#season of the splicer

[taxus-fraud]

[Image ID: Quria, Blade Transform, a large taken Hydra, in their boss fight arena. Overlain is an image of a post that reads “It should be night for a month just so we can see who panics and who lives and who dies.” /End ID]

[thefirstknife]

I want to talk about Lakshmi-2 again since her story came back as relevant, as well as touch on Savathun since she's coming back. So this is going to be a retrospective on their involvement in Season of the Splicer!

A lot of people weren't around for Season of the Splicer or maybe don't remember it as well. That season was a lot and one of the most important parts of it was that at the time we still didn't know about Savathun impersonating Osiris. SOME of us who dedicated a lot of time to figuring it out have speculated it and were pretty much 100% convinced that Osiris in Splicer was NOT Osiris, but this wasn't confirmed until after Splicer ended.

I think that the misunderstanding of this event has also led to misunderstanding Lakshmi and what she did in Splicer. The entire season's story takes on a completely different vibe if you know that Lakshmi was heavily manipulated by Savathun whose presence in the City had a major goal of destabilising leadership and drawing attention away from her own schemes.

This isn't a post to justify anything that Lakshmi did; her actions in Splicer were unambiguously bigoted towards the Eliksni. She used her xenophobia for personal political gains while putting a vulnerable population in danger with her words and actions. Lakshmi's xenophobic preaching resulted in direct violence against the Eliksni. There is no excuse for that, no matter what's the origin of that xenophobia. I want to make that clear before I dive into this.

What happened in Splicer?

Season of the Splicer was the third season in Y4 (Beyond Light). It focused on a mysterious phenomenon known as "the endless night" which wrapped the Last City in perpetual darkness. This was done by the Vex. Nobody knew how to deal with this, including every single Guardian and scholar in the Tower so out of desperation, we turned to the Eliksni for help; sacred Eliksni Splicers had means to enter the Vex Network and find a root cause as well as a possible solution to the problem. This is how Mithrax and his House of Light were invited to the City, in an unprecedent move for an alliance with the Eliksni. Splicers and Guardians together have the unique power to manifest physically in the Vex Network and deal with the cause for the endless night. Long post under:

Accepting the Eliksni into the City was tough. Most humans have experienced some form of violence at the hands of the Eliksni. Our past is filled with wars and battles against the Eliksni. The first big battle for the City, Battle of Six Fronts was against the Eliksni who wanted to breach the newly built wall and attack humanity. Battle of Twilight Gap was a final fight against united Eliksni houses that got close to conquering the City, only to be held off at the Twilight Gap as the last line of defence. This battle was saved, in part, because Mara decided to reveal the Awoken and stop House of Wolves from joining Twilight Gap which essentially prevented Eliksni victory, but spurned the Reef Wars which devastated the Reef; both the Eliksni and the Awoken. This is but a small selection of the biggest conflicts that show for how long this has been going on and how many people were affected by the wars with the Eliksni.

This is all after the Eliksni arrived to the system just as our Collapse finished and they wasted no time settling in a world just beginning to recover from the Collapse. Early human settlements were routinely entirely destroyed by the Eliksni who were stronger and better equipped than humans; until the Risen showed up. But even with the Risen, ordinary humans still continued to suffer to both the Eliksni and the Risen and their combined conflicts. Stories about Amanda and Safiyah are but a fraction of stories of ordinary humans who had to deal with Eliksni attacks. This also includes civilian Eliksni; many Eliksni were literally just survivors of their own apocalypse and had nowhere else to go, while dealing with unfathomable desperation about being abandoned by what they saw as their deity. Both humans and Eliksni were exploited by their leaders and pushed to constant wars.

