Mr Fires

Beyond this point lie **major spoilers** for *Fallen London*, *Sunless Sea*, or *Sunless Skies*. This may include **endgame** or **Fate-locked** content. **Proceed at your own risk**.
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### Affiliation

The Masters of the Bazaar
The Echo Bazaar

> *"'Coal, gas, candles. Warm yourself.'"*
> *"Not bad, my little one. I’ll be keeping an eye on you."*
>
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**Mr Fires** is a charming but ruthless Master of the Bazaar.

## The Boss

Ember-eyed and honey-voiced, this Master governs trade in coal, gas, and candles, along with the Neath's unique form of railway steel. It also presides over several of the factories in Fallen London, and many of the workers at Wolfstack Docks, with an unwavering grip. It can usually be found near its office in Wolfstack, and it is also in command of London's dirigible system, a position that apparently required quite a lot of effort on its part to acquire. Mr Fires also dabbles in weapon and engine manufacturing, under the company Caminus Yards.

Fires is known to deny its laborers many basic necessities, like safe working conditions and fair pay. It often uses the Masters' enforcers, the **neddy men**, to quell and dissipate any protests, unions, or revolutionary activity it deems troublesome. Furthermore, its factories are heavy polluters, spewing several pounds of noxious waste into the air and waters of London and beyond. All these factors make Mr Fires notorious, especially among those of a revolutionary bent, as one of the most antipathetic and poor-tempered Masters in modern-day Fallen London.

Every seven years, Mr Fires is obligated to write a letter to the Bazaar; this letter is usually a love story, as to be expected, but sometimes Fires likes to change it up a little and submit an editorial on Fallen London based on the opinion of one of London's intrepid citizens. By writing the letter in this manner, Mr Fires wishes to change the course of London's fate by influencing the Bazaar's opinion on some unspecified issue. Does this place Fires in the same boat as the revolutionaries it seeks to destroy? Probably not.

Oh, and it considers London escaping to the skies a *spectacularly* bad idea.

Mr Fires resides in several apartments that blaze in various hues of light so bright they recall the Surface: gas, candles, dazzling stones, and strange light bulbs.

Mr Fires was known as the **Khan of Fire** in the time of the Fourth City, and is called the **Saint on the Pyre** by the Cult of the Sanctified in the *Sunless Skies* timeline.

## A Payment in False Coin

> *"ONE DAY YOU WILL FORGIVE is stamped on the back. It is a commandment as much as a promise."*
> *"It looks much like a real Justificande, but it doesn't have the same effect on nearby clocks."*
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   Mr Fires is known to conduct several independent schemes that often come into conflict with its colleagues, like Mr Wines, Mr Spices, and Mr Stones. It commissioned the **Dean of Supernumerary Fellows** at the University to investigate the private stash of mysterious sedatives that Mr Spices (possibly) consumes but doesn't sell, and it paid the Dean in several forged **Justificande Coins**, the mysterious currency of Irem.

To produce these coins, Mr Fires made an arrangement of sorts with Mr Veils to take over one of its neglected workshops from the Fourth City. Fires converted this workshop into a coin fabrication factory, while Veils retained ownership but would not visit. Within this workshop lies an automaton imitation of Mr Veils (yes, seriously) to fill in its position in its silk shops should the real Mr Veils ever meet its end or go missing. Given its activities, Veils' demise seems fairly likely to occur soon...

## A Moon of Misery

> *""Once a suitable love story is found, it’ll be the end of London. Can you imagine?" The lamp trembles in its hand. Its voice rises an octave. "The end of London! I couldn't bear it! I love this city. It's my sole comfort, the greatest joy I have discovered in all my centuries. I'd do anything to preserve it.""*
> *"Since the very beginning, I have had the best interests of London at heart. In the longer term, the Hybrid's milk is the only thing that can save the city. Once seeded across the populace, all love stories will be rendered suspect. Any love, no matter how pure or moving, could simply be the symptoms of an aberration's venom. Love will be robbed of its allure. The Bazaar will not know which stories it can truly believe in."*
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   Deep within Mr Fires' soot-blackened heart lies a surprisingly genuine love for London as a city; this puts it at odds with its colleagues, many of whom seek to end their service to the Bazaar as soon as possible. As a result, Mr Fires regularly sabotages the love stories procured by Mr Wines and Mr Spices, and it is responsible for interfering in Mr Stones' plan to sell moon-milk to an exiled captain from Hell; this would have persuaded the captain to destroy London in an apocalyptic war.

