Author's Note: So here is the sequel to Shattered Persona. Follows the life of Jake Cross after his death (weird huh?) and a timeline will be posted on the AuDC Productions page starting with Jake's early life to now, so you don't necessarily have to read Shattered Persona- but do it anyway! This story will be longer and done in Arcs unlike the previous ones. Enjoy and leave a review or PM for any thoughts, comments, or questions. Later.

Disclaimer: AuDC Productions does not own Young Justice, Teen Titans, any DC Comics, Batman: Arkham Asylum/Arkham City, or the Nolan series of Batman.


Arkham Risings

Three Years Later Arc

Prologue: Graduation

Three years. It had been three years since Jake Cross had passed. It seemed longer. But there were things that she did to occupy her time. Killing, for instance, was her new favorite pastime. It sounded sadistic, but it helped her cope. Toying with the former Speedy also fueled her desires. He could never be Jake, but he would do for the time.

Now she stares as one Richard Grayson makes his way across the stage. The boy, now a young man, was graduating. Jake should have graduated. He would have graduated. Two years ago. But he died. He died because of the boy smiling and shaking hands with the principal.

And Jade would make sure that today would be the last day anyone saw that stupid smile ever again.

"Cheshire," Jade huffs. Damn Talia and her sense of timing. "You are wanted. Meet back at the warehouse immediately."

"I'm kind of in the middle of something. I'll call back-"

"This isn't a debate. Come. Now."

Jade lets out a grunt of frustration. She waited for this particular day to kill Dick. A day where she knew that all his friends and family would be gathered to witness his death. How people would mourn for him like she did Jake. But now this woman and her godforsaken jobs has Jade delaying her killings.

"Soon…" Cheshire said before leaving. "I'll see you soon Birdbrain."


It would be late that night that Jade would return home. Her apartment was her sanctuary, a place that even the League of Assassins dread to near. However, something was seriously off. Her living room seemed disturbed. The remote was turned wrong. And there was a magazine on her table.

The assassin grabbed her sai, clutching them in her hands.

"You have to be one dumb bastard for breaking into my house!" she calls out. "Come out!"

A chuckle makes her hesitate.

"You know Sunshine, I thought that I'd find some half-dead naked man in your room. You know, for that itch that I scratched for you so well."

The blades fell to the ground immediately followed by her mask. She could only stare as the boy- no man- that she had been mourning for stood in front of her as if he had not died. He had noticeably grown taller, taller than her now. And more muscular. He looked much like his father, just with short black hair and two dark brown eyes instead of white hair and one good blue eye and a defunct one.

"J-Jake." Jade stammered. "You… Your…"

"Alive? Well, as the greatest thief in the world, I had to cement my legacy by stealing my life from death itself. I dare Catwoman try that with any of her nine lives." Jake jokes. Jade takes a small step towards Jake, though he puts his hands up, stopping her. "You're going to slap me and I would rather not start our reunion off like that."

"How did-"

"When you're mad, your fingers curl and stretch repeatedly." The young man said before pointing to her hands at her sides. They were indeed doing the actions he said. "I don't need training to know that. To know you."

"How…? How did you live?" Jade said, taking another step towards him. "Artemis… She had your mask. It was your blood. I tested it."

Jake strips off his shirt, revealing her his muscular body before turning around. She stared at the red demonic symbols on his back that stretched from one shoulder to the other. She frowns, her finger tracing them before she pieced the symbols together.

"It's a bird…" she muses.

"Raven." Jake told her. "She gave me a mark similar to the Mark of Scath. It saved my life, sort of."

"I don't get it." said Cheshire.

"In order for this thing to activate, I must be seconds away from dying and it preserves my life while repairing whatever it is that is killing me." Jake explained. "In other words, when Kaldur stabbed me, it was supposed to activate… But it didn't."

"Why?" questions the assassin, her fingers still tracing the symbols that made the bird.

"I don't know. Despite Raven telling me that it was only a twenty percent chance of working anyway I-"

"Twenty percent?! You almost kill yourself for what?!" Jade shouts.

Jake sighs, turning to face her. "I had to do it. And it worked."

"The body though. Did you get yourself buried?" Jade questioned.

"No. Gemini replaced me in the hospital and then we put a person that resembles me in my place. Jake Wilson is dead. Red X is dead." Jade's eyes narrowed. "I couldn't tell you." She crosses her arms. "You wouldn't have reacted the way you did if you knew I was safe and would leave you for three years. In fact, you would have probably killed me if you knew that I was alive and ignoring your calls."

"It's still an option…" The woman growled.

Jake's eyes hardened. "Listen to me. There are things far beyond our control and your employers were going to kill your sister in hopes of making me into the perfect killing machine. Not to mention that Vandal Savage-"

"Fuck Vandal! You made some plan to kill yourself and you didn't tell me?! Do you know that I-"

"Attacked the Team? Yeah, I do. Every time. You even planned on killing Dick."

"How did you-"

"I didn't know that last part until you just admitted it. I followed you to his graduation and just assumed that that's what you were going to do." Jade's lips thinned. He was different, far different than when they first met that was for sure. "I'm back. And in two days, I told Ra's I'd be ready for a mission. I'd really like it if I had my old partner back. She may have been a bit bitchy and sadistic, but seeing her in her tight kimono really made my night sometime."

Jade snorts. "What are you? Some perverted teenager spying on me?"

"Not so much a pervert and no longer a teen. Plus I don't need to spy on someone living in my apartment." Jade frowned. "Oh, meet the guy that just bought this complex. Jake Cross."

"You…"

"Consider living here rent free a personal gift from me to you for not killing me now." Jake said with a grin. The man of twenty turns. "Now, meet me on the roof. I would like to spar with you for old time-"

Cheshire was shocked when her reach for his belt loop was stopped by him spinning and catching her wrist. His reflexes were at least twice as fast as they once were.

The two kept eye contact, thief to assassin, before he pulled her body towards his and gave her the kiss she had been longing for. Jake could feel the corners of his partner's lips turning upwards into a smirk as the thrill was slightly amusing to her. It always was.

Jade lets out a long guttural moan when she feels her back slamming against the door to her bedroom. He pressed against her tightly, allowing her to rub herself as much as she wanted without letting her lose control completely. That's how it used to be. Jake allowing her pleasure but never too much. He would move just before she could find the right combinations to driver herself into the pits of euphoria. And every time Jade felt Jake's body move too far out of her reach, she would growl just like she once did.

"Who's touched you?" His words almost end their moment but she knew he would notice. He was the Heir of the Demon after all.

"He isn't important." Jade replies. Jake apparently accepts the answer, nibbling on a sensitive spot on her neck. "Do you want your rematch, Junior?"

She almost loses her breath when he hoists her up. Her legs are forced around his waist as he pulls away from her neck and glares at her with pure lust.

"Game on, Partner."

Yes, he was back. Not so much as the cold distant version that she had met in mid-February after he returned from wherever. Not the annoying boy she had met when The Brain thought it was a good idea to bring in one of the world's most talkative thieves into the Brotherhood of Evil. But the guy that constantly looked after her on missions whether he wanted to or not was back.

Her teammate.

Her partner.

Her lover.