Beyond the Bowling Ball Bombing: From Under the Sun, #1

By Kordel Lentine

Winner of IndieReader's 2022 Discover Award for Science Fiction*

A B.R.A.G.Medallion Honoree

Top Shelf Magazine's 2021 First Place Winner for "Young Adult Sci-Fi"*

 

Terrance is a bullied high schooler who frequently takes the long way home to avoid trouble. It is a plan that usually works-until the day that the bowling ball falls from the sky. He barely escapes the ensuing devastation that turns a sleepy suburban neighborhood into a disaster zone. In the media frenzy that follows, the incident is dubbed "the bowling ball bombing" and overnight Terrance becomes an unlikely national figure and high school celebrity. 

 

Experts are baffled by the incident while crackpots suggest theories that range from alien tractor beam malfunctions to government conspiracies. Most reasonable people, including Terrance, conclude that the world will never solve this mystery. Then Terrance receives an unusual puzzle box with an inscription that claims that he will learn the secret when he opens the box exactly five months after the bombing at 7:57 pm. He assumes that it is a joke until the prediction comes true. 

 

He soon finds himself in the hands of a benefactor who claims that Terrance had unwittingly inspired the creation of time travel. As an alleged favor, Terrance is sent 98 years into the future where he discovers evidence suggesting that his benefactor has sinister intentions. While fleeing through time and space, Terrance tries to take control of his destiny, only to find himself in an epic battle for his freedom.

 

*The all-in-one hardcover won IndieReader's 2022 Discovery Award for science fiction and was Top Shelf Magazine's 2021 first place winner for "Young Adult Sci-Fi." That story is also available in paperback and eBook as a trilogy, of which this is book #1 (of 3).

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kordel Lentine
• Release date: Feb 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781953812018

Kordel Lentine

Kordel Lentine was the kind of high school freshman who once wrote a how-to paper about how to write a how-to paper. No kidding. It was the most boring paper ever written. Even worse, when the teacher offered bonus points for students to read their papers in front of the class, he volunteered, as though his A+ in the class needed a boost. As far as horrible public readings go, it was not quite on par with Vogon poetry (since no one had to gnaw a leg off in order to survive), but it was nonetheless quite dismal, both for him and for everyone else in the room who happened to have ears. Kordel still bemoans that he simply could not think of anything more interesting to write about that fit the assigned criteria. It was the first time that he shared something he wrote, but thankfully not the last. Now that Kordel gets to choose his own topics, he likes to write science fiction novels with time travel and digital dinosaurs and no sign of how-to papers as far as the mind can see.Kordel was born and raised in South Bend, IN where screaming at the top of your lungs at the TV during Notre Dame football games was a regular family event. He now lives in Kansas City and has five awesome children. Four of his children have flown the coop while Kordel’s brilliant wife still homeschools the remaining two. (No, that wasn’t a typo or bad math—sorry unnamed not-awesome child!). Kordel is a CPA, his best time solving the Rubik's Cube is 47 seconds, he has a black belt in Taekwondo, and he enjoys activities that can be shared with his family such as scuba diving, board games, riddles, digital scrapbooking, and amateur astronomy.

Book preview

Prologue

A mysterious clock in the sky

Terrance stared himself in the eyes and realized with a sinking feeling in both of his stomachs that something had gone wrong. But how? How could he have duplicated himself?

He had thought everything through so thoroughly.

He had drawn the line graph just as he had been shown.

He had planned and planned until his head hurt and he was certain that he had anticipated everything.

Yet here he was, standing in front of himself. Again. Something had gone terribly wrong.

If this were a story in a book or movie, Terrance would have assumed it was merely one more failed attempt in a long line of such attempts to get this sort of story right. Even with his limited experience, he knew of at least a dozen books and movies that were popular enough to make millions while still getting the details all wrong. But he had done everything right. Or so he had thought, but this was neither a book nor a movie and the proof that his planning had gone terribly wrong was literally staring him in the face.

