The train door clicks and shifts, twisting and turning until the door splits in half, opening a path for Steven as he opens the door to the next train car. As Steven enters, the door opens to a bright blue sky with puffy white clouds and warm sunny 80 degree weather. There is a stone path lined with trees, branching off into a few different paths. Off of the path are large chain fences, with plentiful vegetation and wildlife inside, and all around are signs and posters of animals and informational displays describing what's inside the cages.
"Is this.. A zoo, I guess it's not all doom and gloom on this train," says Steven, in a better mood than before now that he at least gets to explore. It's been a few hours since Steven entered the train. As he slowly begins to get into a rhythm, he begins to cheer up and enjoy the better things on the train.
"OOOOOOH, they have TIGERS, I have to see one!" Steven says while exploring his surroundings. Steven runs over to the left where the tiger display board is. As he looks in, he sees a full grown tiger looking back at him, and two more tigers in the background feeding in a smaller, separate enclosure. One looks younger than the other, and is probably the child of the two older tigers.
"Aww, look at this little family, aren't they adorable," Steven says while putting his hand on his chin.
"You're sure excited, can I offer a bottle of water, it's important to stay hydrated on a hot summer day like this!" says a zoo employee next to the tiger exhibit.
"Sure, I could use a drin-" Steven says before suddenly noticing the zoo employee.
The employees are humanoid in figure, but have the heads of different kinds of lizards. Steven notices that the employee offering the water bottle is a gecko, two more employees in the distance are iguanas, and the employee feeding the tigers is a chameleon.
"Wait- you guys are lizards? Isn't that a little....ironic?" Steven says with a smirk.
"Don't patronize me sir, just take the water bottle," says the lizard employee.
"Alright, I don't want to keep you waiting, I better gecko-ing" Steven says with a cheeky smile to a clearly unamused employee.
Steven takes the water bottle and continues on his trip down the brick road. He eventually finds a map of the place abandoned on the ground next to the monkey exhibit.
"Wow, this is a big zoo, nothing I can't handle in a day though, assuming time is even passing in here," Steven thinks. "Lets go to the reptile section, I need to know what that looks like if all the employees are reptiles."
Steven begins to make his way over to the reptile enclosure, exploring the rest of the zoo on his way there. He passes a segment of the zoo dedicated to farm animals, including pigs, sheep, and cattle. A herd of cows moos at Steven as he passes by. He jokefully moos back, laughing to himself as he does. The cows then follow him as he walks by next to the enclosure, continuing to moo at Steven as he moos back.
As he explores the rest of the zoo, Steven begins to see signs for animals that should be extinct, such as a path leading to an area called Mesozoic Meadow.
"Yeah I've seen enough movies about dinosaurs to know that's not a good idea," Steven thinks, avoiding the path. Steven even begins to see signs for mythical creatures, such as an exhibit for Unicorns. Looking into the unicorn enclosure, he sees a herd of horses with large horn protrusions on their heads soaking themselves in mud.
"I always thought they'd be a bit more elegant, then again I thought that about regular horses in the first place," Steven thinks.
Steven eventually reaches the reptile closure after about 30 minutes of exploring the zoo. There is a sign on an arch above him saying "Roaming with Reptiles." The sign leads into a large building designed like a dirt cave, with many different enclaves that hold a glass container, each filled with many different types of lizards, snakes, and turtles. Above the cave like walls are little circular sunroofs meant to give the area lighting. All over the walls are lizard footprints, snake tracks, and dinosaur bones.
YOU ARE READING
Infinity Train Book SU: Gem Shards (Steven Universe AU)
FanfictionThe events of the past few months have begun to take a toll on his mental health. Steven no longer trusts anyone to help him, but his options become very limited when he is abducted by the Infinity Train, a seemingly infinite train with countless ca...
