You are listening to a Clarksworld magazine podcast. I'm your host and narrator Kate Baker. Welcome to the third story for the month of March, 2006, issue 234. I hope that this is finding you as well as can be, all things considered. I want to thank you for spending the time here at Clarksworld for a little escapism. I want to thank you for your ongoing support.

Without your contribution,

via patreon.com forward slash Clarksworld,

we can't do this.

So thank you.

If you're a subscriber,

if you've gone to Patreon,

if you've gone to Clarksvillecitizens.com,

or you've checked a few bucks our way via a donation.

Every little bit counts, and I can't thank you enough.

Our story is titled Cross Talk, Elysium, by Carolyn Jow.

Carolyn Jow is a speculative fiction writer and retired English major,

based in New York City and Chicago.

Her work has been published in Clark's World and Strange Horizons.

She loves her dog almost as much as her dog loves her. And if you like what you hear, please go back to

Symbiotic and in which Caruth is correct. So, my dear listener, I hope that you can sit back,

relax, and let me tell you a story.

Tell me a story where it all goes right.

Say that we only ever stopped at the station with the largest wingspan and busiest fuel pipes,

the 50-something spears jutting out of its hull like enormous oars, the edges swarming with lights from all the other ships

like Elysium, fighting for their places to feed. Tell me when I squint that I can still see it shine.

Every few days as we swing around the orbit again, the faraway station hall glimmers like a secret in the long, quiet, dark.

...