Marilyn Haygate had become infected two months earlier while at an upscale camping lodge with her husband. He hadn't survived the attack. Thankfully, due to how obvious the evidence had been, there'd been no long investigation, nor even any legal roadblocks to her claiming her rightful ownership of all of his assets. While initially traumatized by the attack, it had been mere weeks before the infection had asserted itself over her mind, leaving her no longer thinking of herself as human. She was a werewolf, and it was her duty to lead her kind to its true dominance over the sheep that covered the planet.
She was an accomplished woman in her own right. She had established her own law firm, designed purely to pursue female equality in the workforce, and had used both her own funds as well as her husband's to fund several trusts and foundations to support female-owned and managed businesses. She didn't see race as the big issue-it was gender. The fact her husband was a very successful investment banker (who came from money to begin with) was only helpful. It didn't define her like so many of her contemporaries-women who railed stridently for equality while being little more than trophy wives who used their husbands' position and money to rally for their own causes. No, she was self-made.
This isn't to say she was a lesbian. While she definitely wasn't averse to finding a woman beautiful, and while she had an experience or two, she definitely hadn't been a man hater. She and her husband Winston had a loving relationship, right up until the attack. She didn't blindly despise males or wish to see them crushed underfoot. Well, until the first time she'd changed. That was when her mind completely caved to the will of this new existence. As she'd changed in the ecstasy of the moonlight, the world had seemed to reveal itself to her, and she knew that she could never truly deny the perfection she'd become as she stared at herself in the mirror of her bedroom. While she never had felt superior to men before, now she didn't just believe it-she KNEW it. She also knew she was superior to women, or at least the uninfected.
She'd checked online during the days of the previous full moon-always checking to make sure that reports weren't coming in about werewolves suddenly emerging. So far they weren't, though she was finding the occasional message board talking about it, along with a disturbing site called 4chan (which she was aware of, though never visited) where someone had posted a video of their girlfriend's body undergoing a portion of the metamorphosis. Thankfully, it seemed that most people there didn't believe it, as they repeatedly called the poster a (sigh) “Fag”.
So far, they were flying under the radar, though Marilyn wasn't a fool. She'd also found several reports of wolf attacks around the same time she'd been turned. That number had more than doubled after her attack-during the moon she'd had her first change on. It was exponential. Add in the number of people who knew what was happening and deliberately didn't report it, and it was a safe estimate that the number of werewolves getting ready to emerge tonight had tripled. It was an inevitability that within the next five weeks SOMEONE would get witnessed. She needed to move fast and establish herself, whether against humanity or against another she-wolf.
While she'd tried to retain the veneer of being a normal human during the day, she found herself looking at every female as a potential sister. Every woman she looked at, regardless of body shape, race, or income level was someone she saw as being able to be made greater with just one bite. Conversely, every male seemed weaker to her-someone to be used at best, and food or simply fodder at worst. All but the oldest and most infirm women seemed viable to her. Still, she didn't hate men. It was simply a numbers game. She-wolves were destined to rule. It was simple evolution, as far as she was concerned. And of course, since they were destined to rule, a certain amount of men simply had to go, to avoid them draining resources of society and the planet. Still, she logically understood that not ALL of them should die. They needed a worker caste to both perform menial duties and to service the women to ensure that a new generation of werewolf pups could be born. She didn't know why she knew a man couldn't be a werewolf-like many things, it was just something she knew. Like her changing worldview, it was something that happened overnight, and now felt like something she'd known all along.
She'd been pleasantly surprised at her ability to transform after the moon was no longer full. While she couldn't do it during the day, all she (like any others who were out there) truly needed was for it to be dark. Like many other things she'd realized instinctively, she knew that a change during the full moon was inevitable, while the other times were optional. Avoiding the moonlight directly could postpone the change, but the pull to it was incredibly powerful. She knew she could infect others at any time, though they wouldn't change for the first time until they beheld their first full moon.
She'd revealed her secret to a couple of women that she knew could prove useful in taking over the city-she knew she could simply have surprised them, but instead decided to go a different route. While she felt confident that they would fall in line with her views (or at least respect her dominance):
Jade Willoughby: A 25 year old woman who runs a battered women's shelter. Herself a victim of severe domestic violence, she runs the largest shelter in the city-actually a network of shelters. (six in total). Unlike Marilyn, she IS a man hater (though for fairly understandable reasons) and a confirmed lesbian.
They met when Marilyn gave significant financial support to her first shelter and used her financial clout to “encourage” the city to speed the permits along. While Jade responded eagerly to the notion of being turned (in fact asking for it even before Marilyn offered), Marilyn held off at the time, wanting to let Jade consider it. Truthfully, it was also because Marilyn wanted to wait until the moon was full-the change was far more intense when it was being pulled out of her-leading to heightened sexual pleasure, and she knew that Jade was definitely attracted. She knew that the easiest way to control Jade in the future was to allow her to have a sexual relationship with her.
Eleanor Vargas-A middle aged scientist, with a specialty in biomedical research. At 45, she's the same age as Marilyn, and received several grants from the Haygate Women's Fund to allow her to pursue independent research on breast and cervical cancer cures. When Marilyn revealed her secret, Eleanor found herself intrigued-the scientific aspects alone were amazing, but the potential gains for women's health overall were fantastic, presuming that a lot of the folkloric aspects were true. Marilyn pitched her on the idea of being one of the first on board, as well as the ability to experiment on multiple werewolves, even if she herself didn't choose to become one. Truthfully, even if she refused, Marilyn knew that her assistance could be useful, and all it would take was a simple bite to bring her into the fold.
Octavia Green: The highest ranking black detective in the city, Octavia was 32 and clearly on a fast track to bigger and better things even before Marilyn had revealed herself to her. They'd first crossed paths at court during detective Green's testimony at a sexual harassment case of a fellow officer. While Marilyn hadn't gone to any great lengths to facilitate Green's career advancement, she made it quietly clear that she and Green were friends in the past few years, in hopes that the mayor and Chief of Police might give her a bit more of a career path. Octavia had witnessed Marilyn's change with fear at first, then growing amazement as she watched the woman's body gain mass and muscle. It was readily apparent to her just how useful it would be for officers to gain that ability for themselves.
She took another sip of brandy, and it burned more intensely. Her nose wrinkled as the aroma irritated her heightened sense of smell. She scanned the sky, and saw the sun was nearly down. The beast was nearly ready to emerge. She set her glass down, not wanting to break it, and she kicked her leather flats off, as they'd already started to feel....wrong.