Of a long-box, and a snow child.

[Some spoilers below because I’m asking for advice.]

So I have recently taken on board an adorable noman-child, to whom I have become attached, and whose demise would make me sad. To this end, the crew and I have put other business on hold while we search for a way to make the dear creature stable. We’ve reached Station III, where we were led to believe a certain item would be our key in the door.

The problem is that the bloody acolyte takes the box, does an autopsy, and sends us on our way, and at no point is there an option to say ‘hey, could we trade this for some of that substance we aren’t supposed to know about?’ until the very end, by which point we no longer have the box.

Am I doing something wrong here? Was I supposed to already have breached Station III before trying this? Where the heck do I get another one? I’m on the early side of the game, probably (still in the tramp steamer, though I’ve upgraded the gun) and playing in Merciful Mode so I can go back to an earlier save if I need to, but I mean ‘back a couple of ports’, not ‘back to before this questline started’.

Thanks for any help!

Yeah, you need to spend one just to unlock Station III, and you need another for the heartmetal. You can buy them in Irem, however, for three secrets, I think it is. You have a little bit of time before the snow-child melts, usually, and it stops melting when you get the heart, so you should have a little bit of time if you need to get there/grab secrets.

Okay, thank you! I haven’t actually been to Irem yet, but I suppose it’s time.

I ended up trading a hunting trophy at the Shepherd Isles (much closer!) and now dear Boreas is safe. Safe as anyone on the Unterzee, anyway.

A little bit of time could be a round trip around the Unterzee… twice or it could be as quick as gaining terror.

I’ve had the poor thing melt rather quickly as soon as I got him before I could even consider getting the needed longboxes.
But the Mr. Sacks quest is just so tempting to take on early before you’ve even considered the next ship and in that one, you need to hurry.