Bite-sized Backstory 18: Majestic Battles and Waves

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After defeating the Taishibethi, Oryx returns to his throne world and makes preparations to have his first direct meeting with the Deep. He creates a special alter for the Deep and prepares an unborn ogre for it to possess. We’ve seen unborn ogres several times in Destiny. You might know them better as Tomb Husks.

When he is ready, Oryx calls out to the deep saying:

I can see you in the sky. You are the waves, which are battles, and the battles are the waves. Come into this vessel I have prepared for you.

This call might seem trivial, or just a fancy greeting, but at the very least Oryx's words here are a clever call back to one of Bungie’s earliest game series. In 1996’s Marathon Infinity, we learn of a creature or creatures called W'rkncacnter. They are described like this:

In primordial space, timeless creatures
made waves. These waves created us and the
others. Waves were the battles, and the
battles were waves.

Later one or more of these W'rkncacnter attack a powerful race called the Jjaro, killing one of them. After this, a second Jjaro somehow flings these powerful ancient beings into a star where they are trapped by the intense gravity and burned by the star’s heat but somehow survive and wait to somehow be released to once again cause chaos.

Part of last game in the Marathon series, Marathon Infinity, involves jumping across timelines in an effort to prevent the W’rkncacnter from being released when a militant race tries to detonate the star they are trapped on.

It’s also worth nothing that in an even earlier Bungie game called Pathways Into Darkness you are a member of a strike force tasked with using a nuclear weapon to temporarily stun an enormous, ancient, mostly dead god-like alien long enough for the Jjaro to arrive and help remove it from the Earth. The opening to Pathways Into Darkness describes the alien and situation like so:

Sixty-four million years ago, a large extra-terrestrial object struck the Earth in what would later be called the Yucatan Peninsula, in southeastern Mexico. The dust and rock thrown up by the resulting explosion caused enormous climactic changes in the ensuing years, and many of the Earth's species became extinct during the long winter that followed.

The object itself was buried thousands of feet below ground, its nearly two kilometer length remarkably intact. It remained there, motionless, for thousands of years before it finally began to stir- and to dream. It was a member of a race whose history began when the Milky Way was still a formless collection of dust and gas- a powerful race of immortals which had quickly grown bored of their tiny universe and nearly exterminated themselves in war.

This particular being, whose name no human throat will ever learn to pronounce, was part of the cataclysmic battle that formed Magellanic Clouds, billions of years ago. It died there, or it came as close to dying as these things can, and drifted aimlessly for millions of light years before striking the Earth.

The heat of impact liquefied the rock around it, which later cooled and encased the dead god's huge body far below ground. As it began to dream, it wrought unintentional changes in its environment. Locked deep beneath the Earth, strange and unbelievable things faded in and out of reality. Vast caverns and landscapes bubbled to life within the rock, populated by horrible manifestations of the dead god's dream.

There’s a few Destiny links here:

The concept of a dead god has been brought up in Destiny before in reference to the Traveler. I believe it was Petra Venj who even mentioned that The City was hiding beneath a dead god back when she was assigned as a diplomat to The City. (Back when she very briefly set up her table on the towers back deck.)
The first Destiny ViDoc was titled Pathways out of Darkness. Given that the thing which the Hive and worm gods call “the Deep” is what The City knows as the Darkness, we have some interesting possible parallels.
Ultimately, we’re looking at tentative similarities between games made decades apart so we can’t draw too many conclusions, but we also may get some small amount of extra insight into the true nature of the Darkness by looking at the themes of Bungie’s past games. It does seem like Destiny’s Deep and Sky have been in conflict before... perhaps similar to the W'rkncacnter and the Jjaro?

When the Deep arrives at Oryx’s alter it possesses the Ogre he prepared for it and speaks to him. Mostly the Deep repeats the philosophy we’ve heard from the worm gods, but interestingly, it does so with a lot more… or at least different… personality. The way it talks is much more conversational that the worm gods distant and almost haughty style of speech. It even refers to Oryx as a friend at one point.

One of the interesting things that it tells Oryx is that if life is going to survive past the end of all things it will have to do so not by kindness or with a smile but by violence and sword. In time, we’ll see at least one other major power in Destiny express a desire to survive past the end of the universe.

In the end, the Deep tells Oryx that two sides pitting themselves against the other until one prevails is the way the universe figures itself out. And it says that this process is not barbaric or evil but is actually majestic. Could it be right? When viewed on on a long enough timeline, is what the Hive and Deep are doing actually beautiful and majestic, even if it causes some suffering along the way?

