Disclaimer: The show Victorious, its characters and other associated copyrights are property of someone else and not me.

Unfairly judged.

Chapter 2 – Opening salvo.

No One's Pov

Not wanting to be blamed for the smashed car, Tori ran to her car and quickly sped off. While that flight, momentarily, pushed Jade out of her mind, thoughts of Jade and the accompanying sorrow soon returned.

By the time she got home, she was miserable. After all, she had not only blown her chance with Jade, but made an enemy at the same time. All her hopes for something more with the Goth had turned to dust. The worst part was the only person she could blame, was herself.

Of course Trina wasted no time in mocking her misfortune and playfully called dibs on her room, once she, "Went away"

Tori was tempted to call and apologize and even picked up the phone 4 or 5 times to do so, but each time she put it back down as she felt it was pointless.

She simply didn't know what to do.

All she knew now was, she was dead.

The following Monday, Tori got out of her car, looking and feeling like a prisoner walking to the electric chair. With slumped shoulders and a look of morbid resignation, she walked towards the school.

Though she half expected Jade to jump out and pummel her the second she entered school, nothing happened. However when she reached her locker, she found Jade had already been there.

Her locker which had "Make is shine" on it, had paint thinner splashed on the locker, causing it to run, leaving the words distorted and unreadable.

Across the way, at that very moment, stood Jade, who was wearing a evil smirk. She was standing by her locker, carefully watching Tori's reaction to the now ruined locker.

But much to her dissepiment, the only thing Tori did was, to sadly shake her head with a look of resignation and open her locker.

"What, no tears, no angry scream, fine. This doesn't bother you. just hold on Vega, I've only gotten started. I'll make you regret playing with my heart!" Quietly ranted Jade, as she stormed off.

Moments later as Tori was pulling out her books, she heard Cat gasp, behind her.

"What happened to your locker? It looks like it melted."

Turning around, she saw a shocked looking Cat and Beck who looked only slightly puzzled.

"What happened? Take a guess."

Cat thought for a moment. "Um…pizza?"

"Pizza?" Said Beck with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes, that's my guess, Pizza. I always guess pizza. I love pizza…you know this one time, my brother…."

Beck carefully put his hand on Cat's shoulder, to stop her wild tangent. "Cat, let's talk about Tori and her locker, Ok?"

He then turned to Tori. "Well….I'm going to guess Jade."

Tori nodded. "And that's the right answer."

"Oh goody." Cat suddenly squealed. "What does he win?"

"Nothing Cat."

Cat then frowned. "Well that's no fun."

"Neither is having your locker splashed with paint thinner."

Stepping forward, Beck looked at the locker again and then to Tori. "Tell me, is there a specific reason that Jade ruined your locker or is this just one of her random acts of terror "

"Is it that time of the month already" Said Cat, as she scratched her head.

Looking rather sheepish Tori replied. "Well she asked me out on a date and, despite the fact that I like her, thought she was just playing a prank on me, so I wasn't home when she showed up for our date. I went out for pizza, instead."

Of course Cat's first question was. "I like pizza, why didn't you invite me?"

Ignoring Cat, Beck cringed. "So you stood her up!"

"Yes"

Cat's frown morphed in a scowl as she quickly put her hands on her hips. "First you don't take Jade out for pizza and then you don't take me. You're mean!"

And with that, Cat turned on her heel and walked off, not before walking up to Andre as he was approaching, saying. "Don't talk to Tori. She doesn't share her pizza."

After giving Cat a somewhat dubious look, Andre looked at the locker than to Tori.

"One of Jade's random acts of cruelty or did you chiz her off?"

"Uh….she asked me out, though I accepted, I fully thought she was playing a prank. So I went out for pizza when she was supposed to pick me up."

"And she showed, didn't she."

"Yep. Sorry about Cat, she's just on one of her tangents. At least she'll get over it."

"Tori" Beck said, as he ran his hand through his hair. "I wish you would have talked to me first. I would have told you, that she'd never pull a prank like that and she was certainly serious about it."

"Yeah Tori…." Started Andre, before getting cut off by Tori.

"Look guys, you're my best friends, but I brought this down on myself and for your own safety, I don't want anyone else involved. "

The guys quickly exchanged looks of worry.

"I you want, I can talk to her." Offered Beck.

"I can do the same Chica." Andre said with a hopeful smile.

Tori shook her head. "No, please don't. I'm asking as a friend. Don't say a word about this to Jade or get involved in any fashion. No matter what she does. I'd feel a thousand times worse if you said something to her and she took any of this out on you. Please guys, promise me."

"Jade can be pretty nasty when she's pissed." Noted Beck, with a great deal of concern.

"No guys, please. Promise me."

Again Beck and Andre exchanged worried glances, but both begrudgingly nodded.

"Ok." Said Andre.

"If you need to talk, I'm there." Added Beck.

"Thanks guys" Tori said looking relieved. "I think, I'll be skipping eating lunch with you guys for a while. We can still do stuff at other times, best to not tempt fate. Just remember all is normal and please don't say anything."

Not looking overly happy about it, the guys headed off to class, leaving Tori alone. As horrible as she felt, and she felt very horrible, she honestly would feel a thousand times worse if Jade took her anger out on them as a result of them talking to Jade on her behalf. That and she simply didn't want to dwell on something she felt she had no control over.

Closing he now ruined locker after gathering her books, Tori took a moment to once again look at Jade's handiwork. All it served to do was, to further convince her that any attempt at apology or reconciliation was pointless. Dating Jade was something she had secretly dreamed of for some time, now those dreams were just as ruined as her locker.

