On April 30, 1945, Adolf Hitler,
one of the most notorious mass-murderers in history, retired to his room
in his bunker, 25 feet beneath
the old Reich Chancery garden. Above him, the Red Army was
encircling Berlin as his dream of a thousand-year Aryan empire lay
in ruins. Hitler placed a glass cyanide capsule between his teeth
and pointed a loaded service pistol at his right temple. Then,
smugly believing he had both evaded capture and escaped all
accountability for his crimes, he bit down and pulled the trigger.
He was wrong!
The Last Way Station begins moments after
Hitler's successful suicide, when the
Fuhrer finds himself mysteriously transported to a
numbingly cold, solitary holding cell in the afterworld. There, he
meets his caseworker, a supernatural being tasked with helping him
face, and work through, his sins. The caseworker explains that
Hitler will remain in solitary confinement indefinitely, as he
prepares his soul for eventual return to the material world. The
method, Hitler learns, involves seeking enlightenment through
physically embodying his victims and then personally reliving the
atrocities committed against them in his name.
This speculative, historical fantasy narrative explores
Hitler's psychology, the psychology of evil and
asks, "%u02DCWhat, if anything, constitutes fitting
punishment for the 'super
evil?'"