is then thrown out a window and seemingly to his death. As Adam and Lilith attempt to wisk Agatha out of the Castle, Klaus recognizes them as the Heterodyne constructs Punch and Judy and deduces that Agatha is the child of Bill Heterodyne and Lucrezia Mongfish. Agatha escapes, but Von Pinn eliminates Punch and Judy.

Actress
Agatha and her, Krosp I, flee in a stolen airship with Othar Tryggvassen who was waiting for her by it. They when Agatha refuses to be Othar's 'plucky girl sidekick' and pushes him off the airship.

In the Wastelands, Agatha runs straight at danger to save Master Payne's Circus of Adventure from a rogue Spider Clank. The Circus then helps Agatha her death to throw off the Wulfenbach pursuit. Agatha acquires her second ally when Zeetha, Daughter of Chump Agatha as her Zumil. She acquires her third set of allies when the three wild Jägers that she from the town of Zumzum come to her  at Passholdt. Agatha learns a lot about herself in the Wastelands, getting conflicting advice concerning heroics from Othar and Master Payne.

While performing the role of Lucrezia Mongfish in the Circus's Heterodyne plays, Agatha forms an  to Lars. Following a performance at Castle Sturmvoraus, the young actress is taken  in rapid succession by Aaronev Wilhelm Sturmvoraus, then by Anevka Sturmvoraus, and then by Lady Vrin. Throughout it all, Agatha is alternately aided and hindered by the machinations of Prince Tarvek.

Vrin and the Geisterdamen use the "Holy Machine" to another personality into Agatha—a personality that they believe is their goddess, Lucrezia Mongfish, Agatha's mother, and The Other. As Agatha fights a losing struggle for control of her own body, she a distress signal to warn the world and the Baron.

Agatha finally regains control when Lucrezia the damping locket that Baron Wulfenbach repaired. When Lars a killing blow from the Baron meant for Agatha, Agatha learns about. She recovers her perspective only after becoming the subject of the first successful test of the calming pie. The Circus creates a of the Heterodyne Boys to cover Agatha's escape from the Battle of Sturmhalten.

Itinerant Heroine
The Circus to England, but Agatha advances to Mechanicsburg to take possession of Castle Heterodyne. There, she is to watch Gil stop an invading army of battle clanks. Agatha encounters competition from that other Heterodyne heiress, Zola, but on the strength of some coffee-making, she convinces former seneschal Carson von Mekkhan to get her  the castle.

Inside the castle, Agatha attempts to take control and begin repairs while Zola and the prisoners hunt her. Agatha of the main castle library, and with it, Mechanicsburg's  air defenses, though this  to a confrontation with Castle Wulfenbach.

As Volume 8 ends and Volume 9 begins, Agatha  Tarvek from one of her Castle's rogue defensive systems, drops him off in a "medical lab" after a brief peck to his cheek and goes in search of Gil, who is also  in her Castle so he can heal Tarvek. She captures Zola and brings Gil to the lab where Tarvek is on the slab. She heals a gunshot Gil suffered and apologizes for her anger at Gil for tossing Othar off of Castle Heterodyne. Tarvek was initially diagnosed with Chromatic Death, but is then proved to be Hogfarb's Resplendent immolation. Using various torture devises lying around, Gil and Agatha construct a device to perform the Si Vales Valeo ressurection on Tarvek to clean out the disease. This involves hooking up Gil to Tarvek so that Tarvek has a healthy person to leach from and not die or go insane. This fails due to the castle having an energy crisis, so Gil and Tarvek are fit with a portable Si Vales Valeo devices so they can help repair the device that pulls energy from the Dyne, a river that runs through Mechanicsburg and is infused with a powerful and mysterious energy. Just before descending into the basements, Agatha begins to show frank symptoms of Hogfarb's Immolation. When she voices that she will simply also parallel herself to Gil and Tarvek and all three get healed at once, the Castle acts on it own to preserve the Heterodyne bloodline by preventing even momentary death. We now wait to see how she will overcome this and save everyone.

In our next episode
Klaus suspects that, some time in the not too distant future, Agatha will a time travel device with Gil and a Geisterdame.

Command Voice
(See main article: Command voice.)

There is a series of in which commands given by Agatha's  (usually while in the madness place) exact  from servants of the Other.

Agatha's Spark
Agatha performed the characteristic Heterodyne humming at age 5. This is the earliest breakthrough known, the earliest being Gilgamesh Wulfenbach. Her uncle Barry feared that a at such an early age could be disastrous, and  her a locket that suppressed her Spark until the story's beginning.

Like most strong sparks, Agatha's style is hard to define because she is marvelously proficient at a number of sparky disciplines. More importantly, she is still a student. However, she seems to specialize in mechanical engineering; her breakthrough creation is a clank, and she produces perhaps the smallest known clank soon afterward - Dingbot Prime - which her in building generations of miniature self-replicating clanks. These are a key factor in her first victory against Baron Wulfenbach. However, she shows a knack for Death rays. Agatha has not yet created a construct in canon and her medical skills are, at least at present.

Creations
(in order of appearance)
 * Search Engine
 * Dingbot Prime and other Dingbots—self-replicating miniature clanks
 * Othar-Rescuing machine
 * Electric foils
 * several portable Death rays
 * repurposed Silverodeon, together with the Battle Circus and Baba Yaga
 * holographic
 * exo-skeleton (non-canon)
 * Fashion Clank (non-canon)
 * Coffee engine capable of producing perfect coffee

Outside information
Agatha's appearance is based on the way Phil used to draw Kaja Foglio. Kaja explains in this old Livejournal post how Agatha was initially designed and why her hair is such a vibrant red-blonde color.

Agatha’s “heterodyning”—the humming/singing noise she makes while thinking Sparky thoughts—was partly inspired by ’s famous trill (in the works of Lester Dent). Doc would unconsciously produce the sound while thinking or fighting.

Shortly before the publication of the Secret Blueprints in February, 2001, issue 279 of Dragon Magazine with the cover date January 2001 contained a page of What's New with Phil and Dixie which had characters strongly resembling both Agatha and Krosp in one panel. (Krosp had previously been named in pages of that comic which appeared in Duelist.)