Zootopia: Project Paradox

by SR2Turoka-1

In the not so distant future humanity finds itself under the tyrannical oppression of a globally reaching organization known as Vanguard. Enter one Nate Roberts a resistance fighter born in the age before Vanguard. On a mission into a research facility where things go terribly wrong Nate finds himself taken to a new world. Crossover with Warframe. Oc x Oc and wildehopps.

3. Chronological Time Period Unknown

Chapter 2: Chronological Time Period…Unknown

(Howdy ladies and gentlemen, I hope everyone is doing well at the time of reading this chapter. I know it's been a while since I updated anything of my own. As many of you may be aware of, much of my time has been spent writing the story Zootopia: Two Worlds with ZombieSlayerOfTheUnderworld and other co-authors. Due to a combination of school, work and writing for this story, my time has been stretched very thin for my other stories that I wanted to write that are of my own idea and creation. This story was the one that I wanted to update for the soonest as I had some really great ideas for this story. I will implement some of them to the story, but for the most part, this story will remain unchanged other than the addition of another mystery into this story's plot, and a shocking surprise for Nate. I know some of you are frustrated at my lack of willingness to want to disclose any details of this change. I however, do believe that you will not be disappointed in the changes I made to my overall plan.

I wanted to once again apologize for my lack of updates to my stories as of late and I hope to have more time in the near future since I am on summer break from college.

Without further ado, I present the next chapter for Zootopia: Project Paradox.)

Confusion…

Pain…

Regret…

Those were the emotions that I felt swirling in my mind as my full realization of what had transpired over the last few hours had caught up to me. In my heart and mind, I felt pain for the loss of such brave and valiant comrades in FoS that I had the pleasure of being able to call my "family." Witnessing each one of my fellow freedom fighters cut down like rabid wolves by Vanguard was difficult enough, but to witness Zhang, the man that my squad had viewed as a mentor and an honorable leader, give his own life to ensure we could complete the mission, it hurt too much. Words couldn't even find a way to describe how much his loss impacted me at the moment. Zhang was the very man that had saved me from a Vanguard death squad when I was in my youth; he was the one who gave me food, shelter, and a means to help protect myself and the world I knew that was gasping for freedom like an old man wheezing for breath. He gave me a purpose and he was the light of reason and hope even when darkness enclosed the world around me and fate seemed ready to seal our world in this dystopia of tyranny and fear.

I felt regret of not being able to save my best friend Barry. The bond of friendship that the two of us shared and developed over the years was as equal parts a weakness in times of battle as it was a boon to our spirit and morale. We always had each other's backs in even the worst of times. He always knew how to cheer somebody up when they really needed it, that part of his personality hidden under the façade that covered who Barry really was. Barry was a nice man and a great friend, but his hard to deal with traits that made so many people want to backhand him over the years were the product of his own losses that he endured before joining FoS. His parents abandoned him at a young age and the only person who ever treated him well and saved Barry from living a life out on the streets was a woman named Jessica who took pity on Barry and took him into her home. One day, when she went out to get her rations for the week, she was killed by a man desperate for her food, a man who Vanguard deemed unproductive to society and therefore undeserving of Vanguard's resources. Barry only found out when a Vanguard official came to the house to kick him out to make room for another family that was being moved there. After years of fending for himself, Barry eventually found an underground agent for FoS that was recruiting people willing to fight for a brighter future and a return to the liberty and memory that was a world that died many years ago. That same man that wanted as much as I did to make the world a better place, a place worth living and dying for, was killed before my eyes and I couldn't do a damn fucking thing to stop it. If only I could have shot first, maybe drawn the soldier's attentions to me, maybe this suit would have saved me and I could have saved him. Then maybe I wouldn't be the only poor soul to be standing in the middle of god knows what forest in god knows where for god knows why.

Then there was the confusion as to where the fuck I was and why the fuck I wound up here. It was clear that it was something with the suit that had brought me to this place that much is certain. The important question was why it did and how it managed to do it. The only thing that came to mind was teleportation by unknown means, which at this point I wouldn't put it past what this fucking weapon system, could do. All I knew is that I was now alone with no idea where I was and what had happened.

I could feel myself starting to cry over all the stress and stimuli of what had happened now working its way through me. I started walking around the immediate area, my mind buzzing with thoughts and memories of what had happened like I was watching a replay of my own life right now.

"Who are you" one voice said.

"Barry, two tangos up on the ridge" said the same voice.

"Shame we couldn't save them" said a different voice.

"What's your name son" asked the same voice?

"…In FoS, our duty is to give the people what they need the most right now" said a voice.

"What's that" replied another voice?

