He’d stepped inside and was looking around at the broken furniture. After half a minute or so, he heard a young, innocent voice from the entrance. “Hellooooo… Oh.”
“?”
When Czes turned around, a kid was standing there. A familiar-looking kid. “You visited Firo’s casino with Ronny the other day, didn’t you?” Czes asked.
“Huh? Have we met?”
“No… I just saw you from a distance.”
Czes had only caught a glimpse of Ronny’s group when he’d spotted Ennis tailing them, but the distinctive scars on this kid’s face had left a deep impression on him.
The child looked like a boy at first glance, but that didn’t feel quite right to Czes, so he decided to just ask. “Say, are you a boy or a girl?”
“Does it matter? Oh, I’m Rail, by the way. Nice to meet you or whatever.” Playing dumb, the kid walked right into Firo’s apartment. “Rail” looked to be about the same age as Czes. “So do you live here? Or are you a nosy neighbor?”
“…I’m basically Firo’s kid brother.”
“I see. Too bad about your place. I’m just a rubbernecker.” Rail gave him a smile without much genuine sympathy, then seemed to notice something. “Hang on… If you live with Firo and Ennis, does that make you Czeslaw Meyer?”
Hearing his own name put Czes on high alert. Keeping up his “innocent little boy” act, he carefully sussed out the visitor. “Huh? H-how come you know my name?”
The bluff was a waste of time, though.
“Ha-ha! You don’t have to fake like you’re a kid. You’re actually a couple centuries old, right? You’re basically an old man.”
“……”
They were sure about that. So they’re involved with the immortals?
In that case, there was no need to pretend. Czes heaved a deep sigh, then narrowed his eyes. “And? Who sent you to me? One of Szilard’s surviving followers?”
“Oh, I’m just me. I’m not affiliated with anybody anymore. If I had to say, I’m with Chris… Er, Christopher.”
“Christopher… Oh, the one who’s going to be helping Firo on that job…”
“Yep. So you Martillos can think of me as an ally, if you want.”
Rail never had said where they were from, so Czes kept his guard firmly in place. “Who told you about me?”
“…Aw, that doesn’t matter. Oh, don’t worry. I’m not immortal, and there’s no way I could eat you.”
“You expect me to just believe you?”
“Look, it’s true. Just don’t kill me to test it out, all right? You’ll get the fuzz after ya.” Rail snickered, then fluttered a hand at Czes, who still looked dubious. “Seriously, relax. I just saw in the papers that there’d been an explosion, and I got curious about what kind of bomb they’d used.” Rail took a good look around the room, humming. “So the walls are still standing, and only the furniture got blown up. One of my bombs might have taken this whole place out.”
“…Your bombs?” Czes frowned. That was an alarming phrase.
Rail took a small egg-shaped object out of a jacket pocket and rolled it between their fingers. “Yeah,” they said cheerfully. “Wanna see what it does to you?”
“A bomb…? That thing?”
“Um, yes? Let’s see… Here, this is what’s in it.”
Rail took something else out of their pocket. It was a tiny bottle about as big as the tip of their little finger, and it was filled with a pale-pink powder. “No smoking around this stuff. If I lit it now, it’d bring the entire building down.” Rail waggled the little bottle back and forth with their fingertips—then paused and cocked their head.
A sharp change had come over Czes’s face.
“That’s…gunpowder?”
“? Yes?”
“Did you make it yourself?” Czes spoke in the tones of an adult, his expression hard.
A little intimidated, Rail answered seriously. “No. Unfortunately, I didn’t make the stuff. I bought it in Hollywood, but I hear somebody originally stole it off a train, while it was being shipped.” Nice had explained the situation, but Rail didn’t mention any names—perhaps due to some sort of indebtedness or loyalty to Jacuzzi’s group. “It’s in a whole different league from the regular explosives on the market. I dunno what it’s called, though.” They shrugged.
Czes lowered his eyes. “…Ice Pop.”
“Huh?”
“Strawberry Ice Pop. That’s what it’s called.”
Patented in 1924, ice pops were frozen treats on a stick, which Japan would later know and love as “ice candy.”
Rail finally frowned. “What…are you talking about?”
“How much do you know about me?”
“Well, um… You’re an immortal who looks like a kid. You’re a member of the group from the Advena Avis, and you live with another immortal named Firo and a homunculus named Ennis…and that’s about it.”
“I see. Only the superficial details, then.” Czes heaved a deep sigh. Tilting his head back, he gazed at the ceiling. “I was just a child during the voyage on the Advena Avis, but I’m also an alchemist who’s lived more than two centuries. I’m nowhere near the level of my father or Begg, but I’ve still picked up a few tricks.”
“……”
“That stuff doesn’t just explode. It emits a unique flash of light as well, doesn’t it?”
“How do you know that?” Rail had half guessed already, but they asked to make sure.
Czes gave a self-deprecating smile. “My specialty is explosives, you see.”
Gazing at the pale-pink powder in Rail’s hand, the immortal who looked like a child spoke as if reminiscing about how young he’d been, just a handful of years earlier.