The Book of Fire

The Stakes couldn't be higher on this episode of Harem Hotel, brought to you and written by Dissonant Soundtrack

Cleopatra, Queen of the Nile

The gang **** their way on the door, which seemed to be resisting them as if being pushed back from another side.

“Push! Push! She’s almost here!” Cleo said. Stan and Molly were giving it all they could, but couldn’t seem to overpower whatever was on the other side. For reasons she’d never be able to articulate, she suddenly wished Boudica were there. Inspiration struck. Sometimes that fire-haired idiot has the right idea. Cleo took a step back and charged, driving her shoulder into the door as hard as she could. It gave, and Cleo flew through, losing her balance and crashing onto a tile floor. Stan and Molly charged through the door immediately after, getting their feet tangled together. Stan was able to recover, but Molly fell hard onto Cleo, knocking the wind out of her. Stan kicked the door shut behind them. It was marked with a sign reading “Maintenance - Staff Only.” The gang found themselves in what appeared to be a bog standard public bathroom which was, fortunately, vacant. And was, even more fortunately, somewhat clean.

Stan, thinking quickly, took a mop from a nearby unattended bucket and jammed it through the door handle.

“That should hold her for a minute.” He said, turning to look at the women with a large smile, seeming to invite a chorus of ‘Thank you! You saved us!’

“That door swings this way, you moron.” Cleo said, trying to wiggle free from under Molly who, in her own attempts to disentagle, kept disrupting Cleo’s. “Where are we now?”

“I have no idea? Another set?” Stan said.

“Not ours though.” Cleo said. The air felt different. Thicker, drier, with an incalculably large amount of air-conditioner recycled smoke.

“What are we gonna do then?” Stan shrugged, already out of ideas.

“No risk it, no biscuit!” Molly said, pushing herself off Cleo and leaping to her feet. Molly was suddenly dressed in a shimmering silver cocktail dress, tight enough to reveal all her secrets and short enough that she didn’t have any. “Momma needs a new pair of shoes!” She said, charging from the bathroom and disappearing.

“What the hell? She has tons of shoes.” Stan said.

“Let her buy more if she must, we can’t wait.” Cleo said, finally managing to get to her feet. As soon as she did, she felt a familiar and powerful buzzing through her body, pleasure forcing its way through her body from her earlobe. The earring! Cleo’s grabbed at her lobe, and her supposedly magical, unremovable, permanently bound to her left earring was missing. “She… stole it!?” Cleo said, rage boiling up in her in equal measure to the lust.

“She’s tied to the hotels,” Stan said, “she’s not in control of herself.”

Cleo groaned, she was fully prepared to leave Molly behind, but she couldn’t risk having one of those piercings floating around. Who knew if she could ever get far enough not to feel its effects. “We need to find her, now.”

Cleo threw her arm over his shoulder and he helped her walk, as she continued to struggle with the sensation of being teased from afar. As soon as they made it out of the bathroom, they were hit by a wall of light and sound that would have easily driven a refugee from the Bronze Age mad. And if Cleo wasn’t 80% insane already, it might have done so.

They emerged from the bathroom near the slot machines on the perpetually busy, all-fun-all-the-time gaming floor of Harem Hotel: Casino, which Cleo identified by the tag on the busty blonde waitress who brushed past them. Stan thought to grab at her arm, stopping her.

“Excuse me, did you see a girl just run out of here? Crazy little brown-haired thing, silver dress?”

The waitress gave the half-dressed, all-inked Cleopatra a once over and looked back at Stan.

“She not crazy enough for you?” The woman said, then tossed an annoyed thumb over her shoulder. “Craps is over there. When someone crazy is about to do something stupid, it’s usually over there.”

The two made their way through the surging crowd as quickly as they could, but everyone was just having such a transparently fake good time that they were difficult to move.

“There!” Stan spotted Molly with her back to them, bent over the rail at the head of the table. He moved quickly, but he was basically dragging Cleo at this point, her eyes were rolling back in her head and she was gasping in pleasure.

“Molly, Molly!” Stan said, but before he could reach her, she tossed a pair of dice down the length of the playing area. They bounced deftly against the far wall and rolled to a stop.

“The lady rolls twelve.” The croupier said, to a chorus of groans.

“Did I just do something bad?” Molly whipped around to the sound of her name, as her eyes returned to normal and her usual personality returned. Molly slowly looked back to the bets being collected on the table. “I think I might have done bad.”

The croupier reached across the table with his chip-collecting rake and scooped up the losers’ money - and Cleo’s earring. As he dragged it along the felt, she screamed out and fell against the table, convulsing with pleasure.

“We need that back!” Stan said, lunging for the earring. As soon as he did so, a large hand darted from the crowd and grabbed his wrist, then casually tossed Stan backwards onto his butt.

“That’s the property of the house now, baby.” A stout little mangoblin pushed past the crowd and leered at them through unnecessary sunglasses and irritating smoke. The hotel staff stopped their games and watched intently, forming a solid circle around the trio and this… thing.

“Who the hell are you?” Stan demanded, rising to his feet but wisely not squaring up with the man, even if he was a foot shorter.

“My friends call me Big Al.”

“You don’t look like a guy with friends.”

“Got me there. Call me Al then. You want this, you gotta win it back.”

“That wasn’t hers to lose!” Cleo demanded. Al eyed her up and down, paying special attention to the tattoos along her chest until he noticed the piercings lining her ears, nose, lip, and bulging under her skimpy top.

