This is where everything began.

The sky shines a striking yellow of the disc of the sun peeking from the eastern horizon. The grass is lush, the palm trees reaching for the skies and a wild yell is heard. Enter a zebra swinging from a vine. He sails majestically through the air, his mohawk mane flowing behind him, black and white colors that flocked his body, gleaming in the light. He lands on one hoof and runs through a choir of penguins, who each fly away in a perfect diagonal pattern.

The zebra takes a running leap and jumps over a canyon, landing softly on the other side and continuing running.

From behind a bush, a lion arises, gaping after the zebra with ambition and frenzy in his eyes. His brown and gold mane and ocean blue eyes look ruffled and crazed.

The lion starts creeping after the zebra, then initiates a full-on sprint, both running towards the water, the glistening, glorious water...and the lion stops before the zebra.

"SURPRISE!"

The zebra screams as he falls backward off of his treadmill, plunging into an accidental double somersault, slamming his head against the wall at the back of his enclosure.

"Alex," he yells to the lion, who was leaning in his treadmill. "Do not interrupt me when I’m daydreaming! When a zebra,'s in the zone, leave him alone."

"Come on, Marty. Just wanted to wish you a happy birthday." Alex replied.

The zebra stops at his track and smiled softly. "Hey, man, thanks."

Alex groaned from the pain on the right side of his jaw, rubbing his cheek. "Hey, um, I got s-I got something stuck in my teeth. It's driving me crazy. Can you help me? Please?"

"Ah! You came to the right place, my friend. Dr. Marty, D.D.S., is in the house. Please hop on top of my sterilized examination table, if you may." Alex hops onto a brick wall separating Marty's pen from another's and he opens his mouth wide.

"I don't see anything."

"It's on the left," Alex mumbled while Marty was basically in the depths of his mouth.

"Ow!"

"Oh, sorry."

"OK, just don't talk with your mouth full." Marty goes deeper into the mouth and found the problem. "Aha! Right in here."

After a few seconds of examination, he finds the object.

"What the heck is this doing in there," he exclaims, holding a miniature snow globe with Alex’s likeness in it in his hand.

"Happy birthday!" Alex exclaims.

"Aw, hey, thanks, man." The zebra remarked. "You put it in behind the tooth. You all right."

"These aren't even on the shelf yet. Here." Alex grabs the souvenir and shakes the globe before handing it back to Marty. "Check it out. Check it out. Look at that. Ooh! Look at that. Ooh!"

After Marty got his gift back, he looked closer to see a sculpture of his friend in the center of the snow globe doing his pose.

"Look at that. It's snowing." Marty commented, removing the snow globe to see the lion doing his pose.

"Ten years old, huh? A decade. Double digits. The big 1-0." The lion smiled brightly at the zebra, believing he was pleased with the gift. Unfortunately, Marty grew forlornly while looking at the snow globe and Alex began to frown as well.

"You don't like it," Alex asks.

"No, no, it's great," Marty replies.

"You hate it. Ugh! I should've gotten you the Alex alarm clock. That's the one. That's the big seller." Alex responds.

"No, no, no. The present's great, really." Marty says, placing down the snow globe down on the ground with others of Alex memorabilia. "It's just that another year's come and gone and I'm still doing the same old thing. 'Stand over here. Trot over there. Eat some grass. Walk back over here'." Marty demonstrated, making the lion tilt his head and nod.

"I see your problem," Alex tells him.

"Maybe I should go to law school." Marty considered.

"You just need to break out of that boring routine," Alex encouraged, walking across the brick wall.

"How?" Marty pondered.

"Throw out the old act. Get out there. Who knows what you're gonna do. Make it up as you go along. Adlib. Improvise. On the fly. Boom, boom, boom." Alex emphasizes, throwing some air punches.

"Really," Marty questions.

"You know, make it fresh," Alex suggested.

"Fresh, huh? OK. I could do fresh." Marty replied with a smile.

"Works for me," Alex responded, smiling.

