My body may be present, but my soul is on the Beach. I'm already dead.
– Heartman to Sam
Heartman is a Bridges member who researches the Death Stranding, who support Sam in his westward expedition.
Story[]
Background[]
Heartman began his studies of the Beach after losing his family in a unique manner: while he was at a hospital undergoing heart surgery, his wife and daughter returned home to retrieve something for him - only to find themselves caught in two simultaneous voidouts which left a heart-shaped crater. The hospital was not directly affected, but the shock wave caused the power to fail, and with it Heartman's life support. Heartman found himself on the Beach, surrounded by the souls of the newly deceased, including his family. However, the ICU's emergency generator activated, allowing the defibrillator to re-start his heart and forcibly return him to the living world.
Heartman never came to terms with the loss of his family, so he began purposefully repeating that experience; obsessively searching the Beach for his wife and daughter, seeking to "move on" with them, stopping his heart for three minutes. Day after day, Heartman visited the Beach without ever finding them, but the repeated cardiac arrests damaged his heart, deforming it, thus acquiring the nickname of "Heartman, the Beach scientist".
Bridges I[]
Becoming a Beach expert, Heartman is hired by Bridges and chosen as a member of the first expedition, led by Amelie, to connect communities to the newly Chiral Network, and study the Beach and Death Stranding. Like all the other members, however, Heartman has never met Amelie in person, as she is part of the advanced team. Once installed in the area north of Mountain Knot City, the team of scientists began to reveal an anomaly in the tar belt around Edge Knot City, tar that surfaced to the surface, devouring Heartman's colleagues and a secondary station, essential for expand the Chiral Network to the west thus remaining disconnected.
Sam's expedition[]
When all that remains for Sam is to add his lab to the Chiral Network, Heartman requested him the Soldier's military dog tags, which Sam brought back from the Beach, Mama's body, which shows no signs of necrosis, and, in secret, President Bridget's umbilical cord. In the laboratory Heartman tells his story to Sam, then moves on to examine Mama's body and then Bridget's umbilical cord, a cord that Heartman immediately realizes is not human but more that of a BT. After a cardiac arrest, Heartman asks Sam to connect to the network the research centers of the scientists of the first expedition intent on studying the earth before the Death Stranding, and the secondary station near Edge Knot City.
When Sam connects his colleagues to the network, Heartman confides to Sam that Mama's dead cells were full of chiralium, and that her daughter, although a BT, was her soul, so the body does not decompose, a condition similar to Bridget. Suggesting a possible Sixth Extinction, and the presence of umbilical cords in five undecomposed ancient entities, Heartman suspects that Bridget, and consequently Amelie as well, is an Extinction Entity, like the previous creatures. Not trusting Die-Hardman the conversation is not recorded.
Averting the Last Stranding[]
With the start of the Sixth Extinction, Fragile transports Heartman, Deadman and Lockne to Capital Knot City to come up with a plan. Here Heartman asks Sam to return east, to rescue Amelie, kidnapped by Cliff, and taken to the Beach, but Fragile is too weak, with the Beachs too unstable for jumping, to carry him too, so he is forced to walk back. During the month in which Sam was lost, isolated, on his Beach, after preventing the Last Stranding and saying goodbye to Amelie, Heartman, with the help of Mama, searched all the Beaches for the presence of his friend, eventually found thanks to the presence of Die-Hardman's gun.
Heartman is later present during Die-Hardman's presidential inauguration as the United Cities of America is formally recognized as a nation made whole, initially in a coma after a cardiac arrest, awakens when Sam leaves the room.
After countless trips to the Beach, he reasoned that with each person's Beach being unique, not even death would allow him to be reunited with his family, so he gave up his quest, realizing that it would change nothing. Moving on with his life, he later met a woman named Samantha Spade, suggesting a future romantic partner.
Abilities[]
Every twenty-one minutes, Heartman's heart stops and the automated external defibrillator (AED) on his chest re-starts it three minutes later.[2] During this time he is clinically dead, so he thus visits the Beach sixty times each day. When he first meets Sam, having requested Mama's body for research purposes (as it is not in necrosis), he reveals to the courier that he has been to the Beach 218,549 times.
Heartman sees his condition as something of a blessing in disguise; his ability to regularly "visit" the other side and then return to the living is relatively unique, and it allows him to effectively (if slowly) research phenomena related to the Death Stranding in addition to searching for his family. This process has gradually deformed and weakened his heart, but after roughly a decade he has become America's leading expert on the Beach.
Heartman generally keeps an alarm that warns him of his impending death, but can and does switch it off occasionally.
Connection rewards[]
- 3 - BT hologram, Lightning Blue "Ludens mask" sunglasses frame and backpack color
- 4 - Lightning Blue Cap color, Cryptobiote accessory
- 5 - Lightning Blue "Sam" sunglasses frame color
Notes[]
- Given his condition, Heartman dies approximately 60 times a day.
- According to Heartman, he has been to the other side 218,550 times as of his first meeting with Sam. When calculated, 218,550 of Heartman's "cycles" equal to just under one decade (approximately 3642.5 days, or 9.97 years).
- Heartman has made changes to his lifestyle to accommodate his life-death-revival cycle. In his room, the floor, walls, and other surfaces are all covered in a thick layer of padding, likely to reduce the chance of bodily injury should he lose track of the time and die before getting into a comfortable position. Heartman also maintains a collection of various short pieces of media (short films and stories, TV shows, music albums, etc.), all of which can be enjoyed in 21 minutes or less.
- Heartman has a rare genetic deformity called "myocardial cordiformia," which caused his actual heart to develop in the shape of a symbolic heart ( ❤ ). This condition is purely fictional.
- Heartman categorizes himself as a "Homo loquens", a "linguist", for understanding the world around him through the language of science and logic.
- Heartman takes heart medication periodically due to his condition.
- Heartman tends to make a heart "icon" pop up when he does a "thumb up" sign. He can also make a broken heart pop up, like when Sam messed with his phonograph while leaving his lab.
- He was the last known person to have Mama's body, but it is not explained what he did with it after he was finished studying. However, it can be presumed that he preserved the body for future study and examination given it’s unique lack of decay or necrosis such as a normal body would have.
- If you mess with his turntable, Heartman will take 20 likes from you.
- At the end of the game, Heartman has started dating a “spirited Hispanic woman" named Samantha Spade whom he nicknames Sam. Samantha is most likely a reference to the “spirited Hispanic woman” Yaritza from Refn’s tv series Too Old to Die Young.
- Samantha "Sam" Spade is also the name of the fictional FBI Special Agent on the CBS television drama Without Trace.
Gallery[]
