E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial in His Adventure on Earth

by William Kotzwinkle

  “E.T., what’s . . . happening . . .”

  The ages-old being slumped forward. His density was changing. He was like the core of a collapsing star, the force of Earth’s gravity fully upon him. He was becoming a black hole in space.

  Lance was hit with it too, his own form weighted down, so that his lowness became still lower and he crouched, like a rat, under E.T.’s other arm. “Look, he communicates through you. He belongs to you. But you gotta make it legal. My dad’s a lawyer. He’ll figure something out. We’ll be millionaires, we’ll go everywhere. Everyone will want to know us because we’ll be the most famous boys in the world. They’ll all want to meet E.T. And he’ll be ours!”

  But E.T. wasn’t anybody’s, except gravity’s. He had come fully to himself, had neutralized drunkenness out of his system with one instant’s focus. But this other thing, this deep imploding of his being, that he could not change.

  Ah, me . . .

  He swayed back and forth, the contraction upon him. It was the end of his star-life. He was inwardly shrinking to the size of a pinhead. His span was over . . .

  But he must not take the boy with him. And yet it was happening; the black hole was open and nothing could escape it. Those pilots who fly too close will be swallowed—that is the law of space.

  “Spell . . . go away . . .”

  He tried to move them back. But they were clinging to him, and he felt their love sweeping under each arm. Foolish children, you don’t wish to follow me. For I am E.T. Your minds cannot follow where I go. I am an ancient traveler in the void, and you are puppies . . .

  Harvey snuck into the room, head down, scowling. Mary was returning; the dog could feel her moving into range, and he must warn Elliott. He growled outside the closet door, and a moment later it opened.

  He looked at the space creature, and his doggie mind saw a dark, cavernous force, into which light-bones were dropping, one after another. He jumped back, his own bones feeling the touch.

  “Leave me . . .” said E.T., trying to lift his arms, but the Great Theory was working itself out in him, and his concentrated energy form, so perfectly suited for outer environments of space, was falling in on itself.

  He had to find a way to die alone. But even then, the force might be so great that it would start to suck nearby forces into it. Could he, a single alien, implode the entire earth? Would his death turn it inside out?

  “Spell . . . danger . . .”

  He shifted through all the cosmic levels, but could not find a correct formula for neutralizing this. He was stuck fast, held, and his Ship was light-years away.

  “He’s . . . so heavy . . .” wheezed Lance, as they stumbled with him across the room. They lifted him up with all their might, and dumped him into Elliott’s bed, just as Mary’s footsteps reached the stairs.

  A moment later she opened the door.

  “Hi, guys . . .”

  Harvey went up in front of her, begging with his paws. His hair stood out, incredibly magnetized, shielding Elliott and Lance as they whipped a blanket over E.T.

  “What’d you do to Harvey?” asked Mary, as the dog panted in front of her, paws waving. “Did you drug him? Tell me the truth.”

  “Harvey,” said Elliott, “cool it.”

  E.T. was dropping, dropping, deeper down. He felt the willow-creature, mother of the house, and knew that she would be tugged in by his force—and he no longer wanted the intimacy, for he had a much different road from hers. Her cosmos and his were cross-related. She would never know where she was if she fell into his sinking depth. Her consciousness would disintegrate, as would that of the boys—

  If I don’t get up . . . get up . . . spell get up . . .

  But he couldn’t move; he could only listen, to the alien tongue of Earth.

  “How was school?”

  “Fine.”

  “Want something to eat?”

  “We’ll be down in a minute,” said Elliott.

  “Do you have . . . any Swiss cheese?” Lance was in need of a fix. His head seemed very weird all of a sudden. He felt himself dropping through something deeper than he’d ever dreamt of. It was like that night on his bike, but in reverse; then he felt he could almost fly, and now he felt caught in dark, sticky substances that only Swiss cheese could control.

  “Somebody ate all the Swiss cheese already,” said Mary, looking at the little nerd suspiciously. She knew something was up with these guys—it was tugging at her mother’s intuition, but she didn’t want to push it. And—she had a sudden, splitting headache. God, she hoped it wasn’t early menopause. That was all she needed.