This is important to understand because it gives some context to why some citizens of the Last City were somewhat reluctant to accept the Eliksni being there, on top of the growing paranoia about a City plunged in an endless night at the hands of the Vex. Humans didn't just wake up one day thinking "Eliksni are stinky!" there were legitimate reasons for being afraid. Mithrax's daughter Eido confirms this in her logs, telling us that the Eliksni are well aware that they were the initial aggressors on humanity. The same can be applied to Eliksni as well; many Eliksni have lived with the knowledge that at any point in time superpowered immortal humans can descend from the sky and start indiscriminately killing them. They have horror stories about this, most notably about Saint-14 who led a long crusade against the Eliksni, including against civilians who wanted nothing to do with the wars. Putting Saint-14 and Mithrax in the same City during a Vex-induced anxiety was a ticking time bomb.

Luckily, Saint-14 is a kind man who is capable of reflecting and being compassionate. Once Mithrax explained how the Eliksni view him, he got deeply ashamed of his actions and sought to atone for his past. It took a while, but the Eliksni accepted him and he became great friends with Mithrax and was willing to lay down his life for Eliksni who, at the end, he claimed are his people equally as anyone else in the City. At the end of the day, the leadership of humanity and the Eliksni decided to put everything behind and start anew, which was the right thing to do. Everybody suffered in the past, but nobody has to continue suffering in the future. Giving everyone a second chance is literally the core theme of Destiny.

The Lakshmi-2 Problem

On the other hand, there was Lakshmi-2. She was the leader of the Future War Cult, one of the City factions. Factions in the city were representatives of the civilians; Future War Cult, New Monarchy and Dead Orbit were the three that operated for the interest of the civilians. Lakshmi was immediately deeply against the Eliksni settling in the City. She proceeded to be a staunch advocate for their removal, broadcast weekly radio messages with anti-Eliksni sentiments and stoked the anxiety and paranoia of the citizens, directing it towards the Eliksni. At one point, the animosity towards the Eliksni turned to violence as well, and the Botza District, where the Eliksni were settled, was attacked and their settlement ransacked. Many Eliksni were harassed in the streets and some were attacked. Lakshmi's broadcasts were a huge part of this violence, which ended with her broadcasting about taking matters into her own hands which resulted in opening a Vex portal to the City (specifically to Botza District to attack the Eliksni).

The fandom immediately hated her for that and with good reason. A lot of people were confused because they didn't think it was right to portray her as a warmongering politician which was always strange to me. She was the leader of the Future War Cult. Her messaging was always that of political warmongering. It's in the name. Splicer just amplified this because the situation was happening in front of our eyes and for other reasons influencing Lakshmi.

Lakshmi was shown actively using the Device, a prediction machine owned by the Future War Cult since the Golden Age which was made back then by Maya Sundaresh who founded the FWC and invested into this Device which is a mesh of Vex technology. Maya called it a "mind-ship" and shown that it was capable of displacing one's consciousness, allowing you to see the future, past, other timelines, or possibly something else. The contemporary FWC found remains of the Device and continued to use it for the same purpose. Using the Device proved to be largely damaging or even lethal to those put in it. A lot of the "futures" that users saw would be that of utter Darkness, war and collapse so they decided to spread the message that "war is all there is" and that there will always be some fight happening in the future and that we must always be ready for it. Lakshmi used this to prove that this whole thing with the Eliksni is that fight; the inevitable yet another clash between human and Eliksni that endangers us all.

It's important to note that using the Device is not safe and it's not reliable. It often shows stuff that is hard to interpret or even completely false and based on what the users wants to see. This shows with Lakshmi with a lot of the visions she was seeing. Even her own fellow FWC members were distraught at her behaviour at the time with some deciding to resign, believing that she was becoming corrupted and going mad. This is relevant because it shows that her close colleagues noticed that she was acting strangely.

And she was. Because of Savathun.

Savathun.

At the time, Savathun was in the city, masquerading as Osiris. Before Splicer, she tried turning us to war with Caiatl, which failed. After that failed, she turned to the ace in her sleeve; Quria, the Taken Vex Mind she was gifted by her brother Oryx back in the Books of Sorrow days. Savathun instructed Quria to manipulate the Vex into creating the Endless Night in order to create a problem for the City that will destabilise its leadership, and cause panic and infighting. Savathun was the one who, as Osiris, suggested that Mithrax and House of Light be invited into the City, knowing full well that it will cause issues. She wanted those issues. She wanted a panicking anxious population on the brink of slaughtering each other, gossiping, spreading lies and misinformation. She needed it to keep her worm fed and she needed it to keep eyes off herself, while she schemed to figure out how to get the Light. She needed time to investigate archives and find materials and learn as much as possible so a little background chaos was perfect for that; nobody will pay attention to an old man who recently lost his Ghost when there's bigger problems at the horizon.

