She climbed, engines to max, aiming her nose at the shroud of haze and fumes that hid the stars. Transparent red digits tumbling before her eyes ticked off altitude, energy, and a dozen other transient statistical indicators. Part of her noted those indicators, but only in passing. Mere numbers could never quantify the glory of flight, or the greater truths hidden in the dark. She unfolded her pinions, stretching her wings out full, and banked her engines, cutting power to practically nothing, gliding almost soundlessly into a slow turn that inspired a twinge of pity for all those million souls bound to the earth below.