But Mr Stones isn't the only Master interested in using moon-milk for its own ends; Mr Fires itself has conducted several experiments on moon-misers and their milk within the walls of the Orphanage, a laboratory that uses political prisoners and other unfortunate victims as guinea pigs. Its inhumane investigations revealed that unaltered moon-milk caused only shallow obsession, not true love - so it was worthless for forging love-stories, and the obsession faded after a few years anyway, to say nothing of the awful side effects it had on its imbibers.

Fires always has a backup plan, however, and this one is ghastly: what if it crossbred a moon-miser *with a human?* The resultant hybrid might secrete a special strain of moon-milk that induces true love, or at least a form of love that the Bazaar cannot distinguish from true love. Fires theorizes that adding this new moon-milk to London's water supply would render all future love stories worthless, frustrating the Bazaar's mission to collect them.

## References

2. ↑ Fight for the neddies, *Fallen London*
3. ↑ Day 7: Mr Sacks, in embered red, *Fallen London*
4. ↑ Ambition: Bag a Legend! - A Road of Silk and Spiders (2), *Fallen London*
5. ↑ Fire at the proper temperature, *Fallen London*
6. ↑ Wolfstack Docks, *Fallen London*
7. ↑ Steer the conversation to Mr Fires, *Fallen London*
8. ↑ Shop Description, *Sunless Sea* *"The dangerously jovial Mr Fires manufactures the most intimidating, least carefully tested devices."*
9. ↑ Sidebar Snippets, *Fallen London*
10. ↑ Call Mr Fires a scourge on London's working class, *Fallen London* *"Its factories work people to death. It fills the river with filth, the air with filth, children's lungs with filth."*
11. ↑ The Season of Embers, *Fallen London* *"If you don't mind taking a little time out of your fascinating life," [...] "My employer needs help with a letter. Every seven years it has to send one. It usually finds a love story, but this time it wants to try something else."*
12. ↑ The Season of Embers, *Fallen London* *"We must write a letter. This time, it shall be about London. The fate of the city may well be changed, if we are successful. [...] "We shall await the outcome of our little enterprise with interest. Perhaps our efforts shall be rejected. Perhaps it will make a difference. Perhaps this time it will change its mind."*
13. ↑ The Season of Embers, *Fallen London* *"You'd take it to the stars; Away from its prison below the earth. [...] "No!" Mr Fires moves abruptly towards you, rocking the gondola alarmingly. "That is a terrible idea!""*
14. ↑ Incarnadine Fur Robe, *Fallen London* *"The apartments of Mr Fires blaze with light: gas, candle, scintillant stone, peculiar incandescent arc-bulbs of glass. You blink. It's like the Surface in here."*
15. ↑ Dubious attribution, *Fallen London*
16. ↑ Provide for a Feast, *Sunless Skies*
17. ↑ Justificande Coin, *Fallen London*
18. ↑ Forged Justificande Coin, *Fallen London*
19. ↑ Take the appointment, *Fallen London*
20. ↑ Demand to know what is going on, *Fallen London*
21. ↑ Enter as though you had a key, *Fallen London*
22. ↑ Forget April, *Fallen London*
23. ↑ Steal one of the coins, *Fallen London*
24. ↑ Stop and look through a distracting mirror 1, *Fallen London*
25. ↑ Demand an explanation for the replica Mr Veils, *Fallen London*
26. ↑ Light Fingers - Mr Fires' Ultimatum 2, *Fallen London*
27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 Call Mr Fires a scourge on London's working class, *Fallen London*
28. ↑ Fires' next move, *Fallen London*
29. ↑ A tiny gift, *Fallen London*
30. ↑ Draw out as many answers as you can, *Fallen London* *""You visited my Orphanage, you saw my moon-milk research." [...] "I was hoping to use the milk to bankrupt London of love stories. [...] It is not a convincing forgery; it creates only a shallow obsession that fades after a few years.""*