Of course, we are probably getting ahead of ourselves. For this to make any sense at all, we need to back up and start at the beginning of the story which was over half a year earlier. In fact, we should probably go even further back to an incident that took place over seven years earlier in Terrance’s fourth-grade science class, which made this blunder possible.

Five hourglasses showing time passing backwards

Mr. Schmidt had just finished demonstrating a gyroscope to the delight of Terrance’s entire fourth-grade class. It operated like an old-fashioned top with a string that had to be wrapped around the center rod and then quickly pulled out to make the middle disc spin rapidly. The result had amazed the class. It moved like a top but only the insides spun, while the outer frame seemed to defy gravity. Students took turns balancing it on their fingers and feeling how it resisted change. They all watched with fascination as it slowly pivoted on their fingers, tilted at steep angles to the floor while still refusing to fall.

After everyone had a turn, Mr. Schmidt set the gyroscope on his desk and proceeded to lecture about gravity, angular momentum, and some other more technical aspects of physics, with the hope that the time he had invested in the opening demonstration would be engaging enough to capture and hold everyone’s attention.

It did not.

One by one, students’ minds began to wander to thoughts of lunch and recess and other things of far greater importance to fourth-graders. There were only two exceptions by the time Mr. Schmidt wrapped up with, Does anyone have any questions?

One of those exceptions was a small, quiet boy in the front row. He had no intention of asking Mr. Schmidt any questions because he was more than three times smarter than any of the teachers in that school. This was a secret he had learned to conceal by being silent most of the time. He actually did have questions, but he already knew that they would be pointless to share with Mr. Schmidt. In fact, they would be pointless to share with most of the leading physicists in the world. So, he quietly watched and listened. And thought.

The other exception was Terrance Brown. He raised his hand and said, I have a question, and proceeded to ask it without waiting to be called on. What would happen if you built a gyroscope out of magnets?

Excuse me? responded Mr. Schmidt in an effort to stall, while he tried to wrap his mind around the question.

Well, Terrance continued, The earth is basically a giant magnet that attracts everything—not just metal and other magnets. So, if a gyroscope with a spinning plastic disc will resist the earth’s gravity, then maybe adding magnetism to a gyroscope will add an extra level of resistance. Perhaps it could float.

Mr. Schmidt stared at him as though Terrance had just declared that his grandmother was a small African parakeet named Bobo. The teacher’s mouth opened and closed as he tried to decide between offering an encouraging response or a belittling dismissive one. He decided on a combination. What an interesting idea, Terrance. Perhaps you should consider something like that for this year’s science fair. This was, of course, nonsense. Mr. Schmidt knew there were no fourth-graders in that school, or any school for that matter, capable of building a gyroscope out of magnets. He was almost correct. There was one exception—and that exception was intrigued by Terrance’s idea. It was an idea that would eventually change both of their lives forever.

Chapter 1

A mysterious clock in the sky

The Bowling Ball Bombing

Terrance fished his books out of the toilet and groaned. He had thought things would be different this year. He was in eleventh grade now. That made him an upperclassman. Since this also made all of his peers upperclassmen, he had hoped that they would have outgrown this sort of petty harassment. No such luck. Apparently, they still found it entertaining to try to complicate Terrance’s life.

He did his best to make his books presentable using only a handful of paper towels, then rushed out the door just in time to be late for Precalculus. The teacher scowled at him as he slid into his seat and opened his soggy textbook to the section on real numbers. Ever since grade school, every math class started the school year with the same mind-numbing review—a summary of integers, whole numbers, real numbers, and so on. It was as if every teacher in every grade assumed all their students had forgotten the basics during the preceding summer. They also assumed every student had forgotten that the order of operations could be remembered by the acronym PEMDAS or the phrase, Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally. So they reviewed the same tired mnemonics every single year.

