Stranger in Need asks you to help Palmer escape after delivering a message to Masato Shima. Return to her hiding place at Space Port during curfew, discuss the risk of Shima's midnight meeting, and arrange help through DeeDee or Caleb if you choose an alternative. Once a helper agrees, report the escape instructions to Palmer and follow the reward objective to the dropbox at Helix Monumental.
The recorded Shima-trust path can lead to an empty dropbox and failure. Reporting Palmer to CorpSec is another recorded failure decision. This walkthrough uses community build 25738165 dialogue against the current Update #4 baseline; this site has not tested the route in the game, and attached outcomes do not guarantee identical behavior in every save.
Accept Palmer's request at Space Port
Palmer is hiding at Space Port, and the opening conversation has an evening condition. She asks for a favor after checking that you are not a security contact. Continue until she identifies Masato Shima and gives you the message Palms down. That two-word message is the important information to carry forward, rather than the surrounding jokes about her transport problem.
Agree to try helping after she explains that you should return with Shima's answer. The recorded acceptance starts the quest. Refusing to get involved ends this conversation without that start attachment. Do not assume that simply discovering Palmer or discussing her missing ride makes the delivery objective active.
She also asks for food. This becomes an optional snack objective, separate from the message delivery. The supported choices are bread, an apple, or an orange. You do not need to provide all three, prepare a cooked dish, or treat the snack as a replacement for contacting Shima.
The introductory discussion does not establish a requirement to own a HOVA or repair Palmer's transport yourself. Her trouble explains why she needs contacts. The actual chain is conversational: deliver information, select assistance, obtain the helper's agreement, and return with instructions.
Deliver the message to Masato Shima
Tell Shima you have a message, explain that it comes from a woman hiding at Space Port, and give him the two-word phrase. Continue until he gives his reply: Palmer should be at Meridian Market at midnight. You are carrying that instruction back to her, not receiving an objective to personally escort her to the meeting.
Shima's conversation allows different reactions to his manner, but the route still turns on delivering the message and getting the reply. Asking for payment earns an unfavorable business attachment and does not reveal a different destination. His threats are not a stated cash reward or an instruction to complete another combat task first.
You can question whether a public meeting makes sense for someone trying to hide. That concern foreshadows the later decision with Palmer. At this stage, however, questioning Shima does not itself arrange an escape. You still need the return conversation and, if you choose to intervene further, a different helper.
After receiving his reply, go back to Space Port when the quest requests the curfew meeting. Do not confuse the time for Palmer's return conversation with Shima's proposed meeting at Meridian Market. They describe different events and different locations.
Return during curfew and deliver the optional snack
The second Palmer conversation is conditioned on night mode, and the journal explicitly directs a return during curfew. If you are visiting her hiding spot during the day and expecting this conversation, the time condition is a concrete reason to recheck the active objective before treating her absence as a quest failure.
When she asks about food, any supported snack you carry can produce the feeding response. The dialogue options for bread, apple, and orange depend on having the relevant item. Without one, you can apologize and the message discussion continues. This confirms the snack's optional role in the recorded exchange.
Tell her what Shima said: Meridian Market, midnight. She questions whether the arrangement is safe and explains that he owes her a debt. The decision here determines whether you merely pass on his plan or look for another way out.
A useful sequence for the rescue route is:
- Return to Palmer during the requested curfew stage.
- Offer a supported snack if you have one.
- Relay Shima's destination and time accurately.
- Discuss the exposure of that meeting or ask whether someone else can help.
- Continue to the offer of assistance.
- Choose a contact route that is actually available in your dialogue.
Giving her food is helpful in the story, but the later escape instructions remain necessary. Do not interpret her gratitude after eating as confirmation that she has left the city.
Choose an alternative to trusting Shima
If you tell Palmer that she has little choice, the conversation can leave her committed to the Meridian arrangement. She says to check a dropbox after a few days if she gets out alive. That conditional promise is not proof of a successful escape or guaranteed reward.
To pursue another route, raise the possibility of someone else getting her out. The discussion can offer contacts on the tracks or at the Docks. The tracks option has a prior-meeting condition for DeeDee, while the docks option is also recorded in the conversation. Missing one option should not be treated as evidence that the entire quest requires that particular contact.
Palmer's reference to an eventual payment does not identify the reward's contents or amount. The data supplied for this guide establishes a reward collection stage and the location of its dropbox, but not a tested cash total, recipe, or item bundle. Keep the rescue plan separate from speculation about what she may leave.