This was possible to piece together during Splicer, but Savathun helpfully admitted to it all in the season after, in Lost. Of course, she framed it to appear that she was being helpful, but we as players have more information so we can piece together everything she's done. Savathun infected both Lakshmi and the City with her viral song. Lakshmi's last broadcast detailed that "Osiris" aided her in opening the portal. Savathun spoke to Lakshmi on multiple occasions. We also have proof of this from the other side, from the perspective of Osiris who could see into Savathun's actions while he was being held prisoner. This lore was the POV from Osiris, from Lost (after Splicer) and it shows Osiris seeing through Savathun's eyes as she was actively influencing Lakshmi. Osiris didn't even know who Lakshmi was; she gained prominence after he'd already been exiled. But he saw an "Exo woman" with "vacant eyes" and Savathun's "true voice" humming to her.

Savathun, besides creating both of the main problems (Endless Night and Eliksni in the City), also worked tirelessly to fuel violence in the City by corrupting Lakshmi-2. Savathun whispered in her ear, running suggestions by her, enticing her day by day and ultimately being the one who made her open the Vex portal in the middle of the City. Lakshmi, on top of being already driven mad by the Device, was also being driven mad by Savathun who desperately wanted the City's leadership to fight. It got to the point of suggesting a coup against the Vanguard. Lakshmi-2 and Executor Hideo (New Monarchy) got as far as to try recruiting Saint-14 to help them with the coup; when he refused, Hideo feared that he will tell Osiris everything and snitch on them, but Lakshmi was convinced that Osiris will stop Saint from saying anything. Why? Because it wasn't Osiris. The "Osiris" that Lakshmi knew was actually Savathun who would indeed try to stop Saint from outing their coup plans.

I want to stress again that Lakshmi wasn't innocent in this whole debacle. She had her own bigoted beliefs, coming from trauma; at the end we learned that Lakshmi-2 survived the sack of London by House of Devils back in the Dark Age. She has personally experienced a traumatic event of Eliksni attacking and murdering humans and destroying their settlement. The problem with Lakshmi is that she didn't even attempt to deal with that trauma or solve it. Saint was also traumatised, as were many other Guardians and people in the City and they all decided to put it aside and work towards getting better. Lakshmi held onto her trauma and never got over it. She confronted the Eliksni (Namrask) who participated in the sack of London and told him to his face that to her, he will never change from a conqueror he was, despite his very honest attempt to do so. Namrask, much like Saint-14 decided to put his warring past behind and to change and be a different person. And as much as Saint, he has the right to do so. Lakshmi denied it from him and instead still held onto her original belief that Eliksni cannot change and cannot be good.

Unfortunately, Lakshmi also never got a chance to change, given that the moment this all started, she was roped in with Savathun who wanted a City leader to sow chaos. Maybe without Savathun and the Device, Lakshmi would've turned out better. Maybe she would've thought about it more, learned to forgive, learned to accept the Eliksni (much like Saint), but she never got the chance before Savathun corrupted her. I feel like people forget that, or maybe even don't know about it. It's much easier to just hate Lakshmi and call her racist and talk about how violently she should die. The nuance and tragedy of her story is often pushed aside or not mentioned at all.

This is even more tragic now. Lakshmi was violated, deeply, in a way that is truly impossible to comprehend. She died, erased, in proximity to an alien entity. In her body, a new identity was installed, a combination of Maya and other Exos that participated in the "chorus" with her as the "conductor." She did not consent to this and as we've seen from her research into Spontaneous Exo Reset Syndrome, she was at least somewhat aware that something horribly wrong had happened to her. She was directed by impulses that were not entirely her own. Her interest in the Future War Cult and the Device are both suspect now, given that those things were Maya's obsessions and Maya used Lakshmi as a proxy; a twisted way to create a "child" by imprinting a part of yourself into them.

