Just before summer arrived for Theo and his family, everyone gathered together to decide what to do. Since Theo and Jonathan had the ability to portal them anywhere they wanted, they didn't need to plan a trip like normal. So as they gathered at May's house, Daniel said, "I think we should plan for day trips."
"But isn't half the fun staying somewhere new and eating at new places?" Richard asked.
Jacob nodded in agreement as he said, "Driving to the destination is also part of the fun."
Daniel pinched Jacob's arm as she said, "You just love driving, that's why we never fly anywhere."
Jacob smiled slightly and put his arm over Daniel's shoulder as he said, "And what's wrong with that? Flying just isn't the same, plus we always find interesting places to visit along the way that we would never find otherwise."
Ben nodded along as he said, "That car museum last summer was a great stop."
May slapped Ben's arm playfully as she said, "That's because you're a gearhead… But you're both right, all the small stops we've found over the years have always been fun. It would be a shame if we missed out on them."
"That's true, but with the ability to portal anywhere, our options are limitless." Theo said before he added, "We can visit any country we want each day and sleep at home each night."
A few others nodded along before Daniel asked, "Wouldn't we need passports for everyone?"
"Technically we would if we traveled normally. But as long as we don't cause issues, no one will bat an eye… I do it all the time and never had an issue." Theo said with a slight shrug and a smile.
Daniel frowned slightly before Jacob pulled her closer and said, "I like it… We could even travel more since we wouldn't need to shut down the shop. Just imagine, every weekend we could travel somewhere new."
"I want to visit Paris!" Milly said excitedly as Isaac nodded in agreement.
"Paris, France? Do you two wanna see the Eiffel Tower?"
Milly shook her head as she said, "They're known for making some of the best pastries in the world! I wanna visit bakeries there!"
"You still have over six months until you can eat sweets again…" Daniel said with a slight frown.
"Six months, twelve days, ten hours and twenty one minutes." Milly said with complete confidence as she looked at the clock on the wall.
Everyone in the room shared a glance before Theo burst into laughter and said, "I don't know if I should be impressed or concerned."
Milly stuck out her tongue at Theo before Daniel said, "Don't do that Milly, that's rude… And the point still stands, you won't be able to eat anything if we go there."
"I know, but I can still look and plan out what to eat next time we go!"
Theo rolled his eyes before he said, "Well besides Paris, anyone else have some ideas? I wouldn't mind visiting some other places in Europe with everyone. A lot of the old churches there are incredible to see up close."
Daniel quickly nodded along as she said, "We could even make it a tour of historic places around Europe."
"Why focus on Europe? We could travel to Asia and Africa too… Or Antarctica!" Richard said excitedly before Mary said, "Summer for us would mean its winter there. It would also be extremely cold and basically dark the entire time."
"I forgot about that… But we could definitely visit after September when the sun would be out." Richard said before he smiled at Mary.
"I could take everyone to visit Mars, but there's honestly nothing to really do there yet… But I could take you up on a space ship and fly you around." Theo said after thinking for a few moments.
Almost everyone looked at Theo in surprise before Theo rubbed the back of his head as he said, "I did mention I was terraforming Mars, right?"
Mary and Richard were the only ones who really understood what that meant and stood as they asked at the same time, "You're terraforming Mars?!?"
"Yeah… It was the easiest planet to start with and is our test bed for terraforming techniques. We wanna work out the kinks before we try something harder."
"All I heard was flying in a space ship, what about you?" Jacob asked as he looked at Ben who nodded.
Richard and Mary were more excited about Mars as they asked, "How far have you gotten on the project?"
"With the use of magic and meta human powers we already have a place set up for habitation. As for the overall project completion it's about twenty percent and we're still in the process of heating up the planet with greenhouse gasses."
"How? We haven't heard anything about it and something like that should be visible by telescopes…" Richard said in confusion as Mary nodded slowly in agreement as she was lost in thought.
"We've used a combination of technology and magic to hide it from the world, since I doubt most governments would be happy…"
Richard nodded before he said, "Would you share the data you collected so far? I would love to look it over."
"Yeah, I'll send it to you later… But let's get back to vacation plans."
The discussion with his family took over an hour, but everyone agreed to use portals for the upcoming summer vacation. They would all take the next few days to figure out where they wanted to go and then plan the trips from there. When everyone gathered back together, each person had at least one place they wanted to visit and a list was made for the trip.
For the trips themselves, Theo used clones and did a bit of research about the area around each place they were visiting. That way instead of just going to see the great pyramids in Giza, they would also explore a couple of the museums and visit the ancient capital of Egypt, Memphis. Or on their trip to Italy to visit the Roman Colosseum, they also planned to visit all the landmarks around it.
