#in d2 lore he was a researcher of the taken!

[vipermenace]

Finally sat down and reworked my exo hunter into a demon! Beloved grumpy Ikaros <3

[leftnipsdoodles]

full offense but d2 painting Asher as incompetent isnt right and it’s pretty obvious it’s mostly done to make Ikora look better and to show the two as opposites (cool concept, still inconsistent). this is pretty clear when you look at the few times Asher is paired with someone else for mission control (Sloane, Failsafe) and is suddenly right in his assumptions and succeeds with his objective. it’s like they just can’t allow more than one warlock in the room to be right lmao

anyway, let me set the record straight, Asher:

- in the main story; correctly guessed that just blowing up the Almighty wouldn’t be the smart thing to do and helped us scan and assess it -> prevented us from accidentally blowing up the sun. he was also the one to alert us to Taken activity on Io, which subsequently kept it from imploding. just saying.

- in Getting Your Hands Dirty; was able to make us control the Taken to the degree that they could be used as a weapon against the Cabal, while never letting things get out of hand

- in Postmodern Prometheus; literally WAS able to create a sort of synthetic light, even if it wasn’t to the extent that he’d hoped. I never understood why the game flat out denies this, as if he didn’t just create a ton of light orbs for us to pick up and charge our Super with.

- in Red Legion, Black Oil; he’s right about the organogel inside Cabal armor/vehicles and helps us sabotage it, which basically makes the entire supply into a guaranteed time-bomb when used. if adventures weren’t self-containted side stories, this would be a sound tactic to gain a leg up on the Cabal by making them kill themselves without ever having a chance to figure out why. btw, in this, he’s also confirmed in his distaste for Titans, as Sloane would have you blow up the supply instead, which would be a much smaller victory without any kind of future merit.

- in Road Rage; rented us a sweet Cabal Interceptor. their intermittent boost, which provides a one-second burst of speed every several seconds, and their Solar cannons that fire large explosive shells, causing splash-damage, combined with their enhanced durability compared to Sparrows or Pikes, makes them a fun and deadly vehicle to ride. furthermore, the variant seen in this particular adventure, distinguishable by its black hull, has a significantly increased rate of fire and an infinite speed boost. with its ability to fire both cannons at once, it certainly is a sight to behold! anyway, thanks to him, the Vex didn’t get their hands on sensitive data on the Warmind project, as well as our beloved copies of Pulp Fiction.

- in Cliffhanger; he managed to upload a virus into the Vex Collective

- didn’t help us in Arecibo, but i’m listing it just to say that to be fair, it wasn’t due to incompetence, just apathy.

- in the Pyramidion strike, he IS constantly wrong about things. however, to help me make my point i will point out that his experience with the Pyramidion was a lot more akin to a raid and towards the end of our strike, it’s made clear that the Vex NOT throwing everything at us was indeed like, super weird. Ikora says it was a trap but.. what kind of trap is that? just letting us waltz into the vex boss’ office and beating the shit out of him? Asher had every right to refuse to accept us getting Brakion handed on a silver platter lol

- in the Dunemarchers’ lore tab; he was able to translate Cabal language from scratch

- exposed us to radiation on multiple occasions. this isn’t actually a good thing, i just feel like we shouldn’t let it slide.

the only time that rly made me go ‘Asher wtf’ was when he wanted us to destroy the data in Road Rage and our Ghost had to suggest to recover it instead, especially since in Red Legion, Black Oil he lectures us abt not always just destroying things mindlessly. i guess that one’s Asher being 100% a hypocrite, since a lot of patrol lines and the like show him being prone to violence and wanton destruction himself. him wanting Brakion dead instead of researching it or at least its body is also p stupid but it ties into the above and it’s made obvious that his need for revenge is an unhealthy and irrational thing so. that’s that on that i guess.

i’ll use this opportunity to also say that like half the time asher uses big words it’s to hide what he’s rly saying bc he’s uncomfortable saying it, so e.g. when he means to say ‘i’m sorry, i was wrong’ he’ll tell you ‘looks like my hypothesis was disproven’ bc he clearly has trouble expressing anything other than anger and it’s also p much canon that he’s better at expressing himself in more impersonal ways, like writing. so everytime someone says Asher using big words is bungie trying to make him sound smart and failing im like yo, give them a break. stop trying to find sth negative abt everything in this game when a bunch of it is genuine characterization.

which is a weird way to end this rant since my whole point is their weird, biased writing. huh. oh well

[written-in-light-blog1]

“LET US SPEAK OF THE TERRIBLE BEAUTY OF BECOMING OURSELVES”

Illustrating Destiny’s Books of Sorrow with community artist Francine Bridge

One of the most impressive Destiny fan-projects we’ve seen to date has been Francine Bridge’s incredible illustrated rendering of Destiny’s Books of Sorrow. Francine, otherwise known as Witnesstheabsurd, agreed to take some time to answer a few of our questions about her work, its impetus, and what the project means to her.

