A/N: hey guys Electro here. And boy do I have something waiting for you. But it won't be till the end so brace yourselves. Plus it'll a nice little reference to, by now, would be a classic for videogames. I mean you just can't forget an amazing game like this, anyways. I hope you enjoy, please reveiw cause I like to see y'alls opinions. Electro out.

Chapter 11
Greetings & Salutations

Chris's (Jack's) POV

At first, the bear seemed quite happy to see us. That was until he saw me. His expression went from gleeful to infuriated faster than you can say 'Hello'. The next thing I knew, I was on the opposite end of the classroom with a bloody nose and a sore jaw. And I was pretty sure something else was broken too. But before I even had a chance to register what was happening, the bear lifted me up by the throat to his eye level.

"H-hey buddy, how've you been?" I wheezed in my Irish accent. "Umm… I'll be honest wit' you. I don' know who you are, or what I did to piss you off. So how 'bout you put me down and we can talk 'bout this. Sound good?"
"Bullshit, you know what you did," he snarled. "You just left without a trace. Do you know how badly you hurt Mel? I swear, you have a lot of gall to be showing your face…"
I didn't hear the rest of his rant over the sounds of Melody and the other animals pulling the bear away from me. I fell to the floor in a slump and was gasping for air. Panic was starting to set in since I couldn't breathe, but then a warm familiar glow flowed through my jaw and neck; I could breathe again.

I looked over to the other animals as I got back on my feet; Melody seemed to be explaining something just out of earshot, and looks of sympathy seemed to wash over their faces as they glanced in my direction. I felt a pang of guilt in the back of my mind.

The bear broke away from the group and came over to me. As much as I didn't feel like getting beaten to a pulp a second time, I stood my ground and glared at him.
"Hey, sorry about that…" He unexpectedly apologized. "If I'd known, I wouldn't have tried to strangle you."
'Tried to?' I had thought. 'You WERE.'
"And if what Mel says is true, then I guess I should reintroduce myself," the bear said as he offered his paw. "Name's Garret Grizolli."
I almost made a double take at the name.
"Uh, okay… I'll accept your apology then," I replied as I shook his paw. "I'm Jack Frost."
"Yeah, we know who you are," Garret chuckled.
"Oh…"
"Hey, don't worry about it," he encouraged with a pat on my shoulder as he let a rhino take his place.
I thought I felt small next to Garret, but this rhino was a giant compared to me. He even had to crouch down in order to offer his hoof.
"Hey Jack, I'm Seth Ceroston," he introduced. "It's good to see ya, bud."
'Okay, this is getting weird,' I thought as I shook his hoof.
Before I could process the weirdness though, I was suddenly hit by a ball of fur that wrapped around my midsection.
"Hey Jack!" It spoke in an excited manner, before releasing me.
It turned out to be a squirrel.
"It's so good to see you again!" She exclaimed while bouncing in place. "But since you probably don't remember me, I'm Aubrey Larkashew!"
Looking at her, I wasn't quite sure if this was her normal demeanor or if she was on a sugar high by how excited she looked.
Aubrey skittered off as a gopher walked up; or was it a groundhog? I always mix those two up.
"Hiya there, Jack," she greeted. "It's been a while. I'm Sarah Carcamas."
I couldn't help but grin at the name as I shook her paw.
The last member of the group was a badger.
"Hey dude," he lazily greeted as he offered a fist. "Name's Connor Cratel."
I gave him a fist bump and he rejoined his friends in whatever it was they were up to, finally giving me a chance to wrap my head around the names. Oddly enough, they were all familiar to me; my friends back home had similar names.

Melody suddenly grabbed my arm and pulled me into the hall.
"We're leaving, now," she explained.
"Woah, wait. We can't just leave," I said as I escaped her grip. "We just got here, and your friends seem nice."
"Yes, they are. But that doesn't change the fact that we can't risk having you exposed!" She hissed.
"Look, in case you forgot, my bag is still in there. And judging by the trouble you seemed to be having yesterday, maybe some extra brainpower will be helpful. And by the way, what did you tell them earlier?"
"I, uh, told them you got hit by a car…" She trailed off.
"By a car," I repeated.
"And that you lost your memory…"
"Uh-huh."
"And that you were wandering around for the past few days."
"Right… Thanks for that," I said unamused.
"Okay! I'm sorry!" She exclaimed. "I just- I was worried when Garret had you at the throat. I panicked."
"It's fine, Mel. It's fine," I sighed.
"And yeah, you're right," she admitted. "They'll probably be able to help. I still need to run some diagnostics on your biological makeup, find out what exactly… Changed…"
She face palmed.
"Shit! I forgot to take a sample! Now we've got nothing to compare you to. Ugh! How could I forget something so basic!"
I grabbed her wrists before she got to hitting herself.
"Mel! Calm down. I'm sure we can find whatever it is you need. Heck, it might even be in my bag," I joked. "I mean, so far, nothing but good has come out of that thing."
She giggled at the statement.
"Okay. You can let go of me now."

