Jade's morning ritual of taking her books from her locker while sending surreptitious glares in everyone else's direction was rudely interrupted by a very familiar high-pitched giggle. Her death glare at the ready, she slammed her locker shut and looked around for the source of said giggling. The sound was on her very expansive list of things she hated, and the fact she was hearing it without caffeine in her system was making things at least twice as bad. Unfortunately, it sounded like it came from one of the very few people Jade did not have the hart to inflict physical pain upon (because as cruel as she could be, she would never kick a puppy, for example). Sure enough, Cat Valentine was walking towards her, staring down at her PearPhone with an amused smile on her face. Just when Jade thought the worst was over, Cat gave another shrill laugh, sending a wave of irritation up the brunette's spine.

"Cat, what's going on?" she asked, her arms folded over her chest.

The redhead was impervious to Jade's murderous stare. She looked up from her phone as she waved. "Oh, hi Jade!" she giggled again, and Jade was reminded why she absolutely hated the sound. "I didn't see you there." Jade stood there with an impatient look on her face. As if suddenly remembering that her friend had asked a question at all, she added cheerfully, "Oh! It's nothing. I'm just reading some Bade!"

It didn't really surprise her that Cat was into yet another obscure hobby, like sky shopping and bibble, but this was something she'd never heard of. She wasn't entirely interested, as it was probably something as inane and pointless as the talking duck on the Tap It app the girl was addicted to sometime earlier. What she was –curious. Was it going to be something that Cat's parents were going to have to stage an intervention against? Her brow furrowed. "What the chiz is Bade?"

Cat looked at her friend innocently, replying, "It's my ship." The expression on her face made it seem like it was the simplest thing in the world, like she had no idea why the brunette wasn't getting it. She hummed a little to herself as she looked good-naturedly at Jade. The way that Cat made it sound like it was the most obvious thing in the world only irritated the girl more.

"Your… ship?"

"Yeah," Cat nodded fervently, adding, "I ship it." As a bit of an afterthought, she finished it with a wide grin and, "You know, like FedEx."

She shook her head. Sometimes she thought Cat was starting to make sense, but then she just turned around and proved her wrong again. Before Jade could prod any more as to what the heck a Bade even was, the bell rang. "Oops, there's the bell! See you later, Jade!" Cat called as she returned to her phone and giggled a little more. She left Jade standing there, totally dumbfounded for a moment before she remembered she had to get to class. Grabbing her bag and slinging it over her shoulder, she made a beeline for Sikowitz's class.

Once there, though, she paid little attention to him and instead opened up Google on her PearPhone. She typed 'bade' into the search bar, determined to get to the bottom of this. That was the thing with her; once she found something out, she had to see it through or else she was going to explode. And the fact that Cat was sitting a short distance away still preoccupied in whatever this was wasn't helping at all. She clicked the first search result, which led her to a dictionary entry for the word.

Bade [bad] v. a simple past tense of bid.

And when she might speak she bade him to be called to her.

Rolling her eyes, she closed the page. That was a complete bust. Maybe she would do better asking people at lunch. She spent the rest of Sikowitz's class casting glances in Cat's direction, trying to get a hint as to what this mystery obsession was. Next to Cat, Beck had leaned in, presumably to ask her what she was reading. The redhead grinned up at him and showed him her phone. Almost as quickly as he leaned in, he looked away. Was that a blush? As far as Jade knew, there was very little that could make Beck react like that, and all the methods she knew definitely didn't involve the Internet. (Cue indecent winking here, had she been anyone but Jade West.)

Her brow furrowed even more, an expression that she was wearing all the way to lunch as she tortured herself thinking about what this Bade thing could be. It didn't sound like any television show or band that she knew of. Was it food? No, the bibble incident proved that if it were food, Jade would probably know by now. Was it a book? After all, Cat had said something about reading it… it was amazing how much time she had spent in thoughts like these that went round in circles, because before long, it was lunch period.

She found Cat tittering next to their friends at their usual table. Apparently, she had eaten early, or just quickly, because she had already cleaned her plate and was busy updating her Slap page. Jade peered over her shoulder just to see this:

Cat I'm a Bademancer for life!

Mood: Excited

It was going to take every effort not to slam her tray into the table and demand to know what was happening.

She didn't make that effort.

Cat squeaked at the impact the tray made on the table. "Hi Jade!" she greeted as she looked up from her phone for the first time in a while. She seemed blissfully unaware that Jade was livid. Everyone else at the table looked positively frightened (save Beck, who was paying far too much attention to his hoagie than was normal). Robbie, probably scared to death of Jade's wrath, was babbling out an incoherent excuse about having to go feed his aunt's pet turtle. Before he could amble off to safety, Jade thrust out a pair of scissors at him threateningly.

"Oh no, you are not leaving!" she fumed, "No one's leaving until I find out what Bade is!"

Beck choked on his sandwich and coughed violently. There was that awkward blush again, and all Jade wanted to do was poke her scissors in his direction and tell him to shut up and stop freaking blushing so much, because frankly, it was starting to piss her off.

With some great feat of will, she managed to pay no attention to him. "Well?" she asked, looking from Andre to Tori to Robbie to Cat. "I'm waiting."

Andre looked at Tori and sighed. "Are you telling her or am I?"

Tori bit her lip before she looked up at Jade. "Cat's reading fanfiction, Jade. Bade is a couple name. You know, like Brangelina," she said, trying to be helpful. She looked at her friends, trying to get some backup. Everyone was looking at her, apart from Beck who was now staring down at his sandwich and honestly looking a little sick.

"Yeah, or TomKat," Andre said supportively.

"My name's Cat!" Cat chimed in. "I don't know a Tom though…"

Robbie nodded, then added, "Bade is… well, half of it's you, Jade."

Her brow furrowed in confusion. "Okay, I guess that makes me the –ade part, but who's B…" she began, and then her blue eyes widened in realization.

From that day forward, there was a very large gash on the table, from where Jade West had stabbed it with a pair of scissors in a fit of anger.

She sat in bed later that night, her laptop pulled up close to her as she scrolled down the website that Cat had linked her to. The Bade stuff actually wasn't that bad, barring the major creepiness of it all. (She couldn't help but cheer on the ones that villainized Tori Vega, even though she could grudgingly say firsthand that she was not, in fact, a horrible person.) There were quite a number of people who thought of her as dark, disturbed, depressed, among a lot of other things… none of which she really focused on. She was a writer, after all. She could forgive some things. Artistic license, and all that.

She clicked on another one that sounded somewhat interesting. She couldn't believe that there were people who had more hope than she did that she and Beck would get back together. She wasn't sure she believed in it all that much anymore, and she was trying her hardest not to think about it. Somehow reading all this made her feel guilty for hoping, guilty for wanting something like that…

Her blue eyes skimmed over the line, "… and the stick turned pink."

The police showed up at the West house less than half an hour later because of complaints from the neighbors over a laptop thrown out the window and a hollered, "For the last time, I am not pregnant!"

Author's Note: Point? Fics are supposed to have a point? Hahaha. So I was just toying with the idea that Cat is a serious Bade shipper and this was the result. Hope you enjoyed it! Also: no offense meant to people who write pregnant!Jade fics, I love a lot of those myself. it's just that I doubt Jade would, haha xD

Disclaimer: Victorious is not mine.