Written by Seth Dickinson, the Books of Sorrow tell the story of the Hive - and by extension Oryx and his siblings - and give deep, rich background to one of the game’s largest and most important conflicts. Lyric and evocative, the books offer insight into both the Hive themselves and the universe they inhabit, and remain Destiny’s most impressive and most in-depth piece of lore-building. For those who may have joined the community in Destiny 2, or never had the chance to read the original books, they can be read in their entirety here. Francine’s project shows the same impressive attention to detail, and most importantly, the same level of empathy as the works that inspired it. We’re ecstatic to be able to share this conversation with the Destiny community, and we hope you’ll take the time to admire the full project.

You can find Francine on Artstation, as well as on Twitter and Tumblr.

Written in Light: To get things started, tell us a bit about yourself. What you're studying, what field you work in, what you like to do for fun - give us a brief summary of who you are and what's important to you!

Francine Bridge: HI! I'm Francine, although I'm better known online as Witnesstheabsurd. I work as a freelance illustrator and concept artist in the UK - you might have seen some of my work in the game Hiveswap or at labels like Killstar. I do album covers, shirt designs, character/monster etc design work for games, comics, private clients. I'm currently in my 4th and final (I took an extra sandwich year to do a supplemental diploma in professional studies) year of my Illustration and Visual Media BA degree in London, after which I'm probably going to look for more permanent studio/contract work rather than the one-off freelance stuff I've been pursuing while I've been in school.

A couple of years ago, prior to starting the degree, I came out as a trans woman, which is probably an important detail, and it's informed a lot of my  work. However, my driving impulse has always been monsters - my preoccupation with Destiny started entirely because a friend of mine showed me screencaps of Oryx after the The Taken King release and I was smitten. Pretty much all of the media I consume, the games I play, the art I create is in pursuit of ever greater or more unique creature and monster design, and they're very dear to my heart.

As far as what I do for fun  - my day is 90% working at the tablet, but I find time to play some games and build "gunpla" model kits as well as paw through my artbook collection. Almost everything I do is informed by my profession, so I use my hobbies as a means to access and process more referential or inspirational visual material or  techniques. I only recently started sincerely learning how to actually "paint," rather than just do some basic rendering under lineart, so that's been a major part of my work lately.

WiL: Was there anything in particular about Oryx that really drew you to him? Did Oryx come across as particularly great and/or unique to you, or is there something else that struck you with his character or design?

FB: Well, as I said, I'm transgender. In the ‘pitch’ my friend made to me about Oryx as a character,  the most interesting aspect to me was that he's a transgender man (although I'm a trans woman, the experience has some shared parallels obviously).

In media, it's incredibly difficult to find trans characters not wholly defined by that aspect of their identity, or who aren't constantly wallowing in the Misery and Tragedy of being trans. I want trans characters who occupy all roles - villain, hero, supporting and main - and it's rare to find anyone who's more than a token or like, tragedy porn. Oryx super resonated with me because he was this figure who acquired power and immediately transitioned, asserting his identity in a way that couldn't be defied - Oryx's story is very much one about self-definition and the value of existence under your own terms, which are very important concepts to me.

When I decided to start work on illustrating the Books I actually reached out to Seth Dickinson, the author Bungie contracted to write them (and the Cabal Booklet/odd flavour text, by the way) to get some specific questions answered and he was kind enough to respond and was very cooperative and supportive. Among the things I asked about I wanted to know  if Oryx was consciously written as transgender character or if it was just a coincidental "weird alien race" flourish. I was very happy to learn Seth had purposefully written Oryx that way, and that he was happy people took strength from it.

It's very novel to have, like, a "trans power fantasy"... a character who acquires absolute power over the self and instantly rewrites the contract between themselves and their body that so many of us spend our entire lives making adjustments to and renegotiating for some measure of peace. It was satisfying, refreshing.

Oryx is super cool to me on multiple visual levels obviously as well, being a mineral-encrusted deep space insect mummy warlord, but that element specifically sets him apart for me, and always will. It's cool to know that a trans character in Destiny can also be a hideous monster from beyond the stars.

WiL: Nice! I've wondered if Oryx was intentionally written to reflect a transgender person. I'm glad to hear a positive answer to that question, and I'm glad you found strength in it!

My next question is, why did you decide to take on this project? I mean, it's very clear that you love Oryx, so that factor is a given, but you mentioned in your original post that this was something you did for your degree. Care to elaborate on that?