The dialogue's internal state names are descriptions of story progress. You do not interact with a visible tracks flag or manually toggle a docks flag. The player action is selecting the corresponding contact plan and then speaking to the named helper.
Ask DeeDee for the tracks route
Ask DeeDee for a favor involving someone who needs to leave the LUZ. Identify Palmer when pressed. Trying to withhold her identity does not resolve the negotiation; DeeDee asks again because the request puts her and others at risk.
There are responses that appeal to kindness and responses that describe common opposition to security. They carry different relationship attachments. After DeeDee considers the wider damage of a search for Palmer, she can either agree to help or refuse. Both final appeals shown at that point feed into a conditional acceptance decision, so this guide does not claim that choosing one compliment guarantees success regardless of your existing relationship.
If she accepts, the instruction is for Palmer to be at the western end of MetroHub right before curfew, without bags or packs. Thank DeeDee and finish the exchange. These are instructions for Palmer's departure, not a request for you to unload your entire inventory.
If she refuses, she says Palmer will need to sail out. The recorded refusal sets up the docks alternative. That gives a supported next direction rather than requiring you to repeatedly ask the same question or assume the refusal ends every possible rescue path.
Do not promise yourself an exact friendship threshold for DeeDee's agreement. The visible material includes the branching decision but not a verified practical numeric threshold for this guide. Her spoken acceptance and the journal's next objective are the useful checkpoints.
Ask Caleb for the boat route
Tell Caleb Foamheart privately that someone needs to escape unseen, then identify Palmer. He recognizes her as a pirate and questions the risk. Continue toward helping another sailor and the idea that crew members should not be left behind.
The conversation supports both a compassionate explanation and a payment-oriented explanation of why you are helping. The latter draws skepticism, but a follow-up about shared seafaring ties still leads toward his agreement. Finish with the actual request and thanks rather than ending after he recognizes her name.
Caleb says he will help and asks for Palmer at the Docks at curfew. The later return dialogue phrases the instruction as being at the Docks before curfew and asking for Caleb. Use that return objective and spoken instruction when reporting the arrangement; this material does not verify a minute-by-minute departure window beyond the curfew transition.
The boat route does not require you to complete Salt Pete's entire Seafaring treasure quest. That is a separate intent and chain. Here you are asking Caleb to provide the escape, not retrieving android treasures or purchasing an upgrade for your own vessel.
Give Palmer the agreed escape instructions
After securing a helper, return to Palmer. The relevant dialogue options depend on whether DeeDee or Caleb has agreed. For the tracks route, report the western end of MetroHub just before curfew. For the boat route, tell her to go to the Docks and ask for Caleb.
Palmer is suspicious even when you deliver good news. Continue past her questions about the helper and finish the exchange in which she promises something at the Helix dropbox if she survives. A skeptical reaction does not by itself prove that the arrangement has failed.
This is a necessary reporting step. Speaking to Caleb or DeeDee without passing the instructions back leaves Palmer without the plan in the recorded chain. Visiting the dropbox immediately after the helper's acceptance skips the person who actually needs to know where to go.
There is no supported escort sequence in these records. You are not instructed to follow Palmer through a drone patrol, sail her personally, or watch a train departure as a substitute for the final conversation. Follow any journal instruction your current game shows, but do not invent those tasks from the escape's narrative stakes.
Find the Helix Monumental dropbox and read the outcome
The named interaction is Dropbox - Helix Monumental. Use the active reward objective to identify it. Palmer says Ava will know the location, so the dropbox direction belongs to this rescue sequence; it is not part of the separate investigation into Ava's past.
If the box is empty and Ava explains that Palmer promised a reward only if she survived, continue reading the outcome. The recorded empty-box conversation says that the wrong person was trusted and carries a quest-failure attachment. That is a distinct ending, not evidence that you should fill the box yourself or repeatedly wait without checking the quest state.
The earlier suggestion to check after a few days comes from Palmer's conditional promise on the Shima-trust path. It is not a universal verified timer for every reward branch. After arranging another helper and reporting back, follow the collection objective your journal actually supplies.
Avoid the separate CorpSec reporting failure
Ava can also discuss Palmer's identity and the consequences of helping her. The exchange offers the possibility of informing CorpSec. Explicitly authorizing that report has a quest-failure attachment. Asking about the risks is different from selecting the final reporting decision.
For a rescue attempt, stay with the assistance route and verify which helper has accepted, whether Palmer received the plan, and whether the journal has moved to reward collection. Those three checkpoints explain progress more accurately than assuming a delivered message, a snack, or a discovered dropbox guarantees Palmer's escape.