Fredric Brown: Martians, Go Home

“I repeat, you can’t hurt them. Your hand goes right through one, as through smoke. Bullets, knives, other weapons are useless for the same reason. And as far as we can see or find out, none of them has tried to hurt any human being anyway. So be calm and don’t panic.”

Another voice was cutting in, more or less garbling what was being said, but the announcer’s voice rose in pitch to carry over the new voice. “Yes, there’s one on my desk right in front of me and he’s talking to me but I’m keeping my mouth so close to the mike that—”

“Bill, that’s a gag, a fiction program. Like the time my parents told me about—back twenty years ago or so. Get another station.”

Bill said, “Sure, honey. Sure it’s a gag.” He turned the dial a quarter of an inch.

Another voice. “…don’t get excited, folks. A lot of people have killed one another or hurt themselves already trying to kill Martians, and they just don’t kill. So don’t try. Stay calm. Yes, they’re all over the world, not just here in Denver. We’ve got part of the staff monitoring other stations, covering as many of them as they can, and we haven’t found a station yet that’s operating that isn’t reporting them, even on the other side of the world.

“But they won’t hurt you. I repeat, they won’t hurt you. So don’t get excited, stay calm. Wait, the one that’s on my shoulder—he’s been trying to say something to me but I don’t know what because I’ve been talking myself. But I’m going to put the mike up to him and I’m going to ask him to reassure you. They’ve been being—well, impolite here to us, but I know that when he knows he’s talking to millions of listeners, he’ll, well—Here, fellow, will you reassure our great audience?” A different voce spoke, a voice a little higher pitched than the announcer’s. “Thanks, Mack. What I’ve been telling you was to screw yourself, and now I can tell all these lovely people to—”

The station went dead.

Bill’s arm had fallen from around Dorothy and hers from around him. They stared at one another. Then she said faintly, “Darling, try another station, That just can’t —”

Bill Gruder reached for the dial, but his hand never got there.

Behind there in the room a voice said, “Hi, Mack. Hi, Toots.”

They whirled. I don’t have to tell you what they saw; you know by now. He was sitting cross-legged on the window sill they had been leaning over a few minutes before.

Neither of them said anything and a full minute went by. Nothing happened except that Bill’s hand found Dorothy’s and squeezed it.

The Martian grinned at them. “Cat got your tongues?”

Bill cleared his throat. “Is this the McCoy? Are you really a—a Martian?”

“Argeth, but you’re stupid. After what you were just listening to, you ask that.”

“Why, you damn little—”

Dorothy grabbed Bill’s arm as he let go of her hand and started forward. “Bill, keep your temper. Remember what the radio said.”

Bill Gruder subsided, but still glared. “All right,” he said to the Martian, “what do you want?”

“Nothing, Mack. Why should I want anything you could give me?”

“Then scram the hell out of here. We don’t want company.”

“Oh, newlyweds maybe?”

Dorothy said, “We were married this afternoon.” Proudly.

“Good,” said the Martian. “There I do want something. I’ve heard about your disgusting mating habits. Now I can watch them.”

Bill Gruder tore loose from his bride’s grip on his arms and strode across the room. He reached for—and right through—the Martian on the window sill. He fell forward so hard that he himself almost went through the open window.

“Temper, temper,” said the Martian. “Chip, Chip.”

Bill went back to Dorothy, put a protecting arm around her, stood glaring.

“I’ll be damned,” he said. “He just isn’t there .”

“That’s what you think, Stupid,” said the Martian.

Dorothy said, “It’s like the radio said, Bill. But remember he can’t hurt us either.”

“He’s hurting me , honey. Just by sitting there”

“You know what I’m waiting for,” the Martian said. “If you want me to go away, go ahead. You people take your clothes off first, don’t you? Well, get undressed.”

Bill took a step forward again. “You little green—”

Dorothy stopped him. “Bill, let me try something.” She stepped around him, looked appealingly at the Martian. “You don’t understand,” she said. “We—make love only in private. We can’t and won’t till you go away. Please go.”

“Nuts, Toots. I’m staying.”

And he stayed.

For three and a half hours, sitting side by side on the edge of the bed they tried to ignore him and outwait him. Not, of course, ever saying to one another that they were trying to outwait him, because they knew by now that that would make him even more stubborn in staying.

Occasionally they talked to one another, or tried to talk, but it wasn’t very intelligent conversation. Occasionally Bill would go over to the radio, turn it on, and fiddle with it for a while, hoping that by now someone would have found some effective way of dealing with Martians, or would give some advice more constructive than simply telling people to stay calm, not to panic. Bill wasn’t panicky but neither was he in any mood to stay calm.

But one radio station was like another—they all sounded like poorly organized madhouses—except for those that had gone off the air completely. And nobody had discovered anything whatsoever to do about the Martians. From time to time a bulletin would go on the air, a statement released by the President of the United States, the Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, or some equally important public figure. The statements all advised people to keep calm and not get excited, that the Martians were harmless, and that we should make friends with them if possible. But no station reported a single incident that indicated that anyone on Earth had succeeded in making friends with a single Martian.

Finally Bill gave up the radio as a bad job for the last time and went back to sit on the bed, forgot that he was ignoring the Martian and glowered at him.

The Martian was seemingly paying no attention whatsoever to the Gruders. He had taken a little fifelike musical instrument out of his pocket and was playing tunes to himself on it—if they were tunes. The notes were unbearably shrill and didn’t form any Earthly musical pattern. Like a peanut wagon gone berserk.

Occasionally he’d put down the fife and look up at them, saying nothing, which was probably the most irritating thing he could have said.

At one o’clock in the morning, Bill Gruder’s impatience exploded. He said, “To hell with this. He can’t see in the dark, and if I pull down the shades before I turn off the light—”

Dorothy’s voice sounded worried. “Darling, how do we know he can’t see in the dark. Cats can, and owls.”

Bill hesitated, but only a moment. “Damn it, honey, even if he can see in the dark he can’t see through blankets. We can even undress under the covers.”

He went over to the window and slammed it down, then pulled the shade, taking angry pleasure in reaching right through the Martian to perform both operations. He pulled down the other shade and then turned off the light. Groped his way to the bed.

And, although their feeling of a need for silence inhibited there in some ways, and they didn’t feel it right every to whisper to one another, it was a wedding night after all.

They’d have been less happy about it though (and were less happy about it the next day) had they known, as everyone found out within a day or two, that not only could Martians see in the dark, but they cold see through blankets. Or even walls. Some kind of X-ray vision or, more likely, some special ability like kwimming, enabled them to see right through solid objects. And very good vision it was too, for they could read the fine print on folded documents in closed drawers or in locked safes. They could read letters or even books without opening them.