In a flash of pink and purple light, a portal opened in the skies above the wilderness below. Rainbow coloured light shone from the opening before a large brown bear ran and tumbled out into the sky. As the portal closed the bear was in freefall towards the planet's surface.
On the back of the bear rode Baldur. The big handsome blonde in all of his radiantly muscular beauty, roared with joy as they fell towards the surface at 8.6 metres per second squared. Behind him sat a beautiful brunette. Her long, finely toned and light tanned legs, straddled the girth of the bear's back straps. Her delicate arms wrapped tightly around Baldur's surfboard of a torso. The woman's cute and stunningly gorgeous face was nestled lovingly against Baldur's beefy traps.
"So this is your homeworld, planet Tralfamadore?" shouted Baldur over the rush of wind as the bear plummeted towards the green valley below.
"Yesss!" replied the woman.
"Look at these lovely lavender skies and pink mountains of quartz crystals … and the endless sea of green forests, stretching out below! It's all so very beautiful!"
"It wasn't always this way!"
The bear continued to plummet towards the valley and achieved terminal velocity. He dove head first through the dense canopy of trees and avoided every branch with pinpoint precision. Just before he hit the surface with a sickening wet thud, the bear reversed himself and pointed his furry backside towards the ground. He blasted a behemoth fart that decelerated his velocity to a standstill. The bear righted himself and gently landed on the forest floor.
The woman climbed off the bear and rubbed his chubby side with affection, "Nice landing, Bjarki."
"If I didn't have you and Baldur on my back," replied Bjarki in a rough and gruff, low monotone macho voice, "I might have done a pirouette."
"Okay show off," smiled Baldur as he rubbed the fur on the top of Bjarki's massive skull.
The woman took several graceful steps across the forest floor. She looked up at the massive trunks of trees and smiled. Baldur on the other hand, watched with lust and love as her hips swayed naturally from side to side. Her proportions were perfect in every way, second to his own, of course.
"Mmm," complimented Bjarki, "in that brown leather mini skirt, your tight little butt looks like two rockmelons, dancing in the wind."
"Hey big boy," she replied without turning around, "eyes off my butt."
"Yeah, eyes off my girl," whispered Baldur in a friendly and joking manner as he dismounted the bear.
"Fair enough," replied Bjarki as he transformed from a bear to a massive man with long brown hair and a big bushy beard. He looked like Hägar the Horrible on roids and human growth hormone. Bjarki in human form, was indeed huge with arms like the turkey drumsticks of a T-Rex, chest like a hairy walrus and a round, rock hard beer keg of a gut. He turned and trudged in the opposite direction, away from Baldur and the woman.
"Where are you going, big boy?" Baldur asked.
"I saw something that kinda looked like a fluffy white rabbit on the way down," Bjarki replied, "I mean, it looked like it had eight legs and four heads, two on each end of its poodle balloon shaped body."
"That sounds like a Pffftomorn," said the woman, "their fur is soft like silk, long and fluffy."
"Mmm," smiled Bjarki, "that sounds good," he continued to walk away as he transformed back into a bear.
"Bjarki mate!" Baldur shouted with a blend of humour and sarcastic concern, "what are you going to get up to big fella?"
"It was a long trip!" replied Bjarki, "and I've been holding Mount Poopamanjara at bay for at least the last six million light years! Reckon I might find a quiet little spot to commune with nature!"
"Awe gross, disgusting!" complained Baldur and the woman.
Bjarki just laughed, "Need to find that fluffy looking thing, I reckon. That'll do the trick."
"You don't think he's actually going to—"
"Yeah," Baldur smiled in acceptance, "he will."
"Totally gross," replied the woman.
"Yeah, he is," agreed Baldur.
She looked around at the beautiful foliage, alien doppelgängers of moss, mushrooms, flowers, ferns and shrubs. Flying creatures, akin to bird like arthropods, chirped and sang songs.
"My people," she began with some sadness, "never made it past their last great filter."
"You've never really opened up about the Tralfamadorians," commented Baldur, "and what last great filter do you speak of?"
She turned her head, looked at him and smiled with mild annoyance and sadness, "You're a god, right? Aren't you supposed to be omniscient or something? Shouldn't you know what the last great filter is for a sentient toolmaking species that evolved on the surface of a planet?"
"Dad's the one with omniscience," replied Baldur, "cutting out his eye, hanging himself from a tree and all of that stoic bullcrap."
"You're not a fan of your father, are you?"
Baldur looked at the forest floor in discontent before he kicked a fallen twig, "He's just another, over the top, egotistical egregore."
"There's worse Baldur," she smiled.
"Oh," he replied with a laugh, "I know that, like, none of the Aesir compare to that knob jockey over in Olympus."