Terrance did not care. It gave him an opportunity to let his mind wander. There was a time when he would have paid careful attention to the teacher, and even probed for further information with sincere questions, but over the years, he had encountered so many teachers who discouraged questions that he had slipped into ovine complacency with the rest of the class. Some teachers saw questions as interruptions to their standardized curriculum. Others did not know the answers and hated to admit it to mere children. Other teachers, like their students, were gradually worn down by a system that discouraged independent thought and had simply become complacent and lazy.

So while Mr. Mason droned on about his dear Aunt Sally’s excuses, Terrance’s mind drifted to the one place where he was truly exceptional. In his daydreams his soft pudgy body was muscular and athletic, and the school gossip often centered around his football heroics. Cheerleaders who currently looked right through him actually knew him by name. In his daydreams he was often wealthy and popular and was never sitting in Precalculus with soggy textbooks. But that was only in his daydreams.

Real life—and even real dreams—held a very different point of view. In real life he had a below-average physique with an above-average intellect and nothing extraordinary ever happened to him or even near him—until the day that the bowling ball fell from the sky.

Five hourglasses showing time passing

Terrance decided to walk home from school that day. Whenever he chose to walk, he always took the long way. By choosing a path that took him through quiet neighborhoods with almost no children, mostly populated with senior citizens, he greatly reduced his chances of meeting any of the bullies who would otherwise enjoy extending his daily torment beyond the confines of school. Consequently, he was the only one on the street when he saw a small dot in the sky. He fancied himself as an amateur astronomer and birdwatcher, so he frequently found himself watching the sky. That is how he ended up seeing a small object falling straight toward him long before he could hear it.

As it grew closer to where he stood, it started to make a whistling sound like a World War II air raid sound effect. Terrance watched with fascination at first, but his mind quickly cycled through concern, fear, and ultimately panic as he fled for his life. Not knowing exactly where it was going to land, he dove beneath a tree as the screaming in his ears culminated in an ear-shattering explosion just twenty feet away. He waited until the ringing in his ears stopped before he used the tree to drag himself to his feet. The adrenaline in his system left him shaky as he struggled to wrap his brain around the ridiculous scene before him.

Whatever had fallen from the sky had struck an old beat-up four-door passenger car. Or maybe it had been a brand-new car moments ago. Terrance was not sure. The object had hit the hood of the car, close to the windshield, and obliterated the vehicle. The engine was both caved in and blown to pieces. Every window in the car was shattered. The roof was twisted and mangled. Nothing was on fire, but smoke lingered in the air. Terrance’s random decision to dive behind the left side of the tree had probably saved his life. The opposite side of the tree was embedded with shrapnel. So were the surrounding houses. Many of the windows on both sides of the street were also shattered.

Terrance heard a shout from behind him and turned to see an old man screaming at him from an open door at the top of some nearby stairs. I called the police, you delinquent hoodlum! I’ll teach you to vandalize my neighborhood. And I already took your picture so don’t even bother trying to run away! The man held a camera in one hand and kept the other hand on the inside doorknob with one foot in the house while he accused Terrance.

Terrance fought the urge to chuckle. Not only was it ludicrous to think that he could have done all this, but the man himself was absurd. He was exceptionally old and wore mismatched plaid and orange with an odd hat. He reminded Terrance of one of the miniature bullies, or toadies, that he often endured. Even Terrance could throttle most of the toadies, but they nonetheless mocked and threatened while staying within arm’s reach of the full-sized bully. To see the same behavior from a full-grown adult struck Terrance as particularly funny.

Terrance wondered how the old man would respond if he suddenly sprinted up the steps while waving both hands in the air yelling, Booga, booga, booga! The thought made Terrance smile, but he resisted the urge after taking only one step toward the man. It was not an appropriate time to smile—or to step toward his accuser. Acute fear seized the old man as he saw Terrance’s menacing figure turn his way and smile fiendishly, his most recent carnage still smoldering in the background, with the obvious intent to turn on him next. The man snapped another picture then quickly retreated into his house. With shaking hands, he secured the lock on the doorknob, then the deadbolt, then the chain, and then fled to his bedroom where he also locked that door and called the police again.

