A/N: The idea for this sketch was stolen from the story The National Chemical Emporium Sketch by Colin M. Taylor. Thanks Colin!
Scene: A small shop with "We sell the elements" in gold letters on the door. Inside there is an empty counter, behind which stands a man wearing a shabby lab coat. On the wall behind him is a poster-sized Periodic Table with several of the elements crossed out in red.
A customer enters.
Shop Man: Welcome to the Chemistry Retail Outlet.
Customer: You sell chemicals?
Shop Man: We specialise in the D.I.Y. market, sir: we sell the elements for our customers to make their own compounds.
Customer: Splendid, my good fellow. I wish to acquire a noble gas.
Shop Man: A worthy aspiration, sir, but we do not sell them: your noble gases don't form compounds.
Customer: Fair enough. Fair enough. What about rare-earth elements?
Shop Man: Only in our larger stores, sir.
Customer: No transUranic elements I suppose.
Shop Man: Yes.
Customer: Yes?
Shop Man: Yes, your supposition is correct.
There is a sudden howling noise; the customer turns to see, in a corner of the shop, a man sitting at what looks like an old fashioned ham-radio shack. The man is wearing Brown's Model F headphones and is twiddling knobs furiously. Lights flash randomly above him. Various hisses, howls and whistles punctuate the conversation from now on.
Shop Man: Pay no attention, sir. Just a little fine tuning. Now, what can I do for you?
Customer: I'd like some bromine.
Shop Man: Not in yet, sir: the delivery driver has overslept again.
Customer: Lithium, then.
Shop Man: The same problem, sir: the delivery service is unreliable.
Customer: Carbon! You must have carbon?
Shop Man: Can't sell it sir, we don't have a carbon licence.
Customer: Radium?
Shop Man: Decayed, I'm afraid.
Customer: Any Uranium?
Shop Man: Our stock is totally depleted.
Customer: You are going to tell me your Zinc is perforated aren't you?
Shop Man: Au contraire, we are famed for our zinc powder. It is the finest available.
Customer: Then I will have some that.
Shop Man: Fame has its downside, we've sold out.
Customer: You must have iron.
Shop Man: Yes, ... but …
Customer: Well?
Shop Man: We've had a lot of damp weather lately, it's rusted away.
Customer (above the rising wailing of the electrics): Do you have ASTATINE?
Shop Man: Bless you, sir.
Customer: Call yourself a shop? You've some brass.
Shop Man (smug): We don't sell brass, sir, it's an alloy.
Customer: That wasn't a question. AND TURN THAT RACKET OFF!
Shop Man (to radio ham): I did warn you.
Customer: What do you have?
Shop Man: Try me, sir.
Customer: Hydrogen?
Shop Man: Leaked away, I'm sorry to say.
Customer: Oxygen?
Shop Man: No call for it around here, sir.
Customer: But it's an essential for life!
Shop Man: It's in the air around us. Folk here won't pay for what they can get for free.
Customer: Err, Molybdenum?
The shop man turns to the Periodic Table behind him and silently points to Mo – it is crossed out.
Customer: Bismuth?
The shop man disappears beneath the counter and is heard routing around. He triumphantly emerges with a pen and ostentatiously crosses out Bi on the Periodic Table.
The radio ham, still wearing the headphones, leaves the shop, ignoring the customer and shop man, who watch him go.
Customer (leaning close to the shop man and lowering his voice): Any Ammonia?
The shop man looks around furtively and leans close up to the customer.
Shop Man (conspiratorially): Ammonia is a compound.
Customer (flashing a bank note): What have you got?
Shop Man (slyly eyeing the money): I could slip you some Sulphate.
Customer: Done!
THE END