The bells at the entrance of the zoo, signaling everyone that it was open. It also made a certain lion burst with excitement. "Here come the people, Marty! Oh, I love the people! It's fun-people-fun-time! Whoo!" He cheered, jumping out of Marty's pen.

Alex landed into a Gloria's habitat and tap dances on her butt. "Let's go, Gloria! Up and at 'em! We're open!" The hippo let out a deep yawn and her brown eyes gazed around.

"What day is it?" Gloria asked.

"It's Friday! Field trip day! Let's go! Come on!" The lion says cheerfully.

"Yes, it's field trip day. Let's get up and go..." Gloria says, feigning enthusiasm as Alex races off. "...in ten more minutes."

Ricochetting off a lamppost, Alex arrives at a tall pen before tap before tap dancing jovially on the rooftop.

"Come on! Melman, Melman, Melman! Melman, Melman, Melman!" Alex sang while he drummed on the roof of Melman's restroom. "Wake up! Rise and shine! It's another fabulous morning in the Big Apple. Let's go!"

A giraffe with green eyes peeked out, a cone around his neck. "Pfft! Not for me. I'm calling in sick." He says in a watery voice which contrasts with Alex's happy one.

"What?" The lion asks in disbelief.

"I found a brow-- another brown spot on my shoulder." He pointed at a random brown spot on his shoulder, looking at Alex and back to it again. "Right here. See? Right t- Right there. You see?"

Alex grabbed Melman by his cone and looked straight in the eye. "Melman, you know it's all in your head. Hm?"

"Could you at least wake up Ayana then? She would be glad to see your face."

The request made Alex smile. Finally, a challenge at hand to start the wonderful morning.

Then he was off.

Ayana. Ayana was a leopard, a short leopard that had more strength than a small building. It was like yesterday when she first arrived at the Central Park Zoo; she was barely a teen at the time and her violent behavior left, thankfully undeep, wounds in the zookeepers and they were extremely pleased to finally sedate the animal. Melman, however, thought she was contagious, poor thing spent a whole week dosing up on medication and the knowledge from medical books to find a cure.

So, believe anyone at the zoo that says "never seen a leopard like her before." For that matter, they've never had a leopard living there until now. To any of them, the zoo would be a paradise; fresh air, short brick walls, an endless sky to look at and meals served regularly. Bliss.

It wasn't until after the first week did Ayana introduce herself to her new neighbors (Once she calmed down). A duo of chimpanzees, a small band of penguins, a few different kinds of lizards and birds, and the permanent sight of pigeons. A quartet of mammals who lived the closets to the lone leopard were the ones she was basically destined to be with, and to her immense shock, the leopard actually liked them.

A female Hippopotamus, Gloria; A reluctant giraffe, Melman; A zebra with enough conversation starters to keep anyone entertained, Marty. And a lion that was the Prince of New York City, Alex.

Day after day, they spent most of their time together; meaning they picked on each other, surprised one another, and made themselves happy by being around each other. In the end, the number four became a five, and Ayana never seemed happier.

The first to talk about had to be Gloria. When they'd first met, Ayana had wrongly assumed she would be a quiet, reserved animal. In fact, she had been the exact opposite. She had even been so outgoing as to intimidate Ayana in her first few weeks. As the time they spent together grew, though, so did Ayana's understanding of her. She might have come off a confident goddess of the Central Park Zoo, but all of it was just her way of dealing with her own insecurities.

Enter Melman, the tall, lanky giraffe that generally resided at the doctor's office rather than his own pen. At least he wasn't going straight to the dying hole like any other giraffe back home. The duo had hit it off from the start due to the sheer irony of their heights. It wasn’t long before Ayana began to pick up on Melman’s enormous crush on Gloria. She won't tell; only until Melman confesses his feelings to the confident hippo.

Another friend of hers. Alex. His eyes were a deep ocean blue, and he had a beautiful mane of speckled brown and gold. His voice was a purr with the words he spoke were always polite and concise to never irritate those around him. The lion had a flair for the dramatic which only someone of his physical stature could pull off as he did. He was never afraid to share touches with those around him to form physical bonds, and that's what made Ayana love his bear hugs.

