Meowtopia #1: Prisma's Quest Begins

Chapter 3

The morning was sunny, but it was still rather cold outside. Prisma was on the train and looked out of the window. They had been going through nothing but forest for quite a while now. Meowtopolis, being the capital of the whole planet, was a big city, so it was a better to take the train to get from the part of the city Prisma lived in to the part where the art school was.

Prisma sighed and leaned her head against the window. She grabbed a picture that was in her pocket, looked at it and smiled. Her friends were in the picture. "Aw man, I've been gone for about two hours and I already miss you guys", she said to herself and stuffed the creasy picture back into her pocket. As she looked out of the window, the trees disappeared. The train was in a tunnel. The lights and glowy exit signs in the tunnel almost looked like shooting stars as the train rushed by. "Heh, I wish these actually were shooting stars. I'd love making a wish for every one of them", Prisma pointed out. Noticing that the people around her started giving her weird looks because she kept talking to herself, she cleaned her throat decided to shut up for the rest of the ride.

The train reached the end of the tunnel just in the moment Prisma's eyes had adjusted to the darkness. "Oh damn! My eyes!", Prisma exclaimed, closing her eyes, dazzled by the light of the morning sun. She gave the people around her a nervous look, noticing them staring back with weirded out expressions. As her eyes had adjusted to the bright sunlight again, Prisma noticed that the train now was on a bridge above the forest. It looked stunning from above. The train passed a huge white and shimmering statue that stuck out of the forest in the distance. It was a cat with long hair, holding a sword up into the air with her left hand and holding a triangular shaped crystal in her right one. The blade of the sword appeared to be made of the same glass-like material as the crystal, and as the sunlight hit it, a rainbow seemed to come out of the sword. Prisma knew that the statue represented Queen Galactic Prism, the person who made Meowtopia the colorful and amazing place that it is today. Back when she was around, it was even more colorful and had seven planets in total, each one being ruled by another cat. But that was pretty much everything Prisma could remember from history class.

The train now was on actual ground again and not on the bridge anymore. Houses appeared around the tracks, firstly separate ones, then entire villages and finally what appeared to be a whole new town. Prisma was glad about having more to look at than just trees. The train passed a sign, and Prisma could barely read it because it went by so quickly. "Welcome to Pasteltown, the pastel-colored borough of Meowtopolis!", she read to herself quietly. A few skyscrapers could be seen in the distance and it felt a lot more like being in Meowtopolis again.

Suddenly, a voice said through the speakers: "Next stop: Meowtopolis School of Art." Prisma looked up as if somebody had called her name and grinned happily. "Yes, finally! Time to get outta here!", she said, this time ignoring the others looking at her. She grabbed her suitcase, which was black with colorful stickers on it, and jumped up as the train slowed down and stopped. Prisma was ready to get off the train, but when the doors opened, a crowd of cats stood there with their luggage. They all looked tired and exhausted, their colorful fur and hair looked rather grayish. Prisma looked at them confusedly, but before she could finally get off the train, the crowd started hurrying to get on the train and accidentally pushed Prisma back. "H-hey! Wait! I gotta get outta here!", she exclaimed. When all the cats were on the train, Prisma managed to make her way to the doors, and just as she hopped out, they closed. "Phew, that was close!", she said and wiped some dust off her shirt. "What did all the people do here? Why did they wanna leave this place that badly?", Prisma wondered. "Aw, whatever. I better keep going." She looked around.

In front of her, next to the small train station, was a sign above a wide way, on its left and on its right were trees, next to the trees lawns with beds of colorful flowers. The sign looked like a rainbow with clouds on its ends and said "Meowtopolis School of Art" in white letters. "Oh, wow!", Prisma said, being very amazed. She walked down the way and petals from the trees rained down on her in the wind. Prisma noticed the benches between the trees. Some people sat there, chatting while they were drawing and painting. The way led to a big open space surrounded by trees in front of a huge building. It was painted in bright colors. In the middle of the place was a fountain, again with some benches around it, as well as some flower pots. Prisma just stood there, looking at the building. "Holy crap", she said after a while. "I bet the people here are all incredibly talented and way better than me. But it's too late to turn back now...!"