#but then keme will go and say the same thing about zoe

[geroya]

[twirling my hair kicking my feet] hiiiii zoe's doppelganger <3 i was wondering if you had any thoughts on her that you wanted to share and, like, how it would play out or any concepts/ or anything like that? i am so intrigued!!!! LOVE U HEATH *KEESES*

oh DO I HAVE THOUGHTS. DO I !!!!!!  

HERE are some thoughts i drafted yesterday when it first struck me !!

‘WHAT if zoe’s doppelganger became someone separate from her. what if she went & lived her own life. what happens when ur doppelganger doesn’t want to squeeze the life out of you (anymore), but instead wishes to LIVE and FLOURISH the way you do. what if it just wants to find it’s own place in the world, as a living thing.’

LIKE ‘you try to kill it. you TRY but you see it just wants to live like you do, like YOU’VE been fighting for ur entire life. (trying to find a purpose) & it thinks YOU’RE in the way. you’ve become it’s boogeyman AND it’s mother. and oh gosh. you’ve turned into her by wrapping ur fingers around its throat and pressing down, saying “i never wanted you no one did” repeating this resounding hurt that has just bounced off the walls of ur own head as the light in its eyes dim, as it stares up at you with that same hopeful sparkle you had in ur eyes when u were a child. only they ARE your eyes. and they’re hoping now to LIVE and YOU are in the WAY. and you could do something good, you could make that impact that you’ve always wanted, give yourself (and someone else) a purpose, so you let go. you stop trying to kill it. this hopeful thing inside of you. and you let it live, you let it breathe and find its place in the world.’

don’t know where she came from. this doppelganger. where she came from or how she got there but i do know, originally, it IS a situation of… u know that one post. that one that’s like ‘if u see urself on the side of the road, kill it.’ that really IS zoe and not!zoe. not!zoe being a culmination of all that zoe is, in the flesh, in the mind, in the overall sense, but she really ISNT her. that isn’t zoe. 

like. remembering that partly zoe is afraid of the doppelganger bc she’s afraid of hurting the people she loves and the doppelganger, being her, but only having. replicated connections with those same people, and seeing zoe as an obstacle to her own ability to LIVE separate from her, would not care with the same intensity about hurting them as zoe does ESPECIALLY if it was to get what she wanted. so zoe is afraid of the doppelganger hurting those that she loves bc she’s afraid of hurting them herself, and Not!zoe is not afraid of that power that they have. she is so unafraid of it.  

and i think, even AFTER zoe doesn’t kill her, she is still greatly unnerved by her. not!zoe is quite literally a mirror she must cover or turn away in order to pass. it’s impossible not to feel that way. how do you look YOURSELF in the face.

also sort of feel like for ZOE, whatever tie they have to each other, it goes one way and it’s STILL there. even when she lets not!zoe go. like she’s still in zoe’s mind but zoe cant get into hers. cant find out her motivations what she's thinking, but not!zoe, she knows EVERYTHING. can figure zoe out from a simple twitch to zoe's brow. that simple. (i would like to think it goes both ways. the potential of that. that not!zoe IS still in zoe’s mind but zoe, ultimately, by that logic, is in hers, and she’s plagued by her. her original motivation had been to get RID of zoe so she could go live as free person, and she isn’t even able to achieve it properly.) 

i have thoughts about not!zoe giving herself a name. naming being a recurring theme with keme and zoe, so of COURSE im going to take that and THROW it as hard as i can at not!zoe. thinking too, that when zoe visits her, (bc i think she does, i mean, how hard is it, to not look in a mirror when u pass one, not even a glance? a little peak? so. that’s where she stands on that.) zoe has to constantly remind herself WHO this is. like bc REALLY thinking about it. REALLY really thinking about it. would a doppelganger feel like another person who just has ur name? or would they feel like a weird out of body experience? TO YOU,  i mean? so would it be like, hi our name is zoe OR would it be like. idk i’m zoe and this is ALSO zoe but you feel weird about saying ur name twice so the letters feel clunky in ur mouth OR would the second instance of ‘zoe’ feel right at home in ur mouth. MUCH to think about

