A/N: The new Batman: Death in the Family Movie came out with bad enough reviews that I just watched all the different endings on YouTube instead of buying the Blu-Ray. New content is new content, but I'm disappointed. Here's to YJ Season 4 coming out...eventually.

Ages: Artemis is 18. Cameron is 20.

A Metropolis Meetup

Late Winter, (Beginning of) Team Year 4

The Bank Bakery.

Not really an original name for a café right next to a bank Cameron thought, but he supposed beggars couldn't be choosers. Not that the owners of this café seemed to be beggars. The place was decorated lavishly: Marble countertops, full glass siding, a menu littered with obnoxiously French sounding options. It even made good use of its top floor location by having a heated semi-outdoor patio with a great view of the city.

And a perfect vantage point to scout the Metropolis National Bank directly across the street.

It wasn't exactly the normal spot for a lower level metahuman criminal to hang out. But a well dressed, slightly pale businessman working fervently on his tablet – that was definitely not hooked up to the bank's security apparatus – as he sipped a Café Latte? That man fit in just perfectly.

Cameron let out a small grin as he checked the news and saw that yes, Superman was still halfway across the world, helping with the aftereffects of a massive tsunami in Southeast Asia. Where he had been for the last couple of days and publicly pledged to be for the rest of the week, alongside prominent Justice League members such as Wonder Woman & Batman.

It was the only reason he accepted this job. He wasn't stupid enough to risk getting in a fist fight with Superman, not when fighting with Superboy left enough bruises. And he wasn't even blessed with super-speed or heat vision.

"You know for the prices, the coffee here is pretty shitty but the bakery isn't that bad," spoke a feminine voice from behind him, and he suppressed the overwhelming urge to facepalm. Of all the fucking voices in the world, it had to be that one.

He tensed instinctively as heard her move into his line of sight but didn't bother to look up from his tablet at he responded. "Better than Gotham gas station food."

Artemis sat down directly across from him, apparently unbothered by the winter chill that kept most of the other patrons away from the patio. "Fancy seeing you around here Mr…" she trailed of with a questioning tone.

"Hawthorne. Blake Hawthorne," he responded curtly.

She raised an eyebrow at the name. "Wow. Blake Hawthorne. That's certainly…a name."

"This is Metropolis ma'am. We're free to be whomever we want," he responded sarcastically. "Besides, don't you have a beach-house to be at? It's a little nippy in this town for your sun-kissed skin don't you think?"

"I'm in town today with friends. Checking the sights, so to speak." She over-enunciated the words 'friends' and 'sights.'

Cameron groaned audibly, reading in between the lines. "Your timing is just perfect, as always."

"It runs in the family," she quipped.

"Should I be on the lookout for Jade then?" He asked, his eyes scanning around the semi-empty patio and into the bustling café, looking not for Jade, but the teammates she had just implied were in town with her.

"No, she's otherwise preoccupied."

"Heh," he chuckled, "I heard Cheshire was getting busy with her archer friend."

Artemis practically gaped at him. "How do you know about that?"

He smirked. "I hear things." That much was true. The gossip about Cheshire's defection from the Shadows, to save the semi-retired Red Arrow of all people, had spread through the criminal underworld like a wildfire.

"No, I meant how did you know that she was Cheshire?" She whispered her sisters pseudonym conspiratorially, eyes narrowed at him.

Oh. Right. He wasn't even supposed to know what Jade looked like these days, let alone know about her dangerous alter ego that liked poisons and sharp knives. It would have been disturbingly hot if he hadn't been hardwired to hate her from all the times he watched Artemis hold back tears on her sisters account.

"I ran across her after I got out of juvie. Or really, she ran one of her shiny knives across my throat in the middle of the night. Had a nice long conversation. Just me, Jade, one knife at my throat and the other on the family jewels. Very fun times."

"She talked with you? About what?" Artemis asked with unrestrained curiosity.

Now he raised his eyebrow at her. "About you. I think she was bored, wanted to hear more about how you were doing. She didn't know that we'd long gone our separate ways."

He remembered how she'd laughed when he'd spat that part out. "Guess little sis outgrew both of us, huh junior?" she'd mocked in a sing song tone while she retreated into the night.

"Jade would threaten you in the middle of the night to see how I was doing instead of just coming to see me."

"I got the distinct feeling she'd been following us a lot back when we were still in Gotham but hasn't had the chance to check in on you recently." Or she'd know that we aren't on speaking terms anymore.

"Well, she's a little more busy than normal these days" she responded absentmindedly.

"What, she finally get pregnant?" he joked. His question gave Artemis a visible pause, and his eyes widened at her.

"No!" he gasped, recognizing her shock for an admission of truth.

"Wha-no. No!" She tried to deflect, but the jig was up.

"Nooo!" he laughed. "I don't believe it. Jade is going to be a mother? The world is coming to an end."

