The Engineer

Erin was in her zone. The weight of the steel beams, the smell of hot metal, the flashing and crackle of her welder over top of Sound of Madness at max volume, and absolutely no one around to bother her. She had been told by pretty much everyone that having her music on max volume will give her hearing damage. So will all the other the noises of a workshop she always said, and I'm not about to give either of them up.

She was making a cage for her friend's trailer. Steel bars and mesh this time. His last one was an old wooden piece of shit that he left outside to rot. Erin had warned him that it didn't have long left, but he didn't care. That was, until it fell apart while he was driving and almost made three other cars wipe out. That was the day he learnt she is often right about this sort of thing.

She was about half-way around welding two beams together, when the power went out. The welder suddenly stopped, the lights went out, and everything went nearly pitch black. "Fuck. Guess that must mean I've done enough for today." As she turned around to leave, her foot caught on the welder cable. Before she realized what was happening, she was about to hit the ground. She braced for impact.... but it never came. She was still falling.

Then the ground abruptly found her. She took the heavy landing on the..... grass? She opened her eyes and looked around. Somehow, Erin wasn't in her workshop. She was in the middle of a castle, in a circle of chairs, with a woman looking down at her from a platform in front of her.

"Aaand here's the first one. Hello Erin" came a woman's voice from above her.

"Where are we? Who are you?" Erin said, standing up and brushing herself off.

"Well my name is Marianne, and you're on the set for Harem Hotel, of which I am the host."

"'Harem Hotel'? What in the fuck?"

"I'll give the full explanation after everyone gets here. In short, Harem Hotel is essentially a reality TV show, where we give a master their very own harem. I'll explain how it works later, but in the mean time why don't you introduce yourself to the audience?"

"Ummmm, if we're on TV, where's the cameras?"

"They're around, trust me. You can't see them, even I can't see them, but they're there."

"OK then. Hi, everyone, I'm Erin Yates" she said to nowhere in particular. "I'm 27 years old. I work as a mechanic at a local place, but it's a pretty boring job. I'm currently single and not really looking for anyone. I've had a couple of fuck buddies over the years - both guys and girls - but no one that could keep up with me."

"Very nice, Erin" Marianne said. "It'll be great having you on the show."

"Care to tell me why I suddenly started telling everyone who cares to watch about my sex life?"

"The show is called 'Harem Hotel', honey. Figure it out. Now if you could go and take your seat, please" she said, gesturing towards one of the seats in the circle. "We need to get cracking with the rest of the intros."

"Fine, but I'll be wanting that explanation soon."

"Fine with me, darling, but right now it's time for our next constant."

As she said that, there was a thud, and another person appeared on the ground where Erin had landed.