As we stepped back into the lab, Connor came up to us while holding my duffel bag.
"Hey Mel, is this your bag? Because we can't seem to get it open," he quickly added.
"Oh, uh… Actually-"
"It's mine actually," I said as I stepped forward and took the bag.
"Well you might want to think about getting some grease for that zipper or something because-"
The badger went silent as I opened the bag with ease.
"But… How did… Not ev…" The badger stuttered as he looked at the open bag.
"What? It's not just a zipper," I told him. "It's a nano-scaled bio-recognition lock. I mean, honestly, did you think I'd leave anything important in here without it being secure?"
Melody and Connor both looked at me with stunned expressions. And to be honest, I was surprised myself. The information came from somewhere in the back of my mind, not from my own thoughts.
"I'm kidding, you know," I chuckled evasively. "The zipper tends to get stuck sometimes; you guys must've loosened it up while we were outside."
"Uh… Right."

As Melody was catching up with her group of friends, I was looking through the contents of the bag. I found a small thumb drive with a small tag attached to it. It read:

HOMO-SAPIEN BIOLOGICAL DATA/CHRISTOPHER ANTHONY BIOLOGICAL DATA/VULPES LAGOPUS (SAPIEN) BIOLOGICAL DATA

'Well… That's convenient,' I thought to myself as I pocketed it. 'Better show this to Mel later.'
I fished out what I was looking for not long after, the envelope containing the various blueprints. I figured they would give me some better insight on what exactly each of the gadgets in the bag could do. The first blueprint I pulled out was for the pair of white boots that took up the bulk of the space. As I eyed the schematics, I felt a weird sense of familiarity with them. And just as suddenly, it dawned on me as I looked again at the name of the gadget:

SHOCK ABSORBER (LONG-FALL) BOOTS

I facepalmed as I cursed myself for not recognizing such a simple gadget, then immediately wondered if they would work just like in the game. I put the schematics away and pulled out the boots as I walked on over to Melody and her friends.
"Hey Mel, do you know where the tallest skyscraper is?" I asked her, meriting me a lot of weird looks.
"Um… The tallest one is in Downtown Square, just off of Peak Street," she answered. "Why?"
"Well if you show me the way, I can show you why," I said with a smirk. "And you're all free to join as well."

I was now standing on the rooftop of Antelope Heights, staring down the twisting building to the street below. While my fear of heights was not that big of a deal to begin with, it certainly got worse now that I was a small fox.
"So what exactly are we doing here?" Mel asked as I slipped on the Aperture Science Long-Fall Boots.
She was the only one to accompany me to the top, the rest of the group I had asked to stay down at street level.
"What do you think I'm here to do?" I asked as I made a few test jumps in place.
"Are you going to throw something off the edge?"
"Replace 'something' by 'me' and you would be correct," I said as I approached the ledge.
"WHAT!?" She shouted as she grabbed my arm to stop me. "ARE YOU INSANE!?"
"I'm perfectly fine, Mel," I told her as I removed her paw. "And if these boots are the real deal, then I'll be fine when I hit the ground as well."
"What are you talking about!?"
"Mel. Just trust me on this," I said as I turned my back to the edge. "See you street-side."
And with a small salute, I jumped.

I had never gone parachuting before, but I can understand now why people love it. The sense of weightlessness as the wind rushes past is amazing. Well, at least it felt amazing after I was terrified by my idiocy. Why in god's name did I think that it was a good idea to jump off the tallest building in Zootopia based on the assumption that I was going to be saved by a piece of technology from a video-game?

That was all that ran through my head for the first five seconds of my fall. Then I briefly enjoyed the rest of what I thought was going to be my last moments. By about the tenth second, I could feel some vibration in the boots. While for most of my fall I was facing the pavement, I was then shifted to an upright position, falling feet-first. Just before I hit the ground, it felt as though time had slowed down. The boots impacted the sidewalk, cracking in a spider-web around me, and dust was blown away from the shockwave.

I stood there for a moment, legs bent, arms outstretched, and my tail as stiff as a board. I was still fazed by the fact that I was still alive. I let out a small chuckle, which soon became a fit of full-blown laughter as I was rushed by Melody's group. A crowd of bystanders surrounded us with chatter as they tried to understand what had happened. It didn't take long for the vixen herself to join the fray; a look of worry was all over her face as she broke from the crowd.
"See Mel! I told you to trust me!" I exclaimed as I walked over to her.
The only response I got was a fist to the snout from a clearly unhappy Melody.