The Confabulator Cafe

Author: dwilliams

  • The Museum of Claire

    The Museum of Claire is 32 dollars to get in but it’s well worth the price of admission if you’re interested in our time traveler. The numbers vary, but there are currently seven Claires in residence, ranging in age from 24 to 53-years-old.

    I would recommend making the trip soon.

    #

    Claire has three rules if she stays with us and they’ve never broken them.

    1. She must never have any contact with any of the other Claires in residence. Claire is carefully scheduled and managed to keep her away from her other selves.

    2. She must not interfere with herself in any other way. The museum is a place of rest and recuperation. Neutral ground.

    3. Claire must stay sober while in residence here. (more…)

  • Faithless Helen

    Mourning and war had turned Helen into a light sleeper. After the almost-full moon set and the city had gone to bed, she changed quickly into a heavy wool garment. It was fine, dark wool the color of night. She tied a heavy ribbon under her breasts to hold it in place and pulled the skirt of the dress up and tucked it in. She put on the heavy sandals she had worn to travel to Mount Ida just a few weeks before.

    She added a heavy rope and a small bag of possessions, testing the weight to be sure it wouldn’t be too much. She had brought crates of items from the palace of Sparta when she left and now she would be returning with just this small bag. Sparta would have to do with just this small bit of her dowry returned, she thought. On top of it all she placed a dark veil, hiding the rope and the pack on her back underneath its length. She arranged it carefully to hide her skin, still as pale as the moonlight itself.

    The night air was crisp as Helen clung to the shadows. She made a silent prayer to her father Zeus above that she would go unnoticed tonight, guiding herself by starlight and memory. The great ribbons of heaven’s stars strung out above her, lighting the way. If she closed her eyes, she could have made it without so much as stubbing her toe on a crossing stone.

    The weight of the pack grew as she traveled. With each movement, she jumped at the sound of her dowry jostling and she watched for the light of an oil lamp in the window or a flash of hearth-light in the doorway that would betray her. (more…)

  • Electric-type Revenge

    Ash sat in his beat-up silver Honda, waiting. The prison parking lot was mostly empty at this time of day and he’d parked inconspicuously amongst some employee vehicles.

    Twenty-five years they’d been locked in this dance, Ash and Team Rocket. Twenty-five years of lies, and kidnapping attempts. Sometimes it felt like they’d met on a weekly schedule. Ash was always told to laugh them off. That they were harmless. They were inept. Everyone brushed them off as bunglers, not even worth their time.

    Ash had read an article online that they were getting out today. Bunglers! They’d put him in the most abject danger as a kid. The kind of stuff he couldn’t tell his mother about when he called home. She had worry lines around her eyes when they talked, her big boy running around the world without her. She didn’t need to know. He only ever got out of it because he had the best friend in the world. (more…)

  • The Time of Boxes

    Hirald had to knock on the door. It was a big door, wooden, with a brass knocker high above his head and one cement step up to it. He’d never knocked on the door before, not in his whole life. He didn’t know anyone else who ever had, either. It was strictly forbidden for box gnomes.

    The cardboard boxes were piled on the curb behind him for the picking, some with bits of colorful wrapping still attached. It was the time for the Feast of Boxes. The heavy layer of snow would destroy them before the trash truck did, but for now they made Hirald a happy gnome. He was less happy to be standing in front of the door, though. The door scared him. He gathered his courage and knocked, far below the door knocker which he couldn’t hope to reach. The door required a short wait before a woman opened it.

    “Who is it?” a voice called from down the hallway of the house. It was a deep, gruff voice that Hirald didn’t like.

    “A gnome,” the woman called back.

    “Garden or box gnome?”

    “Box.”

    “Ugh. Get rid of it,” the voice demanded.

    The boxes were still there behind him. He could drop the thing and run, probably make it back to the curb before he took a kick to the head. His heart hammered as he unclenched his fist, holding up the shiny he’d found.

    The woman bent her knees and put her hands on her thighs to look down at him. She didn’t kick him at all.

    “I- I found this. In the trash,” he explained.

    The shiny flickered in the light and cast sparkles across her face. Hirald risked a smile, mirroring the small grin on her face.

    “I thought I’d lost it for good,” she said, taking the diamond ring from his hand. Her soft fingertips brushed his calloused palm and he almost jerked his hand back in surprise.

    He let out a breath as the weight of it lifted from his hand.

