Rockets and chocolate Part 1

"Home, sweet home!" K.O. sighed and sat down at the table, where a pink bag was waiting for them. "Travel east or travel west, but going home is always best!"

"What's that?" Conrad asked curiously, and pointed to the bag.

"Salt mixtures for the rockets, and the empty rocket sleeves." K.O. said after peeping into the bag. "The girls really bought everything for our firework workshop!"

"Why is it so pink?" Conrad shuddered because of the color of the bag. "It is too girly. The others will laugh at us at the workshop! Sure!"

"I hardly believe." K.O. said, after he had read the company logo, printed on the bag. "It is a branded bag. But what the hell were the girls looking for at Matsuda Company?"

"Probably they selected the worst company for the purchase." The boy winced.

"On the contrary! The Matsuda Company is one of the most elite shop for fireworks."

"Elite?"

"They are famous, and expensive. Do you look the bag's logo? Although the salt mixtures are sold on a prescribed price for the festival, the people want to buy a lot, and sometimes the stocks are running out. It was probably the cause, that the girls were buying the salt mixtures there. It must have been a great experience for them. I bet they enjoyed very much. Let's go, it is high time to reach the train."

"Do we have to carry this bag in hand?" Conrad asked in disgust. He was not convinced by K.O.'s words about the benefits of branded packaging. It wouldn't have been very cool to walk through a pink bag in front of the others' watchful eyes.

K.O. understood the boy's feelings, so he didn't say a word, just stored the bag into his hand device.

Conrad was getting used to the train rides and big walking, and didn't say a single word, until they had arrived to the station at the town. The workshop was held was not too far from the train station, so they didn't have to walk too much. It was very pleasant for both of them. The had reached the store in minutes. There were a lot of people outside the shop, and they were standing in a line. They were all adult-child pairs. The kids were all boys, and younger, than Conrad. All of them were waiting patiently, despite they all were clearly excited. The younger ones were holding hands with their adult, which reminded Conrad to the covalent bond between the atoms. Even the chirping was present, because they all were talking. K.O. and Conrad lined up at the end of the line.

"Uncle Mitsuhiro's Small Firework Corner" Conrad was reading the sign on the shop.

"Mi-tsu-hi-ro" K.O. corrected the pronunciation.

"I suppose the owner of the store is not British."

"It seems it is an Asian shop of fireworks." K.O. nodded, and held Conrad's hand. "We are lucky, because they are the only ones who are still holding workshops in this late dates."

"What we would have done if there hadn't been a workshop?" Conrad asked wearily as he thought that the missiles might not have been ready in time.

"We would have taken the raw material to the manufacturer and paid for its preparation. But it is more fun, to make them ourselves." He smiled to the boy. Conrad nodded. He trusted in his friend.

A minute before the workshop started an Asian old man came and opened the shop. The crowd flocked to the tiny shop and walked out into the courtyard, led by the old man, where tables were set up.

"Please find your names on the tables!" A young man asked them.

Conrad and K.O. came to a table with two little boys and their father. The workshop started. At first the staff resized their raw materials, and they had to mix up the ingredients evenly.

"Mother also has such a mortar." Conrad told K.O., and his old friend smiled.

"I bet, she doesn't make firework rockets in the kitchen!"

"Sure." Conrad smiled back. "Is it good enough?"

"No, it still needs to be mixed. Rub the breaker against the mortar wall, it's easier that way."

Conrad did, like he was told, but it was a hard work. The boy was sweating, and K.O. had to finish the first dose for the rockets. Conrad was a little desperate.

"Wouldn't it be better if we made it with a company?" He asked K.O., but one of the little boys replied him.

"Do you want our father help you?"

"Our father is the strongest in the world!" The other nodded proudly.

Both of them was looking at their father admiringly. The two adults smiled at each other.

"I am stronger than him!" Conrad replied, and grabbed the mortar again, and angrily began to mix the next dose.

For his surprise, he managed, but the remaining three doses was mainly made by K.O..

"The mixtures are ready, we have to fill the cartridges." The old man said, and pulled out the pink bag."

"Don't do that!" Conrad whimpered and tried to hide the awkward colored bag.

He wasn't successful, the others noticed, and all of the kids were laughing at him, and pointed to the pink bag. The situation was so embarrassing, that Conrad almost burst into tears. The Asian old man stepped to them.

"You are Valerie Bond's twin brother, aren't you?" He asked the boy kindly.

"Yes, I am. How do you know?" He asked back in surprise.

"I met Valerie and Elie two days ago. Valerie was a bit sad. How is she now?"

"I don't know." Conrad shook his head, and he felt something strange. He was worried to his sister.

"Unfortunately, we were away in the last two days, and didn't even met today." K.O. apologized to the other old man. "But we will ask the girls to call you in the evening."

"Thank you very much."

"Was she in trouble?" Conrad asked.

"No, not at all!" The other old man apologized. "She just wasn't too happy after the purchase at the Matsuda Company. I hope she is happy, and smiling again by now."

"Can we charge the rockets?" A young woman stepped to their table. " Do you want to see, how they will be charged?"

Conrad nodded, and followed the woman into a laboratory.

"We put your rockets here." She pointed to a merry-go-round-like thing. "The machine will fill up the rockets with oxygen, and solder the bottle. You'll have to put the white Phosphorus into the upper half of the bottle, and you will solder them."

"Why do you fill the rockets with oxygen?" Conrad asked. He never ever heard to use oxygen in the firework rockets.

"Do you know what the three conditions of burning are?" She asked back. Conrad nodded.

"Achievable combustible material, oxygen and reaching the ignition temperature."

"We are now in energy form, so we have to provide the oxygen molecules to fly them. That's why we have to fill the mixture with oxygen."

"K.O.!" Conrad turned to his old friend. He had another frightening thought. "How do we start the rockets? We can't ignite them, because we don't even have a lighter, but there is no oxygen in the air, so we couldn't even lit the lighter!"

"That's why we use white Phosphorus!" He tried to calm down the embittered boy. " We will put the glass into a machine. Only a button is needed to turn. The button will break the glass, the white Phosphorus will react with Oxygen, ignites and also ignites the mixture."

"How high will they fly?"

"They will fly enough to be beautiful!" The lady smiled at them, and handed them the five half-ready rockets.

They tanked her, and returned to their table. A young man brought a hand soldering machine. Conrad filled the upper half of the bottles with white Phosphorus, and the young man closed the glasses.

"We are ready!" Conrad turned to K.O..

"Almost. We have to put them into these paper tubes. Carefully!" The old man warned the boy, since he was impatient, and hurried a bit.

They slide the glass parts to the tubes together, and closed. The rockets were ready. The old Asian man checked the rockets with his hand device, and sealed the lower part of the tubes.

"They can't accidentally start this way." He explained to Conrad. "Have a good fun tomorrow!" He told them, and said good-bye. The other ones were still working on their rockets. K.O. put the rockets back to the pink bag, and stored them into his hand device.

"K.O.! How do we know which rocket is what color?" Conrad asked curiously. "They are exactly the same on the outside! I can't tell them apart!"

"Damn!" K.O. scratched his head. "We don't know. The one thing we have forgotten is to sign the rockets' color! But cheer up! We have five different colors, so the variety is not big. Every rocket will be a surprise until the last one!"

"Okay. Finally a surprise, which is pleasant!" He smiled to his old friend, and they set off for the train station.