also much to think about the idea of them going out TOGETHER?? and not!zoe is content with being perceived as eerily identical twins but zoe is just. frozen solid. bc how can NO ONE tell. that that is her? but not her and she is HER but separate and that THING is a copy?? STILL!! (i also think. zoe gets weird anxiety about it bc her brothers were twins. and she and not!zoe. they’re NOT twins. how is not!zoe so content with it. how is her stomach not churning standing next to zoe???) 

i do not know what not!zoe gets up to on her free time but it could be something dangerous ! who knows! she's threatened to kill people before !! i'll get back to u on this <3

ALSO the thought of TWO zoe's just. existing. WOOF.

[abiik]

@vhsgf replied to your post “this song made me realize i've never written about jason missing zoe”

heather this might be too forward and angsty of me to say (pls lmk if is) but now i am curious about zoe reacting to jason's death and then mirroring w jason coming back from the dead and then finding out his best friend is dead. like it sounds so PAINFUL but like. also i wanna know about it. heather what have you done i-

i had to put my hair up for this. im literally so emotional about this rn,,,like when am i not but STILL OKAY IT MAKES ME VERY [SCREECHES] (also a read more because this is fucking long im so sorry)

okay let’s start with zoe because jason’s death is a traumatic thing for her on like multiple points all relating back to when she was like elementary school aged (im pretty sure i have it where she’s like 8 ish when this happens). before jason and before going into the whole vigilante business – no matter what version of zoe you prefer – she loses her two younger brothers in a joker related accident. he kills them. and zoe… zoe is so,,, well she’s angry. because no one does anything. no one. not that fabled batman, not the police, not the fucking government – NOBODY. and she’s just supposed to keep living her life like everything is fucking fine because oh that’s just the way gotham is. and like why the fuck would she just keep living her life when her barely out of toddler aged little brothers are now dead?? why wouldn’t she want to do something about that?? why the fuck should she just let it roll off her back like no biggie?? (of course, this is a catalyst for her mother’s downward spiral and eventual disappearance, and then keme’s).

then of course, there’s zoe’s powers. at that age she didn’t really understand the extent of them, what she could do with them and all that, but as they develop and her own awareness of them develop, she is faced by like intense guilt and remorse. if only she’d been able to do something. if only she’d been there. if only she could’ve stopped the joker. if only, if only, if only. and like, realistically, there wasn’t much she could do. it wasn’t like she knew fully how strong she was; she’d barely gotten flying down at that point, but then she’s growing up and she realizes she never really had a limit. and she kind of has this complex, i’ve said it before but she really does try to bear the weight of the world on her shoulders, so everything that has happened to her up until this point after the twins die, it’s partly her fault; if only she could have been better, she could have saved them, she could have her mom, she could have keme – she could have her family back.

then, of course, there is in all of this her intense hatred of the joker. and by correlation to the whole fucking issue, gotham city and batman. (ive said that they kind of grow to like each other more, but when z and jay become friends and through their teen years until his death, it’s kind of like whenever youre gay and your bff is gay and you both kind of hate the other’s really fucked up parent who’s okay sometimes but isn’t all the time and you would totally like throw down with them if only there weren’t like,,,repercussions)

anyway, so when jason dies, it’s a big fucking deal. like he’d already been acting weird, bruce was worried about him, z was worried about him, and then he dies okay. and zoe… bruce doesn’t tell zoe right away. he doesn’t tell her and when zoe does find out, she. is. pissed. all of the shit with her baby brothers comes back. she wasn’t there. she wasn’t able to save him – because she sure as hell KNOWS that she could have at this point. and now he’s GONE. AND THIS ENTIRE TIME, SHE HAD NO FUCKING CLUE BECAUSE BRUCE DIDN’T TELL HER!!! she couldn’t even go to his funeral!!! and then, AND THEN, on fucking top of that – it was the joker who killed him. so jason’s death was like a fucking quadruple blow to her.

