Chapter SevenAfter kicking loose the Ariane, they rode in silence down the gravitational slope: thermosphere, mesosphere, stratosphere. He had double-checked that the Lifters were quiet and safely strapped into acceleration hammocks before he’d aimed the Mod18 down the path of Karina’s flight plan. They slid within fifty klicks of the Aussie dome: the shining silver that shrouded any view of the nations within and meant instant death to any who approached.
Brody had never told that story of his own Lift to anyone. Only his aunt and the man who’d rescued them with his cargo vessel, flying well into range of the I-Beam to pull them out, knew the whole awful truth.
The Mod18 skipped off the upper atmosphere at barely fifty kilometers above ground. At this low of an altitude—due to the curve
