26 June 2009

You Have to Imagine Rod Serling Saying This

Here's the original opening I wrote for this week's story:

Lincoln Nevins was thirty-nine years old when he was born. But Lincoln was not "born" in the traditional sense. It would be more accurate to say that he was "created" or "constructed."

Because Lincoln Nevins is not a person. Lincoln Nevins is a human-shaped prison, built to contain and to punish an entity who was not welcome in our world and who did not succeed in his attempt to conquer us.

Ask any child on the street about Lincoln Nevins these days, and they'll laugh. He's no longer a threat. No one fears him. And that makes him all the more dangerous.

It is, as they say, a bit of throat-clearing.

More trivia: I changed the name three times. It started out as "Leroy Jenkins" (just a placeholder, obviously), then "Lincoln Nevins" (too random), and finally "Clay" (to maximize the evocative imagery. And shit).

EOF

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