Late Bloomer is the last Starfield mission in Kelton Frush’s questline; you can play in New Atlantis after you complete the previous two missions for him ( A Tree Grows In New Atlantis and Out on a Limb).
Basically, the Starfield Late Bloomer mission allows you to help Kelton finish his research; however, as you can guess, the scientist needs your help in obtaining another item for him—specifically, an olive branch.
As you may remember from the previous missions, Kelton Frush is far from being the most brilliant scientist in New Atlantis, and you probably figured out that his research is foolish, to say the least.
Ketlon also committed some crimes by ambushing President Abello, and he lied to you, saying that he informed MAST about the upcoming disaster that the tree he investigates could cause. Well, his wild-goose chase continues in Late Bloomer, and once again, you’ll be involved in it, whether you like it or not.
His last mission, however, requires your presence on Planet Akila, and throughout the following Starfield Late Bloomer walkthrough, I’ll tell you how to get there and where to find the olive branch.
How To Start the Late Bloomer Mission in Starfield
To begin the Late Bloomer Starfield side mission, first, you’ll need to complete the previous two missions for Kelton Frush in the MAST district of New Atlantis.
If you need help finding him and dealing with his requests, feel free to refer to our A Tree Grows In New Atlantis walkthrough and Out on a Limb walkthrough.
After finishing the latter, you’ll have to give Kelton some time before he calls you again, so, at this point, you’ll want to spend time on other activities and missions. Eventually, you’ll be prompted that Kelton wants to speak to you again, so you must return to him under the big tree he is studying in the MAST District.
When talking to Kelton, he’ll tell you that he is on the verge of something but doesn’t have all the information he needs as usual. Feel free to answer how you see fit, and he’ll tell you that he finally figured out that the tree is not vibrating. It is listening!
This discovery is definitely something else, and if you press on and ask Kelton how he knows what is going on with the tree, he’ll tell you he doesn’t. It’s just one of his theories.
According to his new theory, the tree sends vibrations and waits for sympathetic answers in return. Since the tree doesn’t receive any answer, its increasing vibrations may destroy the city. So, as you can guess, Kelton plans to find a way to answer the tree. Unfortunately, there is no way to stop this nonsense; if you wish to complete the mission, so play along, and Kelton will reveal his plan.
The scientist will tell you about the Narion War that took place over 100 years ago. At the end of the war between the Freestar Collective and the United Colonies, an olive branch from New Atlantis was offered to the people in Akila City.
Tell Kelton, “that seems like a nice gesture” because you probably know that this is a sign of peace. Obviously, he considers this short-sighted and ill-advised because he doesn’t understand the meaning. Regardless, he tells you that even if the olive tree died, a branch exists in the Akila City museum.
He wants you to retrieve the withered branch so he can use its DNA to simulate a response for the vibrating tree. Now, feel free to tell him you agree to help, and let’s go after the Late Bloomer tree branch, which is conveniently placed under the supervision of Leah Casler.
How To Get To Akila City in Starfield
To find Leah Casler, you must leave New Atlantis and visit Akila City in the Cheyenne System. If this is your first trip to another star system, things can get a bit confusing due to the travel system implemented by Bethesda‘s devs. So, let’s see how to get to Akila City in Starfield.
The first thing you’ll want to do is open your Hand Scanner by pressing LB, then press RB and fast-travel to your ship in New Atlantis.
Now, press and hold Y on your Xbox controller to Take Off. While in space, open the menu, then the Starmap. Next, press B twice to zoom out the map and see the whole galaxy map.
Finally, move your Thumbstick to find the Cheyenne System, which should be highlighted, provided you track the Late Bloomer mission in your journal.
If this is your first trip to the Cheyenne System, when you select your new destination, you’ll be informed that the chosen route goes through an unexplored system (as you can see pictured below).
This means that you can’t reach Akila directly, so you must first travel to the first known system, which in this case is Olymus (notice the white line between Alpha Centauri and Olympus).
So, select the closest known system (Olympus in the screenshot above), and press X to perform a Grav Jump. After reaching Olympus, open the galaxy map again and look for the Cheyenne System to perform another Grav Jump, as you can see below.
After reaching Akila, while in your ship targeting the objective marker, press X to open the planet map and move the planet around until you see the Akila City icon. Select it, then press and hold X to land.
