Lithium

The story of Lithium takes place some hundred years or so in the future, set at a Lithium evaporation plant deep in the desert. As the planet has moved away from coal power and towards electric vehicles, the demand for batteries has increased, and with it the need for the chemicals used to create them. This sudden rise in demand has resulted in vast grids of evaporation pools being created, and with them, a risky illegal business known as ‘skimming’.

Skimmers fly ships at insane speeds above the pools, dipping slightly into the lithium to take it up, but due to the regular grid pattern of the pools, the skimmers must lift up at every grid edge to bypass it. One badly timed movement will send the ship smashing into a gridline, and at these speeds, there is little chance of survival.