Norman Spinrad

Feric could well understand what the SS Commandant felt. For his part, the sight of the Bora Firestorm ignited two distinct pleasurable responses: the patriotic and the aesthetic. The total flaming destmction of the last scrap of resistance to complete Helder domination of the habitable earth was something that could only set any true human's heart to soaring. At the same time, the abstract spectacle of this magnificent, unthinkably huge gusher of fire turning the very universe a rich deep orange struck a deep chord in his aesthetic sensibilities, in and of itself. Thus Feric perceived the Bora Firestorm as a true and high work of art: noble and uplifting in its inner meaning for the true human spirit, and sensually stimulating in style and form. Only a final touch was needed to create a visual epic that would inspire the people of Heldon and immor-talize this pinnacle of human history for all time to come.

"Bogel, do you have camera planes in the air over Bora?"

"Of course, my Commander! What sort of High Commander of Public Will would be foolish enough to miss the opportunity to film the climactic moment of human history? We are now broadcasting to every public square in Heldon as well as preserving the spectacle for posterity."

"Very well then, Bogel, I'll give your cameras something to fit the dignity and significance of the moment that will delight the eye as welll"

Feric chose to view the spectacle from a camera plane with Bogel, for this would be the best possible vantage from which to observe the work of art he had wrought; moreover, this aerial view would be the image burned into the folklore of true humanity for all time.

The camera plane spiraled dizzyingly upward, high over the pillar of fire that was Bora, turning Bogel's face a sickly shade of green and giving Feric himself no little discomfort. Finally the plane reached a height of over ten thousand feet, leveled off, began circling the Firestorm, and turned its cameras on the spectacle below.

Ferie had used SS motorcyclists and freshly polished 226

black tanks to form an enormous swastika of men and machines centered on the fountain of fire that was the final funeral pyre of the putrescence that had been Zind.

From this great height, the sight below took the breach away: a huge gleaming black swastika with an enormous pillar of fire soaring toward the heavens out of its center and casting rich orange highlights off the burnished black metal of the massed fighting machines.

"It's beautiful, Feric," Bogel said softly.

Feric opened his microphone to give the final orders to Waning, who was supervising on the ground. "It's not quite completed yet," he told Bogel. Then he began issuing orders to the men below.

"March!"

Below, the glistening black swastika began to rotate about the central axis of the pillar of fire. A great Helder army formed into the sacred racial emblem executed a massive victory march around the burning capital of true humanity's final enemy.

"Open fire!"

From the huge swastika circling the great flame, there now erupted a universe of smoke and sparkle and flame, as every tank opened up with its cannon and every SS

motorcyclist fired a stream of bright tracers with his submachine gun, all directed inward to feed the raging firestorm at the heart of the grand spectacle.

Now the incredible final victory pageant was complete and the transcendent glory of the moment properly celebrated. Far below, a swastika of smoke and fire revolved about the raging funeral pyre of the Dominator mutation, and in a large sense of every defilement, small or large, of the human gene pool. The vast sparkling swastika of ten thousand bright stars set off against gleaming black metal rotating about the immense pillar of billowing orange flames was a sight to stir the soul with its sheer immensity and physical beauty alone. But the symbolism pleased an even more noble level of the human spirit: the great circling swastika of fire and metal was the visual epitomization of Helder idealism and Helder power in the eyes of even the simplest of men; likewise no one could mistake the captive fountain of fire for other than what it was, the funeral pyre of Zind. Thus the spectacle was both perfectly symbolic of the final victory of the forces of Heldon over the putrescence of Zind and the actual historical moment of that victory itself; a pinnacle of human his-227

tory, and that event's celebration in a great work of art, all in one.

Tears filled Feric's eyes as he beheld this sight. His fondest dreams were fulfilled. He had led Heldon to total victory and insured the posterity of the pure human genotype forever; soon the breeding program would convert the race of Helder into a race of purebred SS supermen.

He had raised humanity to its former genetic purity and glory and would someday have the unprecedented honor of creating the next step in human evolution, a true master race. No man could conceivably ask to accomplish more.