The Coworker, Brianna

Brianna was humming a catchy tune as she worked on the green Mustang in front of her. It was pretty banged up, but that didn’t stop Brianna from putting her all into fixing it. Hours passed by as she was engrossed in her job. Finding and cataloging all the various broken pieces was a massive ordeal, but it didn’t deter her since she believed that all cars could be repaired to move once again. There was nothing quite like fixing something that was broken, after all. It was a special feeling for her that she worked hard to repeat. It wasn’t until her supervisor, Sarah, came by that she wondered how much time had passed.

“I see you’re walking as hard as ever. You should take a break. Better idea, go home. You’ve worked more than your fair share for today.”

Brianna laughed, “This coming from the woman who forces us to work overtime.”

“Most of the guys in this place are super lazy. They should be thanking me that I’m just forcing them to work overtime instead of firing them. If they’d work as hard as you. I’d let them leave early every day.”

“Thanks, Sarah.”

She glanced at the clock and realized it was getting late.

“Don’t worry about your tools. I’ll put them away myself since I can’t trust any of these people not to screw it up somehow.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

Sarah smiled, “I know, I want to. Now, get out of here before I give you another raise.”

Brianna smiled as she left her workshop to Sarah for the night and made her way home. She entered her house and saw her brother, Zane.

“Hey sis, how was work?”

“Great, I would’ve worked more if Sarah hadn’t kicked me out.”

Zane laughed and said, “Remind me to get her a gift. You’d be a tired mess if it wasn’t for her.”

“What? I'm not that bad.”

“Not bad, she says. You maxed out your overtime for the year already.”

“I thought we agreed not to bring that up.”

“Did I? My memory must be foggy since I could’ve sworn you said you’d be here to watch Super Soldiers 3 with me tonight at 8.”

“Sorry, Zane. Time just got away from me.”

“I know, sis. I’m not upset. I just worry that you're working too hard. It’s okay to relax, you know. I'm worried you're going to work yourself into an early grave if you keep working too hard.”

Brianna sighed, “You’re right. I’ll take tomorrow off. I think Max is also off tomorrow.”

“You should just ask him out already. You have his number, right.”

“Zane, I told you that in confidence.”

“The worst he can say is no, and if he does, then I’ll talk to him.”

Brianna frowned, “Zane, no.”

“Zane, yes.”

“That’s not funny.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m hilarious. In all seriousness though, you should ask sooner rather than later. Someone else might take the opportunity to snatch him up if you’re not careful.”

Brianna pouted, “Why are you like this?”

“I love you too.”

Brianna hugged her brother as she moved past him to go to her room. She lay down in her bed. She’d just close her eyes for a second before getting up to take a shower. She still stinks, after all. She let her eyes close as darkness filled her vision, and her consciousness faded.

Max was surprised to see someone he could recognize being summoned in front of him. Brianna was wearing her normal uniform consisting of a white shirt that was covered in some blue overalls. Her uniform combined with her dark skin and amber eyes stood out to him, which allowed him to recognize her instantly. Brianna also had short, black, curly hair that he thought looked rather nice. However, she didn’t have much in the way of curves like some of the other contestants or Ann. She looked around the room in confusion, having absolutely no idea what was going on.

“Let’s give it up for our fourth contestant, Brianna. She’s a coworker of the master. Everyone, please give her a big round of applause.”

“Contestant? Is this a dream?”

“No dear, you’re a contestant for Harem Hotel with Max as your master. I would explain more, but it's better to wait until everyone is here. Now, why don’t you tell me and the audience at home a bit about yourself.”

Brianna was going to respond with a question, but the magic of this place took hold, and she started saying, “My name is Brianna West, and I’m 19 years old. I enjoy fixing broken cars so much that I got a job doing just that. Some would say I spend too much time at my job because I don’t think of my job as a job. One day, I hope that I can have my car shop and build myself a personal high-tech car.

Brianna seemed confused as to why she had just started speaking these things out of nowhere, but Ann, as if reading her mind, answered her.

“I used magic to **** you to introduce yourself. It’s a fairly simple power compared to what you’ll see throughout your time as a contestant in this game. Now, please sit down. I’ve only gone through half of these, and I’m sure that the audience doesn’t want me to keep retreading old ground.”

She snapped her fingers as five more chairs appeared. Briana warily sat down next to Lisa who seemed somewhat in awe of what was going on.

“Now, without further ado. Let’s see who's our fifth contestant.”

Brianna