By Packie Williams
CHICAGO – Larry Canary, an inmate at Greywalker Prison outside of Chicago, tried to work a time device to speed up his sentence, but the device backfired on him in an unexpected way.
Canary was convicted two years ago for trafficking weapons, drugs, and money for the mob. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison with possibility for parole in 10, but after participating in a failed breakout last August, another 20 years was added onto his sentence. So he tried to “fast forward” through time with several smuggled components.
“We’re not sure where he got the parts,” said the warden, Jack Offman, “or how he put them together without us knowing. Someone wrote out some complicated instructions for him on how to build this device, but Larry was never a science guy or an engineer. He just knows how to traffic weapons. It’s no wonder he screwed up.”
The device Canary built was intended to “fast forward” himself through his sentence like if he were to fast forward through a DVR recording. When he activated the device, a bright light flashed in his cell, and nothing seemed to happen. The guards checked his cell, and he was moving slow, very slow. They ordered him out of his cell, and he complied. It took him six minutes to take one step.
An hour later, Canary had finally exited his cell, but by then, the guards had already confiscated the device, which had broken, and searched his person. To avoid waiting for him to walk to another cell for questioning, two guards picked him up, as if he were a log, and carried him there. By morning, a full ten hours later, Canary had finally realized that he wasn’t in his cell anymore and that something was amiss.
“This is the craziest thing I’ve ever experienced,” said Offman. “I’ve dealt with animal people, mud men, Keymaster, and Al Capone clones, but this takes the cake. Figuring out what to do with Larry Canary is going to be a disaster. We’re going to have to hook him up to an IV and a catheter just to keep him alive. Never mind, it’s going to take years just to get him to answer one question.”
Since the incident, the warden has talked to Dr. Amazing to understand what happened. Apparently, the device was to lower Canary’s chronoton levels, which regulate an objects experience of time. The less chronotons, the faster time goes by for the object. Canary’s device backfired and overloaded his chronoton levels, bogging him down in slower time. “But it wouldn’t ever ‘fast forward’ him through time,” said Dr. Amazing. “That takes a proper time machine. All this would do, if it worked like Canary thought, is put him into ‘fast forward’ and make his sentence seem longer. Although maybe it worked exactly like he thought. He is moving slower to us, but we’re moving faster to him, so one of his days will be one of our months.”
“Perhaps he got what he wanted after all.”
Even still, another 20 years was added onto Canary’s sentence, and he will have to endure the abuse given to him by his fellow inmates. “He gets smacked upside the head,” said Offman, “and it takes another four hours for him to respond.” Currently, Canary is in an isolated workshop, making a license plate by hand. The warden hopes he will finish it by next month.