  She walked out of the room. Elliott quickly turned back to E.T. The old wanderer’s arm had fallen out from under the blanket. Horror crossed Elliott’s face as he looked at the color of it—a grayish shade, which drew his gaze hypnotically into warps of dreaming he wasn’t up to, at all.

  He sank down, grabbing the old hand in his own. “E.T., heal yourself . . .”

  C H A P T E R

  1 4

  Night had fallen. Elliott had brought in every medicine the family cupboard held, but they just lay in his room like toy medicines, useless for what ailed the creature lying in the bed.

  E.T. was in the whirling vortex of the gravitational force. His dream of Earth-life, and his dream of star-shine, was over. His sun was the black sun now.

  And all because he couldn’t resist . . . peeking in windows . . .

  Somehow he must prevent his personal disaster from overtaking these Earthlings, or the Earth itself, for he didn’t know—there was no formulated equation for this planet—it might indeed follow him if he went, for his body contained a great atomic secret.

  Every plant in the house was dead. The walls themselves seemed to be heaving toward him, with each breath of his own lung.

  “Heal yourself,” begged Elliott again, for he felt that the old genius could do anything. But there are some things not even the elderly gods can accomplish.

  E.T. slowly shook his head.

  “Then give it to me,” said Elliott, not knowing that in fact he already had too much of it, had the power to vanish into an alien world. But it was a power so old and so fast he could never control it, and the rush into the other dimension would scissor his consciousness in half.

  “Carry me . . . far away . . .” whispered E.T. “. . . and leave me . . .”

  “E.T.,” said Elliott, “I’d never leave you.”

  The lost voyager summoned himself back toward the surface again, to speak, to plead. “I am . . . a grave danger to you . . .” He lifted the tip of his long finger. “. . . and to your planet . . .” He lifted his head, his star-eyes shining in the moonlight.

  “But our communicator,” said Elliott. “It’s still working.”

  “Junk,” said E.T.

  His eyes flashed in the darkness. Within them, Elliott saw lines of incredible complexity stitching interstices of light, eyes comprehending collapsing depth-force. The ceiling groaned overhead. Harvey whined in the corner, and the unearthly eyes gazed on, at rushing mysteries of matter that no mere botanist of the stars could alter.

  “You’re not even trying,” said Elliott, afraid of the eyes, and drawn to them. “Please, E.T.”

  The night passed on. E.T.’s body became more rigid, and gray all over. His lips moved, but no words came, only an inner rushing noise, of the ultimate compression of stellar matter. The mass of E.T.’s body, though no bigger than an umbrella stand, was of incredible density. His high energy load was being soaked up by his nucleus. Things were piling up inside him, squeezing his star-core.

  Elliott’s body felt as though it were made of chains, chains of iron holding him down. He felt heavier and heavier; his head was splitting, and dark depression weighed on him like a hundred thousand tons of lead. When the gray light of morning finally came, he pulled himself up and looked at E.T. The monster was like something drained, no longer gray, but white, a white dwarf.

  Elliott dragged himself into the ha
llway, and staggered down it toward Mary’s room. He pushed open the door, iron depression and cosmic loneliness all one to him now. He felt like an extraterrestrial, felt alien to himself, and he was afraid.

  Mary opened her eyes, looked at him. “What’s wrong?”

  “Everything—is worth nothing,” he said, feeling the deep in-falling, the collapsing, the departing.

  “Oh, baby, that’s no way to feel,” said Mary, though in fact it was exactly how she felt too; all night she’d been dreaming she was underwater, unable to get to the surface.

  “I have something wonderful,” said Elliott, “and I’ve made it sad.”

  “Everyone feels like that now and then,” said Mary, trying for an appropriate platitude, but it was no medicine for her, so why should it be any better for Elliott? She patted the bed, indicating the space beside her. Warmth was better than words, but her body felt cold in the gray dawn, chilled to the marrow, and chillier still as Elliott moved in beside her.

