Shopping At Prosperity's Venture Part 2/3

Posted on Fri Jul 19th, 2024 @ 2:01am by Captain Cronin Keys [GM] & Lieutenant Commander Rafael Montoya & Callisi Veera & Lieutenant JG Jake Simon [Morris] & Lieutenant JG Nebuchadnezzar [GM] & Ensign Athalar Quinlan [Cronin]
Edited on on Fri Jul 19th, 2024 @ 2:02am

1,362 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: M2: Culture Shock
Location: Ledosian Station One, Ledos Orbit
Timeline: After "Difficulties Already?"

on

Continuation…

Deciding to mimic her actions Cronin did the greeting bow a moment after the Rabbit woman did, he smiled and she began to speak untranslated words. He couldn't really make sense of the surface thoughts coming from her, the rock being was even more non-sensical well Cronin put that up to so alien.

He looked forward to conversing with all of them. He smiled again as she went through the various languages but at the last one he nodded. "Those are my words or at least words," he gestured to his combadge, "my universal translator can decipher. Greetings, its a pleasure to meet you all."

"The trade language, excellent." she remarked. "My name is Callisi, I'm with the Prosperity's Venture, a collection of trade merchants, licensed under the Dalacari Trade Commission. It's good to make your meeting." she offered, it sounded rehearsed but she made it work. "What you're hearing and using is a common trade tongue. It's rather common in commerce hubs, but commerce hubs get rarer and rarer as more and more people develop fabricators. We offer machine parts, basic and advanced processor chips, bulk food stock, and Craglin there is guarding our reactives and fuel rods. As it's a core-priest, those reactives are blessed by them, and their harvesting was overseen at all times." another rehearsed piece, but again, she made it work.

"Was there anything in particular that you were looking for?"

He straightened to a comfortable height and smiled. "I am Captain Cronin Keys of the Federation starship Pioneer. Core Priest? Blessed how? Harvesting fuel rods?" He asked the questions in rapid fire.

"Craglin, or that's what they want us to know them as, is a Slate. They're silicon based lithoforms. Rock people." she explained. "They hold all planets with warm cores as sacred holy ground, since all that churning and mineral wash to the surface is what brings them life. They're born from the world, literally. Five Slate get together and sing to the world, and after about, oh, twenty years or so a new Slate is born. Craglin is a Core Priest. They've been allowed to sing to a planet to help locate heavy metals and reactives, which are very in demand in the less advanced races who use reaction mass as fuel for star travel. Now, whether or not a Core Priest blessing a lump of uranium actually DOES anything, I couldn't tell you. But, it means a lot to some people, so who am I to deny them?"

Nebuchadnezzar looked and listened to what was taking place. His main objective was the safety of the captain, everything else was secondary though ze knew that the Security officers had their Captain's safety covered, ze was here to help with identifying possible trading partners that they can recommend to the Merchant Marines.

Nebuchadnezzar's initial observation might lead Zem to suspect that the most dangerous people here were, in fact, Starfleet. However, there was something about how these rabbit folk moved. How they could almost tell a whole sentence worth of conversation with little more then a glance, a nudge, a nudge. Everything in its place. Everyone has a job. Everything. Everywhere.

Every one of them was either current, or ex-military. The fluid in the suit, civilian. No doubt. The rock... person... thing.. hard to tell. It was too ponderous and slow.

"Indeed," he smiled. "We know of a few similar silicon based species, they all are rather interesting in various ways." Cronin said, "may I see what kind of food stocks you deal in?" He asked as he glanced over the stall's setup.

She lead them to the food stocks, which was a table with various cases and boxes, and then pallets with bags and boxes on it. Labels were in an alien script on the various, perhaps details as to the contents. "We have sealed pre-prepared meals, military grade. Bulk base stock, standard and protein infused. For the more luxurious meals we have fabricator dbase licenses for over four thousand food stocks from all across the home sectors. A few rare Ts'usugi delicacies, Dalacari teas and spices, Trilark marinades, and other assorted samples from various regions." she showed off a PaDD of sorts with the entire list, ordered very neatly. It was replicator recipes for tons of food and drink. "And of course, the drink list. Alcohol is the universal constant."

At that, some of the others working the stall chuckled. "Sorry Craglin, No alcohol for you." Callisi turned back to the crew, "They're underage." and that was apparently the punchline. The crew of the stall laughed, and even Craglin rumbled in what was agreed upon to be laughter.

"We can provide samples before purchase, but bear in mind we're not a sampling bar."

He chuckled when the joke was made and was glad to see that Craglin seemed to find it funny as well. Cronin gestured at the drinks list. "Are all of them Alcoholic?"

"Not all." she started, "But that also depends on what molecule gets you drunk. For some, it's ethanol." she motioned to herself, and the other long eared members of the crew. "For others, it's hydroxyl Isopropanol." She looked over at the humanoid encounter suit, with the fluidic lifeform swirling within.

"And for others, it's literally limestone."

"If you want to know what on this list is intoxicating for your species or not, I'll just need you to consent to a sweat swab and then we can proceed." she ducked under the table briefly and came back out with a green tissue in a sealed package. Writing on the package identified it as a 'saline excretion litmus pad' and further assured its sterility until opened, and declared what it was designed for. Very official.

She placed the sealed pack on the desk between them. "Just open, and rub the tissue against where you'd normally sweat. Palms, back of the neck, under the jawline. No need to dig deep, please." she advised with a smirk.

"Oh no need for all that, I was simply curious, though the dbase licenses of both Food stock and Drinks are of interest to the Federation." He smiled and gestured at the Rabbit like woman. "Miss Callisi...do you have a family name?" Cronin asked.

"Well then I think we can work out a bulk rate." She replied, which caught the attention of one of the other rabbit'ish folk, "Ie o tebanasanai yō ni shite kudasai." he warned, and Callisi gave a less than reassuring wave away. She tucked the litmus pad back under the desk. Unopened meant it was still good to use later. "A family name? Veera."

The tender moment was broken as one of the other members of the trader crew finalized a particularly big purchase. Food stock, and about two hundred kilos of the stuff from the looks of it. The same rabbit that gave Callisi a comment earlier helped load up the large sealed bags of powdered food, while another gave a cry of "Huzzah!" followed by another, and another. The fluidic creature in its suit raised a fist and cheered, and Callisi took a break from her conversation to join in the cheer. Even Craglin, who was literally on his own timetable, gave a rumble. Something on its 'shoulder' translated that rumble into 'Excitement!' and everyone had a good laugh. A hearty cheer at a big purchase. The being that made the purchase seemed very pleased with the amount of currency that just exchanged hands.

"Apologies. It's tradition to celebrate large purchases. Makes the shopper feel good." She softly smiled, leaning in slightly against the table.

Noticing the large purchase that just occurred, another oddity accompanied it: Actual currency. Physical coins of some form, with a circular notch cut out of one of the edges almost to denote a 'top' to a coin. A lot of them changed hands in a bag, that the rabbit that made the sale took the moment to quickly inspect. Mental math, and then some of the coins were returned in a smaller denomination. Payment, and Change. Literally the price of doing business.

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To Be Continued…

 

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