And as if that wasn't enough, she was grabbed by Savathun, a master in manipulation, lies and corruption who didn't care about her or about the City or about the Eliksni. I hope people can also realise that it was Savathun who used the bigotry against the Eliksni as a tool with zero care for actual victims of this bigotry. Eliksni dying in violent attacks around the City were nothing but an accessory to Savathun; accessory to her plans to ruin us while she's looking for a way get rid of her worm with the Light. It was entirely selfish, through and through, with no regards to either humans or Eliksni. In this case, I would put more blame on Savathun than Lakshmi for any kind of bigotry towards the Eliksni; Lakshmi could've learned better had she gotten a chance, while Savathun had many chances and simply did not care.

Lakshmi was an incredibly interesting character to me since I first saw her. This is partially due to her VA (Shohreh Aghdashloo) whom I adore to death so just hearing her speak had me enchanted. But Lakshmi and the FWC were always my favourite faction and I didn't like how the community boiled them all down to just xenophobia towards Eliksni as if there was nothing else to them and as if they all agreed with what Lakshmi did in Splicer. At the same time, people ignored the same xenophobia first and foremost from Savathun who had zero reason to even remotely object to Eliksni being in the City, or even New Monarchy who also participated in Lakshmi's schemes. It was only ever Lakshmi, a woman whose trauma was manipulated against her by an entity known for toppling down entire civilisations with the use of manipulation and corruption. Savathun infiltrated many civilisations in the same way she did ours and they all ended up much worse than us: her infiltration of the Harmony led to their downfall and her corruption of Umun'Arath led to the fall of Torobatl. A lesser known example is told to us by Rhulk, of a species (Kalarahnda) he came to destroy but that destroyed itself upon seeing him because someone (Savathun) alerted them to him so they spent centuries preparing their entire civilisation for his arrival as per her instructions. When he arrived, they self-destructed their whole planet, believing they're fulfilling a great prophecy of mass sacrifice to ascend. This was Savathun's doing; instead of helping them escape Rhulk, she orchestrated their demise purely to take the satisfaction of it from Rhulk. Not to help those people, to spite Rhulk.

I'm adding this because I want to absolutely stress how much Savathun does not care for any lives other than her own. Entire civilisations crumbled into dust due to her manipulations. We've talked about this before due to some of the stuff writers said about Savathun recently and I feel like people simply forget this or want to excuse it, but are super quick to judge Lakshmi in a way they never would Savathun; the actual person who orchestrated her actions and ultimately her death.

I think they should both be judged, albeit in different ways. And I definitely think that the blame for what happened to the City during the Endless Night and specifically for what happened to the Eliksni should fall mostly on Savathun, not Lakshmi. It was Savathun who even orchestrated the endless night to begin with. Lakshmi was complicit and she had her own issues that she should've worked out in the centuries she's had to think about them. Savathun probably chose Lakshmi because she was an easier target; already with a problem against the Eliksni. A believable victim, someone that wouldn't take much to convince and corrupt. I'm also of the belief that, as Osiris, she also tried to do it to Saint-14, but he's a much more principled person than Lakshmi.

So they both suck. Both Savathun and Lakshmi were using the struggles of the Eliksni as a tool for their own gains which contributed to untold Eliksni suffering, but in the grand scheme of things, it was Savathun that forged it all from the bottom to the top. She made the Endless Night, she directed the Vanguard into going to Mithrax and the Eliksni for help, she orchestrated their settlement in the City, she spent time picking a target in the form of Lakshmi to spread propaganda and force people to be in a perpetual state of panic and misinformation for months, while she tended to her own goals of gaining the Light.

And once more, Savathun's attempt to put us at war with someone, ultimately led to another alliance. At the end of the day, compassion and friendship in the face of danger prevailed because Destiny is fundamentally a story about hope.