Artemis made a sound that was something between a laugh and a groan. "I'm trying to convince her to let me be there during labor, so I can call BS when she tells everyone she went through labor in stony assassin silence."

"That little kid is going to come out the womb with a shuriken in hand and an uncontrollable blood lust," Cameron joked, continuing to laugh as he took another sip of his overpriced coffee.

Artemis let his laughter peter out before continuing. "I uh, I'd prefer you didn't mention this. To anyone. Ever."

He raised his hands in defense. "I wouldn't put a pregnant woman at risk just for some street cred, even if it is Jade." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Not sure if she counts as a woman really."

"Hey, that's my sister we're talking about!"

"Uh huh."

The waiter came to take Artemis's order – to go, of course – and when she left the two sat in silence for a little bit, the conversation from before dying down. Cameron took more sips of his coffee, while Artemis played with the decorative napkins on the table. The air wasn't choking with the thick tension of that night in the Gotham alley last year, or even as much as their last encounter in Palo Alto. Still, the awkwardness was palpable, and neither moved to say anything for several minutes.

Finally, she broke the silence. "I missed this."

"What?"

"This. Us. Acting normal. Like how things used to be."

He gave her a disbelieving look, dismissing her words almost immediately. "We were never normal."

"You know what I mean. How things used to be before. Between us." When we still talked to each other.

"How things used to be went out the window 4 years ago in a Star City Police station." When you stabbed me in the back.

"I didn't know it was going to be you," she suddenly blurted out.

"What?" he asked, not sure what she meant.

"When they sent me on that mission, they only told me that I was going to be going undercover to get information on captured villains conspiring to get transferred to Belle Revve. They never told me it was going to be you. Hell, you were still a minor! Never in a thousand years did I think it would be you sitting there –"

"But that didn't stop you from doing it anyway," he interjected, his anger stoked, not subdued, by the words being spoken to him. Betrayal is betrayal.

"I panicked! When I realized it was just me and you I wasn't sure how much they knew about how close we were. I thought it was some sort of test to see if I was mole. Friggin Batman set the whole thing up."

"Didn't look like you were panicking at the time!" he fumed. "And even if you were, I've seen you operate better under pressure. You didn't give me any heads up, any warning signs, nothing! You just milked me for information like a low-rate snitch."

She flinched at his words. Even three years removed from life in the criminal underworld, the accusation of being a snitch carried heavy weight. Loyalty was worth it's weight in kryptonite.

"It happened before I was even on the team, and Batman & Green Arrow, they knew who I was. Who my family was. I was desperate to prove I wasn't like them. I did what I thought I had to do to survive, and what happened after happened and I'm sorry Cam. Damn it I'm so sorry," she pleaded, her voice hitting a desperate note on those last few words.

He sipped his coffee, looking hard out the edge of the patio. She took that as a signal to continue.

"I didn't know Superboy & Miss Martian were going to Belle Revve after that either. When I did find out, I didn't know how that mission ended. Not for a while later."

"Yea, and I bet you were happy to see me rotting in that cell, like all the other scum of the earth," he responded, still processing her earlier apology. He was unsure if he wanted to believe it, let alone accept it.

"That's not true! I know what you did to help Superboy & Miss Martian!" she said in hushed tones. "You saved their lives in the middle of a prison break, when you didn't have to!"

"Lot of good that did me. You know for a bunch of heroes you really do a lousy job of helping people who help you."

"That's not true! Superboy said he went back to check on you. That they worked with the warden to make sure you were protected from the other inmates. I personally checked every report with your name on it up until the day you got transferred to juvie. There wasn't so much as one incident."

"Is that what you guys think happened?" he laughed coldly, resisting the urge to touch the scar that traced along his lower abdomen. His goodbye gift before being set off to juvie.

"It's what I know happened. I wouldn't have left your safety up to chance."

"The reports were faked Artemis," he sneered, visibly disgusted by her faith in the prison system. "The Warden was dirty. The guards don't think we're human, because half the inmates really aren't. My dad was pissed about the damage to his rep. They had to make an example out of me. So they did, and whatever reports you got fed were crap."

"I didn't know –" she started, the horror palpable in her face.

"Because you didn't want to! If you really wanted to check on me you could have visited. You could have checked in on me. You knew the second I saw you on TV I'd put two and two together. You could have told me about your new job in person, I deserved that at least. After everything damn it!" He slammed his fist down on his own knee, not wanting to make a scene by hitting the table.

Artemis sucked in a breath, still shaken by the revelation, and feeling a new wave of guilt creeping up on her. But she had to ask, had to know how wrong she'd been those years ago: "If I had shown up, would you have even talked to me?" she whispered.

Cameron didn't answer, curling and then uncurling his hands into fists along his pants – you're ruining them kid he could hear Crystal lecture – while he started straight down at his plate. Wondering if he'd feel better if he threw it. Smashed the table with it. Trashed the glass windows of this pompous restaurant.

