Recap: Floor 4

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**Floor 4 Recap (VoidInVoid)** *Released on 6th Sep 2021*

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## Floor 4 Recap

Following victory on the 3rd Floor, Ashley Gray, Syl, Nuon, Ferra and Ogborth take the elevator to the 4th, trip uneventful save for an anxious Syl almost blowing everyone up with a rocket.

On arrival, the group come to a noir-ish jazz club - full of climbers despite Mordium's claims of limited numbers passing the 3rd Floor - clothing switched for outfits more suited for the time without their noticing, forms reduced to a more human size and equipment suddenly missing. The group split up to talk to other climbers, with the goal of locating the floor's Overseer.

At the club's bar, Ashley and Syl meet another climber - Dixon - a man in a dress who draws attention to the use of some form of time dilation on the floor. Despite the ideal strategy of finding the oldest climber to track down the Overseer, the dilation makes this impossible, as Dixon reveals that he arrived on the floor after Ashley's group depsite Ashley feeling she'd just arrived, making arrival order hard to track.

Concerned, Ashley and Syl regroup with the others, who have reached a similar dead-end. Out of options, Ashley proposes goading another climber into doing something against the club's rules to draw the Overseer out. To this end, Nuon winds up a mule-eared woman, inciting her to attack, for which she's shot repeatedly by the Overseer of the floor - the crime-lady Esther Fuega - who chooses this moment to reveal herself.

Quick to brush past formalities, Fuega sets the task for the floor: Carrying a parcel in a free-for-all from the hotel club to the city docks - avoiding hungry police officers along the way - before taking a boat to another city across the bay and tracking down Myriam's Bash and Brass Joint for delivery. The first nine to the club will pass on to the 5th Floor, Fuega implying that she will eat the rest. With that warning, Fuega and the club's back wall vanish, giving access to the outside.

Getting underway, Ashley and the gang - after some discussion - witness an overeager climber dash into the street with their parcel in full view, getting immediately swallowed by a nearby officer. To get around this, the group swallow their parcels, storing them safely within themselves due to non-living objects taking longer to digest.

Quickly making their way through a city that feels older than Ashley's grandparents, the group make their way among the strange, half-alive citizens, before Ashley takes the initiative and hails a cab, telling the driver to take the group to the docks. Amidst conversation, Ashley briefly spots Fuega watching from a window reflection. Realizing they have nothing to pay with, Ashley panics, regurgitating her parcel as the cab pulls up at the docks and quickly swallowing and digesting the driver, to the others' shock. Despite complaints, Ashley barks that the group put her in charge, asserting her authority in a manner unlike herself. Before the group leave the cab, Ashley swipes the driver's gun, hiding it in her clothes.

The group are the first to the docks. Ashley attempts to question Fuega - waiting there - about having seen her, but the Overseer is unhelpfully vague, instead telling Ashley not to think too much about the mechanics of the Tower, as well as adding details of her own life. Ashley also, in her developing darker persona, shoots down Ferra's suggestion that they make more alliances outside their group.

Once other climbers arrive, Fuega offers a deal to the first 25: the chance to leave the Tower in return for a life of crime under her divine superiors, though only a handful take the offer, Ashley and her group choosing to remain. On a climber asking if Fuega has any advice, she rattles off a series of inane, alleged hints about future floors, though admits she could be making them up.

On the boat to the second city, the group meet Dixon again, now carrying a sack with several parcels in it - owing to an unfounded rumor that there's a bonus for having more at the end. The group barely dodge a knife-wielding climber trying to take Syl's parcel when she regurgitates it briefly, Ogborth tossing them into the sea to be taken by a hungry iguana woman. Ashley again shoots down Ferra's wishes to make more alliances after she's caught trying to do just that.

On arrival, the group quickly enter the city and, unable to find a cab this time, settle for thoroughly asking every pedestrian they can find where Myriam's is, Ashley deferring most of the work to who she now begins to view as aides. Through persistence - and directions from a clown-like street musician - they find their way there. Going around the back, Nuon goes on ahead and is jumped by Dixon, who puts a gun to her head, Ashley retaliating by drawing her own weapon. Dixon threatens the group, demanding they hand over their parcels, but Ashley stalls him for long enough with an argument about how oddly everyone is acting for Ogborth to tackle him away from Nuon, injuring him enough to cause him lasting consequences, such as ending up in a certain Overseer's stomach amongst every other failure, though Ashley's group remain unaware of this.

As those left cough up their packages, Fuega arrives to congratulate them, letting them know that their three-day ordeal - hours, to them - will be over as soon as they step through the backdoor of Myriam's, which will take them to the 5th Floor and return their equipment, gains and personalities. After making apologies for how they've been acting, the group get underway, stepping through, albeit not before Fuega tells Ashley to let an "alarm clock-looking bitch" know some choice words for messing with her shtick, should the girl meet her.

Meanwhile, Fuega meets with the clown performer, discussing some potential jobs, and her time as Overseer almost being up...