It's just something I wanted to recap and remind people if they aren't aware or don't remember. Because I feel like the new information will reignite the old "Lakshmi is racist" spiel with complete disregard of everything we know about her and with complete disregard of the actual culprit of the bigotry in Splicer: Savathun.

This doesn't mean that you can't dislike Lakshmi for what she's done. You absolutely can! We can't claim that all her actions were because of Savathun; as a matter of fact, she was chosen by Savathun because of how maleable she was. It's not easy to just turn someone into a bigot. The new information definitely adds to the tragedy of Lakshmi's life and to how much she was manipulated by those around her, but it doesn't remove her own fault for what happened.

This also doesn't mean that you have to hate Savathun. Just be aware of some of the more heinous stuff she's done and don't ignore it or view it as not important. Savathun's actions should be condemned as much as Lakshmi's, if not more so, but I'm not here to compare who's a worse bigot. They've both done horrible things to humans and Eliksni in a situation where we needed to stay united. And in the same way we can discuss the complexity and tragedy of Lakshmi, we have to acknowledge it for Savathun as well. She was a victim of manipulation as well, someone who took millions of years to realise that those she swore her life to are liars. She will eventually have to reckon with that.

Luckily, the outcome was ultimately in our favour, although not without consequences. Many Eliksni were attacked and died. Lakshmi died and the rest of the factions were exiled. We now can't simply ask Lakshmi about the new revelations, we can't get more information from her or the FWC, something that might be able to help us understanding and defeating the Witness. There's still a chance to find out in some way, but it would've been so much easier if we could simply ask someone who is in the City.

Splicer was a really good season, I highly recommend going through the story of it if you haven't played. DLV has everything in the playlist I linked and the official channel has just the cutscenes. Being there was truly a whole special experience because of the stuff with Savathun and Osiris. I cannot stress enough that the majority of the players did NOT believe that Osiris isn't Osiris. The theory was out there but it was largely not listened to. Some even used lore tabs that explicitly confirmed the theory from Splicer to claim it debunks it. It was a wild time. The wildest of all was the ending where people were genuinely saying that the ending to Splicer changed their mind to NOT believing it was Savathun. It was one of the most mind-boggling time in Destiny for me and I think that the misunderstanding of that whole plot made a lot of people either forget or not properly understand Savathun's involvement with the events of Splicer. If one played through the whole thing believing that was actually Osiris, Savathun's actions may have eluded them, especially if they didn't engage with a retrospective of the season. I believe that understanding how Savathun manipulated Lakshmi is important for understanding Lakshmi as a character, especially now with these new reveals (and possibly directly because of the new reveals; perhaps Savathun also targeted Lakshmi because of her origin). But at the end of the day, Lakshmi is still someone who couldn't let go of her xenophobia which made her the best target for Savathun to manipulate. That one is on her, regardless of all of her origins and trauma.

[telestoapologist]

how I look with she/her in my bio

[flowers-of-io]

Misraaks, in chapter 8 of Achilles Weaves a Cocoon: Do you have any sales experience?

Namrask: I once sold a bag of oregano to some Dregs who thought it was weed.

[scribonia-art]

(Originally written in August 2021 in the final weeks of Season of the Splicer, during the Endless Night event)

The truce of peace between the Vanguard and the Imperial Cabal is still fresh; the alliance is strained and new, just a few months old. The Coalition is naught but a distant dream of the future.

Empress Caiatl considers the diplomatic approach in the wake of the Endless Night and the Vex attack on the Last City. She sees a familiar pattern in the chaos, in the poison that led to it all, and hates what it implies. (1700~ words) --- Empress Caiatl’s gilded tusks swung as she shook her head at the footage of all the dead lining the streets. The chair creaked beneath her weight as she shifted and leant back, another sigh hissing through her gritted teeth. She let the video continue as she pulled her datapad over and scrolled through report after report. The small factions in the City had been obliterated or had abandoned ship; there were many dead; the Eliksni had fought alongside some Guardians; all sorts of civil drama and unrest that really would have been avoided if Zavala and Ikora had taken the proper approach and squashed the dissenting voices before they had a chance to cause the rot that left the internal civil structure weak and poisoned. Had she been in charge, she suspected this may not have happened. Even now, some voices on her War Council called for her to strike, to disregard the Rite, to raze the City and take mastery of Humanity while they were weak and reeling. 

