You are listening to a Clarkshold magazine podcast.

I'm your host and narrator Kate Baker and welcome to the first story for the month of July,

2025, issue 226.

Our story is titled Missing Helen.

It is by Tia Tishiro.

And you know what?

This story, along with all of our stories, are brought to you by your support.

So thank you if you are a subscriber, if you are a Patreon supporter at patreon.com forward slash Clarksworld.

If you go to Clarksworld Citizens.com.

And if you haven't yet considered doing so, your support helps us bring you the stories,

the nonfiction, the podcast, the art, and helps put it together each and every month.

So thank you so much for your ongoing support and for maybe your future support.

Now, Tia is a multiracial science fiction and fantasy writer hailing from the Pacific Northwest.

By day, she works in a neurobiology lab by night, she writes, and in between, she dabbles

in stained glass and juggling, though never at the same time.

She is an astounding award finalist with short fiction published in Clark's World Uncanny

and Apex.

And if you like what you hear, you can go back to the temporary murder of Thomas Monroe,

every hopeless thing, an intergalactic smuggler's guide to homecoming, and to carry you inside you. So, my dear listener, I hope that you can sit back, relax, and let me tell you a story when mark told you he was marrying your clone you said

congratulations on autopilot because that's what you say when your friend tells you they're

getting married and you had promised to stay friendly after the divorce you studied face, his fingers crimping the pleats of his dress pants.

That judgmental twist crept onto the corner of your lips without you quite realizing it.

...