On an unknown planet, in an unknown universe, at an unknown time and date.
The blue tiger stares at me, visibly stunned. My transformation has thrown it off balance. Its yellow eyes betray a confusion that wasn't there a few seconds ago. The prey has become something else. Something it doesn't understand.
Me, I understand. I understand perfectly. The fear that was eating away at my guts is gone. Evaporated. Replaced by a raw power flowing through my veins like molten lava. Every beat of my heart is a forge hammer striking. Every breath fills my lungs with a new energy. I am alive. More alive than I've ever been.
Bobby: "Come on! You wanted to eat me? Now I'm the one who's gonna eat you."
The tiger growls, deep, menacing.
"Grrrrrrrr!"
Bobby: "Grr yourself. Come on, bring it."
My provocation hits home. The beast sees red. It steps back, resets into a hunting stance, muscles coiled, claws digging into the soil. Then it leaps.
Everything happens in slow motion.
I see every detail of its jump. The contraction of its hind legs. The perfect trajectory of its massive body. Its fangs aiming for my throat. It's beautiful, almost artistic. A predator at the peak of its craft.
Except I'm no longer prey.
I raise my hand, palm open, and I bring it down in a sweeping motion.
"SMACK!"
A monumental slap. A Don Lee-style slap, the fist of Gilgamesh himself. My hand collides with the tiger's head with a force I didn't even suspect I had. The beast's skull does a complete 360-degree spin. A sinister crack tears through the air. The body crashes heavily to the ground, lifeless.
I look at my hand. I look at the blue tiger, collapsed at my feet, its head in an anatomically impossible position. Then I smile.
Bobby: "Courtesy of Don Lee."
The body of a Primarch is no ordinary thing. I feel knowledge imprinting itself on my mind, as if the information had always been there, dormant, waiting to be awakened.
In the universe of Warhammer 40,000, a Primarch is one of the twenty genetic "sons" of the Emperor of Mankind. Superhuman beings created at the end of the 30th millennium to be perfect generals. They are superior to Space Marines in every way. Strength. Intelligence. Longevity. Each one was designed to lead an entire Legion during the Great Crusade. Living gods walking among mortals.
And I, Bob Wilkinson, 41-year-old unemployed Texan, virgin and scrawny, now possess the body of Vulkan. The most humane of the Primarchs. The most compassionate. But also an absolute physical powerhouse, capable of lifting tanks, shattering mountains, enduring anything. Immortal, a Perpetual who rises from his ashes after every death. Master artisan and smith, whose hands can create wonders as easily as weapons of mass destruction.
I pick up the tiger's body effortlessly. It must weigh a good three hundred kilos, but I lift it like a grocery bag.
Bobby: "I'm gonna have to go full Man vs Wild. Or rather, to put it simply... Primarch vs Mother Nature. Hahaha!"
My laughter echoes through the alien jungle. A deep, powerful laugh that makes the air around me vibrate. The creatures that were lurking nearby flee without looking back.
I sling the carcass over my shoulder and gaze at the horizon. Purple sky. Fluorescent vegetation. Two suns slowly setting. I have no idea where I am, or how to get home.
But for the first time in my life, I don't feel powerless.
I am a Primarch. And this hostile planet has just met its new alpha predator.