Meowtopia #1: Prisma's Quest Begins

Chapter 5

„Hey, Canny, it's 6:30 pm...", Prisma said, sitting at her desk and looking at the clock above it. "Doesn't that mean that dinner is ready in the cafeteria?" Spray Can, lying on her bed, looked up from Prisma's book that she had been looking through for quite some time now. "Oh, yeah... I didn't even notice the time going by. Let me tell ya, you've got quite a bunch of good ideas written down here! I like that one dude from that parallel dimension where all guys are girls and all girls are guys... What was his name again?" "Oh, you mean Stormy Seas? Heh, I actually planned a super-dramatic death scene for him...", Prisma said and got up from her chair. Canny looked sad, but Prisma could tell that she was only acting that. "Oh, whaaat? You monster!", Canny exclaimed. The two girls laughed.

"Uh, anyway, what about dinner?", Prisma asked. "Oh, that... Well, I'm more hungry for this book than for actual food right now, ya know", Canny said and winked. Prisma was surprised and glad that Canny liked the ideas she had drawn and written down. "How about you go alone today and try to talk to some more people? I'm sure you'd like to know more people here at this school than just me. It's important to talk to the other artists here, ya know", Canny explained. "Just get me a chocolate bar or something from the vending machine at the end of the hallway when you come back, okay?" Prisma smiled and got up from her chair. She agreed and walked out of the room, heading for the elevator to go to the cafeteria on the first floor.

Compared to the first time she had been in the hallways, they were rather crowded this time. "Hmm, I think they've all been busy when I arrived, and now they stopped working for the rest of the day, I guess...", Prisma mumbled to herself. After arriving on the first floor, Prisma could hear the sound of many people talking as well as the clanking noise of tableware. She went down the hallway, following the sound, and arrived at a big open door. Looking inside, she could see dozens, maybe hundreds of her fellow art students, sitting in groups, eating and chatting. Prisma got a little nervous thinking about where she was gonna sit.

Prisma felt too shy and awkward to join any of the groups and was relieved when she noticed a completely free table in a corner. Deciding to sit there, she grabbed a tray and a plate and got herself some food. They had pizza and salad there. Prisma was happy because she loved pizza. Just as she happily headed towards her table, she noticed that some other people had already sat down there. "Aw man", Prisma said quietly as she watched them. But finally, she decided to sit down there anyway. As she came closer, she realized that one of the two people sitting there was a cat and the other one was a bird. Birds, at least anthropomorphic ones, were kind of a rare thing on Meowtopia since pretty much every species had their own planet or even their own solar system, and most people didn't leave their home planet to live on another one, even though travelling between planets was a quite common thing.

Prisma cleaned her throat and stepped forward. "Ahem, uh, could I maybe sit here? I mean, eheheh, there's barely any seats left and... well, you know...", she said and laughed nervously as she wished to vanish into thin air because of how awkward and dumb she felt. The cat, who had light green fur and pink straight hair, and the bird, who had yellow feathers and light brown hair, stopped talking and simply looked at Prisma for a brief moment which made her even more nervous. Finally, the cat smiled. "Sure!", she said and moved a bit to the side so that Prisma could sit next to her.

Prisma placed her tray on the table and sat down. "So, um, well... Maybe I should introduce myself", Prisma began, trying to avoid awkward silence between the three of them. "My name is Prisma. Prisma Colors." "Oh, hi then, Prisma", the green cat said happily. "My name is Daisy Breeze. And this over here " -she pointed at the bird- "is my friend Flora." Flora stopped slurping her milkshake. She smiled and simply said "Sup" with a rather hoarse voice. Prisma looked at Flora and tried to figure out what kind of a bird she was. But Flora, even though she was actually focused on eating her pizza, noticed Prisma's look and looked up with a confused expression. "What is it? Never seen an anthro bird before?", she asked. Prisma was startled. "Um, I did, but I was just wondering-" "You see, I'm from planet Avia", Flora started. "Pretty much everybody there is a bird. We don't have weird names like you guys here on Meowtopia either. Everybody here is pretty much named after what they look like. Like, what's up with that?" "N-no! I wasn't staring at you because you're... well, from another planet", Prisma excused herself. "I was just wondering what kind of bird you are. Your feathers are all yellow... are you a canary bird?" Flora took a big sip from her milkshake and let out an annoyed sigh. "Many people think that", she said. "But I am in fact a budgie. I'm kind of a rare breed though. You see, most budgies have almost black eyes and yellow-green feathers with a typical black pattern. I got red eyes and completely yellow feathers. They say it's some kind of genetic defect", Flora explained. When she was done, she leaned back on her chair and took another big sip of her milkshake. Daisy rolled her eyes at Flora's sudden outburst of explanation as if it was something that occurred frequently. She leaned to the side and nudged Prisma with her elbow. "The more you know, right?", she asked jokingly and winked. "Heh, yeah", Prisma replied, still being a little nervous about her new surroundings, but also excited about meeting two new people. "The more you know..."

„So, who do work with? You know, on the project for this year's art festival?", Daisy asked a couple minutes later, wiping some pizza crumbs off her shirt. Prisma stopped drinking the ice coffee she had just bought. "Not sure if you know her, but I'm working with Spray Can", she replied. Daisy's eyes widened. Flora, who was slurping her milkshake, nearly choked on it. Prisma was confused. "You are Spray Can's new partner?", Daisy asked in disbelief. "Um, yep", Prisma replied and forced herself to smile even though she was very insecure. Why were Daisy and Flora so shocked?