The takeoff was flawless.
The polar-modified Bombardier lifted smoothly from the private airfield's runway, climbing with the effortless confidence of a top-tier long-range business jet flown by a fully rated pilot, a qualification the system had quietly granted Stan barely twelve hours earlier.
The initial climb was uneventful.
Air Traffic Control cleared him through Inksea's regional airspace without incident before handing him off to the transoceanic control network as the aircraft leveled off at its cruising altitude of forty-one thousand feet.
Stan engaged the autopilot, confirmed the polar flight plan, gave the instruments one last sweep, and let the aircraft do exactly what it had been engineered to do.
The next ten hours passed in the slow, almost hypnotic rhythm unique to long-haul, high-altitude flight.