Terrance rolled his eyes and returned his gaze to the devastation in front of him. He knew that it was illegal to leave the scene of an accident and wondered if this counted. He was soon spared the need to decide by the sound of approaching sirens. Two police cars came to a screeching halt on either side of the wreckage. Officers bolted from both vehicles with their full attention on Terrance.

Don’t move! the first one yelled.

Keep your hands where we can see them! the second one screamed.

Both had drawn their weapons and were aiming them at Terrance’s head. Their instructions were completely unnecessary since Terrance was suddenly paralyzed by fear. No one had ever pointed a gun at him before and he instantly decided that he did not care for the experience.

Despite the fear that gripped him, Terrance’s overactive imagination interrupted his paralysis with an amusing thought. In a way, these officers reminded him of the old man—or the toadies. They were nervous and it showed, but instead of hiding behind bullies or deadbolts, their comfort blankets were their guns. He found himself wondering what it would look like if their guns were replaced with medieval shields to hide behind. As a result, Terrance had to try very hard not to smile but he had no problem at all resisting the urge to see what would happen if he ran toward them waving both arms in the air yelling, Booga, booga, booga.

Chapter 2

A mysterious clock in the sky

The Aftermath

Terrance was starting to feel impatient and irritable after four hours in police custody. He had done his best to cooperate and to tell them exactly what had happened, but everyone he spoke to seemed dissatisfied with his story. Most of them seemed to think that he was somehow responsible but were frustrated that they could not figure out how. Terrance originally thought that if he just told the truth everything would work out, but he was starting to have doubts.

Terrance sat at a table in a small room. There was a single door in the wall to his right and a one-way mirror in the wall to his left. A tape recorder in the middle of the table continued recording the never-ending barrage of questions. Across from him was a detective with a permanent scowl on his face. Was it Detective Johnson? Terrance was starting to forget all the names of all the people he had spoken to so far.

Where did you get the explosives? asked the detective. Did you make them yourself?

No, sighed Terrance. I already told you, it wasn’t an explosive. It looked more like a cannonball that fell from the sky.

Detective Johnson frowned at his clipboard. Right, so you say. But you and I both know that isn’t possible, don’t we? A cannonball couldn’t have fallen straight down from as high up in the sky as you described. Even if it could have somehow been shot up that high it would have fallen at an angle. He stared down his nose at Terrance and added sarcastically, And besides that, terrorists don’t use cannons anymore.

In the awkward silence that ensued, Detective Johnson reviewed his notes. Even though the department’s actions were legal, it was not typical for them to detain a youth for so long who had no prior offenses. However, his superiors had made it clear that Terrance was not to be released until the investigators at the scene of the explosion had shared their findings. His superiors also wanted as much information as possible out of Terrance, but Terrance’s story remained perfectly consistent no matter how much they cross-examined him. The whole situation made no sense to the detective, and it had him on edge.

Detective Johnson took a deep breath then decided to change gears. I have an eyewitness on the scene, a Mr. Wallace, who claims that he caught you red-handed at the scene of the crime.

I already told you I was there, but I didn’t do it! Terrance exclaimed. I almost died!

He says that you threatened him. He claims that you were going to attack him, too, but he was able to get away.

Terrance made a sound that was a cross between a groan and a sigh. That old man is psychotic! All I did was smile at him.

Oh? And exactly what part of this incident did you find humorous?

"Absolutely no part of any of this is funny. That man was just acting weird. Look, I’m not a criminal and I’m tired of being treated like one. I barely survived an apparent terrorist attack on our nation, and I’m being treated like a culprit instead of a survivor. This is ridiculous!"

Oh, Detective Johnson said, his face lighting up with a brilliant thought, as if he finally understood. Terrance felt a glimmer of hope until the detective continued, So that’s your game. You were hoping to get attention out of this, and it backfired and almost blew up in your face. Admit it and cooperate, then things will go easier on you.

