During that month, Drayda had stayed at the home of the young man who helped her, but she had to leave after her third week there. During this time, she walked about and found that there was crime running rampant. She had to find her family and make sure they were alright.
As she made her way to her house in a seemingly nice part of town, she knocked on the door. She could see a familiar, baby-like face peering through a window and then excited shrieking could be heard. The door opened to reveal a middle-aged woman with cornrows, her face red and puffy as if she had been crying. She grabbed a hold of Drayda in a death grip and didn't want to let go. She just kept crying out in a relieved voice, "My baby, oh my baby is alright!"
The father came in, who seemed to be quite tall and an afro going on for a middle-aged man, and he let out a surprised gasp of excitement and relief as he joined the hug and squeezed Drayda and her mom tightly. "We thought you wouldn't get out of there. When the monsters attacked, we thought you were-"
Drayda saw as both her parents, who were strong-willed and very tough, had broken down in front of her, holding what they could of her as if they couldn't believe she was alive and their waking nightmares were over. She couldn't help but sob with them, not believing that she was alive either. She hugged them tightly, happy to see they were all alright, just a little shaken up about the experience. Her baby brother, who looked to be about five with a shaved head, waddled up to her and she picked him up and held him tightly. She was lucky that he didn't understand why their parents were crying or where she had been gone, but seeing strong role models in their life being broken down to a mess like this made the toddler shed a few tears in confusion and empathy.
After a few moments of this, Drayda had to explain to her parents - in private - what happened out there and what happened to everyone, and reluctantly showed them her power. Well, she tried to. The dragon was too shy. She didn't want to be used near her parents. Irritated, she started cursing at herself, when her hand sprouted black scales before retracting back in her skin painfully. Her parents looked quite startled, as one would. Then her father piped up, "Are you one of them? Those monsters outside? But you aren't a monster right, your our baby girl?"
Drayda sighed. She didn't know what to think. She just responded as honestly as she could. "Well, many people received powers. Those people either got corrupted by their power, or they just have a bad conscious. But you guys taught me well for the years that I have been alive. I will figure out how to control this power and use it for good. I may have freakish talents, but everybody else who was exposed to that crystal have powers, too. Why not help everyone see that we aren't all bad?"
Then her mother chimed in, her weary face from stress carried worry, as well. "Hun, we don't want you doing anything that could hurt you... But the world is a dangerous place now, with all those people running amok. Please..." She got up and put her hands on Drayda's shoulders. "Please be careful, sweetheart. I want to see you come back to us when all of this is over."
"I will, ma," Drayda smiled up at her mother, but she could see her mother had wavering hope in her eyes that were brimming with tears. Did she not believe she was going to make it out alive? What kind of horrors did they see?
"Also, I heard the same guy who was making that speech about the crystal is trying to make a team of super powered people to stop the crime. Maybe you should go over there," said her father as he stood up.
Drayda nodded, now having a sense of direction. She gave them both big hugs before leaving her room. The very room she likely may not be able to come back to for quite a while. She saw her baby brother playing with his teddy bear and she hugged him goodbye and told him not to worry about her, that she was going to do something as awesome as Superman and Batman. The little brother thought it was so cool that she was going to be a superhero, so he replied with, "I wanna be a superhero like you when I grow up."
Saddened yet finding it adorable, she gave him one last hug before taking a backpack that was prepped for her and she ran outside.
Fast forward to a week, and it was the end of the month. She had traveled around town, dodging the crime that she could before trying to find the man behind Asos Industries. Looking up at the rooftops, she could see a man in a super suit with hands ablaze as he jumped from rooftop to rooftop. He seemed familiar and so she followed him. Using the knowledge she had of her urban jungle, she followed him until she saw the Asos Industries building was being rebuilt. She decided to head there. Looking around for faster transportation, she found an abandoned bike that seemed to be sitting there for quite some time. She picked it up and found that the brakes don't work. Oh well, she was only going to be using it once. She hopped on and pedaled quite quickly down the road to Asos Industries to find out what was going.
As she made it to the building, she looked around for the man himself.