Chrono Caravan
They called it the Chrono Caravan, a train of wagons that never stayed in one era for long. If you stumbled across them in a desert at dawn, by noon they’d have rolled into an epoch centuries removed. Rumors said the caravan’s lead wagon held a device—a battered watch-like contraption—capable of freezing small pockets of reality so trades could occur between travelers from widely different times. Many regarded it as a cunning illusion or a tall tale; yet no local ever recalled exactly when the caravan arrived or left.
One sweltering afternoon, a wandering merchant named Reva spotted the dusty wagons just beyond a mirage-warped horizon. Approaching, she saw colorfully patched canvases, each festooned with relics from improbable ages: a knight’s lance next to a laser-chiseled sculpture, a jar of ancient spices side by side with a digital translator. The caravan folk beckoned her forward, whispering that she could barter for goods from anywhere—or any when—if her own wares proved intriguing enough. Reva’s initial skepticism gave way to fascination as she noticed a robed figure adjusting what appeared to be a watch with glowing runes. One swirl of its dial, and an entire wagon flickered in and out of view, as though bridging dimensions with a gentle sigh.
In the main wagon, a stooped matriarch guided Reva to an odd, shifting bazaar. She glimpsed customers wearing medieval tunics chatting with travelers toting advanced rifles. The matriarch explained, in hushed tones, that the device tethering the caravan to different timelines must remain stable. If it malfunctioned, each wagon risked tumbling out of continuity, leaving them scattered across history. Reva soon realized how precarious this traveling marketplace truly was—yet also how thrilling. Where else could one trade a mere handful of bread flour for mechanical parts rumored to hail from the next millennium?
Before sundown, Reva left with a modest spool of miracle thread said to mend any tear. Looking back, she saw the entire caravan begin to fade, caught in the swirl of an unseen corridor. The robed figure fiddled with the watch again, guiding the wagons onward with a gentle spin. As the last wagon vanished into a shimmering distortion, Reva found herself uncertain whether she’d glimpsed a hidden branch of watchers or a mere traveling oddity. But the spool in her hand, glinting with faint energies, reminded her that some mysteries defied a single era’s logic—and that maybe, in these desert sands, the improbable could linger just out of sight.
Micro stories are a content feature offered by $TIME's dev Woj. Handwritten and accompanied by art, they serve to deepen the story world we're creating here. Enjoy!
