Zed Hudson (Universe Gemini)
The Universe Gemini version of Zed Hudson was the illegitimate son of legendary superhero Hardcore, and inherited superpowers from him, but preferred a quiet life with his friends, who included Ophelia the Barista and the local incarnation of Jenny Everywhere.
Description
Physical appearances
Zed was a young, fit black man with a relatively slim build. He was clean-shaven, his short hair trimmed in an undercut, and had pierced ears, wearing small, round, plug-style earrings. Since he was emphatically not a conventional costumed superhero, his outfits varied, but usually included a T-shirt with a large “Z” insignia, for example in white on a dark blue background (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory, Zed Vs. The Glow) black on a red background, (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Usual) red on a blue background, (COMIC: Zed Vs. Iniquity) dark blue on blue, (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Singularity) white on a green background, (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Alien) or dark green on green. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Dogzilla) On other occasions he wore hoodies, such as a yellow hoodie with a black Z on it over a blue shirt, (COMIC: Zed Vs. Mother Nature) and a beige hoodie with a white Z on it over the same. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Limitations)
Personality
In contrast to most of his half-siblings, Zed was uninterested in being a superhero, though he did like helping people. As a result, he didn't get along too well with most of the half-siblings in question, stressing that they were not his full siblings. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory) He reluctantly accepted the title of superhero, but was staunchly against wearing retro-type outfits in primary colours. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Perspective)
He loved coffee (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory) to an extent which he intentionally played up to an eccentric extent. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Usual)
He was mistrustful of artificial intelligence due to a long history of supervillainous robots in his universe. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Singularity)
He had arachnophobia. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Alien)
Powers & abilities
Zed inherited a panoply of superpowers from his father, (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory) including “the basic ‘flying brick’ started package” including the power of flight, superhuman strength, speed and toughness, and “eyebeams”. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Superpowers) He also had a degree of Fourth Wall Awareness, able to interrupt and correct the narrator of his life (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory) and to address his readers. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Superpowers)
Biography
Origins
Zed was an illegitimate son of the superhero Hardcore, who “fell in the line of duty”. One of a number of superpowered half-siblings, he was unique in not sharing their motivation to carry on their father's legacy of superheroics. This drew the disdain of Kid Hardcore, Hardcore's one legitimate son, who referred to Zed as a “little punk”, even though Kid Hardcore also resented his other half-siblings' attempts to claim his father's legacy instead of leaving him as the only rightful heir. As a young man, Zed preferred quiet life whose greatest concern was getting his daily coffee from Ophelia the Barista to high-flying adventure. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Backstory)
Hanging out
One day, Zed stumbled into the coffee shop, barely standing, and claiming that his superpowers were fading and quickly ingesting some caffeine was his last chance. Unimpressed, Ophelia quietly served him his cup and asked him why he couldn't just ask for “the usual” like everyone else, with Zed cheerfully dropping the act to tell her that “the coffee deserve[d] better” than “normality”. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Usual)
As she started to get a handle on her shifting powers, this universe's Jenny Everywhere began hanging out with Zed, who had more experience with living as a superpowered being. She started by asking him to describe his powers to her. After listing very standard ones, he added, and demonstrated, Fourth Wall Awareness by addressing his readers, to Jenny's confusion. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Superpowers)
Irritated by rapidly-changing weather, Zed once called out to “Mother Nature”, only to be surprised when she actually materialised in front of him to chide him for blaming her unfairly. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Mother Nature)
Heroic duties
On a later occasion, supervillainess Iniquity tried to goad Zed into a superpowered fight out of the blue, having randomly picked him as a superhero on whom to work off some built-up anger. He refused to fight her, however, because he found her impractically revealing outfit embarrassing. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Iniquity)
Later, correctly suspecting that artificially-intelligent robot Otto Maton 3.47 was up to no good, Zed engaged him in conversation about what life was like for a robot and casually mentioned “prepping for next year's A.I. uprising” as one of the things which Otto didn't have to worry about scheduling thanks to his programming doing it for him. Not spotting the trap, Otto corrected him by giving the correct date of the planned takeover instead, and Zed used his eyebeams to disintegrate him. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Singularity)
Again engaged in hero business, he had to deal with the mutated, excitable giant dog Dogzilla on one of the many occasions it snuck into town. Overcome by the smell, however, he shirked his duties with regards to disposing of the beast's radioactive droppings. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Dogzilla)
One night, flying over the rooftops of the city, Zed spotted Ophelia at her window, her extremely pale skin almost glowing in the moonlight. He phoned her and, not initially explaining where he is, jokingly suggested that she accompany him to the beach in the morning to get a bit of a tan. She quickly figured out what was going on and chided Zed for the childish prank. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Glow)
Later, walking down the street with Jenny Everywhere, he witnessed the arrival of a flying saucer. Despite his initial fears that this was the start of an invasion, the operator proved to be an attractive “space-nymph” with entirely benign intentions, who asked the two for directions to Roswell. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Alien)
One day, while on patrol through the skies, he crossed flight-paths with Criterion. Both greeted the other amicably, but came away boggling at the other's choice of outfit. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Perspective)
Hanging out at Ophelia the Barista's coffee place once again, he once attempted to give the shop free advertising by using his powers to fake a cartoonishly strong reaction to the coffee. Ophelia was unimpressed until a passing customer showed that it was actually working. (COMIC: Zed Vs. Word of Mouth)
One morning, Zed's shapeshifting brother Presto decided to practice his powers by following Zed around, transforming into a variety of things including a mailbox, a trash can, a fire hydrant, and a lamppost. Eventually, Zed grew weary and let him know that he was onto him, advising him to stick to objects that were actually meant to be green if he wished to be stealthy in the future. (COMIC: Zed Vs. The Limitations)
