Endeavor doesn't know what happened to Shoto in details. The information he received was merely that Shoto got in a fight with one of the villains in I-Island and came out a victor. Oh, and that Shoto is alive and well-functioning. That's the most important thing, right?
Other details—like what the villain's quirk was, the kind of damage Shoto sustained afterwards, whether he is currently under effect said villain's quirk or not—Endeavor has no idea. So, maybe he should consider the possibility that somehow, his son's appearance might have been temporarily changed into this... shameful, defective form.
A girl so petite that she couldn't be taller than his shoulders. Her skin tone is impossibly pale, like someone who had never bathed in the sun for years. The scarlet sleeveless top she's wearing makes it easy for him to notice her muscles—or the lack of them.
Sure, there is that possibility. However, under any circumstances, Endeavor is sure as hell that this puny, weak-looking brat on the computer screen is not his prized child. Not because she doesn't bear any resemblance to his son, but because those green eyes are missing the cold animosity that Shoto seems to have an abundance of.
"Who are you!? Where's my son!?" Endeavor immediately yanks his computer monitor, almost knocking the CPU beside it in the process. His eyes widen when her gaze darts to the remote on the bed. "Hey! Don't turn off the—"
But, it's too late. In one swift move, she thrusts it forward, then his call ends with a blip.
"— Damn it!" Grunting in irritation, Endeavor slams his fist on the table surface.
Upon the light vibrations he sends throughout the house, a pair of footsteps comes approaching. After a polite knock, the shoji panel behind him slides open.
"Otou-san, what's wrong?" His only daughter enters the room in a hurry, then her grey eyes flick to the computer screen. "Did Shoto, uh, decline your call?"
"Fuyumi, did you see that girl? Where's Shoto!?"
"What girl?"
"On the screen just now!"
"Wait, I don't follow... Earlier I went out to turn the stove off."
"Isn't this a video call to Shoto's hotel room?" Endeavor grouches, clicking aimlessly using his mouse. "Why did a girl pick it up instead?"
A girl? Did the call get mixed up? Or could she be Shoto's...? As soon as Fuyumi plays over an imaginary scene in her mind, she shakes her own head. Nah, he doesn't seem like the type. He enjoys his solitude too much.
Has he even started looking at girls in that way? I think not.
But, then, just about when Fuyumi is going to dump that notion away for good, she recalls a question Shoto gave her a few weeks ago.
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"Nee-san." Shoto put down his tea cup on the dining table without a sound. "Have you ever watched any cartoon with a princess in it?"
Her youngest brother, asking about fictional princesses? The plate in Fuyumi's soapy hands almost took a straight dive into the sink. Luckily, she managed to clutch it tighter before it actually slipped.
"Hmm... some. The popular ones," Fuyumi pondered, scrubbing the dishes as she tried to keep her cool. She didn't want to scare him off with the many, many questions bombarding her mind right now. "I know a lot of princess characters from the students I teach. Which princess are you asking for?"
"The one who was locked in a tower for years."
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It was very unexpected for Shoto, who doesn't care much for anything except his studies and training, to suddenly have an interest in princesses.
Was it for a girl? He was outside home an awful lot of times too... Had he been meeting up with her?
But, Okaa-san said that Shoto dropped by the hospital pretty often since his final exams ended, so I'm not sure if he even had the time to go out and meet up with this girl—
"Fuyumi, are you going to just stand there," Endeavor huffs at her, arms crossed in front of his chest, "or set up another call using this computer? I couldn't reach Shoto yet."
Snapped out from her train of thought, Fuyumi walks to him right away. "Sorry, Otou-san. I'll help."
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It's been some time since another dial tone started ringing again in their hotel room. However, Shoto hasn't answered the call yet. He merely sits there, back against the headboard of her bed, staring at the remote in his hand with a blank drawn on his face.
"Shoto-san?" Arata casts a worried glance at him. "It's your father..."
His lips press into a thin line as he mutters softly, "I don't want to talk to him."
"Maybe he simply wants to know if you're okay?"
"I'm his tool to surpass All Might—of course that old man wants to know." Ignoring the mild ache spreading on his bicep, he clutches the remote tighter, making her flinch a bit when it cries out in a low cracking sound. "Can't leave his perfect creation unchecked."
"Shoto-san, you're not a... creation." Arata tugs at his hand, easing his hold on the remote. The gesture brings his whole focus to her, where each of her words ebbs into his being. "You're not an object. He indeed brought you into this world, but this is your life. Yours and no one else's."
Shoto wishes he could thank her for genuinely caring about him, but his mind is too full of spite for his father at the moment. "Then, it should be all right for me not to answer his call."
"Um, about that..."
"What?"
"I hope you'll... reconsider." Arata's green eyes flicker hesitantly before him, and Shoto can feel his own narrow into a piercing glare.
Reconsider? Why? Are you siding with my old man now, Ara?
You, out of all people?
Her request feels almost like a betrayal, like a drop of gasoline on his flaring temper. A mental barrier instantly towers between them, one he erects on instinct. In case her words would turn against him.
"I have nothing to say to him." His voice teeters on a dangerous edge, cleaving sharply among all the dial tones in their room. "You're welcome to answer his call if you want, though."
I can't believe this. I thought you were on my side.
"Wait!" Arata squeaks out, startled at the sudden coldness that's creeping into his demeanor. "I— I didn't say you have to answer it, Shoto-san! That's absolutely your decision and—"
"And what? You know I resent him. Sorry, but I don't think even you can change my mind about it."
