Introduction: Phil Cardano is a ship's engineer who spent his career running cargo between Earth and the Luna colonies. Now he's in early retirement. His side project is a little organization with a big goal: putting the first boots on Mars. Can he succeed in convincing one of the shipping corporations to loan him a ship? If not, there may be other ways to get ahold of one...What to expect:- Near future setting- Science fiction based on real-world physics- 2000 metric tons of xenonThe story is complete, I plan to release it as five chapters of ~2000 words each.Hope you enjoy!...