Sources:
XXXI battle made waves
XXXII Majestic. Majestic.
W’rkncacnter section of the Marathon.Bungie.Org Story Page
PID.Bungie.Org Transcript of the Pathways Into Darkness manual

Previous: 17: The End of an Age
Next: 19: Betrayal & Dreams of Teeth

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After defeating the Taishibethi, Oryx returns to his throne world and makes preparations to have his first direct meeting with the Deep. He creates a special alter for the Deep and prepares an unborn ogre for it to possess. We’ve seen unborn ogres several times in Destiny. You might know them better as Tomb Husks.

Many, many times so far when reading your interpretations of the backstory I have bitten my tongue off, so to speak, in an attempt to not be 'that guy' that actively badgers others at every turn to provide source documentation for their information, paraphrases, or summations. (as has happened before 'round these parts)

Please, can you help with your assertion above ^?

Do you think the rock in the map Cathedral of Dusk could be one of Oryx's tablets? The 'table stone' of an altar? Gravemarker/tombstone?

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After defeating the Taishibethi, Oryx returns to his throne world and makes preparations to have his first direct meeting with the Deep. He creates a special alter for the Deep and prepares an unborn ogre for it to possess. We’ve seen unborn ogres several times in Destiny. You might know them better as Tomb Husks.

Many, many times so far when reading your interpretations of the backstory I have bitten my tongue off, so to speak, in an attempt to not be 'that guy' that actively badgers others at every turn to provide source documentation for their information, paraphrases, or summations. (as has happened before 'round these parts)

Please, can you help with your assertion above ^?

Well, I am that guy. So I welcome any and all questions. Especially ones about the source of things. And I always try to have an answer or basis ready to go before hand. In fact, it makes me sad to hear that you have not engaged in the past. :(

In this case, you are right. I was basing my comment on the events of the mission "The Summoner's Circle." In it you help birth an Ogre before it is ready by way of a Tomb Husk. Turns out I had misremembered the dialog from the mission. I was thinking we'd deposited what was essentially a fetal Ogre into the pool, but that was wrong. Two relevant quotes from Eris tell us:

In the depths of the Dreadnaught, a coven of Acolytes gestate an abomination – a warspawn of the Hive, pulsing and growing in a pool of Taken power.

The souls (of nearby Hive champions you just killed) nestle within the husk. Find its gestation pit and summon forth the beast. Do not allow its worm to complete the cycle. End it now.

So, it seems that the tomb husk was not the Ogre but was the thing needed to birth the Ogre early. This fits with Toland talking about tomb husks having the energy needed to break Hive rune locks. I wondered about the conflict between Toland and what I thought I remembered from the Summoner's Circle but forgot to investigate.

So good work! You've helped our understanding of Destiny's world! Thank you! And please, speak up any time you have a question or concern. I write these, but I write them for all of you. I'd much rather have people be engaged and be proven wrong than people stay silent. :)

Do you think the rock in the map Cathedral of Dusk could be one of Oryx's tablets? The 'table stone' of an altar? Gravemarker/tombstone?

It's possible. I don't think there's anything to say it isn't. I do wonder if he'd have just left it laying around. Presumably, Oryx was still alive in his alternate dimension for part of the time we were holding Crucible matches so it does seem a bit unlikely he didn't have his tablets with him. But given that the Dreadnaught is kinda his throne world in and of itself... maybe sitting right there in its special spot is considered being with him?

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Do you think the rock in the map Cathedral of Dusk could be one of Oryx's tablets? The 'table stone' of an altar? Gravemarker/tombstone?

It's possible. I don't think there's anything to say it isn't. I do wonder if he'd have just left it laying around. Presumably, Oryx was still alive in his alternate dimension for part of the time we were holding Crucible matches so it does seem a bit unlikely he didn't have his tablets with him. But given that the Dreadnaught is kinda his throne world in and of itself... maybe sitting right there in its special spot is considered being with him?

We see one of the tablets in Gogoroth's cellar. It lights up as guardians die and will wipe the team if 6 kick the bucket. This is the only time we see one of the tablets in game, as far as I know.

Also, the marathon backstory at one point was a bunch of immortals fighting it out due to boredom :)

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We see one of the tablets in Gogoroth's cellar. It lights up as guardians die and will wipe the team if 6 kick the bucket. This is the only time we see one of the tablets in game, as far as I know.

Indeed.

Could the pillars that block the Warpriest's ultimate attack also be considered tablets? Don't they have symbols on the front?

Also, the marathon backstory at one point was a bunch of immortals fighting it out due to boredom :)

Do you mean at one time Marathon's backstory included these bored immortals but was later changed, or that there's more about Marathon's ancient races/gods fighting buried within the terminal text of the games?

I very generally know about the stuff that happened in Marathon but its been quite a while since I've read through everything and there's a lot to remember, so feel free to bring up anything you think might apply to Destiny! :)

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Do you mean at one time Marathon's backstory included these bored immortals but was later changed, or that there's more about Marathon's ancient races/gods fighting buried within the terminal text of the games?

