I agree with what @bozz said and this is not a short story by any means.

There is a certain parallelism between what he tells us about this mission to Mars, what happens in the time the story takes place and situations of the here and now: hacker, betrayal, comfort zone, changes. And, in that invitation to leave the mission to return to the comforts of yesteryear or the changes that are occurring in life today is that I prefer to focus my attention as a teaching of this part of the story. What a teaching!
Thank you for giving us several lessons for life. Happy journey. Cheers and greetings.