"Hope" said the previous voice.

I screamed at the top of my lungs as my mind went into blind fury and I drew my fist and punched the nearest tree. To my surprise, instead of the pain that would be expected, my hand impaled itself into the thick trunk of the Oak tree I had punched.

I pulled my arm a few times trying to dislodge it from the tree, the plant refusing to let my extremity go. I finally pulled it free as I panted with anger.

Suddenly, I heard a voice say with complete clarity, much clearer than the echoing voices I heard in my mind just a few moments ago…

"You couldn't save them. It's not your fault" said the voice.

The suddenness of it made me whip around in surprise with one of my pistols for the suit drawn. The pistol expanded rapidly in my hand, having been ejected from the palm of my right hand as a block no bigger than a Lego. As soon as the pistol expanded to its full size and now killing potential, I pulled the trigger where I thought I heard the voice come from, sending a red ball of energy out of the "barrel" of the weapon towards my target.

Once I realized the situation before me, I saw that the projectile had impacted not a person, but just a tree, causing the truck to explode and fragment as if struck with a car. The tree still stood, but barely as the shrapnel cleared and I realized that no one was ever there.

I whipped my head around as I pulled out the other pistol in my opposite hand the exact same way and looked around for anyone that could have said that sentence.

I hesitantly stopped looking around as I then said out loud, "H…Hello, is anyone out there?"

I waited a few seconds before a voice replied, "There is nothing to fear out there…nor in here."

My eyes widened as I whipped around franticly to find the source of the voice as it again sounded like it was coming from right near me.

I then said, "Where are you?"

I looked around as the voice then said again, "I'm inside you." The voice then paused a second and said, "I am no danger to you Nate. I am just as confused as you right now."

I immediately began to think that I was going insane or something. I then shouted with fear and curiosity in my voice, "What do you mean 'inside me'? Who are you?"

The voice then said, "I am the A.I. integrated into the suit you are wearing Nate. I am conversing with you via the transference link between myself and your central nervous system. In essence, I am talking to you inside your own brain."

I breathed a shaky breath as I knew I wasn't insane, but that I now had a Vanguard made A.I. stuck inside my head right now.

The A.I. then said, "I…am Chronos."

I felt my own legs feel weak as I fell to the ground as I was afraid of what this A.I. would try to do with me. Would it fry my mind? Steal the secrets I knew about FoS? Would it control my body?

I then said, "Listen Chronos, I want two things to be clear to you. One, I am for sure not afraid of what's going on. Two, I am going to take this suit off before you deliver me to Vanguard or kill me for…"

Chronos then said, "Slow down Nate. I mean it when I say you have nothing to fear. Who…who is this 'Vanguard' you speak of?"

I felt my blood turn to ice as I repeated in my mind what the A.I. had said.

Who is this 'Vanguard' you speak of?

My mind refused to work for a few seconds as I was trying to grasp how an A.I. made by Vanguard didn't know who its creators were. Either this was a ruse, or something really good for me had just happened.

"You…you don't know who Vanguard is" I asked in disbelief?

"No" said Chronos in response.

"What year were you made" I asked out of curiosity?

Chronos remained silent for a few moments before he said simply, "I…I don't know. I have no data on my own creation date stored on my systems.

I then clarified, "But you know what you are clearly, right?"

Chronos then said, "I know what my function is based off of the programing encoded onto my mainframe. I know what I can and can't control with this suit. I don't know who programed me, or how you and I got here. It's almost as if any of that information was corrupted in my systems."

I had my doubts and to my surprise, Chronos was able to sense that I was slow to believe what he said. He then said, "I'm telling the truth Nate."

I was about to ask how he knew my name, when I heard a bush near me…us shake. I spun around with my pistols in hand and Chronos then said, "Nate, two heat signatures detected in the lilac bush bearing 15 degrees to your right. Marking on HUD."

I suddenly saw my blue tinted vision near the bush replaced with a thermal overlay that indicated two heat signatures in the bush. They were too close together to be able to tell what they were specifically, but I could tell for sure that there were two, plus Chronos confirmed what I was seeing.

I didn't want to wait around for what they were and why they seemed to be lying in wait. I raised my pistols and fired two rounds over the bush to scare them away as I then shouted, "Stay away from me!"

I took off sprinting away from the clearing I was in and I heard Chronos say, "I know how we can lose them Nate."

"Ho…" I tried to ask, when suddenly I saw the world around me slow down to near the speed of a snail as I kept running at normal speed. I looked over to my right and briefly saw a hummingbird flying, but its wings were beating at a fraction of the pace it should be. I only managed to get a look at it for a few seconds due to my concern about getting as far away from what was in that bush as I could get.

