This week, Futures is delighted to welcome back Hall Jameson with her story Breaking and entering. Hall previously appeared in Futures when she revealed the secrets of The offering. You can find out more about her work at her website or by following her on Twitter. Here, she reveals what inspired her latest tale, as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing Breaking and entering

Breaking and entering started life in a much different form. I wanted to take a broken yet resilient character, lock them in a tin can in space, and see how they coped. My original protagonist was a murderer and there were many, many more bugs involved (and, unlike Neil, they were robotic). The problem: I hated my main character and the robotic ‘rehabilitation’ bugs sealed in the pod with him were giving me nightmares. So I hit backspace and changed the story.

Enter Kelly, a female protagonist who knew she was a screw-up, but was also proud of the fact that she could break out of any type of lock down. It was her choice — her’s alone — as to whether or not she stayed in a place; even a pod drifting in outer space.

The ‘relationship’ between Kelly and Neil was lightly influenced by my love of the novel Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes, one of those books you read as a kid that stays with you forever. The fluctuating emotion that Charlie felt for the mouse, Algernon, as he gradually became more intelligent, paralleled Kelly’s bond with Neil and her growth and realization throughout this short piece. In the end, it was no longer about her ability to escape, but about the great lesson she learnt from a bug. Of course, Neil wasn’t brainy like Algernon, he was just a cockroach.

On second thought, (spoiler alert) maybe he was. He escaped after all.

This story was great fun to write. I hope you enjoy it.