"I met Zeus once," she said.
"Oh really? Where and when?"
"Salmoneus," she replied, "in Ancient Greece, the bastard levelled the entire city to the ground and killed everyone."
"What an arsehole," commented Baldur, "anyway," he smiled as he strolled over and hugged the woman from behind, "fancy a quick one, Hulio?"
"It's Huliette now Baldur," she smiled, turning her head to rest the side of her cheek on Baldur's glistening left pec, "I've fully transitioned."
"Tralfamadorians are a fascinating species," said Baldur as he kissed Huliette's soft and supple neck.
"Oh, and how's that?" she smiled as she swayed from side to side.
"It's their ability to change sex," replied Baldur, "depending on the sex of the partner they fall in love with."
"They," she replied with sadness, "you mean me; it's only just me now … and it's a bit more nuanced than that Baldur," she ran her delicate fingers over his hardened forearms, "it also depends on the sexual orientation of the partner."
"You know I swing both ways," he said as he moved to kiss the other side of her neck.
"Oh, don't I know that," she giggled, "but you still swing more towards women."
"True," Baldur replied.
Huliette sighed, "A city once stood here. Back then, the forests were cleared. There was nothing but concrete, roads, factories and skyscrapers. And now, none of that is left."
"Mm," pondered Baldur, "how long ago are we talking about?
"It would only take a few centuries or at most, a few thousand years for the returning wilderness and elements to erase all evidence of civilisation."
"So, it's been a few thousand years then?"
"Oh Baldur," replied Huliette, "I haven't told you this before. I wanted to wait until we came here to Tralfamadore."
"Tell me what?"
"About my past."
"The work you did for the Primordial Earth Protectorate?"
"No, long before that."
"So," he began, kissing both sides of her neck along with the tops of her shoulders, "go ahead and tell me then."
Huliette took in a deep breath. She had longed for this moment, "I was an astronaut. Sent on a one-way mission to a nearby star. I was custodian to hundreds of frozen embryos along with embryonic tanks. On a mission to a new world, travelling at just one percent the speed of light."
"Oh, I see," he said. Baldur could feel his heart race. Whatever she was about to tell him, had to be big, massive perhaps. If not, then why did she hold off until they finally visited her home planet? He had to know, "tell me more, my love."
"I was," paused Huliette with some trepidation, "altered."
"Altered?" quizzed Baldur, "how?"
"Our understanding of physics was largely incomplete," began Huliette, "we didn't have a unified theory for quantum gravity. And our scientists believed it was impossible to break the light speed barrier."
"Oh, how debilitating."
"Yes," agreed Huliette, "I know. But our biotechnologies were a lot more advanced and as a result, I was selected and altered, for long term, deep space travel."
"I see."
"No Baldur, you don't."
"Well then my love, explain it to me."
"I was genetically altered to regenerate and to remain young, never to age … to live forever."
"So, your scientists made you immortal."
"You seem a little shocked," she noted.
"Well," pondered Baldur, "I just assumed that immortality was something your people evolved. You know, like naturally."
"No," Huliette replied, sadness returned to the way she spoke, her expression and the melancholy in her eyes, "everything dies Baldur. My people were no exception."
"Well, you and I won't die."
"You know that's not exactly true Baldur."
"I know, I know," he said as he rocked her gently in his arms from side to side, "we can be killed. It would take a lot, a hell of a lot. But it can be done."
"I've been killed so many times that I've long lost count," she said, "but I just regenerate. So long as something is left, anything, then I'll simply grow back."
"Why did your people alter you my love? For what purpose?"
She held up his mighty yet soft hands, kissing each knuckle, "to endure millennia upon millennia of interstellar space travel – to live without ever growing old and to regenerate damage from cosmic radiation."
"They didn't put you to sleep or freeze you in stasis for the trip?"
"We hadn't developed hibernation technology or cryogenics that could freeze and revive a person, but I was genetically altered to hibernate in deep states of torpor."
"Cool babe," he didn't actually think it was cool one bit. What did her people do to her? Had it been painful? And to send her off alone, into the void. It all seemed so unspeakably cruel. "I mean, how long could you sleep for?"
"I would sleep for six to eight years Baldur and then awaken. Over three to four days, I would make checks on the ship's diagnostics, astronavigation and the state of the embryos that were cryogenically preserved. I would eat like a pig Baldur, gorging myself on rations before returning to sleep.
A look of realisation, alarm and concern, flashed across Baldur's eyes, "You mean, you engaged in the most primitive form of interstellar travel … all alone, in a ship that crawled through the dark at only one percent the speed of light?"
"Yes."
"What did you eat?"
