Roman inserted a dollar bill into the slot and selected "B3" on the keypad. In the one to the direct right of the vending machine he was using, he pushed four quarters into the coin slot. He waited for the first machine to vend the water before he would push buttons in the next.
He turned over the bottle in his hands and realized how weird his situation was. A couple months ago, he was robbing dust shops and running from the cops, and his only saving grace was that he wasn't high enough of a priority to the Vale Police Department to actively pursue. But now they had launched a kingdom-wide manhunt, and even if things did quiet down, he would probably remain the VPD's top priority.
But even so, his days passed very quietly, in the same routine. Neo and Junior stopped by everyday—an occurrence that didn't happen before his incarceration and subsequent escape—to bring by food, water, drinks, and money if he had run out the day before. But just about everything he had in his fridge disappeared by the time Mercury, Emerald, and Cinder left. His work was the only thing that shifted continuously forward.
The part of the city Roman lived in was so busy at nights that he couldn't risk going out at night and being recognized. He used to not care at all, have a backup plan, but those were back in the days when Cinder needed him to pull heists and when he lived in a part of town where he could dress in his signature bowler cap and white coat, and no one would care enough to do about it. But those times had passed, and Neo most likely had the intention of keeping him in the same building to avoid more run-ins with the police.
And then there was Ruby. The only thing that didn't recur as part of a set pattern; when she came over to his house, the first feeling that came up was excitement, soon followed by disgust, annoyance, distrust and the slightest twinge of guilt. The fact that she was fifteen should have bothered him. Instead, the disgust culminated as a combination of the fact that she had expressed quite clearly her interest in him. For some reason, the thought of her becoming as close to him as Junior and Neo were sent Roman's head spinning. And as always, there was the possibility that she was planning to turn him in to the police. But she has had his address this entire time, and if it was as simple as calling the police and that was in fact her intention, then why hadn't she gone through with it?
Roman bent over to retrieve the two items he purchased and made the walk back to his apartment.
I forgot to include something in the last chapter (no, what you just read isn't it. This is more of a prelude to the next chapter. What I forgot to say was something in response to a review that was left on Chapter 15, written by the oh-so-lovely Tobimadara94 people do in fact have auras. What happened in the chapter itself was based more on a hypothesis I had for the canon in RWBY: extended use of your semblance can exhaust the person using it and can also wear aura down. The whole point is that she had run miles from the club in a sudden panic and left Yang behind, so she ran all the way back. The idea was that she was relatively drained, but I understand that I probably did leave in some plot holes either way. For the rest of the fic, just know that that is the headcanon that I'm basing this story off of. Thanks everybody for the reviews! I love reading them :) Oh, and next chapter is on the way!
