This is probably the best fanfiction introduction chapter I have ever written. I'm really happy with it. Unfortunately, I am a very unmotivated, clinically depressed person currently going through benzo withdrawals (which are awful, especially when you abuse them like I did), so there is a high probability that I will never return to this story. I'm sorry, but I still think this is a good one-shot, although I have an idea of what direction I would take the story if I thought I could continue. Please enjoy it for what it is. I think you may- or at least, I hope.

/Wicked Game/

Raven hurled a drab green jacket over her shoulders, slipping her bare arms through the woolen lining and pulling the underside of the winter apparel's collar forward with her index and thumbs. Her fingernails were painted a shade of subtle grayish blue as she pinched the corners of the material. She observed herself in the mirror with a dubious eye, as if staring into the face of an unfamiliar, alien being before closing her eyes and exhaling a shallow breathe before leaving the dark hallows of her ominously silent quarters.

The light from the main room of the tower was always a startling transition from the cold, somber corridors whose walls hummed gently with the rhythm of tower security systems and ventilation shafts. As usual, her teammates were all situated in some vicinity of the living room, involved in their own worlds. Beast boy and Cyborg were playing one of Beast boy's old 8-bit games he had been obsessed with for the past month or so. However, as was typical, the game served as a conduit for often humorous banter between him and Cyborg.

Starfire was rustling about in the kitchen, opening barren cabinet after cabinet, and checking the refrigerator filled with little more than condiments and a box of pizza with a questionable expiration date. She seemed preoccupied enough to Raven's relief.

Finally, there was Robin sitting on the left edge of the couch, with his often apparent and innate, but subtle tension in his stiff posture, staring intently into a crossword puzzle on the back of a local newspaper. With the intentness of his concentration he held his pencil tightly between his fingers indicating mild vexation.

Raven walked at a brisk, yet stealth pace, between surveying her friends and eyeing the front doorway to the tower. Cyborg gloated at Beast boy, oblivious to Raven's presence, "You see, this is how an expert plays Mega Man 2." Beast boy rolled his eyes and scoffed, "Yea right, I've been playing Mega Man 2 since I was in grade school. You're weak sauce skills are pure amateur luck." Cyborg returned curtly, "You confuse luck for raw talent."

Everything was running smoothly until Beast boy caught a side-glance of his friend's nearly inconspicuously self-conscious march toward the nearest tower exit. He exclaimed spontaneously in his blunt fashion, his voice cracking just a touch, "Whoa, Raven's wearing a dress, haha!"

Raven clutched her fists and froze in place only to view all her peers now looking upward at attention at her uncharacteristically conventional attire with mixed expressions. She felt her stomach lurch in anxiety from their intrusive curiosity. She wore a well-fitted, simple black dress just above knee length with receding short sleeves beneath her oddly juxtaposed casual drab coat, and black converse tennis shoes. Raven couldn't help but glower at the changeling and his stupid need to make a spectacle of her despite her implicitly understood wish to fly under the radar.

Raven's voice churned with thinly veiled contempt, "I'm a girl. It's a dress."

Beast boy laughed, "Yea, but it's on YOU."

Cyborg grimaced at Beast boy, and offered with conciliatory sincerity, "It looks nice, Raven."

Before she could turn her attention back to the front entrance of the tower she heard the piercing glee of her only female housemate, causing her shoulders to raise instinctively, "Oh, you look so lovely, Raven! You have even adorned decorative hair barrettes!"

Raven side-stepped the enthusiasm radiating from her overzealous, but well-meaning friend while eyeing the indiscernible and disconcerting absence of emotion from her team's leader, "They're more functional than decorative."

Raven was grateful that she usually wore a subdued makeup on regular occasions, otherwise there would probably be more attention toward her slight cosmetic upgrade. But as usual, Beast boy had to pry like an insatiable dog begging for table scraps, "So, the only question is- what's the occasion?"

Raven's face betrayed no emotion, "I just wanted to get out of the house."

Beast boy deadpanned, "But...you never leave the house...let alone your room." He added daftly, "And you're wearing berets!"

Starfire corrected Beast boy with a simple matter of fact revision, "I believe they are called barrettes."

Beast boy insisted despite recognizing his error, "Yea, that's what I said."

A disquieting moment passed when suddenly, a horrifying smirk emerged on Beast boy's face; a wicked, boyish grin saturated in devilish pleasure, "You know what I think? I think Raven's got a hot date tonight." He chortled to himself fiendishly, delighting in his mischievous intentions.

Raven's breathe caught in her throat. She nearly responded, but was interrupted by Starfire's insidiously timed sincerity, "Is it true? Are you really going out to meet a boy- to be courted?"

Beast boy laughed at Starfire unwittingly aiding him in his amusement at causing Raven further grief. Raven's molars ground together, and she faintly huffed with hushed resentment, pausing with telling hesitation before reply, "I never said that..."

The silence that followed was deafening, almost suffocating for a moment as Raven felt as if her throat had became a reversed cleaning vacuum, stealing the air from her lungs. Beast boy's eyes went wide like saucers of milk, his pupils enlarged, "Holy shit, you really ARE going on a date, aren't you?"

Starfire paused, but could not resist, "Please, tell us his name." She tried her best to repress her desire to squeal in jubilee over Raven's fortune. Raven tried, futile, to hide a groan she simply could not repress before sighing, "If I tell you his name will you all leave me alone?"

Starfire and Beast boy both seemed to lean forward in engrossed anticipation, while Cyborg looked on with a collected, but attentive gaze, while Robin squirmed uncomfortably in his already tense sitting position, crossing his legs and folding his arms over himself while still looking up with equal, but hidden interest.

"His name is Sebastian," Raven replied with a stone face, and did not wait for further interrogation before hauling herself out the front door with a certain rapid stride, feeling what could only be described as the liberating freedom of social withdrawal from ubiquitous personal invasion.

Robin immediately looked down at his crossword puzzle. Number nineteen, across, a nine letter name- a 16th century German composer from the baroque period. Robin lowered his chin and grimaced.