What the fuck I thought?!

We had crossed the river and I noticed that the pace of my footsteps seemed to be outpacing the rippling and splashing from my feet impacting the river. I couldn't even imagine how this was possible. I stopped on the other side of the river and suddenly the whole world returned to its normal pace, as proven by the pace of a few leaves being carried by the wind through the forest moving at a faster rate than those just moments ago. The leaves drifted away through the air as if without a care in the world. I on the other hand, was not so blessed with a lack of troubles.

I panted slightly as I then shouted to Chronos, "What…the…FUCK…was that?!"

Chronos then said, "An emergency precept in case the operator of this suit was in danger. I shifted the chronotronic field around you to decelerate the space-time field around you, while nullifying the effects of a temporal shift to you yourself."

I then said confused, "I only understood half of…"

Chronos then said, "I made time around you slow down, while keeping you operating at the normal progression of time."

My mind exploded over the fact that apparently Vanguard was experimenting with a means to be able to perform time travel or alter time. Also, I felt a rush as I realized that I was one of the first humans ever to probably be able to experience time travel. However, I now fully realized something else.

What happened to me at the research facility that got me here was probably some form of time travel. The question was how Vanguard managed to even be able to find a means to control time, if indeed I getting here was by time travel.

Chronos then said cautiously, "Now Nate, I'm sure you have some questions, but I'm still trying to wrap my mainframe around this myself. It's as if large chunks of my memory have been deleted, and…"

"HOW THE FUCK IS ANY OF THIS POSSIBLE" I yelled out to no one in particular.

Chronos then chuckled and said, "Well I could tell you how, but I know you want more than that. Sadly, I can't give it to you."

I looked around and saw that indeed we weren't being followed by whatever those heat signatures were; at least nothing visible was coming up on the motion tracker. I'm surprised that I forgot about that even being a thing, but after what I've seen, I'd be willing to believe that aliens were a real thing. I grunted and started walking forwards towards nowhere in particular. I then retracted my pistols back into my palms as I kept walking.

I then heard Chronos speak up as he said, "Nate, where are we going?"

I then said, "You mean where I am going? I still don't trust your fucking virtual ass. Not after what I've seen today."

Chronos then let out a glum and drown out, "Oh…well, I see Nate. As much as I don't want to upset the operator, as long as you're wearing this suit, then you're stuck with me. If my very…presence makes you upset, then I suggest you remove your body from this suit and leave me."

I was half tempted to do just that, but a small part of me didn't want to. I had no idea what could be waiting around here to kill me if I was indeed brought here by time travel. Whether I wanted to admit it or not, Chronos and this damned suit were my best bet at staying alive. After all, he may have just saved me from whatever those two things were lurking inside that bush.

I breathed a heavy sigh as I said, "I'm not going to leave you. I may need your help to survive whatever may be waiting for us out here, whether it's Vanguard or not."

Chronos then said, "Thank you Na…"

I then said clearly to the A.I., "Just because I need you, that doesn't mean that we're friends. You need to earn my trust before I'll be willing to believe whatever an A.I. from…god knows where says."

I didn't want to mention to Chronos that Vanguard made him, only because I was afraid that it may somehow bring his memory back and make things quite…messy for me.

Chronos then said with slight hope in his voice, "I'm stuck in an unknown environment as much as you are Nate. If that's what it takes for us to be able to cooperate and work together as an effective team, then it will be done."

I kept our aimless trek through the woods going as so many questions buzzed in my mind. How could Chronos know my name? Could he read my mind? Could he be trying to trick me, luring me back into the hands of Vanguard?"

After a few minutes of us walking, I then asked, "So you can read my mind?"

Chronos then responded, "Not entirely, I am able to pick up on physical and psychological distress to the operator, with that function rooted in my programming to be able to offer tactical advice and keep the operator safe from harm. The emotional distress you were experiencing back there was akin to extreme distress from the loss of one or several loved ones…people you were close too. Naturally, I tried to offer the best form of comfort that I knew how to be able to, which was reassurance that the loss was not due to the responsibility of the operator. People need to hear what they need to hear sometimes to help them get through the pain of loss."

Chronos then paused and said, "I hope I fulfilled that function as best as I could."

Inwardly, I was impressed by the sophistication of this Vanguard A.I.'s programming, but I was also a little relieved that it seemed the A.I. I was stuck with for now seemed to have my best interests at heart for me.

As I…we kept on walking, I started to hear a distant rumbling sound. I gazed above me when I heard the rumbling turn into the more distinct sound of jet turbines. I then heard Chronos say, "Nate, six 'o clock high. Jet engines, appears to be from a civilian airliner."

