Mobius is a mental patient under the care of Fraulein Doktor Mathilde Von Zahnd in the villa of an institution called Les Cerisiers. He is one of three mental patients, along with Herbert Georg Beutler and Ernst Heinrich Ernesti, who live in the "villa" portion of the institution: all other patients have been moved to a (never seen) new building in the vicinity. All three mental patients believe they are physicists.