Dan Whitaker, a 25-year-old IT Manager

A jazzy theme takes off as a scene of a nighttime entertainment district quickly cuts to a shot of multiple palm trees blowing in the wind. Waves crash along the beach while scantily clad co-eds giggle and hang off their boy toys. Neon lights flash across the South Beach architecture as a final establishing shot of a tall, gorgeous building comes into the frame.

The camera moves at a hastened pace before it stops in front of large elevator doors closing, coinciding with the screen fading to black. The scene comes back in a new location, this time overlooking the bright nightlife of a city alive. The music lowers in volume as a female voice with a Southern accent begins.

“Howdy y’all, and welcome to this extraordinary season of Harem Hotel.” The camera pans in on a balcony with a rather young-looking woman with long curly ginger hair, her freckled face shimmering in the set lights. A daring crimson dress envelops her bottom-heavy body and openly displays a hint of cleavage while staying professional.

“My name is Vanessa, and I’ll be your host and Mistress of Ceremonies. Pleasure to meet y’all!” The girl giggled with a megawatt smile before continuing. “If you’ve never seen the show before or are returning viewer, we’re glad you could stop by because we have quite the show for you this time around.”

A floating screen appears to the left of the ginger host and displays various scenes from past seasons of the show while Vanessa continued her greeting.

“For those of you new here, Harem Hotel is normally a show where we draft a group of women to compete for the affection of a chosen master. They’ll compete in various challenges and games to earn victory points while getting wild and sexy transformations that you, the audience, vote for! At the end of the show, the winners are those who meet the point threshold and join our lucky Masters Harem. Those who don’t meet that threshold are considered the losers, and though they will still be bound to their Master, they will be held in lower regard than those in the Harem proper. That’s not the worst fate, though! Throughout the competition, girls who perform poorly may face elimination where they’ll be kicked from the show and placed in some rather… poor positions in life.”

The screen then displayed a few examples of what happens to eliminated contestants. Girls to be French-speaking maids or sex slaves were some of the lightest among them.

Vanessa cringed at the sight of a petite girl getting cow-like udders before turning back toward the camera. “Trust me. You do not want to see your favorite girl eliminated.”

Dispelling the floating screen, the host smiled sweetly and gestured to the camera. “So that’s the gist of things, a bunch of gals get crazy transformations and fight over their right to claim their loving Master. Sounds like a hoot of a time, right!?”

An invisible audience began clapping and cheering at the prompt. They slowed down, however, when they saw that Vanessa’s smile took on a mischievous grin. “That is… If we were doing things like other seasons. No, no, no, my sweets. We’re putting a twist on things.”

The audience's roar lowered to a soft murmur, awaiting the clarification of the ginger’s words.

“Through community feedback and surveys, we’re trying something a little new this time. Usually, we pick a Master who has plenty of folks in their life who would make the perfect little Harem for them. The girlfriend, the high school sweetheart, or maybe the boss. Women who, in the right circumstances, could’ve ended up with the Master at any point. But what if our Master didn’t have any of those? What if none of the women in his life quite fit the bill for what we want for him? What if… we looked beyond them?” The host giggled. “Well, if none of the girls around him quite make the cut, how ‘bout the men? Have you ever had that thought about that one guy friend in your life where you think, ‘Gee, if only so-and-so was a gal, I’d date them in a heartbeat!’”

The host's face lit up in excitement. “That’s right! This season we’ll be taking a selection of a few men from our lucky Master's life and swapping them over to the fairer sex in order to compete for his love and affection. Because sometimes it takes a real man to become best girl. Welcome to Harem Hotel: Bros to Hoes Edition!”

The full title card finally displays as applause roars until the scene shifts to a set with several large sofas to the left of a couple of leather chairs where our cheerful host sits.

“With the premise out of the way, let’s finally meet our lucky Master. From sunny Atlantica City, his name is Dan Whitaker. He’s 25 years old and already the manager of an IT team at a local theme park. I’d say he’s doing pretty good for himself! Let’s bring him in, shall we…”

**********

Dan Whitaker was having an okay day. Sure, his date for the night was canceled on him, making it the second time this month. But hey! His IT team managed to put out a pretty big fire before the theme park lost a good chunk of change! That has to count for something, right?

The man sighed as he looked out of his office window, his reflection reminding him just how tired he was after the long day at work. His tired emerald eyes began looking over his state. His brunette hair, usually combed back, had grown wild as his hair gel wore out, and the stubble he kept short felt much more unruly than usual. Due to summer approaching, he couldn’t help but unbutton a little bit and roll up his sleeves, displaying his toned and muscular arms. Overall, Dan looked far from his usual professional self.

“At least my work life is booming…” Dan muttered to himself as he sat alone in his office while leaning back in his ergonomic supportive office chair. Well, calling it an office was a bit of a stretch as it was more like a cubicle with a door than an actual room. But it was cozy enough for a man in his position. Right out of college, he scored an Assistant Manager position on a low-level IT team at Funway: Atlantica. This opportunity would eventually lead to a quick promotion when his former Manager moved up to Director.

Dan looked at the time on his laptop after decompressing to finally realize how late it was.

“Shit, 8 pm already… Guess I would have missed that date anyways… Suppose I’ll drive through something on my way home.” The man began packing his things to finally head home for the day when he noticed a cubical still had its light on a row over.