Alex was perfect in almost every way. He was funny, beautifully handsome, polite, and he always did his best to cheer everyone up.

Finally, Marty. The zebra is enthusiastic and always willing for a great adventure with his pals.

In the beginning, Ayana only hung around Marty, finding his company very relaxing. They clicked almost immediately. Eventually, she had to hang out with the other three.

However, he also has a complexity about his individuality, and for that reason when Ayana spoke about Africa, she left the detail of all zebras appearing similar and sounding the same out.

Though what made him special was the fact he had big dreams to talk about, and the places he could go.

If Ayana even spoke about the other zebras and the lack of identity amongst them, the dreams would vanish and his spirit would break.

Speaking of Ayana, she woke to the sensation of something or one bouncing near her.

It's not a pleasant thing to wake to, but it's a familiar one.

Add that with the boisterous cheering and the dashing through the animal exhibits like the ball of energy he was. Alex was always like this. It's what she found relieving about the zoo: nobody had unrealistic personalities and always stayed true to themselves.

In an attempt to drown out the bold noise, Ayana lazily stretched on her tree, lazily draped over a branch. She rolls over and takes the chance to spend the rest of the day resting in her camouflage tree.

That's when Alex climbs her tree.

"Ayana!" Alex exclaims. "It's Friday! Field Trip Day," Alex singsongs, flopped over Ayana's back. He tugs at Aina's fur, running it between his paws and humming.

Ignore him.

Ignore him.

"Go back to bed, man," Ayana says blearily.

"Nope! We have to perform to a crowd of people, 'member? Gotta be fresh!"

Ayana grumbles quietly, wanting to stay right where she is and capture a few more hours of sleep.

"Ayana, Ayana come on," Alex urges, jostling Ayana by tap-dancing the branch, disturbing her attempt to sleep. "It won't be so bad! Just another beautiful day in the Big Apple!"

"Gimme five," she mumbles. Alex says a big thank you and gives her a famous bear hug, sliding off her back and making a melee for his pen.

"Mornin', Ayana," Marty shouted over at her. She waved her hand and resumed her position under the tee branch. She observed the zoo come to life before her. The ringing gongs of the bell at the entrance of the zoo rang out, other animals waking up and starting their daily routines, and the zookeepers were doing their jobs.

Today should be a good, maybe even great, day.

...So nobody should mind if Ayana just went back to bed.

The gate was opened, children and their parents flooded past them. Not too long passed by when a grown man threw away his coffee cup. Mason the chimp retrieves a newspaper, a bagel, and the half-empty coffee cup from the trash and returns to his roommate Phil, a mute chimp.

The animal was resting on a tree with empty root beer cans on his stomach.

"Phil!" Mason called to his primate roommate, noticed he was still asleep, then smacked him with the newspaper. "Wake up, you filthy monkey."

Mason hands him the coffee, which Phil gargled and threw it back on the ground while Mason read the paper and ate the bagel.

Five minutes later, back at Ayana's habitat, the leopard slept in peace.

Well, reader, in case you didn't know, leopards' like to spend their day resting, camouflaged in the trees, or hiding in caves.

So maybe she shouldn't have gone back to sleep when her only feline friend had tried to convince her to wake up. But it's not like Alex could beat her. Even with his taller stature, he doesn't try to get stronger like Ayana.

Now for the challenge.

Alex sneaks out of his pen and slips inside Ayana's, climbing up ber tree, and saw his great big lovable feline friend crammed onto a branch she could never outgrow because she was the smallest out of his friends.

Alex grins in anticipation, bending his knees and practically wiggling with excitement. As has been the ritual for years upon years to re-awake a sleeping leopard, Alex takes a running leap at Ayana and lands on the root of the limb.

Ayana squawked, fumbling with the vibrating tree branch- but in one smooth motion, she spun upon her paws and jabbed, sending the would-be assailant flying into the ground.

Ayana peered over her branch and groaned. "If I wake up, will you stop?"

Alex clutched his noses in pain because he forgot to dodge, gave a thumbs-up, and raced to his pen before anyone saw.

Ayana smirks.