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Girl Genius
This article is about a member of House Heterodyne. For others in the lineage or other uses, see Heterodyne (disambiguation).

William Heterodyne, better known as Bill, was one of the now-legendary Heterodyne Boys.

History[]

Raised primarily by their kind and compassionate mother, Bill and his brother Barry renounced their family's vicious past and instead set to work cleaning up Europa. (It's implied that Bill did the physical derring-do while Barry handled the tech end of things.) They accomplished what they set out to do with such success that their family name, which once inspired terror and loathing, became synonymous with heroism.

For several years he and his brother put the beatdown on evil sparks, fought monsters, and generally acted heroically. They were helped by their constructs Punch and Judy and their friend Klaus. (Among others, such as Thundering Engine Woman.) Several times they found themselves up against the evil Dr. Mongfish and his beautiful daughter, Lucrezia. As noted, when the comic starts the brothers' exploits are already passing into legend, but one of these Mongfish-adjacent adventures definitely involved a search for The West Pole, which may have been an actual physical object. During this expedition, Bill and Lucrezia had an intense.. conversation.. onboard a burning submarine, and The Iron Sheik also got involved at some point.

Bill fell for Lucrezia, and asked her to renounce her evil ways and marry him. She said yes.[1][2] For at least two years they lived together in Castle Heterodyne, and Lucrezia bore them a son, whom Bill insisted be named after the now-disappeared Klaus. When the Castle was attacked by The Other, his son killed and Lucrezia kidnapped, Bill was nearly mad with grief.

Locket-bill

Agatha's Locket

Together with his brother, he left to stop The Other. After fighting and searching for years, the attacks by The Other finally ceased. Bill has not been seen since.

According to Barry, popular depictions of him are exaggerated, while Dimo comments that Bill's adventures took such a physical toll on him, he was "more stitches than skin" towards the end.

The Novels[]

To date, the only certain first-hand depiction of Bill we've seen has been in the prologue to Agatha H. and the Airship City, wherein Bill and Barry finally successfully predict and (partially) thwart an attack by The Other. Bill is shown to be an utterly silent, grim and obsessed avenger, with POV character Barry very worried about his brother's mental state.

At one point Castle Heterodyne describes Bill as being a very "simple" man, and says that had he been born in a different era, he might have made a very effective old-school Heterodyne.

The Works[]

Bill appears together with his brother Barry in The Works card game, but unlike Barry does not appear on a card in his own right.

See Also[]

References

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