after finding out the details, zoe goes binary for the first time. and it’s… well it’s scary. it takes a whole lot of coaxing from old teammates and being physically restrained by diana (who lowkey is kinda like why?? are?? we?? stopping?? her?? from?? killing?? the?? joker??) and clark and donna, and they can’t even really knock her out because when she’s binary, there’s only really waiting out the duration of the high until she passes tf out from using too much energy. which she DOES and then after a good long talk with gran-gran, zoe’s going on a much needed retreat with diana to themyscira.

during that time, zoe’s super depressed. like reasonably, so. she’s so exhausted and she’s still angry but she’s also just like,,, so tired. she lost her best friend dude. like she loves jason so much, she loves him so much, and then he was just gone. poof! and at least, at least with atsa and ahiga, she got to like, be there for their send off. jason ends up being another hole in her life, like her dad and her mom and keme. he’s added to this list of people who all were just…g o n e. she didn’t get to mourn them. like obviously, she can, but every time she thinks about jason, she begins to spiral. (this is kind of when she starts drinking,,,, human alcohol can’t really touch her but she does therapeutically – which is!! not good!!) she also begins to distance herself – from jason’s titans (connor holds on with an iron grip and eddie still checks up on her, but rose was just as distraught and kyle is still kind of numb), from the original titans, from bruce and alfred, from diana, even from gran-gran and uncle bell. she fills the void with work as well as the alcohol that doesn’t really do anything to her except make her mouth taste gross and weird and she hates it but it’s become a habit. if she isn’t out doing some reckless thing while saving the world, then she’s at a bar or just sitting by the ocean.

she has bad dreams too, like horrible dreams. and like,,, they’re not necessarily horrific or anything,, she usually dreams about good times, memories with jason or with atsa and ahiga, sometimes some weird mixture of all three of them hanging out together and it’s the worst fucking thing because she wakes up and she wishes she was there too, that she could stay with them, because she misses them so much. she just wants her family back, she wants the family she had before jason and dick and alfred and the titans, but she also wants them too – she wants all of it.

and then it all comes to head with her dad’s sudden involvement with earth and shit. zoe sacrifices herself not only because she carries the fucking world on her shoulders and has a stupid martyr complex, but also because she thinks she’d be okay dying like this. she doesn’t. die that is. she doesn’t die but she also doesn’t come back.

jason’s revival story arc thing is all a bit murky for me bc I kind of like mix the whole waking up and clawing himself from his grave and also the under the red hood storyline (and like correct me if there is a version like that bc like,,, idk I can’t remember). anyway, so jason comes back, and like it’s kind of messy bc of timeline shit but he doesn’t really come back, come back, until z’s gone. like gone gone. like they held a funeral and everything for her. jason didn’t get to go and THAT is SHIT. like yeah, he wasn’t fucking alive, nobody fucking knows he’s alive anyway, but it still hurts.

and like,,, you know what else kind of hurts, is like he kind of thought that after he came back, if no one was on his side – if for some reason literally everyone was against him – he’d still have zoe. that’s the worst fucking part. he hears about what happened. he hears that she literally went ballistic. and like,, jason KNOWS that zoe would have his side, that zoe would be there for him, that even if she might not have agreed with some of the things he’s done, that she’d be right by his side, showing she cares. because like. like I know bruce is kind of stunted with emotional expression, but it’s really hard to feel like you’re appreciated when someone else’s love language is so fucking hard to translate, when you need constant validation, to be told you matter to be shown you matter to them and they can’t accommodate even a little bit, because of their pride or because they have to deem that you deserve it all of a sudden. and like I love bruce, but they way he treats his kids is shit. so yeah. jason feels hella alone when he comes back and his best friend, his rock, his ride or die (literally wfkejvnk) is fucking gone.