"The food module attached to my ship, had a volume of 80,000 cubic metres, the equivalent of a large warehouse. It contained enough rations to sustain me for up to 50,000 years. And that's without taking into account my ability to hibernate."
"Oh."
"It took four years just to reach the edge of our solar system's Oort Cloud."
"Fudge me."
"And by then," Huliette sighed, "all communications from Tralfamadore ceased as our civilisation collapsed."
"What happened?"
"Oh the usual, environmental degradation, overpopulation, scarcity of resources and conflicts over the scraps that were left. It all culminated in a global thermonuclear war."
"Here? On this beautiful planet?"
"It was a long time ago Baldur."
"So, your people crapped where they ate and then blew themselves up?"
"They had enough foresight to plan my mission and to build my ship," responded Huliette in defence, "not that it mattered though. From observations I could make, for another century, there were camp fires from what I deduced were survivors who reverted back to hunter gatherers. After about a hundred years, the last of these fires ceased."
"I see," realised Baldur, "so they ceased to be."
"Yes, my people went extinct. But my mission continued, I was to travel to nearby star systems that possessed potentially habitable worlds. It was a miracle that the ship survived so long. It was capable of self repair and recycling of materials with nanotechnology and repair drones.
"The ship even used a force field of sorts that could scoop up molecular hydrogen from the interstellar medium. It used a fusion matter assembler to take the hydrogen harvested from space and assemble any atom on the periodic table.
"I travelled Baldur for a very, very long time, but despite my best efforts, I couldn't find a habitable world. The ship's critical systems were finally starting to fail. I made the difficult decision to store the embryos in a cave at the bottom of a crevice on the surface of an asteroid. The temperature range would remain stable at near absolute zero for billions of years. It was the only way I could keep them safe. If I found a world, perhaps I could make some substantial repairs to the ship while it was in orbit of the planet … before returning to retrieve the embryos."
"The timescales my love. Even for a god like myself; what you endured was sheer madness."
"I travelled from star system to star system Baldur but I found not a single habitable world. Eventually the ship's systems failed and to preserve myself indefinitely, I sealed myself in an airtight compartment and fell into torpor before the coldness of space froze me solid."
Baldur remained silent while he held his woman tight.
She continued, "And for millions of years the ship drifted through space, eroded and shredded by micro meteorites, stripped to a skeletal frame that drifted on into the dark."
"Who eventually found you, my love?"
"Oh, some drunk college kids from Earth 4.0, off on a road trip between universes during spring break. They brought me into their ship and freaked the fudge out when I thawed out and regenerated. They took me to one of their space police stations.
"I was processed, collected by the Commonwealth of Human Posterity's Border Control and Biosecurity, further processed at one of their quarantine centres and then collected by their Department of Immigration. Because my species looked externally identical to Homo sapiens, I was finally deported to Primordial Earth and indentured to work for the Primordial Earth Protectorate."
"So, that's your story, my love?" Was there anything else, she hadn't said? He thought.
"Yes Baldur," she paused for a moment. An intense sadness washed over her, "You know, those embryos are still out there, somewhere. But they're lost now. I have no idea where they could be."
"Thank you for sharing this," he said as he kissed the back of her head, holding her even closer and tighter, "and don't worry, we'll find that asteroid and those embryos."
She felt reassured that this man, this god, loved her with every fabric of his being. However, it was the fabric of his being that concerned her. She could feel him gradually weakening. As an egregore, Baldur could not stay away from the Asgard bubble in the pan cosmic imaginarium indefinitely. He needed to be nourished by the collective thoughts and beliefs of his worshippers, which coalesced in and gave rise to Asgard. Without that nourishment, he would eventually fade into oblivion.
"You need to return home for a while Baldur," she said.
"I know," he replied, "and I will, soon."
It was then that the forest rumbled and a mighty wind roared through the trees. An ungodly sound of whirring, terrorised their ears as a massive flying saucer flew above their heads…
Bjarki noticed it as well, even if he was busy communing with nature, wiping his backside with a very disgruntled Pffftomorn after taking the mother of all craps.
"What is it?" asked Baldur.
"Oh no, fudge no," said Huliette, "not here."
She raced off into the forest towards the direction of the flying saucer. Baldur followed along with Bjarki who chased up to them. The three came upon a cliff that gave them a panoramic view. In the plains below, the saucer had already landed.
An air locked opened and a ramp extended to the ground. Huliette watched in dismay as a procession of small tank like, washing machine looking malevolent contraptions, rolled awkwardly down the ramp.
"What are they?" asked Bjarki.
"You don't want to know," replied Baldur.
"Those vile, putrid and pathetic things," sighed Huliette, "are Herrenrasse."