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It’s not that she disagrees with her so-called ‘Dark’ reflection. The world deserves to pay, they deserve their due recompense of what they’ve suffered. But the way she goes about it is so… useless. Just posturing, just overinflated words and violence, like that’s all it takes to make a change. Basal, animal, the growled mutters of a thing locked up tight in it’s room.
But that’s Mio’s fault, in a sense. Rather than molding those ideas, she’d locked them all away, let them fester and grow a mind of their own. She could’ve been using them, she realizes, used that energy and worked toward her goals with a higher purpose. She can do it now, though.
No, all of those grand statements sound so much better coming from Zoe. Her partner in crime, the frontman to her stage crew, eager and willing to take the spotlight Mio never wanted. The partner that’s willing to step back, allow Mio to stalk toward her weaker copy’s trembling form.
“You know what I’ve realized?” Dark Mio’s voice box is too shattered to do more but mechanical stuttering, the sound of dying motors and fried servos. It’s like music to her ears. “I was never the pathetic one, here. At least I was doing something, working toward something. You? What have you done for me? Nothing but bitch and moan and provide not a single solution. You’ve got fire, but you’re not strong enough to aim it, not without burning us up in the process.” Mio wraps her hands around Dark Mio’s wire-formed neck, nails sinking into the casing, electrical pulses jumping too weak to anything more than give her a neat little shock. “That’s alright, though. Because we’re going to do something. I just need that fire, that drive, and I promise I’ll put it to good use. We’ll get what we’re owed.” The lights in her eyes are dying, and Mio can feel it filling her up, shining from between her teeth. “The rest of you… well, we’ve already got a friend.”
Twist- snap, and the body flickers to ash, to nanites, particulates that Mio sits back on her heels and breathes in, eyelids fluttering as energy courses through her like a wave. Zoe kneels beside her, leans against her shoulder. “Feeling better?” Her tone is teasing, yes, but there’s a note of care, the question genuine. Mio takes her hand, her own still dripping with oil-blood. “You look better.”
Mio breathes again, settles a little bigger into her skin, a little sharper, a little meaner. But it’s easily tamed, not shoved away, but holstered like a weapon. Ready. She knows just the target. “Couldn’t have done it without you.” It’s true both practically and metaphorically.
Zoe’s a perfect counterbalance, a way to let her own ‘worst’ traits out, to bleed away the unnecessary emotion, to forget about the human element and just solve the problem. If Mio is the heat of the flame, Zoe is the light, the dazzle and the blind, the start of humanity and more than likely it’s end.
She knows how to talk just right, how to play the part in a way Mio just can’t grasp, can puzzle out how a person ticks on a personal level, when all that Mio could tell you is the biological firings of their mind. They work.
The ground cracks open and sends them tumbling, and through it all, she doesn’t let go of Zoe’s hand.
This bird is an aberration. It’s an error she can identify but not fix, an almost-right answer that doesn’t fit the bill. It is light but not heat, glowing bright with no substance, and Mio hates it. Zoe’s got no answers, not that she blamed her friend for the state of it.
“Maybe it’s just like you! Maybe you won’t see the real part of it until it’s ready to show itself! That’s very you.” She nods decisively, like her word is law. Entitlement, confidence that Mio wouldn’t call over because she does not wield it clumsy and obvious, but sewn into her skin and flashed like light glinting off a knife. “And no, we can’t switch.”
Mio draws her foot up to rest on the bench, resting her chin on her knee and glaring at the bird. “It’s not like I have any better ideas of what it should be.” It’s more of a sense than a thing she can explain. Just not-right, for some reason. “Let’s move on.”
Thinking, plotting, watching Zoe and watching as her masks come down, as she spits angry words at her not-parents, revulsion threading every inch of her as they help them along. Mio wants them gone because Zoe does, Zoe wants them gone because who-knows why, but then they are, and they don’t have time to get into it, because there’s a bigger threat.
You’re not supposed to cut heads off of a Hydra, but there’s not much else to do, really, and it keeps them safe. It’s good, to be the flame with Zoe, the light and the heat all in one, searing flesh as you separate head from the main length, hissing steam as the wounds cauterize, Zoe laughs up a storm and Mio grins a smile that’s all teeth, lets a dark chuckle ripped right from Dark Mio crawl up from chest.
The obvious happens, and they’re swallowed up, into the disgusting darkness, reeking so bad it clogs up her throat. She and Zoe land hard, but more importantly, they land apart from each other, Mio curled on stone and Zoe screaming in the depths.
Now, finally, that stupid bird changes. Something in her heart roars sharp fury at the sight of Zoe, and the manifestation responds, gold calcifying over to black like the cracked earth after a wildfire, an invisible aura of heat that sears the flesh under her feet with each step. “I’m coming, Zoe!” It’s got dark Mio’s booming cadence, undercut by the crackle and pop of blood being flash-burned. Zoe reaches for it, shimmering in the darkness.
Mio runs, and leaves a trail of agony in her wake, heart above thumping harder to compensate for the destruction. She slides in the gore and yanks Zoe in close, charcoal-black raven circling overhead. Zoe’s clutching tight, pressing forward like she wants to mold herself close. “You’re so warm, Mio.” The glow is getting brighter, the two spirits overhead connecting.
Zoe yanks her down to a kiss at the center of the inferno. It scorches the monster to ash from within, every bit of matter fueling the flames. They’re untouched by the flames that leap upward to the heart, but Mio feels as though she’s burning up regardless. Zoe’s touch, her greedy lips and grasping hands, they’re the spark to her gasoline. She’s so bright, so hot, Mio would let this woman immolate her, but she doesn’t need to, because they're the center of the firestorm, together.
They burn, and burn, and burn, and when they open their eyes, they’re outside. Zoe’s childhood home is in the distance, and when she sees it, her breath catches, something stricken and vulnerable crossing her face. Mio kisses the expression away, and drags her to her feet. “Just this left, and then Rader’s ours.”
Zoe perks up right away, green eyes like bright acid. "See how he likes it when everything he worked for crumbles to ash." Burn it all down, and leave the two of them the only ones strong enough to stride from the flames.
It's a sound plan to Mio.