Special Feature

Posted on by scott

Update: I won’t be posting again till Sunday (in the US). Return to your regularly scheduled duties!

You know on DVDs when you get to watch deleted scenes? I always like those, because they teach you a bit about filmaking. As a wise teacher once told me, the eraser is most important part of the pencil.

Well, here’s a whole scene that didn’t make it into Specials. It was supposed to start on page 147, when Tally and Shay are tracking Zane and the other Crims across the wild.

Read it first, and then I’ll tell you why it was in there and, more importantly, why I took it out.

“Hush.”

“Look, Shay, I know that I—”

“No, hush, Tally.” Shay’s nose was in the air, her eyes closed. “Do you smell that?”

“What?” Then Tally smelled it too. “It’s smoke, isn’t it?”

Shay was slowly shaking her head. “Yeah, but it’s not some campfire, Tally. It smells big.” She made an interface gesture, then pointed directly upwind. “Look.”

Tally flipped down her infrared overlay and peered into the darkness. In the distance, she saw glimmering streak of orange laying across the horizon. The fire wasn’t only big, it was far away. Tens of kilometers in the distance, it was spreading slowly along a forested ridge line. A ghostly wall of heat rose up from it, turning an iridescent yellow as Tally tuned her infrared.

“A forest fire?” Tally said. “But there’s no lightning tonight.”

Shay nodded. “None at all. Looks like somebody made a little mistake.” She angled her board forward. “Let’s check it out.”

For a moment, Tally hesitated. If the two of them stumbled on the New Smoke by accident tonight, then there’d be no point in letting Zane escape. Their plan for making him a Special would fall apart.

But there was no way to protest without sounding totally random. Forest fires didn’t pop out of nowhere, so this one had been set by humans. That meant that someone else was out there in the wild, farther than any camp-happy city pretty would dare to go.

This was a Special Circumstance.

Without another word, Tally tipped her board forward and followed Shay into the darkness.

The fire had grown huge by the time they got there.

As they approached, the smoke rolled down the valley, too thick to see through and dense enough to choke even a Special’s lungs. It drove them out of the downwind path and around to higher ground. They climbed a nearby hilltop, where Shay paused to watch the .

Even from a few hundred meters, Tally could feel the heat. It sucked the moisture from the air, and the pine needles on the trees looked dry and dangerous, ready to explode if the fire managed to reach them.

The wind was at her back now, pressing her toward the inferno. It had become a ravenous thing, sucking air from all directions to feed its hunger.

“Be careful around here,” Shay said, looking up at the stars.

“Yeah, no kidding.”

“No, I don’t mean the fire. This is a restricted area.”

“Restricted?” Tally asked. “How do you mean?”

Shay didn’t answer except to say, “Just be careful and stick close to me. Move slow, and if you feeling funny, pull back.”

Tally glanced at the sky, calculating the path that had taken them here. There was no place Specials were restricted from, not that she knew about. Of course, she hadn’t gone anywhere on her own since turning special, either.

End of deleted scene.

A forest fire? What’s that all about?

Well, I knew that I wanted all the main characters to come back in Specials. And since Tally was out in the wild, it was the right time to have her run into Andrew Simpson Smith. But I had to make that happen somehow.

My first idea, shown here, was that Andrew would be leading an escape from his reservation by starting a forest fire to burn the “little men.” (Those nerve janglers that keep the villagers inside their borders.) Tally and Shay would smell the smoke and head that way. They would have an action-packed firefighting scene, then meet Andrew, and Tally would get a chance to recall a piece of her pre-Special past.

Action, plot point, character development. What’s not to love?

Well, the problem was, it was sort of whopping coincidence that Andrew would be setting his forest fire exactly when Tally left town. Maybe that was too easy.

This is the sort of problem writers face all the time: You want something to happen, but it’s tricky to make it work without getting your big fat fingerprints all over it. It’s like in the horror movie when there’s a scary noise in the basement, and seeing as how six people are already missing, NOBODY IN THEIR RIGHT MIND would go down in the basement to check. But somebody announces “I’m not afraid” and goes to their doom, because the writer’s too lazy to think of a real motivation for them to.

It doesn’t happen because it make sense, but because it moves the plot along.

Coincidences are just as lazy. So I threw out the 500 words above and rethought how to introduce Andrew.

I decided that Andrew had already escaped the reservation, since he’s had a few months to try since Tally told him the world had no walls around it. By now he was helping the New Smokies with runaways. And given that Zane and the Crims were still hooked up with the New Smokies and were running away, they would know where to rendezvous with Andrew.

