Cardin's Victims
Jaune was always bullied by Cardin, and while Cardin did bully a lot of others, one other victim stood out to Jaune. That victim was Velvet. It always seemed like Cardin picked on her just for being a faunus. Jaune didn't discriminate and, even though Cardin was a bully, didn't think Cardin would stoop that low. Velvet didn't seem particularly weak either. So he thought to himself, maybe I should talk to her.
"Jaune are you alright?" Pyrrha asked.
"Oh yeah. Of course. I was just thinking of inviting Velvet to join us for lunch. She's always picked on by Cardin like me, so I figured maybe she'd feel a bit safer." Jaune replied.
Everyone agreed that it was a good idea. Jaune went over to invite Velvet over.
"Y-you want me to join you guys?" She asked.
"Yup." Jaune replied.
She thought about it for a second and figured maybe it would be a good idea. She knew that Cardin picks on him a lot as well, and maybe she'd be able to make a few friends as well. So she agreed and they both head on back to their table.
"Hey everyone look! It looks like bunny girl and the weakling are an item now!" Cardin yelled, he and his friends (if you can call them that) all laughing now.
Velvet looked like she was about to blow up out of anger and curl up and cry at the same time. Jaune had enough of this, while he hated Cardin for all of this bullying, he knew violence would just be stooping down to his level.
"Velvet why don't we just go explain to him how it makes us feel. I mean, if we just start a fight with him, we'll only be stooping to his level. It would make us no better than him."
"You have a point. I guess it's worth a shot." Velvet replied, calming herself.
They walked over to Cardin.
"What do you guys want?"
"Cardin listen, all of the things you say to us really hurts our feelings." Jaune replied first, he looked over at Velvet.
"Yeah, especially when you make fun of my animal attributes. It makes me feel like humans and faunus aren't any closer to being equal. When clearly it's the opposite." She said looking at Jaune.
"Yeah, and saying stuff like I'm a weakling, it brings me down like I'm not gonna go anywhere. All of my friends tell me to do my best and I'll succeed, but when you tell me I'm weak and won't go anywhere in life... It makes me second guess myself..." Jaune told him, beginning to look down.
"Oh... I see why you guys get so upset now. I didn't realize it was cutting that deep. I thought I was just making jokes to be funny, I didn't intend for them to hurt the way they did, just to poke fun. Sorry guys, if I make jokes I'll try to be more careful to not hurt anyone like that." Cardin said, they could tell he felt at least a little bad about it.
"Thanks Cardin, that's all we wanted." Said Jaune.
Jaune and Velvet started back towards their lunch table. As they sat down they realized everyone was watching them.
"You guys did a great job. I can tell it went well by the smiles on your faces." Pyrrha told them.
They told everyone exactly what happened. Everyone was proud of Jaune and Velvet for standing up for themselves, and Cardin for being honest. Jaune and Velvet high fived.
"Welcome to the group Velvet."
"Thanks Jaune. It feels nice to have friends that care about me as much as I care for them."