jason definitely has nightmares too. he doesn’t know how zoe died, like really know – no one does, because there hadn’t been a body. and jason’s mind can be a pretty dark place already, add on top of that the nightmares about his best friend dying the same way he did, or being like dick, who actually witnessed the explosion that ‘killed’ zoe. he can’t even fathom what zoe went through with his death, but eventually, as jason kind of comes back into the batfam and shit, he also kind of gets to be with the last of zoe’s family. gran-gran and uncle bell are much warmer than bruce wayne and that too big mansion and that cold fucking cave. jason goes to the ranch a lot, or finds himself at uncle bell’s antique shop whenever he needs a breather, to just be alone with something that close to zoe.

they literally both go through that period where they’re extremely reckless with mourning and regrets and fuck i never got to say this and fuck what could I have done differently, what could I have changed if I’d been there? but where jason is able to recover more effectively, zoe doesn’t do so well in space.

really, that song had triggered thoughts about jason going through her things, the things she left in his bedroom – that bruce refused to touch or move or anything – and just thinking back on their life together. it was definitely shorter than they expected and when jason thinks about it, it’s a whole bunch of salty anger and throat swelling sadness that has him kind of crippled. because like,,, he also knows how the twins died, he knows how it happened, not only did he have the firsthand accounts from those most effected, but also like, he read the reports. he KNOWS, and he feels kind of guilty, just a little bit, that what he did put her through a similar version to losing her baby brothers.

NREJKVNERLFEWLFJNEKR FUCK OKAY I THINK I NEED TO STOP LIKE THIS IS OBVIOUSLY JUST A BIG DUMB BUT BFJKERNFKJEN F   U   C   K  OKAY

[abiik]

[hugs u bec we earth sign gang and now sick gang] what is the hardest thing keme has ever had to do? what is zoe's achilles heel? does keme ask jason to marry him, does jason ask keme, or does it come about in conversation as opposed to a question? who is on the wedding guest list? who is absolutely NOT on the guest list? and im Just Curious does jason get a face full of cake at the kemejay wedding? asking for a friend

[hugs u right back bc u deserve it during these trying times]

what is the hardest thing keme has ever had to do?

this. leaving his family behind to fulfill a mission he wasnt sure was going to allow him to return from. the amount of people he was playing during his time away left him with the opportunity to get on SO many BAD BAD people's shit lists, so the fact that he had to leave everything he knew behind on what was practically a suicide mission, no matter WHAT the JL wanted to HOPE, without saying goodbye was SO HARD for him. and then, like, with that, he was going to the place where his FATHER WAS and playing as a quadruple agent, lying to his father's face (and to plenty of other people's faces) in order to try and fix the corrupt court that was ruling there. having to stare zoe in the face when she showed up on the planet and NOT comfort her, NOT reach out, NOT try and help her, stand by and watch her drink herself into oblivion, watching her be in so much pain,,,just ugh. really,,,, that whOLE MISSION was the hardest fucking thing for him.

what is zoe's achilles heel?

her family. which i think is pretty obvious. if u wanna hit zoe where it hurts, hurt her family. but like, physically, in a fight, nothing really unless you make her go binary or ur someone like keme. if u make z go binary, manage to wear her tf out without getting ur own ass ripped to shreds, then once she conks out, she's REALLY WEAK for days after and has to recover from using up all of that energy + her healing factor is super sluggish, making this the best time to like physically harm zoe if u wanna (: usually tho, ppl dont survive making her go binary unless ur someone like her/keme.

