Whispered Conspiracies

"Don't be an idiot and I won't have a reason to slap you." -Raina to John about slapping him.

A few days later, things became chaotic with the birth of a vampire/zombie hybrid child to her allies Darkress and MSGT Morris. The child grew quickly and escaped, wreaking havoc in the city. Raina was dispatched with the task force to hunt it down and bring it back into custody. She cornered the thing in the Talos train station, dragging two mutilated civilian corpses with it. She was quickly joined by Darkress and MGST Morris. Darkress's mothering instinct proved to be a hindrance when she caught and embraced the child, begging Raina and Morris not to kill it. Raina insisted that the child was too dangerous to be left alive. Events reached a fever pitch when the child broke loose and attacked Raina, who was seriously wounded in the ensuing scuffle. Darkress activated the werecat's mediport becon and sent her back to base for healing where John found her.

Picking her up, he took her to medbay, summoning a medical team to attend her. They quickly started surgery on her to repair the nearly mortal wounds. They also quickly deduced and reported to John that Raina was not human, thus partially exposing her secret. Since her race had never been studied extensively medically, they were unable to determine exactly what she was. However, halfway through the surgery, Raina woke up partially disoriented and slightly delusional. Her cat took the surrounding medical team as a threat and shifted her form to that of an over-sized ocelot, shocking everyone there. Despite her hissed warnings, John advanced on her when her cat was almost fully in-control. Raina managed to get control of herself and shift back, preventing herself from attacking John. However, she slapped him for his foolhardy stupidity and was warned against ever hitting him again.

Several days passed with Raina still fuming at the exposure of her secret and her confusion that they did not seem to label her a monster for it as she had been at home. However, she was thrown for a loop when she checked in one evening to John declaring Morris and Darkress traitors. Shocked and confused, Raina immediately contacted Morris on his private comm and demanded to know what had happened. Morris explained that he could not take John's leadership anymore and had been forced to act against him. Somewhat distraught, Raina questioned the validity of the original plan with this new event. Morris answered that John would still die and that they would take control. Raina, while dubious, agreed and offered to stay under the guise of being loyal to John but that she would keep Morris informed on John's movements and plans.

The arrangement enabled Morris to stay a few steps ahead of John without Raina being suspected of anything. However it all collapsed when, by chance, Morris and John found each other and fought to the death. Morris detonated the ordinance he carried, effectively killing himself and John. While glad that the coup's objective had been accomplished, Raina mourned the loss of her friend, but had to be careful not to reveal herself as a conspirator to anyone. In talking with some of her fellow allies, it was decided that Valos would be the likely successor to John's mantle. This was acceptable to Raina since Morris had already told her that Valos was trustworthy.

However, things went from bad to worse when a new player arrived. Project White Melody arrived and declared that Hero Corps had appointed her leader after her cousin's death. Raina, along with several other members, questioned the validity of the claim when none of them were aware that Hero Corps had any jurisdiction over the group. It was soon evident that there was no love lost between the by-the-book Melody and her new charges. Melody also launched a full investigation into John's death, with Raina being a prime suspect due to many video taped meetings with Morris where the audio had been corrupted or lost. Through a series of interrogations attended by Mindstryker, an ex-Psiops Vanguard operative, Raina was eventually cleared of involvement.

She found herself in trouble again when Melody declared Valos to be a current Arachnos commander and a fugitive. Valos insisted that Melody was mistaken and her information incorrect, but he refused to turn himself in and submit to questioning. Melody dispatched some of the group, but not Raina, to find and bring him in, even going with them herself. Raina, however, was glad to have escaped being found out as being involved in the conspiracy for John's death and had gone out into the city to run, a favorite past time.