I looked up behind me and saw a jet liner that vaguely matched up with an old Boeing 747, but I was unable to determine its exact model. It was easily flying at a cruising altitude of several thousand feet, but it seemed to be shifting its course downwards. Perhaps towards a destination?

Where there's a plane, there are people. Where there are people, there must be a city or something I thought in analysis.

I took off in a sprint towards the direction of where that airliner was heading, apparently much to Chronos' surprise for he then said, "Nate, I know you have a desire to figure out where we are, but think about this carefully. Those "people" may not even be people. We have no idea of where we even are."

I slowed down but still didn't stop running as I thought about what the A.I. had said. I then asked out of curiosity, "Chronos, what is todays date?"

The A.I. then said, "Judging from the temperature and humidity in the atmosphere that my sensors are reading, I would say early April, year...unknown."

I then stopped as I said in disbelief, "Whoa, back it up. What do you mean year unknown?"

Chronos then said, "I mean that if I had a way to be able to determine the year, which I most certainly did given the complexity of my software, it cannot give an accurate lock on when we are right now."

I hated to admit it, but Chronos was right. Barging into a population center of people and asking around for help in an unknown time period with no indication of who we were dealing with and what may be going on right now may turn out to be a bad idea.

I went back to my training with FoS to figure out how I could handle something like this, not that FoS ever prepared its operatives and fighters for contact after time travel. I remember that Zhang had told me that the best option when facing the unknown is to observe the unknown. Gather information, assess the situation, and coming from my guerilla warfare training, the most important thing to do, was to lay low and blend into the population, revealing yourself when the time to strike arises.

"Nate, I know you're there. Nate" asked Chronos, apparently trying to get my attention?

I jumped out of my thoughts and looked towards the jetliner that was now passing out of sight over the tree line in the forest.

I sighed in defeat and said, "Yeah, your right Chronos. We got to figure out what we are dealing with now to not put us into risk later."

Chronos chipped in with an "I am glad that you agree Nate."

I took off again in the direction of the jetliner to figure out just where the hell we wound up. I reached the end of the forest as the trees thinned out and I passed into the open on the other side. I was now standing up on a cliff face overlooking a bay. I gazed out across the waters and saw the jetliner heading towards a formation in the distance. I gazed out towards the sight of structures, manmade, that formed a city. The city stood with its tallest buildings in the center and appeared quite unusual in both the architecture of the buildings themselves, but also in that the city seemed to be built on the intersection of a jungle, a desert, and a rolling expanse of tundra. It was a sight that defied all logic on climate and geography.

Chronos spoke in a speechless tone and said, "Nate, that city architecture does not match any known examples in my memory banks. I advise caution if you attempt what I believe you are thinking as we may be dealing with an unknown society of humans."

I looked around form a way down the cliff and noticed towards my left that there was a narrow and broken up outcropping of rock that seemed to lead down somewhere. Hopefully it led towards the bottom of the cliff. I started walking over towards the outcropping and clung towards the wall to not fall. I followed the path down until the trail ended and I was forced to climb to the ground using rocks and cracks as steps, careful to not slip on my way down. The cliff face was unforgiving as several outcroppings gave out under my feet on the way down. One in particular caused me to drop a foot before I could grab hold of a rock jutting out of the cliff to prevent myself from falling to my doom.

Upon reaching the ground, I was panting heavily from the exertion and the adrenaline rush of nearly plummeting to my death. Oddly enough, I was not sweating in the suit. The air inside the suit seemed to adjust itself to keep my body heat in check; either that or I was getting paranoid of being encased in a sentient super computer capable of god knows what else. I walked across an expanse of gently rolling grass and shrubbery towards where the jet liner had gone. I then heard what sounded like the faint noise of somebody talking.

"Thanks a lot Mikey. You and your stupid imagination once again stopping us from having a vacation" said a disgruntled light female voice.

I dropped down in the knee high grass instinctively to prevent myself from being seen. I listened for the voice again, trying to isolate it from the ambient sounds of bird calls and wind blowing through trees and the grass.

The same female voice then said, "Why can't mom and dad just realize he is like such a total faker."

I started crawling towards where I heard the voice coming from and started approaching the edge of the grass, still hopefully concealed from whoever it was. I reached the edge and my jaw hit the floor.