[zalia]

(Possibly Unhinged) Theory Rambling

2 thoughts I was poking recently, one leading on from the first. The first regards the Deterministic Chaos exotic lore. The 2nd regards Soteria from Spire of the Watcher and the Dreaming City.

Thought 1

Deterministic Chaos and the identity of the bracketed speaker.

I wondered at first if it was Praedyth, but I am pretty sure now that it is one of the Chioma copies.

Firstly, Rohan feels like he recognises the voice, which would tally since Chioma was one of the founders of Neomuna. It’s likely that they have many recordings of Chioma and Maya Sundaresh that Rohan will have heard.

Second, some of the ways the bracketed speaker talks tally closely with some of the Chioma copy sections in the Aspect lore book.

Bracketed Speaker:

wondering what might have been if we had stayed in our familiar prism-prison or kept tightrope-walking across the quantum wilds.

Chioma Copy in Aspect

227.18's Chioma turns wry. "What's a little more tightrope walking between friends?"

and again, in Aspect

You've got to translate everything into metaphor to understand it, here, and this is like tightrope walking on a greased line. You and Maya lean into each other.

Also, some of what the bracketed voice describes sounds very much like some of what the Chioma copy in Aspect experiences.

Bracketed Speaker:

is disincorporated immortality really so bad compared to the others' ends?

Would you have preferred an attack by vitreous helicoprion or stumbling over the edge of unreality?

Chioma Copy in Aspect

Duane-McNiadh walks too quickly, not testing the ground. He's gone before you can blink—fallen through an unseen edge of the simulation.

The entire Volitive section of the Aspect lore covers the many ways various copies die, with Chioma as the focus character.

Also, with Neomuna and the Veil being a thing, I would like to add that I am side-eying the fuck out of this section of the Aspect lore:

Somewhere, a veil is always lifting.

Somewhere, Kabr is always dooming himself.

Somewhere, a door is always opening.

Somewhere, they are always stepping through.

Anyway, this led to

Thought 2

This is a bit more specualtion, for sure.

With Spire of the Watcher, we learned about an AI called Soteria, the Augur Mind. Soteria is an AI partly created from the Vex, and a fragment of Soteria now exists in Neomuna, dormant in the Vex network, but vital to the Cloud Ark. Augur is a term meaning seer/prophet/oracle, or someone who interprets signs to predict the future, and Soteria was used to interpret data to predict locations of possible planets for human colonisation. She also predicted the Black Fleet.

A friend who has studied classics, pointed out that Soteria is an epithet for Persephone, meaning deliverance/safety/salvation.

Cool, so we now have another mythological figure who descended to the underworld and returned (Ishtar/Inanna/Osiris) related to Neomuna.

In Season of the Splicer we saw various Vex Minds in the Expunge missions as we worked to stop Quria Blade Transform. Labyrinth, Styx, Tartarus, Delphi. We fight the Oppressive Minds (including Dikast - Dikastes was a legal position in Ancient Greece who could pass judgement, and Dimio - probably referencing Deimos, god of fear/terror).

Labyrinth - Theseus and the Minotaur. The Labyrinth was built following advice from the Oracle at Delphi.

Styx - One of the rivers of the Underworld, often said the mark the border between the world of the living, and the world of the dead

Tartarus - An area of the Underworld where the dead were punished e.g. Sisyphus

Delphi - A sacred precinct in Ancient Greece, home to the famous Oracle of Delphi.

Oh hey, another descent to the underworld, and another prophet.

So, we have Vex minds, a descent to the underworld, and prophets. We have Quiria, Blade Transform, who was/is responsible for the curse on the Dreaming City.

The centre of the curse is the Shattered Throne dungeon, where Dul Incaru waits. The Shattered Throne was originally Mara Sov’s Throne World, otherwise known as Elusinia.

