Norman Spinrad

These four men sat on the front seat of the command car's open cabin, and as the rotund Waning occupied the seat area of two normal men, they were jammed together like peas in a pod. Still, the mood was nothing less than jovial as the car drove eastward in the center of a vast line of tanks and motorcycles. Moreover, Waning had not neglected to provision the car with a keg of foaming beer to which they all had frequent recourse. Feric himself sat alone on the raised rear seat in easy sight of his troops, with the keg conveniently before him.

"We should be within sight of Bora soon," Waffing said.

"Or at least what's left of it. I'm afraid the air force isn't leaving very much for us to destroy."

Two more wings of dive-bombers roared eastward across the empty wastelands on their way to Bora.

"My only remaining desire is to kill the last Dominator on earth with the Great Truncheon of Held itself," Feric said. "This seems only fitting. I hope that our pilots spare the life of one Dominator so that this final war may be ended with appropriate ceremony. As for the rest of Bora, they can turn it into a steaming ruin before we reach it, for all I care."

Waffing laughed. "You question the total efficiency of our pilots?" he japed. "I really don't think that the chances of anything surviving our bombing are very good."

"Surely we will be left one Dominator?" Feric said.

"Are our bombers really as good as all that?"

Waning waved his arms in the air as if to take in all of conquered Zind in their sweep. Within sight of the command car, there was not a single trace of living protoplasm native to the putrid gray landscape, nor an intact artifact crafted by the minions of Zind. "The proof is all around you, my Commander," he said.

Feric laughed. "It's very strange," he said, "to be 224

hoping that the Helder air force will be performing with something less than its accustomed efficiencyi"

An hour later, Waffing's boast concerning the efficiency of the bomber pilots proved to be more than justified. To the east, across a desolate gray plain studded with rank patches of radiation jungle, Feric saw a huge blotch of fire, like the mouth of some gigantic volcano. As the command car and its flanking lines of troops roared toward this massive conflagration, crushing the radiation jungle under steel tank treads and then setting the rubble ablaze with flamethrowers, Feric could see swarms of planes circling and swooping over the burning city, dropping yet more napalm cannisters and high explosives on the funeral pyre of the Dominators of Zind. Even at this distance, the heat given off by the fire was clearly discernible.

"Not much chance of anything surviving that, my Commander," Waning said, quaffing an entire mug of beer in three gulps. "I'm afraid I must apologize for the prowess of our pilots!"

Feric could not find it in his heart to be really angry.

Who could but rejoice at the sight of the last stronghold of the final enemy of true humanity going up in billowing flames! Beside the racial joy of this sight, his disappointment at not being able to dispatch the last Dominator on earth by his own hand was, after all, a trivial matter.

Across the plain, there was a sudden upsurge in the flames consuming Bora. The massive individual fires consuming the city seemed to merge into an enormous fireball, which the Helder planes had to hasten to avoid. This earthbound sun hovered over the doomed city for a long bright moment; then it soared upward as if seeking to return to its rightful place in the heavens. In its van, an enormous pillar of fire at least a mile wide and as tall as the clouds fountained into the sky. Amazingly enough, this flaming beacon persisted as the Helder army bore down on the city.

"Our planes have ignited a firestorm!" Waffing exclaimed. "Army scientists predicted such a possibility—

that fierce enough bombing could generate a pillar of flame that would burn until all combustibles in the area are consumed. It seemed like an extravagance until now."

"It looks like the legendary Fire of the Ancients," Bogel whispered.

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Waffing nodded. "It's the next best thing," he said.

"For myself," said Remler, his blue eyes glistening, "the sight has an awesome beauty." He wet his lips with beer without for an instant taking his eyes off the great fountain of fire that gushed red-orange brilliance into the heavens.