I very generally know about the stuff that happened in Marathon but its been quite a while since I've read through everything and there's a lot to remember, so feel free to bring up anything you think might apply to Destiny! :)

One of Marathon's initial concepts were that there were a bunch of immortals who built these arenas for "fun", and you were a late immortal to the party and trying to figure out where everyone went. This story line was competently shelved in favor of the sci-fi concept we all know and love.

I think bits of the concept made it into some of the more esoteric electric sheep terminals as background.

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After defeating the Taishibethi, Oryx returns to his throne world and makes preparations to have his first direct meeting with the Deep. He creates a special alter for the Deep and prepares an unborn ogre for it to possess. We’ve seen unborn ogres several times in Destiny. You might know them better as Tomb Husks.

Many, many times so far when reading your interpretations of the backstory I have bitten my tongue off, so to speak, in an attempt to not be 'that guy' that actively badgers others at every turn to provide source documentation for their information, paraphrases, or summations. (as has happened before 'round these parts)

Please, can you help with your assertion above ^?

Well, I am that guy. So I welcome any and all questions. Especially ones about the source of things. And I always try to have an answer or basis ready to go before hand. In fact, it makes me sad to hear that you have not engaged in the past. :(

In this case, you are right. I was basing my comment on the events of the mission "The Summoner's Circle." In it you help birth an Ogre before it is ready by way of a Tomb Husk. Turns out I had misremembered the dialog from the mission. I was thinking we'd deposited what was essentially a fetal Ogre into the pool, but that was wrong. Two relevant quotes from Eris tell us:

"In the depths of the Dreadnaught, a coven of Acolytes gestate an abomination – a warspawn of the Hive, pulsing and growing in a pool of Taken power."

"The souls (of nearby Hive champions you just killed) nestle within the husk. Find its gestation pit and summon forth the beast. Do not allow its worm to complete the cycle. End it now."

So, it seems that the tomb husk was not the Ogre but was the thing needed to birth the Ogre early. This fits with Toland talking about tomb husks having the energy needed to break Hive rune locks. I wondered about the conflict between Toland and what I thought I remembered from the Summoner's Circle but forgot to investigate.

Thanks very much for the clarity
Yeah, I replayed The Summoner's Circle after you mentioned the level name. The Tomb Husk appears that it can be used as a receptacle for souls and energies.

I do remember places in the game where the tomb husks are used to unlock a locked door. It doesn't make complete sense WHY the Tomb Husks unlock Hive rune locks? Is it "biometric" in nature, utilizing the souls contained within? Does the lock just require a lot of energy to unlock? Does the energy stored in the Tomb Husk not even interact with the lock and just brute force it? Is it a sacrifice thing (and the encased souls are spent to carry out the task)?
Is the Tomb Husk a vehicle for transporting the Hive rune language from "The Taken realm/throne worlds", and the combination of runes unlocks the locked door? "Through these spaces passed speech and food"

... I'd much rather have people be engaged and be proven wrong than people stay silent. :)

I don't post all too often, much more than I used to.
Lurkers got to lurk

I love what you have been doing so far and I simply don't want to be the only or one of the only people commenting on the Bite-sized Backstories. Sometimes my questions or concerns have been easy source requests, fairly petty, or simply 'semantical'. I love to see what others have to say. I miss terribly all the friendly great folks that used to post around *BO and have since gone quiet. Looking back on post histories pops up friendly old names all the time. :(
(I also miss so terribly badly the casual online interaction with Bungie employees, in the past :( )

The knowledge of the group is worth so much more than any single piece I can try and muster all by myself. I don't claim to know anything at all. This foray into the Books of Sorrow still remains as my only significant steps into the Grimoire thus far.

Do you think the rock in the map Cathedral of Dusk could be one of Oryx's tablets? The 'table stone' of an altar? Gravemarker/tombstone?

It's possible. I don't think there's anything to say it isn't. I do wonder if he'd have just left it laying around. Presumably, Oryx was still alive in his alternate dimension for part of the time we were holding Crucible matches so it does seem a bit unlikely he didn't have his tablets with him. But given that the Dreadnaught is kinda his throne world in and of itself... maybe sitting right there in its special spot is considered being with him?

The symbol at the top of the stone appears in the background of the Grimoire Cards, behind the Calcified Fragments of cards XX: Hive - XXIX: Carved in Ruin.

This symbol is also found around the Dreadnaught walls and ceilings on old tattered banners and such.
Does this symbol represent Oryx? The Dreadnaught? The Hive ("circle of life"/pyramid scheme)? (The Traveller? -not likely)
Could the banners be leftover decorations from "The Coronation of Oryx"?
Could it be some symbol that commemorates Eversion Day?
Is it the image of a Syzygy with a light source being eclipsed?

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Bite-sized Backstory 18: Majestic Battles and Waves (Destiny)