Glendale and the Jellicle Cats

What?

"Hello... cat... man", the watcher sputtered as he continued to slap himself. The red-brown kitten gave out a low-pitched meow, its ears held back. Great, he made a baby cat sad. Just great.

"Do you know where you are?", the silver cat asked. Although he was stuck smiling, his voice sounded confused. The watcher was getting mixed messages. The red-brown kitten started to scratch at the cardboard box, moving its clawed paw carefully across the side.

"I am at a junkyard. Came here because I heard a noise. Lots of noise."

"Oh, that is all? You are not going to, you know, throw boots at us or threaten to attack us?" The silver cat moved his body forward slightly, turning his head in an attempt to see what was hidden behind the man's back.

"N-no, not at all. I am not... in the mood to attack cats." With that, the watcher quickly dropped the aluminum bat and kicked it to the side. The sound startled the pure white kitten, which upset the red-brown kitten who was just finishing its scratch art.

"Jemima, what are you doing?", the silver cat directed to the red-brown kitten. The kitten, whose name was now known to the watcher, had begun to purr as it continued to work on its art. At least it recovered from the watcher's harmful behaviors.

"Just drawin', ya know," Jemima murmured as she added the finishing touches. Her voice was a clear flute. "Wanna see?" Without warning, she spun the box around to face the watcher, causing the silver cat to fall on its face and the pure white kitten to tumble at the watcher's feet.

On the side of the cardboard box, both cat and man were confused by what they saw. Did it seem to be the face of a cat-thing ... or maybe a dog-thing? The watcher thought it looked like a warped version of a deer while the silver cat proposed that it was a mutated pig. Soon enough, the entire congregation of junkyard cats that were present surrounded the cardboard box. The watcher had overestimated the amount; aside from Goldie, Silver, Jemima, the piebald cat, and the pure white kitten, there were no other cats present. Silver reassured the watcher that the other members were either house cats or were on the prowl someplace else. That's reassuring.

"Jemima," the black and gold cat spoke up, "where are its pupils?" If Jemima's voice were a flute, her voice was a saxophone. She outstretched her front leg and pressed her paw against the ... thing's eyes, which were as large as her head. "I am already unnerved by this but I'd feel better to know that it's not a demon." The other cats sans Jemima nodded their heads in agreement. They were a superstitious bunch.

"Demeter, I can't give it eyes," Jemima retorted quietly. She then took on a hushed tone. "It might come to life." Her eyes darted from left to right as if something were to pop out of nowhere. "Or... I could summon someone ... or something."

"Jemima, who told you that giving eyes would bring it life?"

"Gus was reading this book that had this kitten paint these dragons and—"

"— the dragons came to life after they got pupils?", Demeter and the silver cat replied in unison. The pair groaned as the red-brown kitten shook its head like a rattle.

"Look, it is fine. Dragons are not real and whatever this is probably is not either." Silver noticed the remaining cats start to shake at the "probably". "I mean, they definitely are not real." He sighed and drew his claws from his right front paw, staring at the weird face. "Anyway, what is this supposed to be?"

"It's a centaur! Well, a centaur head and part of its neck but I'm gonna get there soon." The red-brown kitten sounded content as she purred and closed her eyes. "I made my own kind, too. It's a..." Jemima tried to remember the name of the weird animal she saw in a book about the Horn of Africa. "Oh! It's a gerenuk."

"Stop making up words," teased the silver cat. "Let me draw the pupils so the remaining Jellicles can go to sleep." At least he was aware of how odd their own name was. Jemima hesitated for a bit before letting Silver continue with the plan. The watcher assumed that Silver was the head of the group present. Authority over everything, it seemed.

As the silver cat, dragging its claw in an orbit inside of each eye, drew the pupils, the ground began to shake within the four walls — three physical, one invisible — of the junkyard. The refrigerators began to topple into the ovens, crumpling them while glass and metal spewed out. The cats and watcher were happy that they had gathered away from the junk but were still scared by the vigorous movement of the earth. While Silver continued to draw on the box, either indifferent or unaware of what was going on, the remaining cats decided to climb onto the watcher's back, arms, and head. The claws digging into his back were less frightening than the shaking.

"And... it's done!", the silver cat shouted in triumph. The shaking of the earth stopped suddenly though none of the cats were willing to step onto the ground. Looking at the finished piece, he felt proud that it was left finished... until a glowing circle began to grow from underneath the box, followed by a loud warping sound. The silver cat ran to the watcher, digging its claws into his lower leg. "What's going on?!"

"I told you, Munkustrap! It'll come to life!", Jemima stuttered as she wrapped her whole body around the watcher's head. "I'm too young to leave!"

A mixture of cats yowling and human screaming filled the air yet nobody around seemed to care.

"Shut up, ya drunk!", an older woman yelled from the second floor of the watcher's apartment building. "Tell those cats to shut up, too!" An old boot soon followed, dropping directly in front of the watcher and cats. Neither the cats nor the man was going to receive help.

As the warping continued, the group could only stare in fear and terror. What was going to pop out from underneath the cardboard box? Was it going to be a dragon? They could only anticipate so much.

A flash of light blinded the group suddenly, startling the watcher enough to fall on his side; luckily for the cats, none of them, aside from the watcher, were injured. The flashlight died, leaving the group to rely on the moonlight to see anything. The cardboard box was now in the air. Underneath the cardboard box, a short figure was mounted on a small horse. Upon closer inspection, they noticed there was no horse head. The body of the rider was connected to the horse—

"Oh, my Everlasting Cat! It's the centaur!" Jemima was both in awe and in fear of what the centaur wanted. She tried to keep her voice down so as to not scare it away. "What do you think it wants to do with us?"

The cats gave a collective puzzled "meow" and continued staring at the centaur. The watcher decided that he had eaten expired cheese and quickly yet gently placed all of the cats on the ground. He then rushed off back to his apartment building, now fully certain that he was having a bad dream. As the front door slammed, the centaur began to flail its arms.

"AAAH! WHERE AM I?! WAMMAWINK? ZULIUS? ANYBODY?!" The centaur began to run in a circle, a chicken without its head. Her voice was rather scratchy for a mythical creature. "I CAN'T SEE!"

The cats, who were previously scared, calmed down and were now puzzled by the weird animal in front of them. They knew it looked weird but they didn't know it would act weird, too. Munkustrap placed his right front paw to his face as the centaur struggled to shake off the cardboard box from her head. This would be a long night.