 | The following is based on Van Buren design documents and is not canon. |
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Photograph of the crawler transporting the Space Shuttle and its launch assembly used in the Bloomfield design document
Shuttle concept art by Robert Nesler
Hermes XIII, also referred to as Hermes 13, was the name of the Mars mission planned to take USSA astronauts from the Bloomfield Space Center, in 2073. It's also used to refer to the shuttle itself.
Background[]
However, as nuclear proliferation reached an all-time high, the U.S. government completed a space station/satellite that housed two-dozen nuclear missiles each carrying four warheads as a reaction to possible nuclear threats, named the Ballistic Orbital Missile Base, or the B.O.M.B.-001. It was considered the ultimate offensive weapon. The only things missing were the main power reactor and launch instructions and codes.
However, since all other space and rocket facilities already used up their resources constructing the missiles for the station, and launching the cargo rockets to carry them to the base, the U.S. needed to scramble to get the much-needed codes and a power reactor to the station. Their answer was to convert the Mars rocket into the vehicle that would carry the codes and reactor to the base. The conversion started in 2074.
In August 2076, the Hermes XIII space rocket was completed and ready to launch at Bloomfield. Unfortunately, by October 2076, funding for the rocket and Bloomfield had to be drastically cut and diverted to vault technology, thanks in large part to the rising world tensions and imminent threat of nuclear war – the launch of Hermes XIII had to be put on hold. All personnel, except for a skeleton maintenance crew, were reassigned to other locations. Bloomfield, B.O.M.B.-001, and Hermes XIII were essentially mothballed. In November 2076, the Enclave seized control of Bloomfield Space Center. They knew the nuclear war was just around the corner, so they tried to refit the Hermes XIII and convert it into a vehicle that would take selected personnel (mainly themselves) off-planet, destination yet to be determined.
The Enclave could not see their goals to fruition, as the Great War happened less than a year later. All were either relocated to "hot-spots" or took cover away from Bloomfield. The last people to leave shut down the sub-reactor to Bloomfield and abandoned the facility, leaving Hermes XIII and Bloomfield to brave the elements.
After Presper takes the Hermes 14 to B.O.M.B.-001, the player would need to use the remaining rocket to reach him.[1]
Related quest[]
- Get Hermes XIII launch codes - The player character will need to acquire the launch codes for the Hermes XIII space rocket, from Willem Clark himself or from his personal computer in his office at Sub-Level 3.
Appearances[]
The Hermes XIII space rocket was to appear in Van Buren.
References[]
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