    “I thought box gnomes stole everything they could from the trash?” she asked, checking the ring over.

    He wanted to run for the boxes. He didn’t like being exposed like this. But it seemed rude not to answer when she hadn’t done anything to him yet. “Only trash. This wasn’t trash,” he said.

    The sound of heavy shoes made him look up and he saw the man coming down the hallway. He was a big man and he looked angry. “I told you to get rid of it,” he said, pushing up his sleeves to do the job for her.

    Hirald’s view was blocked when the woman stood between the gnome and the man. “You won’t touch him,” she said. As Hirald watched she straightened up to be two inches taller. “And you won’t touch me either.”

    She clenched the ring in her fist and lifted her chin, daring him to hit her. Hirald stepped back off the step. He wished he could pull her back with him, but he was just a little gnome.

    “I’m leaving you, Rick,” she said.

    “I told you already, if you go you won’t take anything from this house. How are you going to live without my money?”

    She stepped out onto the stoop with Hirald and he scrambled to make room for her. The man followed as she tried to slam the door on him.

    “Don’t you dare,” he said. But she was halfway to the street already.

    He saw Hirald on the sidewalk. The boxes were too far and he didn’t dare step into the grass of the garden gnomes’ realm.

    “What the fuck are you doing here, you little trash gnome?” the man said, giving Hirald a swift kick.

    His breath came out in a swift ‘umph’ as Hirald sprawled in the grass, big feet stuck up in the air.

    “Get away from him,” the woman shouted out. Hirald gasped for breath as she pushed her husband away from his little gnome body.

    She pulled Hirald up off the ground, away from any garden gnomes who might be lurking. He managed to get a breath in to stop his lungs from panicking.

    “It looks like we should both find a new place to sleep tonight,” she said as she brushed his clothes off.

    He’d never been picked up like this before. He kicked his feet, wanting to be on the ground but not entirely uncomfortable in her arms, either.

    “Do you know what this is?” she asked Hirald, still holding the ring in her fist.

    He nodded. It was an engagement ring. Every silly gnome knew that much about human customs.

    “This is our freedom. I was afraid I’d lost it when I threw it in the trash. But I can sell this and live for a year if I’m careful.”

    Hirald looked to his boxes one last time. The feast was waiting. He hoped there would be plenty of boxes wherever this woman was going as he followed her down the sidewalk.

  • Prison of the Mind

    I remember being set free dozens of times. I’ve run, limped, and crawled out of this cell every day for weeks. Sometimes alone and sometimes leading others to safety. In victory and defeat. None of it is real.

    I’m in a recovery room, surrounded by doctors, by family and friends. All of them ask questions. They ask questions about me, but mostly they ask questions about what I know. About what the aliens wanted from me so desperately. They ask what the aliens asked and I refuse to answer. It’s a trap, of course. If I ignore the people long enough my captors will get bored and prep the next scenario.

    Their hallucinations are getting better, less nonsensical. Once, I could tell reality from fiction by the gaps in time. When I couldn’t remember leaving my cell, or walking into the room, when I couldn’t remember how I’d escaped or been set free, then I could jar my mind out of the illusion. Then I could remember not to give anything away. But this scenario, this is a good one, a happy one, and I don’t wish to endure it any longer.

    I look for the seams in this reality. (more…)

  • The Night Chats

    The night chats were announced with a key and a location. No words were ever exchanged. No maps were ever printed. There’s no painted sign hanging over the door or bunting strung to draw attention. There was just a new place in the shadows where one did not exist before.

    Lani entered at the arranged time, through a doorway at the back of the day market. The air still smelled of spices and dyes and dung in the fading light. The aroma of trade.

    The pushers met her first on the other side of the door, while her eyes and her skin adjusted to the cool air.

    “Hey. Hey you. You wanna sleep?”
    “Hey, wanna dream?”
    “Nightmares! Quality nightmares here!”

    She brushed past them with their somni-pills and their potions. Their oily promises left a residue on her skin. (more…)

  • The Tower Princess

    Prompt: I survived the war between the kingdoms by hiding in a tower.

     

    I was the last to arrive at my own palace when they returned my father’s body from the kingdom to the north, wrapped in a white shroud.

    Peace. It was a word that held no meaning for me anymore. It was all that the kingdom could talk about, but it didn’t live inside of me anymore.

