The woman smiled at him with professionalism.
"Welcome to Hop/e, sir. I can understand your doubt. You are not the first person to ask this question. And you are also not the first person coming with a mask on. Are you asking because you are interested in our services?"
"Well, I guess so."
"That's great. Do not worry as we do not conduct identity checks on our clients for privacy purposes. No one will ask you to remove your mask and your identity will be protected. Instead of answering your questions here, would you like me to take you on a tour of our facilities? You will be able to see things for yourself."
"Yes, that sounds nice. Are you alright with leaving the front desk unattended?"
"Yes. We haven't been open for business for long and we don't have many male clients. As you might know, our business relies greatly on them. We are lucky when we have more than a couple of people per day. In fact, you are our first male client for the day, sir."
"I see. I am not a client yet, though."
"Of course, sir. You said you have seen our website? Are you aware of the two separate courses we are proposing?"
"Yes. Today I would like to check course one, please."
From what he had read on their site, this course was the most popular and the most standard one, which is why he decided to check it for his first time.
"Very well. Please follow me."
She left the reception desk and headed toward the entrance on the right, Benjamin following her. They walked through a corridor after passing the door separating the inner building from the reception. The employee started her explanations.
"Course one consists of one man lying down on his back and women using the lower part of his body to their wishes, limited by the options chosen by the man beforehand. Our system is made so that there will always only be one woman at a time."
They arrived in front of the first door on the right in the corridor. There was a panel on the door with a simple "Men" written on it. She opened it and they went inside. The room was huge, mostly in its length. It was divided in two by a glass wall, which only had a hole at the bottom with a mattress under it, half on one side and half on the other side. On the side they were currently in, there was only a table in one corner with some towels, snacks, water, books, magazines, and handheld consoles on it while the other corner had a shower cabin. The rest of the room was empty except for a few buttons and a screen next to the mattress. The other side of the room was also quite empty. There were some towels next to the mattress, a shower handle with the hose disappearing into the ground, a strange big rail on the ceiling, and a security camera on one of the walls with speakers next to it.
"This is the place from where men lie down. The head should be on our side and the lower part of the body on the other side. The glass wall should be around the navel. Please note that the glass wall is actually a one-way mirror. From here, the men can see everything that happens on the other side but the other side will only see their reflections."
She pointed to the table in the corner.
"Men are free to use whatever they want from the items on this table. It is best to take everything one might want to use from the start since it is hard to move after the course begins."
She then approached the mattress and showed the buttons next to it. There were only two of them, respectively labeled "End course" and "Call staff".
"The man should press the "End course" button when he has enough. If there is anything they need during the course, they can use the "Call staff" button here. That is it for the men's side. Do you have any questions so far?"
"A lot but I think I will ask everything at the end. It's just... this is quite the amazing setup."
"Thank you, sir. Let me show you the women's side now, this is the part we are the proudest of."
They went out of the room and continued down the corridor. It forked to the right and soon after, they passed by a door marked with "Staff only". The woman explained that it allowed employees to enter the women's side of the room without going through their setup and reassured him that no one would enter during the course unless there was a problem. A few meters down the corridor and they reached a door with "Women" on it.
They went inside and Benjamin was met with quite the bizarre sight. This room was also large, about the same size as the main room. There was a great number of some sorts of harnesses hanging by a cable to a rail which was set on the ceiling. He could see the rail going all the way to the walls of the room on two different sides. This looked very industrial and Benjamin couldn't believe that the website didn't lie and they really implemented something like this. The woman looked at him proudly and explained.
"The women are required to put these harnesses on and be strictly tied to them. This is because the price for women only includes a one-time session of five minutes. They need to pay again for any additional sessions. This harness they are tied on is a way to both bring them as well as remove them from the room when the time is up. We do this because most of them would get too indulged in their act and be reluctant to leave on time. This is a way to force them to leave without harming anyone. Let me show you how it works."
She went to the harness closest to one of the walls, put it on, and tied herself on the level of her armpits. She now looked like she was ready to do some rock climbing. She took a controller out and pressed a few buttons. Suddenly, the cable length shortened and the harness lifted her in the air, while the wall in front of her started to rotate, showing that the other side was the main room. Now in the air, she was slowly being towed toward the course room and asked a completely astonished Benjamin to follow.