Magik Beans: The Director's Cut

When I wrote the end of episode 6 to include the Leprechauns, I had no idea how bloated the storyline Episode 7 started would become. I figured that the thread of Episode 7 would be over and done with by the time I reached Episode 13. Instead, the story was starting to ramp up, not plane down. I had never intended the leprechauns to go bad. Sometimes the story writes itself.

Add to this my realization that Episode 1 took place in January and the arrival of the Leprechauns was miraculously only days away from St. Patrick's day in March, so that there are about two months of missing story running around somewhere. Which brings us to the Director's Cut.

So in short, I'm starting to revise the story. I hope this doesn't get anyone too angry about where the story was headed up until this point. It seems like a good time to go back and flesh out the things that would have lead up to a journey into the tree. Besides, that way the climax can occur at the Pole right around Christmas!

As a result, the end of Episode 6 now has a link to this post...and once I've caught the story up to my satisfaction, there will be a link back to Episode 7, with the words "Which was right about the time the leprechauns walked in" reinserted.

I know it's not linear, but the story got away on me before I knew it! Besides, given the space/time possibilities within the story itself, maybe we're all just traveling the Tree.

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE DIRECTOR'S CUT SCENE ONE: BLACKOUT

Here's a preview from "Blackout":

Andrew looked at Lara. If a picture is really worth a thousand words, most of the words in Andrew's current picture could be summed up by How the hell am I supposed to explain all this. Lara's picture could have had the caption, I'm not the one who let him in.

"I'm renovating," Andrew said, a weak smile on his face.

"Is that a real tree?" Blackout said, squinting as his eyes continued to adjust to the dim light inside the shop. "That can't be a real tree. You didn't have a tree here last week."

"It looks fake to you?" Andrew asked.

"Well, no...it looks really real," Blackout said. "But it can't be...you can't grow a tree in a week. And it's deciduous...they don't have leaves in the winter." He sounded like he was trying to talk himself into believing the tree wasn't real. Lara took the opportunity and jumped in.

"I made it," she said.