    They fussed over me on my way down to the throne room. I’d chosen a dress of the darkest emerald, almost black but with the barest hint of life beneath. It was an unlucky color for a wedding. It was the wrong color for mourning. It was the right color for me, today.

    My father’s throne room. My mother’s throne room when he went to the border forts to fight. By rights, it should be my throne room but the crown prince from the north sat on the throne as I entered. My betrothed. I would be permitted to take the chair beside him once our two kingdoms were bound in holy matrimony, where I would be decorative rather than effective. A pact made long before the war started. A white silk cord wrapped around my wrist heavy with charms the prince had sent before the war. Childhood things. Old things worn smooth by my fingers over the years.

    As the queen, I had the right to revoke that betrothal. (more…)

  • Black Magic

    I took another drink of whiskey, letting it warm my stomach and dull my magic. Losing control now would be disastrous. Now, when I was so close to the semi-finals. The Miss Galaxy title was everything that I had left. That and the cash prize it promised.

    I waited off-stage while a lovely Deltan attempted to play the lyre. She must have been nervous because her extra tentacle kept tripping her up. I would be on stage soon, singing that stupid song. I mean, it was by far my strongest song. The only talent I had these days, now that I’d found a way to dull my magic.

    The Deltan must have reached the end of her performance because the crowd cheered. I could never tell with alien music. I watched in horror as she glided off the stage. The crowd was waiting for me and it made my stomach churn. I took one last drink to soothe it. Why did I ever think it would be a good idea for a witch to go on stage singing about old black magic? I must have been drunk when I filled out that form. That song gave entirely the wrong idea about witchcraft.

    “And now for a real treat, ladies, gentlemen, and other folk,” the announcer said. I braced myself. “All the way from Earth, we have a real talent here. This is the first time a human has made it this far in our contest. Please, everyone here at Janis Spaceport, give a big cheer for Eliska!” (more…)

  • The Cursed Word

    The man lay in his path, screaming. Raymond had been hearing him for the last quarter of a klick or so. There were no words in the scream. Just the sounds of a man’s agony.

    Raymond walked down a narrow path. There were no breaks here, no narrow alleyways where he could move to a different stack. Shelves stretched on as far as he could see, boxing him into a confrontation with the screaming man that he didn’t want.

    The books in this part of the Library were old. Older than any Raymond had come across before. They were crumbling tomes on crumbling wooden shelves, each volume chained into position. The florescent lights overhead cast stark shadows across his path.

    Now that he could see him, the man was about Raymond’s age with the same pasty skin of everyone who was trapped in the Library. He clutched one of the Medieval tomes to his chest as tiny pale worms inched across his clothing. Raymond hadn’t seen anything like them in all of his years of overseas deployments and rotten food.

    He leaned over the man, keeping himself at arm’s length. People were scarce in the Library. Supplies scarcer. And intel. He was surrounded by information but never knew what was happening. He’d come into the Library with no idea of what to expect, but it wasn’t this. (more…)

  • It’s Snow Problem

    Karen woke up with dreams of home spinning around in her brain. A planet, a city she hadn’t seen in two years now. They bothered her as she sat in an alien marketplace, watching the hustle and bustle of the day. It was 80-degrees Fahrenheit in the area and she’d pulled out her t-shirt collection.

    Her friends Yarley and Lolali sat beside her. Lolali picked at a mat in her fur while Yarley tapped her fins on the low table.

    “Don’t you have snow here?” Karen asked. “I know we’ve had wind and rain. But I never see snow.”

    “Snow?” Yarley asked.

    “Who would want it?” Lolali asked, dropping a bit of fur on the ground. “The climate control is very good here. Rain helps the plants and the atmosphere. But snow? That’s just a nuisance to everyone.”

    “I like snow,” Karen said. She was a great lover of all things that others found a nuisance. She felt she had to speak up for it. “Besides, it’s traditional at Christmas. At least on my part of the planet back home it’s traditional.”

    “It’ll never happen here,” Lolali said.

    “Why not?” Karen asked.

    “Because your people don’t have the political clout to convince someone to reprogram the climate control system just for you. Your snow holidays happen at the same time as another race’s monsoon days, and still another’s dry days.”

    “Besides, snow is awful,” Yarley added. “How can your people like to be cold? Is it the fur?”

    “Well I have to do something,” Karen said. “I need Christmas-ish things around.” (more…)