RWBY Through Worlds (End)

BC90: Bait (Heroes)-3

After Shine and Wally left, with their assurance that they would try to visit again soon, it was time to get back to work.

Royal took Ruby and Oscar back to Vale as planned, and Cinder tagged along so that they could head straight to Vacuo afterward.

"I asked Theo about those books," Oscar told Royal. "Hopefully he'll have them ready for you by the time you get there."

"Thanks," Royal said.

He was kind of subdued.

Cinder was in the co-pilot seat, though she kind of wished she wasn't...but Ruby and Oscar hadn't vied for it.

They started talking about movie and book adaptations, and Royal tried to tune them out.

Since the silence that ensued was awkward, he finally broke it.

"So...should we talk?"

Cinder put down her scroll she'd been pretending to use.

"I don't know," she said. "Do you have anything new to say?"

"I've thought about what I said before," Royal said. "And there's a lot of stuff still to think about...but it might be a good idea to at least get it out there."

He sounded nervous.

Cinder drew a deep breath. Why was she nervous? she asked herself. It wasn't her problem.

"I'm not really one to stand on ceremony, ironically," Royal finally went ahead. "I kind of just tell it how it is, so I don't know a really nuanced way to bring up anything."

"Just get to the point," Cinder said sharply. This was killing her.

"Fine..." Royal still hesitated. "Well, I think you know already, but I'll say it... I like you."

Cinder raised an eyebrow.

Of course, she knew that.

Somehow it still surprised her to hear it though. Maybe she still hadn't really accepted that was it.

It was almost...funny... That was what all this came down to?

"Is...that it?" she asked finally.

"No," Royal said. "But now would be the time to say something."

"Like what?" Cinder tightened her grip on her scroll, belying her fake calmness. "I don't know what you mean by that."

"I don't know how to make it more clear," Royal said. "Didn't you guess that already? I mean...it's kind of obvious."

"I...suspected," Cinder faltered. She wished she wasn't admitting that, but she didn't have anything else to say. "But it seemed...too out there."

"Yeah, well...don't worry, I don't have any real expectations." Royal didn't take her response in the best light. "But that's what's been weighing on me. I didn't know whether to talk about it or not. I know where you stand on that kind of thing, so... But that's it. I hope at least you're not mad."

"Mad?" Cinder said.

"I didn't want to give you the idea that that was the only reason for any of this." Royal gestured. "The help and all that. Trust me, that's not it. I mean, it's not to get anything from you. I would never do that to anyone. And I do respect you enough to back off, if that's going to bother you. But I was hoping at least we could still be...friendly, even if it was kind of unwanted attention."

"You're concerned about that?" Cinder still had no real response...but that was kind of sweet...in a weird way.

"That's why I never mentioned it before," Royal said. "I knew it would be awkward. As if the others teasing about it wasn't awkward enough. But then it seemed like it was just stupid to fake it since everyone knew, might as well just be honest. So...are you okay?"