Are you serious? Terrance snapped, jumping to his feet and slamming both fists on the table. Cooperate? Me? All I’ve done is cooperate. I’ve already told you exactly what happened. Which, coincidentally, is exactly what I told the guy before you, and the lady before him, and the guy before her. Over and over I have told all of you exactly the same thing and you refuse to believe me. I’m done. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some daydreaming to do. Terrance dropped back into his seat and began to intently study the hairs on the back of his hand.

Don’t play tough with me, you little punk. I have enough evidence to lock you up for a very long time.

Terrance studied the hair on the back of his other hand.

Why did you do it? the detective fumed.

Terrance began scrutinizing his fingernails, one at a time.

You can’t sit there and ignore me, lied the detective.

Terrance ignored him.

I can keep this up all day, the detective lied again.

Terrance continued to ignore him.

You are a stupid little boy if you think I’m going to tolerate all this… the detective began to rant.

Do you mind? I’m trying to ignore you, said Terrance, miserably failing to ignore him. Is this even legal? I think I saw on a movie once that you aren’t allowed to interrogate a minor without his parents present. I’m going to go back to ignoring you now and dream about what I’m going to do with all the money I’ll get when I sue you and your department for wrongful prosecution. There’s no way this can be legal. Terrance proceeded to study his fingernails while doing a much better job of ignoring the detective.

Detective Johnson spent the next half hour speaking to the brick wall behind Terrance until a new officer entered the room. Captain Oliver! Detective Johnson exclaimed, jumping to his feet. Terrance could tell that the new officer must be someone of importance.

That will be enough, Johnson, Captain Oliver snapped. A team of experts has been sorting through the wreckage for hours now and they have concluded that it was not an explosive and that this young man could not have had anything to do with it. Young man, he directed his attention to Terrance, The department would like to offer you our sincerest apologies for this misunderstanding. We will be in touch if we have any further questions for you. You are free to go.

Terrance opened and closed his mouth a few times. A blender full of mixed emotions struggled to be voiced. In the end he decided on a simple, Thank you, along with an obnoxious glance at Detective Johnson. Terrance knew enough about probable cause from his high school government class to realize that he had no feasible recourse against the police department. Even if he had some valid complaints about his treatment, all he could really expect would be a simple apology and someone somewhere being reprimanded behind closed doors.

As Terrance opened the door to leave what had recently become his least favorite room on the planet, he paused and turned back to Captain Oliver. Can you tell me one thing before I go? What was that thing? And where did it come from?

Well, replied Captain Oliver, I’m not supposed to disclose information to anyone until the department makes a formal statement to the press later this evening, but considering how much you’ve been through, both there and here, I’ll tell you this: When you said it looked like a cannonball, you were close. But it wasn’t a cannonball. It was a bowling ball. As for where it came from, that’s what I and everyone else would like to know. Experts from a dozen precincts and universities and even the military have been trying to piece together a logical theory and no one has succeeded yet. As far as the most brilliant minds in our nation are concerned, it just doesn’t make any sense.

The bowling ball bombing, as it came to be known, quickly grew into more than just local news. By the following evening it had already made national newscasts, and by the day after that it had spread to morning shows, tabloids, talk shows, and evening broadcasts. It reached radio, television, newspapers, magazines, and comedy routines. The internet was ablaze with various memes and articles. Everyone seemed to have an opinion and most of them were so absurd or sensational that they were practically handcrafted to fuel the controversy. If this were a marketing campaign it would have been a brilliant publicity stunt, but as far as anyone knew no one was selling anything.

As far as the world was concerned, the facts were quite simple. Based on the impact crater and the damage to the bowling ball, experts agreed that the bowling ball fell from a height of about six miles. Witnesses and observable facts agreed that it fell into a quiet suburb, almost killing a high school boy while demolishing a car and dealing large amounts of damage to the surrounding houses. Physicists were in agreement that due to the physical properties of the bowling ball, the lack of chemical or powder residues on the outside, and the angle of descent, there is no way that it could