"Sure, I'm fine with it. I happen to have nothing going on lately." Bella did not hesitate at all. She had an excellent relationship with Professor Serizawa and had already begun preparing her graduate thesis. Normally, no one really supervised her.
Natasha thought for a moment. "All right. I'll go too."
Nick Fury had secretly approached her twice, hoping she would return to frontline field work. Natasha had hesitated for a long time before ultimately choosing to refuse.
She was very intelligent and had carried out quite a few private investigations. She had a general idea of the chaos inside S.H.I.E.L.D. Although she did not know that this was a HYDRA branch, something was clearly off about a lot of people. She could see that much.
Normally, playing games with spies who all had their own schemes was fine. She enjoyed that kind of thing. But this was a critical period for Charlie. Jumping back into that mess now would simply create trouble for her family.
Nick Fury was extremely disappointed. With no other choice, he could only start looking for a new female agent.
Frontline S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were extremely busy, and the work was dangerous. Desk jobs were much easier. Natasha had very little enthusiasm for repetitive work, so she worked on and off whenever she felt like it.
Nick Fury's attitude toward this was to truly turn a blind eye.
At first, Charlie really had relied on Bella and Natasha giving him a huge boost and helping him rack up quite a few achievements. But now that he had reached his current position, his influence was strong enough to benefit his two daughters in return.
At the very least, Nick Fury could not possibly fire Natasha just because she spent her time loafing around inside S.H.I.E.L.D. Let her loaf around! She would still receive her salary as usual, with every benefit intact. S.H.I.E.L.D. was enormous; surely an organization that big could afford one more salary.
Not long ago, they had even found an excuse to promote Natasha back to Level Six after she had been demoted to Level Five for transferring to desk duty.
Field agents had higher levels, while desk agents had lower ones. Her Level Six desk position was already equivalent to Level Seven in the field.
Was this because Natasha had performed outstandingly and made enormous contributions to S.H.I.E.L.D.? No. She arrived late and left early every day and often ran home to look after the child. What contribution could she possibly have made? It was entirely because of Charlie's status.
Bella and Natasha both had plenty of free time, while Charlie and Samantha naturally had even more.
Samantha was currently retired. As former President Nixon's wife Pat Nixon once put it, "The First Lady is the hardest unpaid job in the world." It had been miserable before: no salary, no benefits, nothing. Even hiring an assistant required a special application.
It was not until 1978, when Carter was president, that legislation was signed giving the First Lady her own budget and staff.
The staff generally consisted of eighteen employees, including positions such as chief of staff, press secretary, social secretary, policy director, and scheduling director. All of them worked under the First Lady, and the White House spent between 1.5 and 2 million dollars a year on their salaries. Only then did being First Lady truly become a profession.
Even now, however, First Lady remained an official role rather than a salaried position. The White House still refused to pay the First Lady a salary.
Inside the White House, the president worked in the Oval Office in the West Wing, while the president's wife handled her own affairs from offices in the East Wing.
At present, Samantha also had far too much free time. Apart from looking after the child every day, she had almost nothing important to do.
They made up their minds, and the family-trip plan was officially put into action.
After Christmas, the family set out by car from Los Angeles, planning to drive across the United States and sightsee all the way to Washington. They would spend the entire spring and summer there, then return to Los Angeles in the fall.
Charlie, Samantha, Bella, Natasha, Little Kitty, and Little Elsa made a family of six, spanning three generations!
Ironhide's severed legs had already been repaired. They used some parts from dead Decepticons, hammered and fitted everything together, and he soon regained his mobility.
Now Jazz, Ironhide, Ratchet, and Bumblebee joined the trip as four Autobot friends and vehicles, while the Divine Dragon's role was that of the family pet.
The group of eleven "people" set off from Los Angeles in four vehicles, forming quite an impressive convoy.
If this had been a few years earlier, Charlie definitely would have worried endlessly about every kind of sudden trouble they might encounter on the road. Bandits and highway robbers were everywhere, and as a police officer, he knew far too much about what really happened.
Never mind what the media said. The United States had never been some peaceful paradise. Crime had always been a problem. Large cities were a little better, but some remote highways and small towns were chaotic beyond belief.
That was also why, four years earlier, Charlie had preferred taking the family to the White House rather than traveling somewhere like the Grand Canyon.
Did he not know that a White House trip would be boring? Of course he knew. He had simply been afraid they would run into trouble somewhere else.
Now he was not afraid, because their group was absurdly powerful. Road bandits? Western cowboys? If they really ran into anyone like that, it was hard to say who would be the unlucky one!
The four vehicles left California and entered Nevada, where deserts stretched everywhere. Little Kitty and Little Elsa had a vague impression of this route. The two of them had even "driven" a car all the way along it before.
The two baby girls had endless questions. They never stopped talking.
Little Elsa had more questions than anyone. "Mom, what's a desert? Why is this place different from home?"
Natasha thought for a moment before answering, "Uh, I remember the definition of a desert is an area covered by large amounts of sand. Why? ...Let me think. It should be because vegetation was destroyed, and once the soil lost its clay and silt particles, the whole area became desertified. If you want to know more, ask your dad! Your dad is almost done with graduate school. She knows more."
Little Elsa looked up at Bella again. No one needed to drive because the vehicle was fully autonomous. The three of them were sitting in the back seat of Bumblebee's Camaro and chatting.
"Dad, what should we do about it, then?"
What should we do? How would I know what to do! Bella looked out the window at the endless yellow sand. What were they supposed to do about this?
"Make it rain, maybe? I suppose we need to restore the nutrients in the soil first. Little Sakura, what do you think?"
Eastern divine dragons were much better at commanding clouds and bringing rain. Asgard did have a God of Thunder, but that Thunder God was an idiot, so there was no point mentioning him.
Clack-clack-clack. The Divine Dragon held the new laptop Bella had bought her. A network cable and a power cable were both tightly connected to Bumblebee. She was currently playing a game with incredible concentration and ignored their childish questions completely.
Seeing this girl's gaming addiction grow worse and worse, Bella was speechless. When the Divine Dragon had first come out of Fountainhead Palace, she had been quite normal and had still been thinking about going home. How had she ended up like this?
Bella deliberately teased the Divine Dragon. "Hey, we're almost at K'un-Lun! A golden divine dragon is coming to welcome us!"
The Divine Dragon did not even raise her head. She merely waved a hand, clearly meaning: stop bothering me! What, were games not fun anymore? Was spending money in-game not satisfying enough? K'un-Lun? Why would I go there?