Ahead of me was a road, a plain country dirt road. On the road was a dark blue pickup truck with its passanger door open and sitting in the seat, legs dangling out to the side between the open car door and the body of the pickup, was not a person. No, it was a fucking Cheetah. I couldn't but help to stare in amazement at the female Cheetah who was wearing clothes and texting on her cell phone. Judging from her attire and her purple dyed hair (fur?), that she was just a teenager. My mind was blank as I couldn't fathom how an animal was wearing clothes and using technology. I studied her behavior for a few minutes and she seemed to be acting like a normal teenager, not some wild man eater.

I then saw her right ear twitch a little as she looked down the dirt to look at something. I tried to catch a glimpse and through the blades of grass, I could make out what looked like three other cheetahs, two that were adults and one that looked like a child or a cub perhaps. Both adults looked like they could possibly be this female teen Cheetah's parents as one was a male and one was a female, both dressed in modern clothes just like the teen in front of me.

The cheetah cub was walking with what looked like a hippo child. My brain couldn't find words as I was looking at animals walking upright and wearing clothes, but now I was witnessing a prey animal walking with a group of man eaters. The hippo was carrying a digital camera of some sort.

"Mikey, I know that you and Alex may think you saw some strange creature, but it could have possibly been a trick of the light, or someone that was hiking through the woods" said the female cheetah with a deeper female voice.

Oh shit I thought. Were these two young animals what I saw on my HUD hiding in the bush?

"But mom, I'm telling you. We saw some weird looking mammal in the woods. He was wearing some funny looking clothes and he was yelling at us and he…" said the cheetah cub named Mikey.

His father than said, "Michael Jacob Clawdenson, I don't want to hear any more of your crazy stories!"

The cub and the hippo child cowered a little as they were walking with the two adults. The Hippo kid then said, "Honest Mr. C, we did find somebody weird in the woods. I got it on my camera and…"

"Oh fuck" I whispered over the kid having proof of my existence here, and threatening looking proof no less.

I then heard the teen Cheetah then say with a little sass to her voice, "Ugh, like finally took them long enough to stop believing his little stories."

The father then said, "Your camera which conveniently is out of battery power. Right, and I suppose you want me to believe in ghosts now?"

The Chettah father then said, "I don't want you two causing any more problems on our trip to Zootopia, alright. For the Lamb above, we stop off the main road so you two can go use the bathroom and then you have the nerve to wander off, scare us half to death and then make up ghost stories?"

The group of animals finally reached the pickup when the mother said, "Andrew, they're just kids, shouldn't you be a little easy on them?"

The father didn't answer with anything besides a slight growling sound as the family then climbed into their truck. The vehicle started as I then realized that this family may be my only means of getting to civilization…even if it's not my own. I quickly examined the vehicle for anyway I could catch a ride on their truck and the only thing that came to mind was climbing into the bed of their truck and hiding in there all the way to this "Zootopia" place

I then whispered, "Chronos, you got something in your bag of tricks to help me get into the bed of that truck unnoticed?"

I then heard the A.I. respond, "I most certainly do."

I then heard all sound around me die out as the exhaust coming of the car's muffler froze in the air and the leaves of the trees that were blowing in the wind froze in place.

Chronos then said, "Make your move fast Nate. Freezing time drains this suits power capacitors like nothing else."

I stood up and stepped around the frozen blades of grass as best as I could, taking advantage of dirt patches and areas where the wind had already bent the grass enough so I could safely walk on it. I cleared the field and crossed the dirt road to the family's truck and climbed in their bed. The bed had several cases of luggage and belongings of the family. I found a gap small enough that could fit me with time frozen like this. I hunkered down and nestled myself between the bags and suitcases.

Chronos then said, "Freeing the time stream now."

Once the A.I. said this, the sounds of the vehicle returned once more and the trees continued their dance in the wind. The truck took off heading down the road, hopefully towards wherever this "Zootopia" place was. As much as going to a population center inhabited by animals wasn't something I wanted to do, I knew that if I wanted to figure out just how the hell animals changed this drastically and what happened to humanity, this was the way to do it. I hoped that I could find out what I needed to in "Zootopia" without causing a scene.

I was horribly mistaken.

(A/N: That marks the end of my current chapter for Zootopia: Project Paradox. I hope you all enjoyed it and let me know what you all think about the suit Nate is wearing. Is it too powerful for Nate to have the ability to be able to freeze time or not? I don't want to make Nate too overpowered, but there will be threats further down the story here that Nate will come across that Nate would not certainly be able to handle without the power of Chronos and the suit. All I'll say about them is that Vanguard is not the only threat. When the time comes as well, I will also reveal the hidden surprises that I have in store for this story. I hope that I can keep these updates coming out now at a semi-reasonable pace and once again apologize for the long delay in me updating anything I own.

I wish you all a great day/evening and I hope to have the next chapter out sometime soon here.)