"I don't know," he finally admitted, before looking back at her. "But you didn't, so we'll never know will we?"

"No, we don't…And I don't have a good reason why I didn't, except I was scared." she admitted. "Of this, of having this exact conversation now. And I'm sorry. And…I'm tired. I'm tired of fighting Cam."

"Yeah well I'm tired in general."

"You saved me. After all that, after how much I failed you, you still saved me when I was captured. Why?" she asked softly. "I was a prisoner. You could have gotten all the revenge in the world right then and there. Could have evened the score for what I did to you."

"Because I wasn't thinking about revenge when I saw you. I wasn't thinking about how much you screwed me over. I was thinking about the horrible things they were going to do to you."

Her features softened. "Because you're a good person."

He snorted. "Few years on the good side have turned you into one giant cheeseball."

"Stop trying to change the subject!"

"What's left to say?"

"Look, I get it Cam. Things have changed, but I, we," she struggled for the words, "We knew each other for so long. Even with everything that's happened since…" she motioned her hands around as if she was trying to physically pluck her next words from the air before continuing. "It would be nice to just talk. About normal things. I missed you, you know."

He bit back an I missed you too, reminding himself that he was still infuriated. That she was very much still the enemy.

"There's this super tacky café near my house. Jade visits me there once in a while. The cameras are fake because the owner is cheap on security. It's practically on the beach so there's no other cameras around. No trace of you being there. It could be like Switzerland. A neutral ground."

"Why now? You see me in a random café, and all of a sudden now you want to explain everything? Have a heart to heart?"

She exhaled audibly. "Because I never wanted us to end up like this. And…we lost a member of our team recently. Again. The Joker. I'm sure you've heard."

He grimaced. He had heard. Everyone had heard about what the deranged clown had done to the second Robin, and whoever hadn't could make an educated guess from the sudden disappearance of Robin and the increased violence from Batman. The sudden uptick in broken bones and near-comatose gangsters that Batman was delivering to the GCPD had been bad enough for Cameron to steer clear of Gotham for the last several weeks.

"I heard. I'm sorry. No one deserves to die like that."

"Yea," she responded, a faraway look in her eyes. "It made me think about things. About what really matters in life."

"And?"

"I'm giving up the life. For good."

Now that was surprising. Possibly the most surprising thing he heard in this entire conversation. He realized that his surprise must have registered on his face, because she explained.

"I don't want to die young Cam. There's nothing glamorous about dying a hero."

"Well…I'm happy you've come to that conclusion."

"I don't want you to die either," she added suddenly. He couldn't find the words to respond, so he just took another sip of his cooling coffee.

The waiter came with Artemis's order, packed in her to-go box. Artemis took the receipt and scribbled something down on the back of it and sliding it across the table to Cameron.

"The café joint I was talking about. In case you ever come."

He didn't take it, just eyeing it's spot at the center of the table.

"Well, I gotta go before my friends start looking for me," Artemis said, standing up from the table and shivering at the sudden gust of cold win. "I'll let you get the bill."

"Ah yes, the gold digger returns," he jabbed reflexively.

"Well I am but a poor broke college student." She gave a sly look. "Besides, I have it on good authority you're planning to make a pretty large withdrawal from Metropolis National Bank tonight."

"No idea what you're talking about."

"I hope so. Wouldn't want all my friends to be in town for no reason."

"Didn't you just say you were giving up your extra curriculars?"

"I said I will be. And you've got no business questioning my honesty, Mr. Hawthorne."

He laughed. "Touché."

"Take care. And think about my offer."

He grabbed her wrist gently before she could walk away, and she glanced back at him. "For people like you and me, The Life is all we've ever known. You think you can really walk away from it?"

She looked him dead in the eyes when she answered. "I have to." And so can you.

After she left, he lounged in the café for another hour, consuming two more over-priced cold drinks before exiting. He made sure to give a cheeky smile to several of the cameras as he walked down the street, no doubt in his mind that he was being surveilled.

He didn't even try to be discreet when dumped his phone, not bothering to give the rest of his "team" a heads up. They wouldn't listen to him anyway, not unless he divulged far more information about his source than he was interested in. And even then, they'd probably still try to put up a fight.

Whatever. If anyone bothered to ask why he was a no-show, he'd just say he drank too much and overslept the early morning heist timeline. As it was, his reputation was still far enough in the gutter that no one would doubt that story, and his partners were greedy enough to try the job without looking for him.

By the time he got to his hotel room – he didn't frequent Metropolis enough anymore to warrant continuous payment for a safehouse here – he collapsed into his bed. The emotional drain of the earlier conversation left him wiped out, and his brain was tired from replaying the words from the earlier conversation.

He fell asleep staring at the neat writing on the back of the receipt he took from the café table, pondering the extended olive branch.

He dreamt of prison beatings and bleeding ribs.

A/N: RIP Jason Todd. Much love to everyone reading this story!