Arata's gaze shifts to the call invitation on their television screen. There's still one minute until it gets declined automatically by the system. She takes a deep breath, then chooses her words carefully.
"He's... the only one who has a communication access to you, Shoto-san. No one else in your family has. Everything they'll know about you during this lockdown is through your father."
"So what?" Shoto barks in return, grey-cyan eyes visibly raging. "I'll eventually return to Japan either way."
"If you reject his call... your sister, your brother, and your mother won't know anything about your condition," Arata explains, not losing patience with him despite his prickly response. "Whether you're safe, you're healthy, you're well... What they know is you got in a dangerous fight that resulted in an emergency mass lockdown for days, on the other side of the world... What are they supposed to think?"
Those lines of hers wrench his eyes open. His view suddenly gets snapped to another direction, to a course he couldn't see before. And as if Arata had poured a bucket of cold water on his head, Shoto could merely sit there, not moving and completely stunned.
It didn't cross my mind at all. I didn't notice this isn't only about he and I.
"I know you don't like your father, but are you going to leave your family in the dark for a few days? They'll be very worried, Shoto-san... Please think about it."
"Ugh..." Is there no other way except talking to him?
"You know, Endeavor is probably panicking too," Arata adds. "The only time his call went through, the answerer was a stranger, not his son."
"Who cares about that one," Shoto grumbles under his breath, eliciting a light chuckle from the girl sitting next to him.
"All in all, it's your decision. You don't have to pick up his call, but you can." Arata laces her fingers with his, then smiles at him, pumping a dose of encouragement into his veins. "Remember that I'm here for you whichever you choose."
I can ignore his call, but like Ara said, it will cost my family their peace of mind, Shoto clicks his tongue as he weighs his options. Between those two...
Having a conversation with my old man is a nuisance, but I'll just have to suck it up.
"Fine, I'll talk to him," he decides, adding an indignant snort along with the last word. "For my family. Only because there's no other way."
"Nice. I'm sure they will appreciate it."
Shoto takes the remote back and presses the green button. At once, the annoying ringing stops and a progress bar flashes on the television screen. He frowns when Arata tugs their joint hands, her legs hanging off the bedside. "What are you doing?"
"I'll... wait in the bathroom...?" she tries to unweave her fingers from his, but his hold persists. "Um... Shoto-san? Can you give me back my hand? It's 75% complete already, I have to hurry before he sees me again. I'll come back when you're done."
"But, you said you're here for me," Shoto reminds her, a little sullen. "I thought you're going to stay with me throughout the call."
"I mean... I am! The bathroom is just over there."
"It's not the same," he insists. "I don't understand why you have to go."
Suppressing a surfacing memory in her mind, Arata exhales and tears her gaze away from his. "Your father... won't be happy to see me."
"Neither am I to see him. Ara, is this about us staying in the same room together?"
The short answer is: yes. The long one is: yes, but that's not all. After Arata signed the Good Will program contract with Principal Nezu, she was given a heads up that some parents had voiced their concerns over U.A.'s decision to take her—a villain's daughter—in as a transfer student.
A small mishap involving Aizawa's habit of leaving his stuff scattered on the coffee table—perhaps because he had lived alone before all this and never had to share his space with someone else—leads her to know that Endeavor was one of them.
It makes sense that Endeavor doesn't like her. It makes total sense. Arata remembers that even Donki, the police officer who hated both Hanakiri and her, understood.
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"And what a joke this is," Donki bellowed at Shoto, his voice cracking with rage. "Your father couldn't capture Hanakiri, and now you're all chummy with her daughter? You think this is some kind of soap opera? I've warned you, Endeavor's son."
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Endeavor might not recognize her during their abrupt call previously, because he was hyper-focused in finding Shoto. However, he would if she appeared again. Then, he probably would get mad. That's... admittedly quite scary. And on top of that...
It doesn't feel right to meet him in this circumstance... Especially since I haven't done anything but be a burden to his son. I need to prove myself to him first, Arata sighs in her head. I need to show him that I'm not a threat, that I'm more than just a problem that Shoto-san has to deal with.
However, she can't say that to Shoto, can she?
"Yeah, it's..." Arata trails off, scouring her brain for a convincing reason. "Won't your father be displeased if he knows about it?"
"Sure, but he'll just have to get over it. There's nothing he can change, anyway."
Arata isn't sure telling Endeavor to "get over it" will make him accept whatever reality there is in front of him. On the other hand, it's not like telling Shoto that it won't work will change his mind either.
Stubbornness runs in the family, huh?
Groaning, she steals a glance at the progress bar, then nearly yelps in surprise when she realizes that it is currently standing at 95%—and rapidly ticking to 100%. Oh no... It's too late for her to hide in the bathroom, isn't it?
"Okay, fine! I'll stay!" Arata scrambles back to his side and dives under the covers as fast as she can. "Move over, quick!"
The thick blanket rustles as she pulls it over her head, up until it envelopes his waist as well. A tiny hump forms on the fabric, bumped upward by her ponytail. Shoto raises his eyebrows when he feels her flatten her body beside his stretched legs. "You know, it's quite obvious that my legs aren't this large."
"As if you had a better idea!" Her muffled protest comes from under the chocolate brown covers. "Just pretend I'm a bolster or whatever!"
"All right. Ara? Sorry I raised my voice at you earlier—"
"SHOTOOO!!!" An excited yell from the television drowns out his apology. "Finally it connects to you!"
A few steps behind his father, Fuyumi is waving her hand, a cheerful grin plastered on her face. "Hi, Shoto. We heard about what happened in I-Island. Are you okay?"