First appearance: S7E7 — A Father’s Son — Agatha Middlebrooke v Lug Hardblock · watch it on YouTube
Agatha Middlebrooke is a sweet, bad-kneed old grandmother and a “classic spooky warlock” who was pulled into the Void to fight Lug Hardblock in S7E7 — A Father’s Son — Agatha Middlebrooke v Lug Hardblock. She showered everyone with butterscotch and compliments while her cat clawed up Lug’s face. She died on purpose, came back as a ghost to announce that she was Lug’s grandmother, and walked out of the arena a champion. Hers is one of the strangest family reunions the Deathmatches have ever hosted.
Story
Agatha came through the Arbiter’s portal cooing over “what strapping young people we have here today.” Within a minute she had complimented Lug’s confidence, warned everyone about her knees (Lug wrote that down to use against her), and handed the Arbiter a toffee “for your lovely portal.” The Arbiter was so touched that he asked the Grandmaster why she couldn’t be nice like that. The arena was an asteroid adrift in The Ether Drifts, with The Acolytes floating overhead in zero-gravity grandstands. Lug opened by growing to two or three times his size and golf-swinging her clean off the asteroid. Agatha calmly blinked back onto solid ground in a little puff of lavender. When Lug protested that magic shouldn’t be allowed, she replied, “You did steroids.”
Then she went after his heart. Lug had mentioned his father, so Agatha filled the air with a dozen or more perfect illusions of his dad and draped the same face over herself. All of them said in unison, “I’m proud of you, son.” Lug wept, and while he was busy weeping, her familiar Lord Cookie Mill came flying at him out of one of the illusory dads’ arms and latched onto his face, shredding his nostril. (“Oh, Lord Cookie Mill, bad kitty… He’s usually so nice to strangers.”) The cat, a Sphinx of Wonder that is “for all intents and purposes a cat” and was trained through the Westhaven Book Club, did all of Agatha’s damage that night. It clung to Lug like he was a cat tree, rocketed at the back of his head, and turned his own blows back on him. Meanwhile Agatha melted his illusory dads in his arms, offered him aloe vera, and magically commanded him to “Share.” He found himself confessing that his father had never shown him a moment of warmth. The Arbiter admitted he’d never spectated a therapy session and wasn’t hating it, and the Acolytes chanted her name. Her kindness had limits, though. When a deformed raccoon named Jimothy crept out of a crater looking for a friendly hand, Agatha whacked him with her broom, citing the HOA, and Jimothy urine-sprayed both her and Lug with acidic raccoon piss for their trouble. Later Lug spiked her into a crevasse that held a tiny worm civilization, crushing sixty worms beneath her. She surveyed the wreckage and said, “Oh, well, at least your souls will feed the garden.” She floated back out on a levitation spell “like a little magical grandma,” and asked Lug one question: “How do you think I knew what your father looked like?”
Lug finally cracked her space helmet, leaving her about three rounds of air. Agatha told the arena that every grandma must one day do the right thing for her family, told Lug “Good shot. He would have been proud,” and cast Little Death. She died on the spot. Her body drifted above the asteroid while Lug was declared the winner and the Grandmaster raised his arm with a forced smile. Then the lights flickered, and Agatha’s ghost appeared, shining through from the Ethereal Plane. She was Lug’s grandmother. His father had kept her away from him, so she had cursed the father into her cat. Lug had been fighting his dad all night. She possessed Lug and used his own arms to give him “the one thing that he was never able to give himself. A hug.” As the cat lunged for his face, she whispered, “You can be a better man than your father was,” and let him go. She returned to her battered but living body. Asked whether she was now fighting alongside her grandson, she explained that she was waiting to see whether he would stand up to his father.
He did. Lug smacked the cat so hard it burned up in the asteroid’s thin atmosphere and burst like a firework (“And if that really was my dad, good riddance”). Agatha then offered him a choice: fight his grandma, or go live a life free of his father’s yoke. Lug chose freedom and thanked her. Agatha was relieved, since now she didn’t have to summon a spirit of death. She promised they would summon one later instead, to collect some souls and celebrate once his condominiums were built. The flustered Grandmaster crowned them both champions, to a crowd that couldn’t decide whether to cheer or throw popcorn at them.
Personality and Abilities
Agatha plays the sweet old lady completely straight. She hands out toffees and butterscotch, praises everyone (including the man hitting her), and recommends book clubs and tea. That niceness covers a ruthless streak. She is nice to everyone except raccoons and one unlucky Acolyte, who asked whether the show was live and got “This is not a rerun, you fuck.” She later explained that “you don’t get to stay ahead of the HOA by playing nice to the chat.” She sits on the council of the Westhaven Book Club and belongs to the local HOA. In her youth she was “a young rebel out in the mountains with the hemp and the boys.” As her player summed her up: “Grandma first, warlock second.”
She hardly lays a finger on anyone herself. She fights with misdirection: lavender-scented teleports, heartbreaking illusions, magical commands, levitation, and her terrifying cat, whose eyes go shark-black before it strikes. Her signature trick is Little Death. She dies, rises as a ghost who can possess people, and then returns to her body. She also claims she can summon a spirit of death. Her advice on life covers shoplifting from the bottom of the shopping cart and telling everyone to get a real job.
Relationships
- Lug Hardblock: her opponent and, it turns out, her grandson. She cursed his father into her cat, used Lug’s own arms to give him a hug, and shared the crown with him.
- Lord Cookie Mill: her familiar cat, who did all her fighting. He was really Lug’s father, cursed by Agatha for keeping her from her grandson. Lug blew him up.
- The Arbiter: won over by her toffee and her compliments about his portal. He wished the Grandmaster were as nice.
- The Grandmaster: escorted her into the arena, switched loyalties back and forth all night, accepted a toffee, and crowned her co-champion.
- The Acolytes: adored her, chanted her name, and pelted Lug with slushies on her behalf.
Memorable Quotes
- “You did steroids.” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son)
- “Oh, well, at least your souls will feed the garden.” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son)
- “How do you think I knew what your father looked like?” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son)
- “It is I, your grandma. And you killed me.” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son)
- “And now I shall give my grandson the one thing that he was never able to give himself. A hug.” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son)
- “Don’t forget to be yourself, but also probably get a real job and, you know, don’t be a fucking loser.” (S7E7 — A Father’s Son, Dried Blood)