Much less coincidence-y. And, as always, the writing gods shower rewards on those who don’t take the easy way out. I realized that Andrew would be giving out directions to the New Smoke (aka Diego). This creates a whole new conflict between Tally and Shay, who must decide whether to follow Zane or Andrew’s locator.

Conflict is always good! And Tally’s choice shows us how she’s still Tally; she cares more about taking care of Zane than taking down the New Smoke.

I still got my action scene (Tally stalking Andrew), a much better plot point, and some character development.

Anyway, that’s my director’s commentary. Hope you enjoyed this deleted scene.

A quick note for the sleepless: I know you’re all dying to win Extras samplers. But I won’t be posting between the hours of 11PM and 11AM US Eastern Time, so you don’t have to stay up all night madly refreshing. Sleep!

Also, I’ll usually post between 7PM and 11PM US EST, which is 9AM to 1PM Sydney time, so that folks in Australia can win too! (Sorry, Perth.)

344 thoughts on “Special Feature”

  2. hola pplz 1230 am almost scott we shall wait… ill be here 10 am sharp… or before… like now….

  8. 130am still up…. still laughing oh and what do you guys think of Trey instead of Troy (check my story on last post) it was what we came up with Trey and Caydn … hmm comment please… and scott we are waiting for more writing advice or anything you gives hungry for info… you could post about meeting maureen and the almost non-piloted trip in a helicoppter that you were going to steal…lol

  9. whatever i blog is the time for us so add an hour for scott like 130am july 8th sunday so he is at 230am sunday

  10. you know what would suck.
    is if kheidi-la and ally-wa
    you guys didn’t get the copies
    of extras
    eventhough you guys go on for like ever.
    but i have faith you will get them.

  14. dont worry ally-wa… scottw sticks together til the real scott gives us samplers then we can talk about it 9after days of catching up on sleep)…

  16. im gonna work on my story… ill be back around oh how about 420 should give me enough time to change troy… and work on that one scene… sry that i wont talk but i need the concentration or itll will never get done.

  21. lmao. yayness. crackers. and I noticed Tally blowing up on David was in Pretties… which I don’t have…

  22. I have to go guys.. sorry. I’m still not tired it’s just my battery is running out and I can’t get my charger without waking my brother up. well, it’s been fun. see you guys later today.. lol.

  24. Hey everyone.. I’m doing this on my phone in my room b/c my mom is up b/c she has to go to work. she leaves at around 6:30 so I will be back on then.. I think its like 4:35 or sumthin

  25. hey ally-wa it’s 7:41 my time which means it’s 6:41 your time which means you should be baaack nooow…i’m bored (in case you didn’t notice)

  26. still bored…was reading but have now finished book…boredness overwhelming…what happened to s.c.o.t.t.w and all the other hardcore sleepless scott fanatics?

  27. omg ppl the day horrible, while working on my story like try practically done with 2 sections my computer clams up (it better hav a pearl inside when im through with it) at neighbors had to wait til he got up… random sleepers… mahaha … i better work by time scott post *threaten computer* OH and scott i will listen to you and your smart ideas (saving my story would hav been smart but did i no) like an hour down the toilet… oh but on the sleepless front sry scott wont listen til samplers is mine… (which better be soon… bat in hand, he he…)

  28. i am taking a break from refreshing to tell scott (he probably won’t hear it) that he should post early today (still after 11) so that parents dont kill him

  30. computer alive… this is like mega-helens happy-making (scott can post now)…. I fixing my story … so much time wasted last night… tired could fall over off chair 9ahv pillow near by … post!

  33. cat-kha some of us call ourselves obsessive refreshers cuz well we are and so we can talk faster we created a chat room… if you want in please list aim s/n and someone will let you in

  34. oh scott i was reading past blog on how yiou chose uglies names… and that david was based on you slightly how could you be so mean to your self… counseling is needed (for all of us)

  35. i know i know alot of blogs by me but i have lots of questions pestering my insane mind… if tally is in extras does that mean david will back too?

  36. It was very nice of you to put that up there, very cool. I can’t wait for Extras.

  37. I’m on my phone again bc the computer is off bc theresba constent roll of thunder and VERY loud lightning. I will be on shortly hopfully if it doesn’t flash flood first

  38. oh and I can’t read the comments when I’m on my phone so sorry if anyone needes in or something.. ahh the power just went out.. scott better not post

  42. I love the whole story of Tally. I mean all the things that she goes through and all the self-discovery, awesome. I mean i was so into Specials that I creid when Zane died. I just felt so bad for Tally because of that loss. You are an amazing writer.

  44. i think tally told shay. i will always love the uglys books it makes me sad that i am such a fast raeder i read the extras in the first three hours i had it! grrrrrrr why cant i be slower

Comments are closed.