You are listening to a Clarks World magazine podcast with your host and narrator Kate Baker,

greetings Clarks World Citizens.

I hope this podcast finds you extraordinarily well.

This is our fourth story for the month of June, issue 189.

I hope that you're doing well.

I want to thank you for taking the time to stop by and listen to yet another podcast,

whether this is your first podcast, somewhere down in the middle of the road, or over 750.

I want to thank you for your support.

Thank you for going to patreon.com for slash Clarks World to see how you can donate a dollar

a more month to let Neil and I continue to bring these wonderful stories each and every month.

So our fourth story is titled The Odyssey Problem and is by Chris Wilrich.

Chris Wilrich, who can be found at the website ChrisWilrich.com.

It has appeared in such venues as Asimov's Beneath Seaseless Skies,

Fantasy and Science Fiction, Lightspeed, Strange Horizons, and Tales from the Magicians Skull.

His books include The Scroll of Years, Pire, 2013, and its sequels.

He lives in Mountain View, California with his family.

So my dear listener, I hope you can sit back, relax, and let me tell you a story.

When the sparkling golden glow fades and my skin stops feeling like mites are crawling all over it,

the room is gone, and I am shivering in a vast bright chamber and strange people clad in orange,

red, and blue pajamas are asking me how I am. I don't know what to say. I feel lighter

and the air feels cleaner. I am giddy and frightened. The room is my only home, and now it is gone.

Sometimes in the old times people would open the door of the room, and someone would stare at me

...