“Ah, the missing piece of a set.” He said. He whistled to the Croupier, who selected the earring from the pile and tossed it to Al. Al ran his thumb over the earring and watched Cleo squirm all over again.

“It’s my fault.” Molly said. “You should take me instead. In trade.”

“Yesss,” Cleo hissed through her moans. “Take her instead.”

Al finally took notice of Molly and Stan, and nodded with understanding as he saw their true nature.

“Nah, I always preferred the real deal. Flesh and blood is just so much more interesting than automatons.”

Al flipped the earring up like a coin and caught it in his coat pocket, then gave it a protective pat.

“You want it, Inky? You gotta play.”

“What’s going on?” A redheaded woman approached the small gathering and pushed into the circle.

“You must be the host here.” Cleo said, drawing herself up to her full regal bearing.

“I am the host. Ruby is my name.”

“Your half a host,” Al jabbed.

“You’re half a man.”

“Settle this on your own time,” Cleo demanded. “He has my property and I need it back.”

“I like the feisty ones.” Ruby said, and Al nodded his agreement. “Was it wagered at a table?”

“Yes.” Molly said, sheepishly.

“And lost?”

“Yes.”

“Then it’s the property of the house.” Ruby said.

“That’s what I told ‘em!” Al said.

“Well you had to be correct once, if only by accident.” Ruby said. “Let me see,” She said, and Al pulled out the earring and tossed it to her. “A lovely set.” Ruby said, holding the gold up to the light. “If you put up its mate, then we’ll settle this immediately.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Stan hissed. “Skylar could be right behind us.”

“Skylar?” Ruby and Al looked at each other, then burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Cleo demanded.

“We gotta little informal power ranking of the hosts going and everyone keeps jostlin’ for the bottom rung.” Al said, wiping tears of laughter from under his glasses. “How could you even choose the worst? Eris tries to host a show in the middle of the most boring town in the most boring state of the US, Vanessa tries to magic her way out of a sausage fest season, Chrissi is even dumber than her assistant, Sylvia couldn’t make it through two votes without getting rolled by a cheater, Leah’s stuck shtupping her own Master, and Yuki-”

“HUSH.” Ruby cut Al off, and he looked a little chastened for a moment. He nodded to acknowledge he’d gone a little far.

“Alright, we leave Yuki off the list. But Skylar? That boob lost her Master, let a contestant take her place, and now you idiots are loose too!” Al shook his head. “An embarrassment to the whole profession.”

“Stop talking about her like that!” Stan yelled.

“What the hell, Stan? You hate her.” Molly said.

“I dunno, it just felt like he was bashing my mom for a second there. She did create me.”

“If this is what I have to do, I accept your wager.” Cleo **** them back on track. “Name your game.”

“Roulette.” Ruby said. She snapped her fingers, and a table from across the room suddenly began flying towards the group, bowling over staff in its way and sending chips flying everywhere. Those who weren’t stampeded immediately began brawling for the loose money. The table slid to a stop carefully in front of Ruby, and the ball jumped into her hand. “Place your earring anywhere you like and we’ll play.”

“Cleo…” Molly said in a worried hush. “This game has terrible odds.”

“Try the colors maybe?” Stan offered. Cleo looked at her two choices. Red or Black. Red was filled with all manner of negative associations to her now. The red flesh of the demons who tormented her and the flames of the Hell she’d endured for millenia.

“Black.” She said, putting down her earring on the space.

“Leaves Red for me. Seems fitting.” Ruby went to place the ball in the spinning wheel.

“Wait.” Cleo said. “We’re wagering, place your stakes too.”

Ruby smiled “Fair enough.” She placed the earring on the red space and dropped the ball. Everyone held their breath and leaned in as it clattered around the spaces.

“Yoink!” Cleo said, grabbing the two earrings off the table and legging it for the bathroom, Stan and Molly following after a quick beat. The flying table had cleared a path for them, and they deftly jumped over the staff who were still busy brawling over the chips. They finally had a clear path to the bathroom, and freedom of a sort… but they all crashed into an invisible wall that had been laid right over the door way.

“I’m sorry, that one is closed for maintenance.” Ruby said, emerging from the crowd with her face hot and as red as her namesake. “Did you seriously think that would work?”

“...It kinda worked in Skylar’s hotel.” Cleo said, rubbing her forehead where she’d struck it.

“We just explained that she’s an idiot!” Ruby said. “Very well, three volunteers for janitorial detail.” Ruby raised her hands, but Al strode between them and cleared his throat for her attention.

“We need to both sign off on hiring, Rubes. Split hosts, split authority.”

“But they stole from the hotel, Al.”

“Well, if you had stayed to watch, you’da seen that it landed on 29 Black. So, Tatty Tits over here actually won.”

“I won?” Cleo said. “I won! I won! In your FACE!”

“...But you can still throw em out.” Al offered.

“Gladly,” said Ruby. Cleo, Stan, and Molly each felt a pair of spectral hands lift them by the back of the neck and the waistband of their underwear, then toss them out the front door and into the parking lot.

“Now what?” Cleo asked, rubbing her butt where the thong had been dragging up her crack. She quickly replaced the earrings and secured the fasteners a little tighter this time.

“The limo?” Molly asked, gesturing to the parked car several spaces away. It’s door opened as she mentioned it.

“It’ll have to do.” Cleo said, and the three climbed in and hoped for the best.