The first trip was planned for London with the goal of sightseeing around the city and visiting at least one museum. In the early morning as everyone gathered at May's, a portal opened up in the living and out stepped Hela in jeans and an anime t-shirt. Theo caught sight of her the moment she arrived and asked, "Hela? What are you doing here?"
Daniel patted Theo on the shoulder as she said, "I invited her to join us."
"Okay… Wait, how did you even contact her?"
Hela approached with a hint of a smile on her face as she said, "She asked for my contact information after the first time we met."
Daniel nodded as she said, "We've kept in contact ever since."
Theo glanced between his mom and Hela who greeted each other before Daniel said, "Since everyone is finally here we should get going.
"Not yet, everyone needs to change their appearance before we leave." Theo said as he pulled out a handful of seals.
"Why do we need to use the transformation jutsu?"
"Because being cautious matters. I'd rather just disguise ourselves and not worry about any kind of issues that pop up if we don't." Theo said as he started to hand over the seals to everyone.
Jacob held up his phone as he said, "But if we change appearance, all of the pictures we take will look weird."
"I already took that into account and the new phones I gave everyone have the ability to see through the standard henge we'll be using. So any pictures you take will be us instead of our disguises… That said, you won't be able to post them online."
As people started to change their appearance with the seals, Jacob snapped a couple photos to check out how it worked before he asked, "Why can't we post them online?"
Daniel pinched Jacob's arm as she said, "For the same reason we will be in disguises. Theo doesn't want to draw any attention to us."
Theo nodded as he said, "I've gone through a lot of effort to basically make us seem like a middle class family who runs a small business. Mom, Richard and Mary are the only standouts and I've used Vibe and my other companies to shield them as just employees. It's why I stand out so much as Ezekiel to draw attention away from my employees."
"Alright, I get it. I won't post anything to Vibe." Jacob said before he used a seal on himself.
After he handed seals out to his family and used one on himself. Theo pulled out an extra one and handed it to Hela as he said, "I know you don't need it-"
Hela cut him off as she took the seal and asked, "It's fine… But how do I use it?"
"Since you don't have chakra, I'll have to inject some into the seal after you put it on. When I do that just think about how you want to look and the seal will do the rest."
Hela nodded before she placed the seal on her forearm before she held it out for Theo. Theo placed a couple fingers gently on the seal before he said, "Concentrate on how you want to look and I'll inject chakra in three… two… one!"
A puff of smoke formed around Hela and after a moment a teenage version of Hela appeared in the same clothes but her long hair was now gone. In its place was something very similar to Yoruichi's short hair style from Bleach when she was younger and still captain of the second division. Theo stared at the younger version of Hela dazed for a moment before his mom said with a smile, "Looks like we're all ready to go."
Theo snapped out of his daze and quickly looked away as he said, "Alright… I'll make a portal now."
Since they were visiting London, Theo made a portal to the London Sanctum for their starting point. After everyone stepped out of the portal, Theo greeted the Sanctum master before they headed out on their adventure for the day. Once outside the group headed towards Big Ben and as they walked Hela stuck close to Theo. At first everyone was just looking around as they took in the new sights but within a few minutes everyone was chatting.
Their first stop wasn't far away and they quickly reached it within ten minutes. They didn't actually go right next to Big Ben at first but a popular tourist destination close by to take pictures. Jacob was happily taking photos of everyone before he said, "Hela, come over here and join us for a picture."
"Are you sure? This is supposed to be your family vacation."
Daniel waved Hela over as she said, "It'll be fine, come stand next to Theo."
After Hela approached, Ben took over picture duty so Jacob could join the family photo. As they stood there, Daniel nudged Theo as she said, "Get a little closer to Hela, don't stand so far apart."
Theo glanced at his mother who smiled back at him as she mentioned him closer to Hela. Once they were shoulder to shoulder, Hela tentatively placed her arm around Theo's waist and pulled him just a tiny bit closer as Ben said, "Alright, smile everyone."
After taking a few photos of their family, Ben shared them with Jacob who chuckled as he said, "Hey honey, look at this."
Daniel looked at the photos before she laughed as she glanced towards Theo and Hela. Theo frowned slightly and before he could ask what was so funny, Jacob showed him one of the photos on his phone. It was focused on Hela and Theo who both looked incredibly awkward as they stood next to each other blushing. The height difference between them just made everything funnier since Hela was a good foot taller than Theo, standing at six foot three.
Hela also saw the picture and stared at it for a few moments before she said, "Send that to me."
After everyone took pictures they headed over to the tower itself and as they walked, Hela reached over and took Theo's hand. Theo glanced at Hela as she did it, but she completely ignored his gaze as she gently locked her fingers with his and kept walking like nothing happened. Theo's hand quickly started to sweat and it only got worse when his mom caught his eye and smiled. While he wouldn't say he disliked what seemed to be happening, Theo really wanted to be anywhere else but where he was right now.