Dan called out to the suspect as we began to walk over, “Gabe, that you? Head home already, man. You killed it today. Go and enjoy your weekend.”

“Yes, sir. Just double-checking something real quick.” A Hispanic-accented voice replied. “The more thorough I look now, the less likely we stay late like this later.”

Dan stood behind the man known as Gabriel Hidalgo, AKA his golden egg. Just a year out of college, he’s the best damn programmer on Dan’s team. The Cuban-descended man had short black hair and was a little shorter than average in height, maybe 5’ 7”. Just a few inches shorter than Dan, who sat at a pretty 6’ 2”. He's also fairly skinny, which was one of the two sides it seemed most programmers sat on.

“Hey, now stop with the Sir stuff. It’s after hours, so I’m just Dan right now.” He reminded his subordinate for the umpteenth time. Dan pat Gabe’s shoulder and began to walk to the exit. “Well, I’m heading out. You should take it easy. Knowing you, you’ll be up all night binging that new sci-fi show that came out. Try to get some rest, at least.”

Gabe turns to face him with a grin. “Jokes on you, Sir. I’ve already binged it.”

“Jesus, man! When do you sleep!?” Dan exclaimed. “That show literally came out last night. You gotta be running on fumes. Do you need me to call you a lift?”

“I’m good si-Dan. My apartment isn’t all that far.” The Cuban recoiled slightly at the shout as he turned around to focus on his computer.

Dan felt a bit guilty for raising his voice like that. Knowing Gabe's background, he should understand better. Dan relented. “If you say so. I’ll be texting you later about the show, and I expect you to be at home.”

“You too… Dan.” Gabe muttered as his manager walked away.

Dan finally continued his walk to the exit, reflecting on what had just occurred. Gabriel always struck people as timid due to his introversion and quietness. But in reality, he can be quite talkative, at least when it’s about the lore of a video game or some fantasy world that strikes his fancy. It’s a shame that he avoids talking with the rest of the team for the most part.

'At least I was able to crack his shell a bit.' Dan thought to himself, thinking about the many hours of conversation the two had over the past few months.

As the man finally made it to his sedan in the manager's parking lot, he thought of what he could eat on his way home. 'Let's see, Taco Loco is open 24/7… McRons’s drive-through should be good. Hmm…'

With food on his mind, Dan fired up his SUV and started on the usual route back toward his apartment. Having lived in Atlantica his whole life, navigating the somewhat light traffic of downtown was a breeze for the young man, especially when it came to trekking toward his favorite fast food joints. Just halfway through his route home, Dan's phone sounded off, caller ID displaying a picture of a shaggy blonde-haired young man.

“Oh shit, I forgot to update Vick…” Dan quickly answered the call. “Hey bro, what’s up?”

“Dude! Where you at? It’s like, practically nine. Figured your date would have skipped out on you by now.” The man, identified as Vick, spoke through the car’s speakers.

“Haha… Funny.” Dan said dryly. “Well, I guess you’re kinda right. Jess did flake on me again. But it’s all good. We actually had a big fire at work today, so I had to stay late to make sure it got put out. So, I guess it sorta worked out.”

“Aw shit, I’m sorry Bro. I was only joking but damn…” A few moments passed in silence before Vick spoke back up. “Listen Bro, what do I always say? If she doesn’t respect your time, then you don’t gotta respect hers. Forget about her; We’ll find you someone worth a damn.”

‘That Victor…’ Dan thought to himself with a smile. Victor is practically a brother to him and has always been there for him with his infamous Bro-Speeches when Dan got down in the dumps. He was also his roommate, so he’d likely gotten the same speech when he got home anyway.

“Alright, Alright, no need for the Bro-Speech. I’m good, man. Just getting tired of it, ya know. Enough about that. Taco Loco or McRons. You have about 2 minutes to decide your fate.” Dan announced dramatically.

“Oh shit. Uh… Locos. Get me one of those special box deals. I’ll call Bro-tax on it for picking your depressed ass up.” Vick began laughing as Dan just shook his head.

Dan acquiesced. “Harr Harr. Alright, I’ll pick this up and be home within 20. Later”

“Aight, See ya my man.” Dan couldn't see it but could feel his best friend's brotherly smile through the phone. A few short minutes passed in silence as Dan approached the fast food venue. Spontaneously, however, a weird sense of nausea began to overtake Dan.

“Oof. What the hell… Shit, I gotta pull over.” Dan quickly maneuvered his car into the closest parking spot available at the Taco Loco. Then, as he placed his car in park, the world became very dark for him.

**********

AN: Howdy Guys my name is Weebvious and this is my branch for Harem Hotel. Been a big fan of this story with what branches are already out and I’m pretty excited to do my own spin on it. If you made it this far then I’m guessing you at least read the premise behind this season I am down to answer any questions you may have in the comments. For the elephant in the room, this is indeed a mostly genderswap story. I was inspired to write this up after reading AliC’s branch with how they handle the character Ryan. Now obviously this will take things a bit further as the whole cast minus the Master will be genderswapped this time but I think this could be fun. There won’t be any gay content between men but there will likely be some girl-on-girl action as is the nature of most Harem stories. Leave a like and I hope you guys enjoy!

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