So, how does Soteria tie into this?

Well, there was this thing in Ancient Greece called the Elusinian Mysteries. These were the initiation rites for the cult of Demeter... and Persephone.

Does this mean anything? Maybe not. I may be badly reaching. But uh... an AI that is a product of both humanity and the Vex (the human world and the Underworld)... may possibly be something to do with breaking the curse.

[phantomwarrior12]

Misraaks setting Spider straight should not have been as attractive as it was 😳

[tatteredcloak]

Splicer Gauntlet lessons

[jupiter-rin]

Splicer Misraaks I did this in November, last season of Witch Queen, missing SO MUCH Season of the Splicer and my boy Misraaks I'm so happy Lightfall gave us back that vex network-cyberpunk vibes alongside our dearest eliksni!!

[pedanticauspice]

[laurarolla]

NODE.OVRD.AVALON

So, Destiny 2 dropped a mission that actually opens like one of the old-school secret missions.  No hints, no warning, just find something strange and investigate.  Awesome stuff.  But it does raise a few questions about some of the events and the nature of the Vex network.

We enter the network as Misraaks’s request, and travel through, doing some platforming and fighting some really rough battles with vex swarming while inputting access codes (easier to enter than the ones in the campaign, thankfully).  As we go along, we see effectively data ghosts of Asher Mir, and they disappear when you approach them.  He’s not entirely part of the network, it seems, but living in it, sneaking through and manipulating security for us.  As the final encounter, we are treated to the return of none other than Brakion, the boss of the Pyramidion strike from Io before the planet vanished at the end of Season of Arrivals, with Asher having gone down into the Pyramidion to collapse it, preventing the witness from having direct access and seemingly sacrificing himself in the process (second best self sacrifice of the season, because Brother Vance’s lightless blind trek to seal the infinite forest damn near makes me tear up everytime I think about it). So... if we finally kill Brakion this time, does it stick?  Is the vex network similar to the ascendant plane regarding the nature of Vex consciousness?  If not, is it ever actually possible to truly destroy a Vex if they are connected to the network?  The Undying Mind, Panoptes, and Quria are generally considered dead for good, and while Quria was killed in the network, she was a special case due to being part Taken.  Undying Mind was killed in the Black Garden, and Panoptes was killed inside the Infinite Forest.  Do the vex just... not ever actually die? Also, did Asher bring us into the network for one last moment of vengeance against Brakion, or was that just a nice bonus in addition to what he really wanted us to find?  Regardless, I’m glad to see the seasonal stories getting follow-up, and this seems to support the return of Titan and Sloane for Season of the Deep even more now.

[phantom-wolf]

Screenshots and Scenery pt. 11

[flowers-of-io]

Affairs of State

With the Consensus practically disbanded in the wake of the Vex incursion, Hawthorne has pressing concerns regarding the City’s governance and the civilians’ place within it.

Read on Ao3

[destiny2paladin]

Thinking about the finale mission of Splicer and how, for but a moment, the playerbase and the Lore Guardians were no different. The sheer fury and wrath on display was amazing. Bosses were erased in fractions of a second. Entire waves of enemies purged without mercy. That first day of reset was special. I remember blasting Sleeper downrange and grinning the whole time because dammit, this is what a guardian does. We wreck shop. The enemy invaded our home, and they attacked our allies. We tore them in half. It was not a war for the sake of humanity, but a war for the Light. Sunlight and the energy of the traveler alike.

[themadamwizard]

[2021] Mithrax

[izzybellgee]

Pink in the Night non-update!

i forgot to ask annie to look over the newest chapter (posted fridays), so it’s still in the oven

but here’s my writing so far! i haven’t posted this fic at all here yet 😅

Fandom: Destiny 2 Rating: Mature Relationships: eventual F!Guardian/Mithrax Characters: guardian OCs, Mithrax, Eido, Saint-14 Tags: Friends to Lovers, Slow Burn, Slow Build, Season of the Splicer, Retelling, liberties taken with the timeline