Roommate Bonding

Team Daddy Issues

Chloe sat on the bed. The room for "Team Daddy Issues" had copied her dorm, or perhaps Ariadne had robbed her in addition to the ****. Laurel's half of the room was a peculiar mix of what Chloe assumed a cheerleader's decor would look like if she were obsessed with firearms and had befriended a talking snake.

"What was the rush?" Chloe asked Laurel. The time-lost contestant was tearing through their closet and leaving a pile of eclectic garments on the bed and floor.

"Oh, you needed to get away from Alan," Laurel explained. "He's your friend or significant other, right? Either way, one of you freaking out in front of the other could fuck up the round. Leo Dulac's season never recovered from Daphne's freakout, if you ask me. I want to trust you two, but we're still in one of the most dangerous periods of the season. Getting through the first vote without someone getting **** or Eliminated is excellent, but you had to notice how hard Ari was restricting everyone to keep things on track."

"Um, we're close friends." Chloe blushed. "Have you watched a lot of Harem Hotel?"

"Unfortunately, yes." Laurel grimaced. "I thought I knew what to expect, but if I were right, I wouldn't have just time-traveled into a horrific future.

"What did you expect?" Chloe asked seriously.

"Well, I chose an elimination. I thought I'd be an assistant on set, and I would probably get some weird shit that kept me in Nathan's orbit. Things would cool down without me in the picture. Fuck, Larry hinted that's what I should do. It's not like that's even weird for a Harem Hotel contestant. A whole season became staff because one guy was such a tool that the Audience didn't want him to keep his harem. This was supposed to be taking initiative." Laurel shook her head.

"Didn't they kidnap you?" Chloe asked.

Laurel shook her head. "They kidnapped Sora, Vi, and Kaitlyn. Working Title thought she was on a rescue mission, Jeremy was in a psych ward. I thought this was a real dating show until the others started complaining."

"Huh." Chloe tried to process the information. "You ended up babysitting a dragon, right?"

"Ari was a sweet kid. Her dad is scary, but not in a bad way." Laurel started to dress herself in tight purple riding pants.

"What's up with that, anyway?" Chloe asked.

"Oh, her family tree's wild, and I helped her with homework about it. One of her grandmothers is a mad scientist who bagged a Producer, and the other's a talking rat that went yandere on a nuclear physicist." Laurel paused. "Sorry, that's probably too much. Sky's nice, anyway."

"Wait, is Ariadne's grandmother this 'Sky' person she mentioned?" Chloe focused on the thread she might understand.

"Kind of..." Laurel looked uncomfortable.

Chloe paused. Laurel, a woman who seemed entirely at home in Harem Hotel, had a subject she was avoiding. Chloe decided not to press, as she could snoop later.

"Um, do you have questions about Alan or your mom?" Chloe tried.

Laurel shrugged. "Mom's a big fan of personal mindfucks to deal with shit. I bet she's fine. Alan seems nice. He has the sex appeal of one of those inbred dogs at a fire station, but you do you."

"Okay..." Chloe frowned. "Any tips, now that we're off camera?"

"We're never 'off-camera,' ever." Laurel gave Chloe an even stare. "That's my advice. We're performing, whether we want to or not. We play, or we lose.

Team Crone

Christian watched as Ariadne used a vape. The host was drained, physically and mentally.

"Do I have to stay here?" Christian asked after a minute. Ariadne had given no sign that she was open to conversation.

"Sure. We don't have a curfew." Ariadne's eyes were unfocused. "Fuck, there's an ancient, forbidden weapon hidden somewhere. If you wanna plan a coup, you should totally find it."

"Um, alright." Christian examined the room. A desk piled with a few small boxes contained everything of sentimental value she owned, presumably collected by Ariadne. The rest of the room was cramped and gloomy, with a low ceiling and no windows. "Can I get you anything while I'm out?"

"Meh, nothing tastes right with an ogre tongue. I should've known Stargazers wanted another hot chick. Sure, I get the romance of the morph. Just, it's like..." Ariadne shook her head.

"Okay." Christian found a door and left. The hallway was wide and well-lit, a hardwood floor extending in two directions. Christian turned left, and started walking.

Soon, Christian found herself in a patio. Outside, heavy cloud cover filled the sky and the patio was surrounded by a pond. Dark plants with colorful insects stretched out as far as Christian could see into the dense fog.

