Josephine Brown made her way quietly into the Great Hall, the name for the building that was effectively Animalia's City Hall. Things had obviously been cleaned up since the open house party that had been held to help Animalia further integrate itself with Lyre and open up to the rest of the world, and Josephine privately felt that had been a good thing. Animalia's creation was accidental and a surprise, and she was privately sure it would probably take a while for people to fully accept a society of half-human/half-animal people living alongside them. Things like that party were good for helping everyone getting to know each other and ultimately see that living together was possible.
"Good morning, Mrs. Brown," came a voice from behind her and she turned to see that it was of the uplifted cattle, who had taken the name Daisy and like Josephine was presently a member of Animalia's City Council.
"Call me Josephine, please," Josephine answered, "as it wouldn't be right to say I own you since you've been uplifted, right?"
"Right," Daisy nodded.
"So that makes us colleagues and equals," Josephine replied, "and hopefully friends..."
And Josephine was honest there. The fact that Animalia came by surprise didn't change her kind and gentle soul. She, like her husband, had to accept that Abby had been infected and would likely spend the rest of her life as an Animalian, and she had seen much of the work that the Animalians had done in creating their own little society. While many of their uplifted livestock had moved and began to look toward other careers and opportunities as being uplifted had opened themselves up to new experiences, but a fair number had decided to stay on the farm. Chief among them was Samson who was taking on a role of foreman for the farm's work, which Josephine was privately very grateful for. Martin wouldn't be able to do all the work on the farm forever. Having Samson's help would keep it going and once things were ready with fields that were planted, the farm would grow enough to feed Animalia's herbivores and keep things sustainable. All of that was something that struck Josephine as something more than just animals with human form. It was like the Animalia Virus actually introduced humanity into the animals it infected, and in some ways the best parts of humanity. Josephine did feel some warm friendship with that.
"Okay... Josephine," Daisy said slowly and walked in as Josephine held the door for her.
The two calmly walked in and began to make their way for the main council chambers. In all her life, Josephine had never seen herself as a public servant of any kind. She figured she'd live out her days as Mrs. Martin Brown and be with him until the day came that they couldn't keep the farm running. Yet, after Animalia got its start, she found herself voted onto the Animalia City Council. She wasn't sure if the uplifted animals had voted for her to fill a needed seat or because since the Brown Farm was geographically grouped with Animalia and not with Lyre, that Animalia would need Josephine's voice to represent its two resident humans, but for the most part everyone had been kind and respectful of her, so she accepted the post, as it did let Martin focus on the farm with Samson and Abby's help.
They arrived to find most of the others getting ready. The council chambers was a fairly large room with a large horseshoe table that was built to be tall enough and sturdy enough for even some of the uplifted mega-fauna from the Lyre Zoo to actually stand on without the table breaking. The chairs were also built of very sturdy construction as well, as Daisy, an uplifted Belgian Blue needed to support her enhanced musculature. Josephine took her chair, which was also specially made, though mostly to make sure she wasn't made to look like she was too short in comparison to many of the uplifted animals. The council wasn't real big, with only seven members. They consisted of Josephine and Daisy, of course, but also an uplifted raven who liked the name "Nightwing" in reference to his black feathers, an uplifted red squirrel who liked the name Scarlet, an uplifted gopher snake who took the name Scales, an uplifted wolf by the name of Harry (though he sometimes wrote it out as Hairy), and an uplifted doe deer who had wandered in a daze after being uplifted into Lyre and was named Bambi by a little girl that she ran into. Standing at the head of the room was Robbie, Animalia's deputy mayor.
"I thank you all for coming," Robbie spoke, "especially since this meeting is outside our normal meetings for Animalia's day to day business and so on."
"I take it there is new business to handle?" Josephine asked.
"In a matter of speaking, yes," Robbie answered, "as you all know, Animalia is new and while we've gotten legal protection, genuine acceptance is something that we need."
"The humanssss in Lyre have been acccccepting," Scales pointed out, his voice having a slight hissing tone to it.
"Yes, but full acceptance will require being accepted by more than just our neighbors in Lyre," Robbie commented, "they accept us because we've been able to show them how well we've been able to work together on a person to person basis. The people we need to convince are the people who don't live near us."
There was a collection of nods, and what Robbie mentioned did make sense. Josephine wasn't one to really obsess over news coverage and how people commented on it, but for Abby's sake, she did follow some of the news coverage from the party. A lot of the reporting seemed fairly positive and opened up possibilities for medical since that without the Animalia Virus wouldn't have been possible, but there was also some commentary on polling information that Animalia's "welcome" by humanity as a whole was fairly limited. Some saw opportunity for development and good press, but most seemed to be putting the "welcome" as being limited to legal protection from murder and obvious discrimination and that was it. That meant that if there was any major political shift at the national level, without widespread acceptance, Animalia might face future problems.
"The wedding in Las Vegas went fairly well," Daisy commented, "and everyone that went looked like they had fun."
"Yes," Robbie chuckled, "and that will be some sign of good news for the future, but that's a one time event. Clara and I think Animalia will need something more that we can use more often than that..."
"Like an ambassador?" Josephine asked, "a representative who would pretty much share the successes and benefits of their society?"
Robbie nodded.
"I believe we could all support that," Bambi commented, "as all of us are so new..."
Everyone nodded to that.
"Yes," Robbie nodded, "the real issue would be WHO would be the ambassadors? In a way we will need those who are familiar with both the human and Animalian worlds and understand how the human world."
Things were quiet for a few moments.
"Wouldn't Mrs. Brown's daughter and her group of friends on our little panel for the IAC be the best for that role then?" Scarlet wondered.
"You can't be considering sending her around the country!?" Josephine gasped, "she still has school!"
"But the news did seem to respond positively to them at the pot-luck party," Nightwing commented, "and they have the most experience with both worlds."
"And aren't there schools that are doing their classes on the internet?" Harry questioned.
"Well, yes..." Josephine answered, "but that'd have her so far away... I... I don't want to wake up one morning and find my baby girl's been killed by some idiot halfway across the country. I can accept Abby being an Animalian... but I don't want her to die..."
"For the moment, I don't think we'll be sending anyone beyond Lyre or Animalia," Robbie said with a very assuring tone to Josephine, "the idea was that we could set up a web cam/broadcast system for Animalia and to try and answer questions that people have about Animalia and so on. Whoever our ambassadors would be would be able to reach out and talk to the world without ever leaving Lyre or Animalia."
Josephine breathed a sigh of relief at that. She was all for helping integrate Animalia with humanity, but she didn't want Abby's own schooling or safety interrupted.
"Thank you," Josephine breathed a sigh in relief.
She looked down for a moment before she felt a warm hug come in from the side. She looked over to see that it was Daisy who had an arm around Josephine's shoulders and got Josephine's head nestled against Daisy's shoulder. Daisy gave Josephine a warm smile.
"I'm sure that Robbie and Clara aren't planning anything that would put your daughter in any real danger," Daisy assured her, "and if need be we'll ALL do our best to protect our ambassadors."
"Here, here," Harry seconded the motion.
"Thank you," Josephine answered.
"So are we agreed on who our ambassadors will be?" Robbie asked, "or is there anyone else who would fit the role?"
"I'd think ANY of the humans that have become Animalians could serve as ambassadors from time to time," Bambi commented, "and if they're only going to be showing how we get along with Lyre's humans and the Browns... that's possible..."
"But the media likessss our friendsssssship panel," Scales pointed out, "we can asssk them assss our firsssst choicccce."
"So, all that would be left would be to settle what questions our ambassadors will answer," Harry commented.