  What was going on in the house? She sensed that there was something at its core, unnameable, horrible, gathering everything to it.

  “Can you . . . tell me about it?” she asked.

  “Later . . .” Elliott snuggled against her, but there was the same sense of falling, down, deeper into the vortex, where nobody’s hands could reach them—because nobody existed.

  “Go to sleep,” said Mary, stroking his brow. “Go to sleep . . .”

  Elliott slept, and dreamt of an iron ball, growing larger, then smaller, then smaller still, and he was riding it through nothingness.

  When the seven-thirty alarm went off, Mary rose alone, leaving Elliott in his deep slumber. She knew he could fake fever, but this did not seem to be an act. As she put on her housecoat, a pull came into her eyelids, closing them. She pulled back, shook herself fully awake, and stared at Elliott. Yes, there was something not right about him today. Was he hung over? Was her baby following so fast in his no-good father’s footsteps? She’d found six empty beer bottles . . .

  The door opened, and Michael came in. “Where’s Elliott?”

  “Don’t wake him,” said Mary, and pushed Michael with her, into the hallway. “Do you know what’s bothering him?” Mary tightened her housecoat. “He seems very depressed.”

  “Probably just school,” said Michael. “School is depressing.” The older brother glanced back down the hall. There was something wrong with E.T., there was something wrong with Elliott, and his own head was splitting.

  “Well,” said Mary, “I want him to rest.”

  “Let me stay with him,” said Michael. “I only have a half-day of school today. Please, Mom . . .”

  Mary took aspirin out of her housecoat. “All right,” she said. “Maybe you can snap him out of it.” She walked to the staircase, trying to shake her own stupor. Had she taken Valium by mistake last night? Her head felt like a lead balloon.

  C H A P T E R

  1 5

  “Wake up now. Okay?” Michael sat on the bed beside Elliott. He lifted Elliott’s eyelid, and the eye that stared back at him held no gaze he’d ever seen in his brother’s eyes before—a gaze of stone.

  Michael groaned and shook Elliott. “Please, Elliott, wake up . . .”

  Elliott came around, slowly, and Michael helped him down the hall toward his room, the two brothers staggering against each other, Michael feeling like he was dragging an iron ball with him. What was this strange downward-tugging force? What had happened to his brother? What had happened to the house? Was it caving in or something?

  Michael touched the wall to reassure himself, but the wall made other-dimension movements, its fibers charged with a subtle dance of dark light.

  “Come on, Elliott, pull out of it . . .”

  He dragged his brother into the bedroom; Elliott felt stiff, like chain, like iron.

  And E.T. was stretched out under a blanket, turning as white as ash.

  Michael dumped Elliott, fear rushing through him, a thousand dark dreams converging at a far-off center.

  E.T. breathed in some deep ratio, off into his great atomic power. The god had to go. He was out of control.

  Save me, he cried to his Captain, far in the night from here, sailing the Ship of Farthest Light.

  Come, my Captain, come for the failing Botanist First Class.

  My plants are dying.

  And I too, I fear that I am dying.

  “We’ve got to tell now, Elliott,” said Michael. “We need help.”

  Elliott turned toward Michael, his eyes like moon jellyfish, swimming with danger, tentacles shining. “No, you can’t, Mike. Don’t . . .”

  Elliott knew the rest of the world must not come in on them. The Army couldn’t understand this. The government couldn’t, either. They’d seize the miraculous creature and do things to him. “I’ll split him half . . . with you,” gasped Elliott. “That’s as far as I’ll go . . .”

  Michael wiped his face, trying to think what half-power meant in the moral boundaries of their game. The power coming from the bed was rocking him back and forth on his heels, pushing him around the room like a puppet, and he knew it was more than they could handle, however the power was cut. It was beyond them by too much. The walls were radiating dark pulses, and Michael saw a thousand little shapes of E.T., with a cosmic fire burning behind him. Was the space creature going to burn the world?

  “Elliott . . .” Michael staggered away, trying to shield himself from the wild dance of overcharged atoms. “We’ll lose him if we don’t get help. And Elliott, we’ll lose you . . .”