ALSO, zoe CAN still bleed, if u hit her hard enough. say, if keme punches her with enough force, he could break her nose. so when she goes up against big heavy hitters, she still feels that pain and she can still get hurt, but she's still pretty indestructible bc of the nature of jiahao's bloodline that makes keme and zoe the way they are. :)

does keme ask jason to marry him, does jason ask keme, or does it come about in conversation as opposed to a question?

they argue that they asked the other, but really i think that they had a conversation about it. enxkjend or they're the fuckers that end up proposing at the same time unknowingly to each other and JEKCJEKDK zoe is fucking LOSING IT IN THE BACKGROUND BC SHE WAS ASKED BY BOTH OF THEM TO RECORD IT

who is on the wedding guest list?

twkxkekdkwkskjeskjwkdke 👁👄👁 okay since i think keme, and by extension, jason, would want to have a traditional dine wedding (or as traditional as they can get being gay and all) i feel like it would solely be family and like,,, really close friends. so all of the batfam + anybody that jason is specifically really close with who would sit on HIS side of the hogan and then keme's family (i WANT jiahao and his mother to come but i am unsure where in the timeline they would be getting married just yet so.... we shall see 👀) + diana and donna JIAHAO'S OLD HOMIES!!!! (the hogan is packed. thank god for zoe's strong arms or else they would not have built a big enough one to fit everybody) ROY IS DEFINITELY ON THE GUEST LISTTT (i am forgetting ppl but ekxkwk)

who is absolutely NOT on the list?

[REDACTED] bc while he MAY be huang family by marriage YOU CAN ROT BITCH

does jason get a face full of cake at the kemejay wedding?

YES HE DOES!!!! HE DOES!!!! AND SO DOES KEME!!!! THEY BOTH GET FACES FULL OF CAKE!!!!!

pspspsps send me asks about zoe & keme!

[abiik]

keme: we shouldn't act irrationally when faced with a problem zoe. we should react with level-headedness and deal with this issue peacefully; we must be better than those we're dealing with and not react aggressively!

also keme: *shoving pancakes into his mouth, ready to throw the FUCK down in an iHop parking lot at the drop of the hat bc his sister was catcalled*

[abiik]

how long do keme and zoe wear their hair? what did they love doing best on the ranch as kids? what onions does gran gran have on jason, dick, the league, & what her grandkids are up to? between keme and zoe who wins rock paper scissors? has zoe ever cheated at rock paper scissors? and if the choice was given to them would they ever choose to be mortal/live the lifespan of an average human?

u are asking all of the v important questions jo ily so much <333

how long do keme and zoe wear their hair?

LONG v long. keme has longer hair but this is a competition he won only bc his hair is much finer in texture, less coarse and wiry than zoe's, which makes it all the more easy to tie in a braid and fly with. while zoe's braids STILL manage to get all tangled no matter HOW hard she tries to make sure that DOESNT happen.

i'd say keme's hair is hip length while zoe's can vary from lower rib to mid waist. new boot goofin arc zoe leaves her with the shortest hair to date with it at her shoulder blades bc of hair fried her hair is and how unkempt she was when she returned to earth that they were required to cut it all off for the sake of her self-care.

what did they love doing best on the ranch as kids?

tbh, PLAYING. all of that open land to just do whatever they wanted. running around in the open fields and hiding in the barns, laying with the cattle and riding the horses. sometimes even the chores were fun when kya and bellamy made games out of those things. tbh if u made a competition out of something (who can fold more clothes or who can collect more eggs) then they would have fun, even if the adults made sure that EVERYBODY won in the end so as to not pit the kids against each other.

exploring was something they loved to do too and of course their rescpective hobbies that have carried over into adulthood, like cooking and zoe's building and crafting and creating with her hands.

what opinions (?) does gran gran have on:

jason?

kanti loves jason. she loves this kid. she LOVES HIM!!!!! he always has a place at her table, he always has a place in her home, his shoes will always have a place to rest next to her front door, she will ALWAYS allow him in. kanti LOVES jason. he is apart of her family, whether he loves keme romantically or not, whether he and zoe drift apart and stop being friends, jason will always have a place as one of kanti's. she Loves him.

she thought he was a little scrawny kid at first in need of some proper care and guardianship when she first met him. so as a grandmother does, she sat him down at her table and stuffed him full of food until he passed out and bellamy carried him to zoe's bed. he didnt really need to grow on her. the moment jason stepped into the house at the ranch, kanti was like, yep i'm keepin him. i'm not letting him out of my sight until he has a full belly and a good night's rest. and then she did EXACTLY THAT!!

