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Max remained in the shop near the counter, so he could block anyone who got ideas about barging into the back room to bother the Envoys, but that only made him a prime target for every curious shopper that made it into the shop.
The girl behind the counter began to panic as the shop became overcrowded, worried that rampant shoplifting would clean out their savings and stock, leaving them with nothing to pay the rental on the unit.
“Don’t worry about it. You are using the approved store tags provided by Absolution. If an unpurchased item is removed from the store, their account will be directly debited for the full retail price of the item.
It was a request of the higher-end shops. Their shoppers don’t care about price, and they don’t want the hassle of a checkout counter.” Max explained, and the girl visibly relaxed.
They were a bit more expensive, but the proximity tags had been her mom’s idea to make them seem more official, not having to manually ring things up.
“Miss, do you think that the Dryads would like this scent? I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but they abhor all things made of artificially created chemical.” A Myceloid in a short red dress asked, dropping a candle on the counter in her excitement to be among the first to the shop.
“All of our candles are made in-store out of beeswax and natural ingredients. I believe that the Dryad Envoy would love that scent since she is a fan of the forest, and that particular moss grows deep in the tropical forests of Endora, a human planet in the Cygnus Kingdom.” The girl explained.
“How do we use them? Are they placed in hot water to release their scent?” The Myceloid asked.
“You can do that, or even over a dry heat source, but the candles are designed to be self-heating. If you light that central string on fire, it will produce a low light, a small amount of heat and release the signature scent for roughly twenty standard hours for that size of our candle line.”
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“The glass container keeps the melted wax and flames contained. Just refrain from touching it while it is lit, as it will get hot. A strong breeze will put it out when you are finished. Would you like a demonstration?”
“Is that permitted in public?” The shopper asked with great excitement while others gathered around.
“Of course. We also have products designed to release scented smoke when they burn. It is very popular with humans, but I suspect that it might not be for every species, as it is still smoke.”
She took a lavender-scented candle from behind the counter and lit it for the shoppers to examine.
Max chuckled at the pure joy on the faces of the Myceloid shopper’s entourage as they encountered a candle for the first time. Their faces were actually just a facsimile of the appendage that mammalian species had, and they didn’t have traditional sight, but they were instantly in love.
They navigated by thermal detection, and the candle produced a directed heat source that lit up everything around them in their vision. They had never had the need for fire in their development and had used directed light for the same purpose, but the lights in a spaceship didn’t give off any heat, so it didn’t give them the same sense of directionality.
The small fire brought them all close to examine it, but not less than half a meter, which they viewed as the closest safe distance from a burning object.
“How did we put it out again?” She asked.
“If you can blow air, that is how humans do it. But a swift wave of an appendage nearby will do the same, like this.” The shopkeeper explained before waving her hand over the candle.
“I will take one of every scent. I don’t know what ones my family will like, but I have Alliance Credits to spare.” She demanded, suddenly sounding much less entranced and much more bossy.
“Certainly. In fact, I actually have a prepacked option that is perfect for you. One candle in each scent that we have in stock and a sneak preview of our potpourri line, which isn’t out yet. Those ones you place in water over a gentle heat source to release the scent.
In Alliance currency, it will be eight hundred credits for the whole selection.”
She passed over the box of candles, and the register beeped happily as it recorded the payment. But that left the shopper in a conundrum. She was finished shopping, and there was a line, but she had actually wanted to see the Envoy before she got distracted by the candles.
“If you wait down the hall, away from the lineup, we will be out within the next hour and headed to the right of the door,” Max suggested.
An hour holding a thirty-kilo box of candles would hopefully be too much for them, and they would give up, but he would at least give them a hint of where to stand so that they could see the Envoys on their way past.
“Thank you, Commander. I’m sure many others want to do actual business, so I will let them pass.” The Myceloid replied, then led her group out so that a half dozen more people could enter.
Fifteen minutes later, the shelves were looking pretty bare, and the line wasn’t getting any shorter. Someone had lit a censer full of incense on their way out, and it was drawing more people here, ones who didn’t know the Envoys were inside and just wanted the incense.
Finding all the good shops in a new city took time, so you went to check out every promising lead that you found, or so Max believed, based on the thoughts that he could sense, but the shop was about to enter a minor crisis.
“If we can get the next group to wait for a few minutes, please, we need to restock the shelves before you enter.” The girl behind the counter called out, to the annoyance of the shoppers who were really just looking to sneak a peek at the Envoys who could be seen behind Max, finishing their candles and placing them in a fridge to cool and harden.
But with Max there, they complied, and in no time, everything from the back room and behind the counter was out on the shelves, except for a stack of assortment boxes.
“We’re all finished with the Candles. I made one that smells just like coffee and freshly baked pastries.” The Innu Envoy declared proudly.
“I think I learned more than they did today. These Envoys have an incredible range of knowledge, including how to combine natural scents to create other perceived scents.” The older hippie laughed from the back room.
“As long as you enjoyed yourselves, it was well worth the time. But we should get moving before we starve the assistants to death.” Max joked.
It was a joke, they had actually eaten before they left the meeting room, but they had been here long enough, and the shop was running out of products to sell.