Matilda Brunet

**Matilda Brunet**, known as Matilda, is a minor character in ***Darlin'***. Matilda is an antagonist to the story of ***Darlin'***, considered to be a competitive rival by Ana Sophía during their clash in the KOVO Champions Cup Hexagonal Qualifiers. She is used as a political marketing campaign by Miggy to attempt to remove Ana Sophía from political influence and replace her with Matilda as the new star of the league. She is viewed by Miggy as the prodigy to the league's future for her modified genes that make her vastly superior to the average female athlete.

## Biography

### Early Life

Matilda was born in Shanghai, China to Brazilian parents with selected traits as a designer baby. She became one of the first ever Brazilian babies to have her genetic makeup altered. Days after her birth, Matilda's parents traveled back to São Paulo, Brazil. She would study at Colégio Humboldt in São Paulo until her departure from Brazil in June of 2017 to study in the United States.

After starting as a freshman at St. Ignatius College Preparatory in August of 2017, Matilda began training to become an athlete, with the dream of competing in the 2020 KOVO Champions Cup. She worked alongside a personal trainer and dedicated weekly hours in the gym with the hopes of playing paid competitive and finding a team.

## Career

### Birthday crossover

Matilda makes her debut in ***Darlin'*** with an appearance at Emma's birthday party hosted at Emma's house in San Francisco. She crosses paths when Niko brings her over to meet Ana Sophía, with Matilda surprising Ana Sophía with her Portuguese and reveal that she is Brazilian as well. Their conversation is cut short when Enzo calls her over and invites her to meet the rest of the guests at the birthday celebration.

Later on during the event, Matilda gets the opportunity to explain to Hunter, Julie & Ana Sophía that she is a big admirer of Ana Sophía's career, admitting she would one day like to follow in her steps to compete in sports as good as her. After the party, Ana Sophía shares her thoughts of feeling flattered by Matilda's earlier words of praise but maintains suspicions about her, especially Enzo's enthusiasm for a new member of their social group. Hunter consequentially agrees on the suspicions, leaving Matilda on the limbo of whether she is someone that can be trusted or not.

### Close alliance

Enzo worked closely with Matilda in the beginning of 2018, becoming a huge influence in her signing with American club Porto Alanza. Matilda agreed to a 3-year contract, a deal that would see her remain with the club until the end of 2020. Her salary agreement made her one of the highest earners on the team at just 15 years of age with no competitive experience. Matilda was announced as part of the 18-player roster ahead of the 2018 KOVO Champions Cup Hexagonal Qualifiers in January 2018.

### Clash with Ana Sophía

In a undisclosed time period, Porto Alanza submitted their starting lineup for their qualifier matchup against Palmeiras U-20. Matilda made the roster, being placed at the center-back position and instructed to mark Brazilian captain Ana Sophía. Being a one-leg playoff match hosted at Allianz Parque in São Paulo, this marked Matilda's return to her home city after having left the country in 2017. Serving as her career debut, Matilda flourished on the pitch. She accumulated a total of 10 ball dispossessions against Ana Sophía and pressured her to give the ball away rapidly on various occasions, successfully marking her every move for the majority of the game.

Near the end of the second half, Miggy reveals to Ana Sophía that Matilda is the player that will replace her, citing the traits of superior strength and intelligence on the field as an overshadow to Ana Sophía's abilities. He confesses the purpose of preventing Ana Sophía to pave the way for Matilda, something that needed to be done for the future of the KOVO Federation's marketing expansion campaign. Ana Sophía would go on to score the only goal for Palmeiras, getting past Matilda from a shot outside the penalty box to bring the score at 1-2 but failed to find the equalizer in time as Matilda scored Porto Alanza's 3rd goal of the game to secure Porto Alanza's spot in the group stage of the 2020 KOVO Champions Cup in the 88th minute. The game ended with a 1-3 score in favor of Porto Alanza. Matilda was awarded the Player of the Match award for her performance that night. We never learn the fate of Matilda after the game.