I claim nothing but the animals!

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Oishi was confused. Why was he here again? Oh, yeah.

Fuji.

Fuji and Tezuka were going on a date to the zoo and invited Oishi along. Oishi didn't want to be a third wheel, but Fuji insisted. He had known Fuji for about twelve or so years and he had yet to find his way around letting the blond get his way.

So here they were, making their way into the zoo at the entrance. There were many children and the line to the ticket booth was more of a zigzag due to the children leaning out to look ahead of their parents. The sound of exotic birds could be heard from inside the zoo. It had been years since he was last here.

Oishi sighed. The last time he was here it was with Eiji. That was back before life separated them and they went different ways. They tried to keep in touch, but when Oishi went to Europe to study medicine, both had ceased writing letters and e-mailing. Heck, Tezuka was closer than Eiji, being in Germany whilst he was in London. Even Fuji, being in New York was considered closer than Eiji.

He was sure Eiji stayed in Japan. He couldn't imagine him leaving his family. Ever since he arrived back in Tokyo, he had been keeping an eye out, just to see if he could catch him by chance somewhere. But Tokyo was a large city and Eiji might have moved to Nagasaki or Myagi, where he had extended family.

"Oishi, come on." Fuji brought the dark haired man out of his thoughts. "Let's decide where we want to go first."

"Let's just follow the path. We can look at everything in order." Oishi said.

As they walked and looked at the animals, Oishi could only smile at how peaceful it was at the zoo, despite small children running everywhere. They had to take the Shinkansen (1) Bullet Rail, the Tokkaido-Sanyo Line, to get to the zoo, which was in Osaka. There are five Shinkansen lines in Japan. One of them, the Tokkaido-Sanyo Line, connects Tokyo with Nagoya, Kyoto, Osaka and Hiroshima before terminating at Fukuoka (northern Kyushu). The whole trip was a scenic ride, with Mt. Fuji out the window for most of it.

(A/N: I have yet to come up with a good pun for Mt. Fuji and Fuji Syusuke! I know it's possible!)

Oishi and Tezuka both noticed that Fuji was looking around a lot. More than one does at a zoo.

"Looking for someone?" Tezuka asked.

"I thought I saw a familiar face when we were in line." Fuji said. "I'm hoping that if it is someone I know I will see them again."

They had made it to the giraffes and decided to sit and watch them for a while. Fuji flipped through the brochure while Tezuka and Oishi relaxed.

"Did you know that this zoo is also a conservation center?" Fuji said. "It has animals so endangered that they don't even show them to the public. It also has walk in habitats just down the path."

"Maybe we should do that." Oishi said. "That sounds fun."

Tezuka nodded and they all got up and walked in the direction of the destination.

The first one was a jungle themed habitat, but it was closed for the hour, so they decided to do the Australian one right on the other side. They walked through three sets of fences and were greeted by a lady inside.

"Welcome to our Australian Walk-In Habitat." She said in a cheery voice. "We warn you to stay on the path provided and to not feed the animals. Have fun!"

The lady left them to greet more people coming in. The large area was covered with grass and a small dirt trail with stakes along the sides every few feet. The three noticed that there was another greeter, but this one of the animal kind. A small wallaby made its way over to the three and sniffed at Oishi's hand.

Oishi smiled and tentatively pet the wallaby. Its cute face looked up at Oishi before moving on to Fuji to get more attention. Fuji bent down and the little marsupial licked his face.

"Aww, he likes you, Fuji." Oishi smiled. Tezuka also smirked a little. He looked over to a small enclosure. Some ferret like creatures were in it, but they seemed to have a meerkat-like face.

"Those are Qualls, I think." Fuji said.

"Why are they in their own pen?" Tezuka asked.

"Because the caretakers want us to leave with ALL of our fingers." Fuji said standing up. They walked on the trail watching the wombats dig and the kangaroos and wallabies forage on the grass. There were koalas in some of the trees along with other animals they didn't know the names of.

The three sat down on a bench halfway through the enclosure. The little wallaby was still with them, hopping alongside the whole way, and Fuji played with the little guy.

Oishi then heard something. He looked up to a door on the wall of the enclosure in front of them. It opened slowly, warning any animals in the way to move. A man stepped through with a safari hat on. His head was tilted so that his face was shadowed. He carried a bucket and after closing the door, he reached in and pulled out what looked to be shrubs and roots.

The little wallaby suddenly left Fuji and hopped over to the man. The man seemed very nice and made sure each animal got close to a fair share of food. The man also took a very fresh looking root to a large kangaroo lying down. The large kangaroo looked old and stiff, but accepted the food from the man.

"Aww, isn't that sweet?" Fuji asked.

There was a sudden noticeable stiffness in the man after Fuji spoke. He turned his head up towards the three.

All four of them were dead silent.

The man with the safari hat and who was feeding the animals was Eiji.

………….

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Shinkansen: Super Express (One of the major railways in Japan)

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This is just an idea that has been playing on my mind for a while so I thought I'd let everyone have a taste of it to see if it was any good. It's a little rushed and shorter than I wanted, but at least the first chapter is done.