The Martian Chronicles

After their arrival on Mars garners no reaction, Captain Williams and his crew from the Second Expedition enter a nearby town and start knocking on doors. They first encounter Mrs. Ttt, who appears to speak English but assures the humans that she is practicing telepathy instead. The humans cannot understand her calm reaction to their presence nor why she displays little interest in their monumental achievement. Instead, she focuses on her baking and eventually forgets about them. She sends them to other Martians who may be more willing to help them, but every Martian they meet is unimpressed and more concerned with the minutia of their own lives. Mr. Aaa is concerned with his feud with Mr. Ttt, a young Martian girl claps “a golden mask over her face” (27) and focuses on her golden spider toy, and the intellectual Mr. Iii is focused on an impending lecture he is to deliver.

Mr. Iii does give Williams a few papers to sign, then gives him a key which will unlock a door down the hall, counseling the men to lock themselves behind the door until morning. Williams experience relief, sure that they will receive the accolades they are due. Once they are inside the room, however, they realize they have been committed to psychiatric facility in which all the patients claim to be from other planets.

The next morning, Mr. Xxx the head psychologist, tells Williams that he is not human: He is a Martian with a mental health condition and the other members of his crew are manifested hallucinations and proof of his psychosis. Williams convinces Mr. Xxx to accompany them to their ship, but when he does, Mr. Xxx simply assumes that the ship is also a manifested hallucination.

Mr. Xxx executes the crew, believing they will disappear afterward, and when they do not, Mr. Xxx assumes Williams is his hallucination and kills him, too. When the bodies and the rocket do not disappear, Mr. Xxx assumes his perception has broken from reality, and he dies by suicide.