A/N: The flashback scene is a lead up to the events of Chapter 8. This isn't really important but I just like throwing it out there. WriteOnForver I like that idea! It also ties into something I had planned for a future chapter heheheh. P.S to other readers, if you're looking for other Frostbite!Fics, look up some of WriteOnForever's stories (especially "Home" & "Comfort").

Ages: Cameron is 15 and Artemis is 14 in the flashback scene. At present, Cameron is 21 and Artemis is 20.

Like Riding A Bike

Summer, 1 Year Before Team Year 1

"Alright, it's my turn to watch! I'm getting bored counting the cracks in the floor!" Cameron groused.

Artemis was standing on some stacked barrels in front of him, just barely able to peer out the windows of the decrepit building they were currently hiding in. She turned to him with a smirk. "That sounds like a you problem. I got this spot first, and since I actually remembered to bring my binoculars, unlike a certain someone, I'm in charge. And I say I don't share."

"Hey, I'm older so I should be in charge!"

"Hah! I'm not gonna take orders from someone with sticks for arms. Try the 'I'm older' card when when puberty catches up with you."

"You're one to talk! I've got science books with curves than you," Cameron retorted, dramatically looking at himself in a makeshift ice mirror.

His self-love session was interrupted as he ducked a shoe flying his way. He turned around with his own victorious grin. "I was literally staring at a mirror, Rapunzel. I had perfect visibility for that-OW" he yelped, the second shoe hitting him squarely in the chest.

"Yeah. Great visibility," she retorted, going back to peering through the binoculars.

Cameron grumbled to himself, deciding whether to answer his wounded pride or get back to focusing on their mission. Naturally, he picked the former, forming an ice baseball bat and and promptly ramming it into the bottom barrels that were currently holding Artemis up.

"Ey!" she let out a shriek as she fell, barely sticking the landing on her feet. She looked up to see Cameron walking up some ice stairs and forming a comfy little seat where she had previously been standing, binoculars in hand.

"Would you look at that? Now I'm in charge," he gloated.

She threw her shoe at him, and it was intercepted by a small ice wall he formed. By the time she reached for her second shoe, he was surrounded by the ice.

"You know, that kind of hostile behavior will get you far in this business," Cameron commented from behind his fortifications.

"You little.." she grumbled.

"Hey were you tryna say something blondie? I couldn't hear it over the sound of you being a sore loser," he teased.

"Oooh look at me, I'm Cameron Mahkent! I can finally make a little ice castle without getting a nosebleed!" Artemis said in a mocking tone, putting her shoes back on.

"Shut up!" he retorted.

"Make me!" she yelled back.

"No, I mean it! Looks like the guy is coming. Time to do the drop."

Like a switch, the jokes were gone. Artemis grabbed her bow and Cameron melted his fortifications, instead putting up his ice armor.

"Alrighty blondie. Simple drop. We got this."

If only.

...

Late Summer, Team Year 5 (Present Day)

Artemis peered through her thermals again. The building she was scanning was a suspected hidey hole for the Star City mafia's highest ranking lieutenant. While she was always down to beat up scumbags, this was part of a Green Arrow op that she had nothing to do with until now, so she was playing it careful.

Oliver had called her up, his voice only slightly less nervous than the last time he talked to her, asking for her help because he had to deal with something else at the last second.

Something about another teenager running around with a bow and arrow "Tryna get themselves damn killed."

Normally it was the exact kind of thing that she'd ask more about, but Oliver was still walking on eggshells around her and any extended conversation was inevitably going to go back to his attempt to check in on her and her overall health. Not a bad thing, but not a conversation she wanted to have with him just yet. She'd only barely convinced her friends that she was ok, and they only believed her because of some choice words from Jade.

The awkward future conversation with her mentor aside, she was still doing a stakeout.

Artemis didn't do stakeouts solo. This was for a lot of reasons, safety among them – especially after the fiasco with the League of Shadows –but mainly because sitting on a crappy roof for hours on end was that much more miserable if you were doing it by yourself.

She'd tried stakeouts with Wally but he always had too much pent up energy. Dick was useful but stakeouts with him tended to escalate because if it wasn't a dangerous rogue, he treated stakeouts like test runs for all of his experimental gadgets and hacking skills, which usually ended in a fistfight. It didn't help that she wasn't exactly a pacifist herself either. Zatanna was much better: Great conversation and clutch magic use. Conner's super-hearing, super-vision, and developing sarcasm made him a swiss army knife and surprisingly funny to spend hours with.

All great options. All of whom she hadn't worked in the field with since The Reach.

She considered it but in the end, she went with her original stakeout partner.

Behind her, said partner let out an exaggerated groan. "Argh, why do I always get stuck with the crappy stakeout spots?"

She looked back at Cameron, who was sprawled out on his own ice blanket atop the cruddy rooftop in what she was positive was his 35th position of the night. "Because I get stuck with the crappy, antsy stakeout partner," she answered.

Cameron pouted, like a child, and Artemis rolled her eyes.

"You know, you asked me to be here," he said. "I can totally leave."