  Elliott’s eyes were the red man-o’-war fish, reddish tentacles waving in his gaze. Power was there, beyond the Earth’s perceiving. Elliott was glowing like iron in a furnace. He could always fake fever, but this . . .

  Michael grabbed Elliott under one arm, and lifted E.T. with the other.

  Mike was big, but the weight of these two creatures in his arms . . .

  He strained with them, with Elliott’s iron ball and E.T.’s cosmic sun. Michael’s fingers twitched, E.T.’s forces moving them. E.T.’s touch was electric magic, and it was converging, ten million years’ worth of spatial learning.

  Flights to forgotten worlds of power, where he’d gathered much . . .

  Michael dragged them into the bathroom and dumped them in the shower stall. He had to put out this fire, had to cool Elliott down . . .

  The water came on, soaking Elliott and E.T.

  The aged voyager shook his head as the water hit. Ah, yes, the shower, where the willow-creature dances.

  E.T. felt Mary, felt the loveliness of her field, but he was moving into comet showers now. Goodbye, little willow . . .

  He staggered forward, beneath the waterfall, but it was a waterfall on Venus, in a hidden grotto where secret rivers danced in darkness. E.T. closed his eyes and bathed there. All this, which he’d thought to visit everlastingly, would be gone.

  He’d thrown it all away, curiosity killing the space cadet, as that well-known adage had it among fliers to strange worlds.

  Peek in or out of the dimension, but don’t get caught by death.

  He’d thrown immortality away like the idiot he was. Though he’d clocked many star-miles, he’d slipped up.

  And now, a last shower . . .

  . . . which some take on Venus, some on Mars . . .

  . . . but only a cosmic lunatic would get himself caught on Earth.

  He splashed his duck feet, and sang softly, in a deep cosmic underground, through ancient reverberation chambers . . .

  “. . . accidents will happennnnn . . .”

  He sank down, knees made of lead, tons of it compressed there.

  Elliott sank with him, dragged to the floor of the tub. “E.T., heal yourself . . .” Elliott felt the power charges going off in him, but couldn’t direct the force; it was just maniacal fire twitching in his limbs, and its healing ray was buried beneath waves of flame.

  The door opened downstairs, and Mary came in, Gertie beside her.

/>   “Go cheer up your brother,” said Mary, sending Gertie along.

  Mary set the groceries down, her splitting headache having returned the second she walked in the house. It felt like a knife blade, down the center of her forehead.

  She moved her head back and forth, trying to see around it, then pressed her temples. She had a strong, sudden image of her doctor, prescribing things she didn’t want . . .

  Michael’s thundering step of adolescence came down the stairs, each one of his footfalls like a ball of lead.

  “Take it easy, honey,” she said, “before you go through the floor.”

  “Mom, I have something to tell you. You’d better sit down . . .”

  Mary sank back toward her chair. Oh, please, God, don’t hit me with another childhood disaster, not today, not human bite marks on the chest or some other horrible boyhood fistfight story . . .

  Her behind hit heavily, and she felt the chair creak, like tendons reaching the snapping point. “Is it something serious?”

  “More serious than you can imagine.”

  She jumped up, head spinning, something terrible converging on her.

  “Remember the goblin?”

  Don’t let it be a sex fiend, she said to herself. What had touched the family? Michael’s eyes were like jellyfish.

  Gertie’s footsteps sounded on the stairs, and Mary felt the floor of the house shake—from the weight of a five-year-old child. “Mama,” cried Gertie, “they’re gone. They’re not in the closet anymore!”

  “They?” Mary looked at Michael.

  “I’d better just show you,” said Michael.

  He led her up the stairs, to the bathroom. “Make the most excellent promise you can make . . .”

  “Michael . . .” Mary’s wits were falling out like hairpins, and Michael was talking like Dungeons & Dragons. “What is it?”

  Michael pulled the shower curtain back. Mary blinked, her eyes remaining closed for one hesitant second, for she thought she’d seen a writhing coil of reptiles on the shower floor. As her eyes opened, she saw Elliott and—