Suddenly, Christian heard a bark. Out of the water surfaced half a dozen long, sleek shapes. The face resembled Ariadne's, with the same tendrils and shape, but the creatures had limbs and were significantly smaller than the serpent, with grey but hairless skin unlike Ariadne's brown. Christian found herself surrounded by the creatures who ran around her in circles, barked, and started doing backflips and other acrobatics.

"Um, hello?" Christian felt unsure if she had found hotel staff or a pack of friendly pets. "Do any of you speak English?"

The creatures wagged long tails and continued to be highly vocal. One smaller creature jumped onto Christian's shoulders. Christian felt paralyzed. Being impolite would be crazy if these were people, but expecting pets to behave like people was almost as bad. Christian made her way to a chair and gently sat down, the creature still perched on her shoulders, and waited for a sign.

Team Too Old For This Shit

"Well, I don't think I have her magical powers," Samuel admitted. Natalia sat patiently in a nearby chair as Samuel's two bodies, both new, shared the bed and tried to figure out how they worked.

"It was good to see if you did copy her powers." Natalia nodded. "Is there anything useful on the device she gave you?"

"She has guest accounts for all of us prepared in advance." Samuel's snake-form paused. "Using this is weird. I think I got something from her about using the device, but I'm not sure why. It might fit mannerisms or speech patterns, somehow? Maybe she included more with the Crawler duplication, or the device is teaching me somehow. Anyway, Ariadne's account has been looking at the history of Namibia, the moons of Saturn, and an ancient Greek play. My guest account can't do much. We don't even have an internet connection. There's a library app, but I don't know what to look for."

"What about history?" Natalia sounded thoughtful. "These people, the Audience, appear to be advanced. They don't sound like aliens, but what are they?"

"Huh, I think they might be from the future." Samuel sounded distant. "This could be an ancestor simulation, or we might be cryonics patients with memory loss. That would give us new questions, but it might keep us in the world we know."

"That's a theory..." Natalia shrugged. "We seem equally helpless in every version of this I can think of. We should find Laurel, but she might be in on it."

"Well, there's a map of this hotel..." Samuel shook her female head. "Yeah, this map doesn't make any sense. The route to her room involves an access tunnel and twenty feet of water."

"Are Crawlers amphibious?" Natalia looked at Samuel's stolen body. "I think they are, actually. Your new head's crocodile features would fit. This place might not be built for human navigation."

"Huh, and I'm handcuffed to this raccoon." Samuel's tendrils patted the avatar affectionately. "Did you find anything surprising in your transformation interface?"

"I've gotten into Advanced Settings, and they're weird." Natalia frowned. "There are presets for how much sleep I got, if I've had food recently, if I need to use the bathroom. It has to be expensive to change that, right?"

"Well, not if this is the Matrix. Samuel answered. "Still, that sounds useful. If you don't need to sleep, that would be big for your career, right?"

"I've got enough money." Natalia laughed. "I was winding down acting. I'm old for Hollywood, even with Marvel options. I was trying to be more available for my kids, but..." She shook her head.

"Oh, sorry.' Samuel winced. "What are they like?"

"They're moody and sarcastic. Junior High does that to a kid." Natalia smiled. "I'm worried, of course. Something about being a mom makes me worry constantly already, but it sounds like this show breaks people. If I come back all messed up, that can't be good for them. They've already had their father bail on us. Fucking loser..." Natalia paused. "Sorry, but no, I'm not. The best part of this is that I'll be hotter than any of the sluts he's banging for the rest of my life, and he'll see it. Fuck, that's amazing."

"Well, I guess it depends on what the other rounds of transformation are like." Samuel sounded thoughtful. "Some of the examples of transformations were terrifying, but it sounds like Alan was raised to be a normal guy by a whole pack who went through a season of this."

"That's promising." Natalia nodded. "What are the new bodies like, anyway?"

"I like both of them, honestly." Samuel's faces both lit up. "I just knew I'd hate what I looked like if I transitioned for real. I told myself I wasn't a real trans girl because I'd hate looking half-done, but having a real girl body makes all of that look silly. This is great! Ariadne's body is strange, but I like it. Nothing hangs loose, and there is just, I don't know, a calm in here. Confident. A creature who does not expect to be fucked with. I get why she calls herself a dragon."