"Wow," Neil breathed as he checked the impressive readings of the planet. It was .93 the size of earth, giving it a very comfortable amount of gravity for the inhabitants, and one a terran or spacer could get used to very swiftly. Its continents were moderately sized and verdant, and its oceans were a cerulean blue and filled with abundant life. Coupled with that, the atmosphere was very slightly more oxygen rich than ancient terra, which made the inhabitants lively and the animals were marginally larger than they might be initially. Neil wished his own wartorn homeplanet was this lovely, and for the first time he began to contemplate that he might have had a rougher upbringing than Junebug. 

Whatever happened after she left her homeworld, it had spat out a woman tougher than iron and colder than the void of space. 

He was glad for it though. It made her into his girlfriend. 

The Highlander approached in a meandering pace, receiving a hailing frequency about two million kilometers from the planet. Neil was surprised when it popped up. Normally they would be hailed fifty million kilos away, not two million. The planet must be used to relaxing when it came to defense. 

"Identification number and ship callsign?" A sonorous man's voice chirped over the feed. 

"ID number I593794, callsign Highlander. Here for refuel and resupply." Neil replied, lowering power from the sublight engines with a few choice button presses so they could cruise the next few hundred kilometers. "Requesting permission to dock." 

"A-ffirmative! Just head in to dock 34D and enjoy your stay on Celandine, sir." 

"Uh, thank you." Neil said, amused at the friendliness. Most places they docked they were speaking to either computers or overworked dock dispatchers. Taya laughed a bit, but she noticed Junebug's severity and furrowed her brow. Neil was none-the-wiser, eyes focused on the display. "Think we'll be able to go to the beach? I been meaning to work on my tan, and I haven't swam in water that wasn't chemically unstable in way too fucking long."

"The beaches here are nice," Junebug said in a tight tone, as if she were begrudgingly admitting to it. "But we shouldn't stay longer than it takes to get resupplied if we want to make that payday at Gliese 876. I'm not gonna take a quick holiday over a few million credits." 

"Yeah, true. But I'm sure we'll have an afternoon. Your family won't take up too much of our time, right?"