"Oh don't be a sour icicle Cam."

"A sour what?" he shrieked dramatically, and Artemis rolled her eyes again.

If their time on the sub reminded her how easy it was to work with Cameron in the thick of it, years of training meshing seamlessly whenever their backs were against the wall, this stakeout was reminded her just how impatient he could he got bored.

To be fair, four hours of watching a warehouse that showed no signs of anyone coming in or out was about as boring as it could get in Star City. This intel must've been bad.

"I'm telling you, your intel was bad," Cameron said, vocalizing her thoughts as she slid back against the parapet.

"Yeah, it's looking that way. Kind of a waste of a night," she sighed, before a thought popped into her mind. "Doesn't mean the night has to go to waste."

Cameron raised his eyebrow at her. "Wow, I'm pretty sure I'm the one supposed to make the innuendos here."

Artemis shot him a withering glare. "What am I, 14?" She put her hand up before he could answer, his mouth already forming what was sure to be a smart-ass retort. "Don't answer that. What I mean is, we've still got a few more hours before I'd usually call it a night. And there's still crime around the city."

"Are you sure? Not to question your skills but, this is your first night out since-" since Wally died went unsaid, "since a while."

"That's why I've got you to watch my back," she answered.

"Well, I mean,-" Cameron started, sounding hesitant.

"Look," she continued. "I'm not exactly ready to go back to the superhero life. This was just a favor for GA, but we're here. I'm suited up. Might as well, right? I mean, it's not like you just forget how to be a vigilante. It's kind of like riding a bike."

"It's not that. It's just, ah, I'll need stop by a costume store or something. Staking out a warehouse is one thing, but it's going to raise a lot of questions if I'm seen hanging out with a superhero."

"I thought you said you were handling those loose ends?"

"I am," he said quickly, "but there's still things I need to sort out. Don't ask, just trust me on that."

She looked like asking was exactly what she wanted to do, but held back. "Fine, there's plenty of costume places still open."

"I think I'm gonna grab myself a hockey mask," he said, images of an icicle Jason Vorhees coming to his mind.

"Ohhh," Artemis grinned, "I have something even better in mind."

...

Two armed robberies, a failed kidnapping attempt, three muggings, and one lost child later, the two were back in the alley for Cameron to Zeta back to Gotham.

"Well that worked out well," Artemis remarked, stretching her arms out. It'd been a while since she'd gotten a proper workout. Well, a proper workout that was accompanied with the adrenaline rush of fighting crime rather than the nagging voice of an older sister.

"Speak for yourself," Cameron groused, pointing at the mask in his hand. "You're not the one who had to spend half the night wearing a stupid Jack Frost mask."

"Hey, you can't say it wasn't the perfect mask for you!"

"I can, and I am! That last mugger couldn't take me seriously enough to stop giggling, and the old lady practically had a heart attack looking at me!"

"That's because you got the cheap mask. If you'd listened to me we could've gone to a better store and gotten a much higher quality one for the night."

He shot her a deadpan look. "I wasn't going to go across town for a Jack Frost mask. If I hadn't left my wallet home, I'd be in a hockey mask right now!"

"All I hear is complaints. You should be thanking me frostbite. The right mask and you'd actually look handsome fighting crime," Artemis prodded, and Cameron couldn't resist the bait.

"How? It's already covering my face, the most handsome part of my body!"

"Riiiiiight."

While the two bickered back and forth, moving much slower to the Zeta Tubes than was justified, a different a green-clad archer watched the two from afar, his goateed face twisted into a mild frown.

The crunch of gravel signaled the arrival of someone behind him, and he turned back to look at a mildly amused Black Canary.

"So, are you going to say something to her, or just watch from the shadows like bats?" she asked.

Oliver made a face. "I'm nothing like his royal Gotham paranoiac."

She raised an eyebrow. "Says the guy stalking his protégé from two rooftops away at 4 a.m."

"I'm not stalking her, I'm just checking in on her. The warehouse was a bust, and I noticed she went around and started doing her own round on patrol."

"She's been on the shelf for a while, so it makes sense for you be a little concerned. Why didn't you just join her?"

"I was going to, but that was before I saw who she was patrolling with." He motioned for her to come over, and handed Dinah the pair of binoculars to look through.

"Huh. Now that's interesting," she remarked.

"That's one way to put it."

She handed him back the binoculars. "Well, Kaldur told us Icicle Junior had their back on Manta's sub. Something about a shared history between the two."

"Yeah, 'shared history' is an understatement."

"Really?" Dinah asked, curiosity piqued.

"It's a long story, but once I tell you about it, you should definitely talk to her."

"Me? She's you're protégé."

"Yeah but you're a girl!"

Dinah shot him a look that had him hastily correcting his previous statement. "What I meant to say was that you're better at handling these kind of emotional conversations, and she's been avoiding me lately."

"All the more reason for you talk to her," she said, giving him a kiss on the cheek and then jumping off the rooftop.

Oliver just sat grumbled.

A/N: Guys Artemis totally stays retired. 100%. *nods convincingly* Much love for those who are still reading!