post death, kanti's opinions on jason don't change. the thing with kanti's family is that while they're demigods they have free will just the same as mortals do, and if jason believes that THIS is how he's going to change the world, than THAT is how he will do it. the only way kanti can hope to change that, if she WANTS TO, is to INFLUENCE HIM. kanti only hopes to serve as a guide to both jason, AND, her grandchildren, should they want to listen to her. if they dont, then they dont.

dick?

kanti actually meets dick before she meets jason! her initial opinion of dick is that he's a ticking time bomb wrapping up in a pretty lil box with a bow on it, the same way her zoe is wrapped up in kya's jacket; both of them are ready to blow their fuse and kanti was actually... REALLY worried about dick bc it didnt seem like ANYONE ELSE saw it. esp when dick began visiting the ranch and all of that kept getting stuffed farther and farther down and NOBODY was addressing it.

other than this, kanti really loves dick too !!! she LOVES HIM just as much as she loves jason! she offers up the ranch as a safe haven to him too should he ever need it and is visited by him Often. they talk too, and sometimes they dont. he'll just show up early in the morning right before she sets out to begin working and will begin helping her out around the house. kanti just lets him do his thing.

i think kanti holds a high opinion of dick, but not so much so that she holds him on a pedestal. it's more like, i'm in awe of how far you've come and i'm so proud of you, and she tells him this TO HIS FACE often. kanti and dick have a very good and close relarionship (and he gets extra presents during the holidays).

the league?

kanti doesnt like what they did with keme but she understands WHY they did it that way. she also doesnt like the way that they can sometimes come off as holding themselves ABOVE everyone else in a way for being this collective group. but overall, kanti is just like who?

what her grandkids are up to?

i'm assuming this means the vigilante stuff in general. kanti is SUPER supportive of this actually. esp bc they're using their powers and intentions for Good. kanti's side of the family comes from like,,,,,renowned tricksters who have also been well-intentioned at times to mortals , so she's pretty proud of them for playing into the 'well-intentioned' part of it. zoe very well could have reacted badly after joker killed the twins and became something WORSE than the red hood, but she DIDNT. like if they're gonna do it, she's happy that they're doing it with GOOD INTENTIONS. (she wishes zoe would take better care of herself tho 👀👀)

between keme & zoe who wins rock, paper, scissors?

zoe

has zoe ever cheated at rock, paper, scissors?

if u asked zoe, no! never! if u asked keme, yes everytime.

if u asked me, why do u think zoe wins?

if the choice was given to them would they ever choose to be a mortal/live the lifespan of an average human?

👁👄👁 this is a personal attack.

for keme, i think this is a hard no. i dont think he's ever even truly considered it. like, it's never been a problem for him, it's never been something he's had to think very hard about. even on his mission, despite realizing he had feelings for jason, he also had just been notified that jason was dead. and kanti and bellamy have lived long enough, no matter how long his mission went, he knew he would be returning home to SOMEONE.

and when he does return, and finds jason ALIVE and with the effects of the lazarus pit being iffy, and then ZOE ALIVE, it remains a hard NO. keme would NOT choose to live a normal mortal life.

zoe :) on the other hand. HAS thought about this. bc if zoe was mortal than it would be MUCH easier to die and if it's much easier to die then well...... u know.

this is also something she as thought about when pursuing a relationship with dick AS U KNOW WHICH IS WHY I AM SO PERSONALLY AFFRONTED BY THIS QUESTION WKIXKEK GRRR BARK bc i genuinely dunno how i would feel about zoe taking up this offer over being able to die with the man she loves

but also if she doesnt, then she has to watch as he gets older and older until eventually he dies of old age and [SCREAMS] You Have Been Stopped™️

pspspsps send me asks about zoe & keme!