* Author : Christoph Weber * Narrator : Dave Robison * Host : Matt Dovey * Audio Producer : Peter Adrian Behravesh * Discuss on Forums PodCastle 728: The Fireman is a PodCastle original. Content warning for fire and child harm. Rated R The Fireman by Christoph Weber   I face the forested mountains, raise my hands like a conductor readying an orchestra, and point to my first section. A glow flickers to life in the inky darkness beneath a grove of trees. Arms of flame climb the bark and the canopy explodes, turning trees into torches, illuminating my canvas. I sweep my hand from left to right and a mile-long slash appears like a knife wound in the mountains, bleeding fire. The flames crawl upslope. Not fast enough. A few twists of my wrists and I sculpt a stampede — orange bulls of fire, a few charging tigers, and one galloping zebra striped red and blue. I pause to appreciate the canvas come to life. It’s my best work. And I’m just getting started. A flock of phoenixes rises from the flames and soars out for a mile in every direction. Transformed into a dozen Icaruses, they plunge back to earth on wings of fire. The mountain range — a dark, blank canvas just moments ago — is now a work of art, a living Pollock-splatter of incendiary shades. I brim with the pride of a father watching his child thrive. Fire is a living creature. It is born, it consumes, it grows, and it dies. It even breathes: the wind whipping past me is my fire inhaling air from below to replace its exhaled smoke plume, glowing with firelight. At times like these, I can feel that flames have desires of their own: ambitions to spread, to conquer new lands. I watch the mountains burn until red-and-blue lights rattle up fire roads — wildland engines come to contain the inferno. Good luck. I close my eyes, breathe deep, and smile. Burning forests smell so lovely. When the first helicopter arrives, I recognize its tail number. I’ve worked with the pilot in my day job fighting fire. Okay, making it look like I fight fire. My assignments have a tendency to burn rather long and out of control. The pilot drops her water bucket on a column of fire probing up toward the ridge. I sculpt the flames into a fist — middle finger extended — that burns so hot the pilot’s water drop evaporates before it can reach earth. The next hero to try slaying my dragon is a large fixed-wing air tanker. It sets its course above a ridge and drops a load of chemical retardant. My child reaches the wet, sticky strip and pauses. I can feel its frustration — until a school of crimson flying fish leaps from the flames, soars over the retardant-soaked ridge, and dives into the next canyon. Turquoise rings ripple out everywhere they land. It’s a wonderful touch. But it’s not enough. Tonight I need more. Tonight, burning every square inch of these mountains will not satisfy me. I turn around and scan the city’s downtown lights, glowing pink and green. They’d look better engulfed in orange. I throw my arms out, signaling the coming finale, and sweep my hands forward. A rumbling avalanche of flame crashes down the wooded slope, rushing around me toward the neighborhood below. When my fire reaches the first long row of homes, I lift the flames up as a great wave, its orange crest curling over rooftops, poised to descend and destroy.