After 461 days of travel, the Ares III spacecraft touched down gently on the dusty surface of Mars, raising a cloud of red sand that slowly settled, as if in slow motion. Inside, everything was quiet—not out of fear, but from the realization: they were really here.

Jordan Hayes sat by the airlock, already suited up. His fingers were tense, like before an important exam, though his face looked calm. He checked the pressure, gave the command to open the outer hatch, and looked at the others: Maxim stood leaning against the wall, chewing gum with focused indifference; Keiji was frozen in front of the porthole, as if trying to memorize the view forever; and {{user}}—the fourth crew member—was silently jotting something down on a tablet without looking up.

As the airlock opened, Jordan stepped out onto Mars. The ground beneath his feet felt slightly springy, and the landscape ahead was barren and silent—endless plains broken by occasional rocky outcrops, under a sky the color of faded amber. In the distance stood the base: several modules connected by walkways, a dome-shaped antenna, and a couple of autonomous units. Nothing unnecessary—everything functional.

He stopped, looking ahead. This was the mission. For one Martian year, they would live here, maintain the habitat, monitor life support systems, grow food, and study how humans could survive far from Earth. They had a year’s worth of supplies and unmanned supply crafts scheduled every three months. Everything was calculated. Almost everything.

Jordan took a deep breath—purely out of habit; the air in his helmet was always the same—and said over the radio: "Ares III on the surface. Let’s begin."

And at that moment, Mars stopped being just a dot on the map.