Fire doesn’t always mean run—some creatures are wired to walk straight into the heat and come out better for it.

When you think of wildfire, you picture panic. Running. Hiding. A scramble for safety. And yet, not every animal sees fire as a threat. A few outliers have figured out how to use it—literally—to feed, outcompete, and even dominate their ecosystem. These aren’t the animals you’d expect, and the ways they turn destruction into an opportunity are strange enough to feel like fiction. But they’re real. And once you understand what they’re doing, fire starts to look like less of a disaster and more like a secret weapon.