For a moment she thought of having it repainted, but sighed.

"She'll just ruin it again, just leave it. There's nothing I can do about it."

Tori went about her day, making a point to avoid Jade as much as possible. In the two classes she had with Jade in the morning, she arrived late and made and effort to sit as far from her as possible and of course avoiding her gaze. In the two times she looked over to Jade and their eyes met, she was the recipient of a cold and hateful glare.

Though Cat was still aloof from the pizza thing, she did encounter Robbie and made him promise to keep out of it as well.

At lunch, she got her food and then moved to the other side of the school, where she ate alone, while sitting on the steps.

While she made her best effort to appear normal, Tori felt this almost overwhelming feeling of loss and sadness. There was some anger too, a great deal of it, but that she turned on herself, as she felt like she deserved it. Overall however, she very much felt like a close friend had died and what made it worse, she felt like she'd be next. All she could hope for, is that Jade would get board of it and move on to terrorize someone else. As much as Tori was an optimist, within her was a very real fatalistic streak.

The next morning, she arrived at school, feeling no better or any less doomed than they day before. Arriving at her now ruined locker she looked with some apprehension to see if Jade was lurking nearby ready to spring something else, but the Goth was not.

The day past, with at least one bright spot, that Cat had seemingly forgotten about the pizza thing and acted as if they were best friends again. But it was little comfort to the Latina and as before she made Cat promise to stay out of it, no matter what. The red haired girl was very sad about the turn of events, but reluctantly agreed.

During the day, despite her best efforts, she encountered Jade. While the Goth said nothing, she simply gave off waves of hostility and hateful stares to go with them. Again Tori made no effort to talk to Jade, seeing there simply was no point.

But one thing Jade didn't do was any sort of prank or trick and by the end of the day, the nervous Latina though she could breathe a sigh of relief.

That's until she made her way to her car at the end of the day. Tori had her car only 4 months by this point, and her 2003 sliver Honda Civic, was her baby. She had saved up a lot of babysitting and part time job money to have this car and was happy to not have to ask Trina for rides.

But as she reached the car and was about to unlock the door, she noticed movement inside. Startled, Tori backed away to see what looked like a small cat pacing back and forth between the two front seats.

But the smell she became aware of a few seconds later told her it was no cat. It was a skunk.

Across the parking lot, one again Jade eagerly, awaited Tori's reaction to her latest effort. But again she found herself disappointed when with a similar look of sad resignation, just looked at her car and walking off.

"Damn it" Cursed Jade, as she walked off.

Tori took the bus home and there told her father that some unknown person had stuck a skunk in her car. He then arranged for animal control to have the creature taken away only an hour later, but her car now had a very rancid smell. Trina knew who did it, but like everyone else, Tori had made her promise not to say anything.

As far as the smell, her father knew of a guy who did detailing work and had special chemicals which could get the smell out of her car. Unfortunately it was rather pricy.

The next morning, Cat was walking across the parking lot and she saw Tori talking to a slimy looking guy in a leather jacket near the one corner of the parking lot.

Curious and concerned she walked up and as she approached, heard the man say.

"28th, Row Taylor Swift Ticket's, I'll give you $200."

"No" Tori said, looking like she was going to throw up. "I need $250 no less"

"$225"

"$250, no less."

"Fine" Said the man who quickly then pulled out his billfold and handed Tori a small wad of money. Tori then handed over what appeared to be two concert tickets.

That done, the man grinned, "Nice doing business with you." Then he walked off.

"Tori, What's going on? You were so excited to get those tickets, why did you sell them to that man?"

"Cause I needed the money!" Said Tori, letting a hint of bitterness creep into her voice, as she watched the man get into a luxury SUV and drive off. "I need $250 to get the smell of skunk out of my car. That's how much it will cost me. So I contacted a scalper and sold the tickets."

Tori shrugged, "The car guy is cleaning my car today and I need the money today.. But…" Tori said letting her voice trail off.

"I'm sorry."

"You want to know the funny thing. I had even thought of asking Jade if she wanted to go. Yeah, I now Swift isn't her thing, but I thought…damn. But there's nothing I can do about it. So I just need to stop complaining about it." Tori said with a sigh

While Tori seemed to be taking it, Cat quickly growled in displeasure. "I'm going to talk too…."

"No you will not. Not a word, you promised me." Said Tori quickly, cutting her off.

"Ok." Replied Cat. "But maybe….."

"If I apologize. It's pointless Cat, utterly pointless. She hates me and that's that. Come on, let's get to class."

Tori could only wonder, with some apprehension, what Jade would do, as the Goth seemed determined to make her miserable. She found out 3 hours later when she finished with gym class, to find her clothes had been stolen out of her gym locker. She told the teacher she had no idea who did it.

For the rest of the day, Tori had to wear and ugly pair of brown corduroy slacks and a faded, New kids on the block t-shirt from the lost and found. But the humiliated Latina, simply shrugged and with an all too familiar look of sad resignation, went about her day.

As the day ended, Jade watched Tori, ignoring the snickers of some of the other Hollywood Arts' students as she walked towards Trina's car.

But Tori just walked on, her shoulders hung low a sad expression on her face.

Three days in a row, Jade had done things to Tori and three days, Tori had simply taken it, not cried or gotten overly upset about it.. Jade who felt increasingly frustrated, simply clenched her fists and went about planning her next move.

Well Jade's angry and has begun to retaliate, but Tori has just taken the abuse and done little else. Much to Jade's frustration. What does Jade really want anyway.

I had intended for this to be a 2 shot, but people really seem to like this one, so it will be a bit longer.

Is Tori wrong to assume an apology is pointless?