We'll Always Have Paris by Ray Bradbury

busy. Get on the ball.’
    The corporal had his hands to his face. ‘It’s a Christ-awful feeling. To know
    we’re so far away from everything. And this whole damn planet is dead. Nothing else here but
    us.’
    They started him unloading packets of frozen food.
    The psychiatrist and the captain stood on a sand dune nearby for a moment,
    watching the men move.
    ‘He’s right, of course,’ said the psychiatrist. ‘I don’t like it, either. It
    really hits you. It hits hard. It’s lonely here. It’s awfully dead and far away. And that wind.
    And the empty cities. I feel lousy.’
    ‘I don’t feel so well myself,’ said the captain. ‘What do you think? About
    Smith? Will he stay on this side of the cliff or will he fall over?’
    ‘I’ll stick with him. He needs friends
    now. If he falls over, I’m afraid he’ll take some others with him. We’re all tied together by
    ropes, even if you can’t see them. I hope to hell the second rocket comes through. See you
    later.’
    The psychiatrist went away and the rocket stood on the sea bottom in the
    night in the center of the planet Mars, as the two white moons rose suddenly, like terrors and
    memories, and flung themselves in a race over the sky. The captain stood looking up at the sky
    and Earth burning there.
    During the night, Smith went mad. He fell over into darkness, but took no
    one with him. He pulled hard at the ropes, caused terrible secret panics all night, with
    screams, shouts, warning of terror and death. But the others stood firm positioned in the dark,
    working, perspiring. None was blown with him to his secret place at the bottom of a long cliff.
    He fell all night. He hit in the morning. Under sedatives, eyes shut, coiled upon himself, he
    was bunked in the ship, where his cries whispered away. There was silence, with only the wind
    and the men working. The psychiatrist passed extra rations of food, chocolate, cigarettes,
    brandy. He watched. The captain watched with him.
    ‘I don’t know. I’m beginning to think—’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Men were never meant to go so far alone. Space travelasks too much. Isolation, completely unnatural, a form of realistic insanity,
    space itself, if you ask me,’ said the captain. ‘Watch out, I’m going balmy myself.’
    ‘Keep talking,’ said the doctor.
    ‘What do you think? Can we stick it out here?’
    ‘We’ll hold on. The men look bad, I admit. If they don’t improve in
    twenty-four hours, and if our relief ship doesn’t show up, we’d best get back into space. Just
    knowing they’re heading home will snap them out of it.’
    ‘God, what a waste. What a shame. A billion dollars spent to send us. What do
    we tell the senators at home, that we were cowards?’
    ‘At times, cowardice is the only thing left. A man can take only so much,
    then it’s time for him to run, unless he can find someone to do his running for him. We’ll
    see.’
    The sun rose. The double moons were gone. But Mars was no more comfortable
    by day than by night. One of the men fired off a gun at some animal he saw behind him. Another
    stopped work with a blinding headache, and retired to the ship. Though they slept most of the
    day, it was a fitful sleeping, with many calls on the doctor for sedatives and brandy rations.
    At nightfall, the doctor and the captain conferred.
    ‘We’d better pull out,’ said Walton. ‘This man Sorenson is another. I give
    him twenty-four hours. Ditto Bernard.A damn shame. Good
    men, both of them. Fine men. But there was no way to duplicate Mars in our Earth offices. No
    test can duplicate the unknown. Isolation-shock, loneliness-shock,
severe
. Well, it was a good try. Better to be happy cowards than raving
    lunatics. Myself? I hate it here. As the man said, I want to go home.’
    ‘Shall I give the order, then?’ asked the captain.
    The psychiatrist nodded.
    ‘Jesus, God, I hate to give up without a fight.’
    ‘Nothing to fight but wind and dust. We could give it a decent fight with