Today was important, at least for Kenya it was.

  The first time she had ever interviewed someone and she was a bit overwhelmed. Maybe being around children for so many hours each day was getting to her or maybe it was something she ate that morning that suddenly disagreed with her. Regardless, the lioness would push through it as always.

  She had opened the daycare months ago. Things were going pretty well at first. But once word got out about her business, more people started coming by. What started as watching one or two kids at a time quickly turned into five or six at a time!

  While Kenya had babysitting experience prior to this, never had she had to watch over so many kids at once in one day. Money wasn’t an issue for her; her parents had provided more than enough for her to live off of on her own. She could afford to hire one more worker if she really needed it. But the pressure of trying to keep the daycare open while maintaining that financial stability was getting progressively difficult each day.

  She needed help, loathe that she was to admit it.

  Combing her fingers through her rough brown hair, Kenya sighed heavily. Then smiled.

  “You’ll be fine Kenya,” she muttered to herself. “You’re a fighter. Remember that.” Kenya pumped a fist at herself in a somewhat victorious stance. “You’ve got this!”

  CRASH!

  “MISS KENYA!!” A high-pitched scream jostled the lioness out of her thoughts, turning her attention towards the office door. The kids were roughhousing… again.

  Letting out a growl-like groan, Kenya steeled herself before heading off to do damage control. Hopefully, whoever she was planning on hiring was competent- and patient- enough to handle a group of toddlers.

                                                     --------------

  Cedric wasn’t sure what to expect when he first entered the daycare but he sure wasn’t expecting to bear witness to a scuffle happening already. From over the wall separating him from the play area, he watched two children fighting over what looked to be a toy turntable. Both of the kids were boys, Animalia as well… at least, he thought they were both Animalia. The older boy was a grey furred wolf, old enough to be in elementary school, his teeth bore into a snarl as he tugged his side of the toy; the younger boy was an arctic fox, a few years younger than the wolf, silver eyes narrowed into slits as he tugged on his side.

  “Let go!” The wolf demanded, a faint accent tinged in his young voice. “It’s my turn!”

  The fox shook his head before screaming in a whiny tone, “No! It’s my turn!” For a split second, Cedric thought he saw the fur around the boy’s face vanish. Didn’t seem to be the case.

  This game of tug of war continued for some time, both boys getting angrier with each pull. All Cedric could do was watch as they fought while all the other kids watched, unsure of what to do.

  If he were being honest with himself, Cedric would admit that he was not expecting this daycare to be a co-species environment. From the sidelines of the play area, there were four other children just staring at the spectacle. Three of them were Animalia, two girls and one boy, while the fourth was a human girl.

  A yellow hedgehog- the first of the Animalia children- hugged a teddy bear, anxiously biting at her lip. The second child, a pink furred echidna, turned her head to either of the boys as they tugged the toy back and forth. The third one, a violet colored rabbit, just sat in silence, holding up his hands nervously almost as if he wanted to intervene but didn’t know how. And finally the only human of the group, a girl with short orange hair and violet eyes, was- seemingly- cheering for either side to win the tug-of-war.

  Since he technically wasn’t hired yet, Cedric just watched the scene play out before turning his attention to Abby, who was also watching the spectacle. She sighed once; apparently this wasn’t the first time she had seen spectacles like this.

  “Do those kids fight often?” he asked, hoping to break the- somewhat- silence between them.

  “Sometimes,” Abby laughed nervously.

  Rikki’s attention was on the fight as well, clinging to his mother as he focused on the wolf pup in concern. Were they already acquainted?

  It wasn’t long before their fight escalated, resulting in the wolf tugging on the toy so hard that he bumped back into the hedgehog, knocking her to the ground. The fox tugged back just as hard, shoving against the rabbit who grabbed hold of the closest thing within reach. That in turn resulted in a small bookcase falling over, spilling its contents onto the ground.

  Noticing the severity of the situation, the young human suddenly stopped cheering. The echidna screamed out, “MISS KENYA!!”

  Okay, now seemed like a good time to intervene. Cedric was about to let himself in to stop the fight when suddenly a door within the daycare opened and a figure quickly stormed over to the two boys.

  “Alright! Break it up!!”