FB: So, the structure of my illustration degree is such that while we’re given specific "briefs," such as topics or techniques, the final year gives us significantly more free rein. We're obligated to  complete three "projects" and author a thesis over the course of the final year, but the subject matter, material, everything about those projects is our call. The outcomes are judged based solely on technical and professional development rather than adherence to a specific brief.

This left the field wide open for me to kill two birds with one stone and bring in a project I had intended to do anyhow, but hadn't had the time or space for; something that I was sincerely passionate about rather than an edict handed down by a tutor. Illustrating the Books of Sorrow was something i'd wanted to do ever since I first read them back in The Taken King, and I jumped at  the chance. In addition, while i've produced and formatted artbooks before (My first published work, The Occult Supergiant Primer, can be found here ), I've been able to recoup the time invested away from client work in sales and funding. The Books are obviously material belonging to Bungie and I can't justify selling copies, digital or otherwise, of my illustrated version, so I had to find some other reason to make this investment of time and unpaid work worthwhile as well as enjoyable.

Being able to use the work produced to further my degree was the perfect "excuse.” That said, I've received so much attention from the Destiny community at large, including commissioned work from several new clients, that it would have easily been worth it regardless.

WiL: Your work definitely deserves the attention, you clearly have a strong sense of design! Would you be willing to tell us a little bit about the process you went through to make the Books of Sorrow? Do you have any early versions or storyboards that you'd like to share? Or did any of the illustrations go through any major changes from start to finish, and would you be willing/able to show us that process and talk a bit about why you made the changes you made?

FB: The greater part of the Books came together incredibly smoothly and naturally, with very little iteration required on specific pieces. The images had been stewing in my mind ever since I read the original verses a few years ago and they were more than ready to be rendered. What did require a lot of research, development and false starts were the designs for the sisters, Savathûn and Xivu Arath. Both of them have yet to appear ingame in any major capacity (although it's looking likely Savathûn is going to be a Year 2 DLC), so it was up to me to create designs for them that:

Satisfied the descriptions appended to them in the verses, as light as they were, and also matched the info Seth gave me

Satisfied my own personal expectations and interpretation

Conformed to the lore and the existing known morphology of the Hive in a way that would make them recognizable to a player with no prior familiarity with the Books

Balancing these principles lead to a lot of internal back and forth - Savathûn was easier because we had already seen her brood in D2 on Titan, so I knew to emphasize ornate crests, bonelike texture and a slightly less mineral, more biological look by comparison to Oryx's brood, the hive we exclusively encountered in D1. She was tough at first but ultimately fell into line with something satisfying for me, which actually drew a lot from the Xenomorph Queen in Aliens.

Xivu Arath was a little trickier because she had to be distinct from Oryx, who kind of already occupies the "big mineral/bone-encrusted bruiser" archetype visually, so I had to take her even further. I spent a lot of time wondering whether she would have any ornamentation like some of  the bigger Knights (Alak-Hul comes to mind), given that she represents the "ultimate" Knight morph, but I eventually eschewed all decoration in favour of something reflecting her nature in the narrative: blunt, implacable, spartan. She dispenses with the ritual and hierarchical trappings the other siblings indulge in - notably she decides that all battlefields are her Court, rather than entertaining a court herself, and she tends to default to just brutally bludgeoning whatever stands in her way rather than making an appeal to the Deep or engaging in trickery. I was very satisfied with how she turned out, and the piece featuring her is easily one of my favourites.

WiL: I was going to ask which piece is your favorite! Do you have a Top 3 that you're most proud of?

Is there anything about the Books that you wish were different, or is there something you wish you had the opportunity to draw for this project but couldn't justify including it?

FB: I have a strong tendency to favour whichever the last piece I completed was, because by default I'm always proudest of my most recent work and very rapidly lose favour with pieces even like, a week old. That said, I think overall the strongest piece for me personally would be Oryx slaying Akka, alongside the final Wormfood painting and the Savathun piece, although honorable mentions go to Xivu Arath and Quria, Blade Transform.

I can't say there's anything about the Books specifically I wish was different. The part of me that's purely consuming it as a narrative wishes that they had found Taox, that there had been some confrontation there. I feel like there's a very strong "childhood vengeance" element to the Taox subplot, like when you're put down by an adult for drawing in class and you fantasize about coming back to the school years later as a wildly successful artist and making them admit they were wrong to have stopped you. A key part of that fantasy is recognizing it as a remnant of childhood, this impulse born out of a narrower perspective and inflated self-worth, and realizing you can move past that shit (Although if/when I do become a wildly successful artist there might be a few teachers I'll look up).

Ultimately, I think the arc of the books and what the story is trying to say about distortion of intent and self makes Taox disappearing a much more emotionally resonant and interesting turn. It would be neat if Taox turned up somewhere in-game, and became the focal point of a new Hive offensive.  An entire species/culture with such a specific individual grudge is a fascinating concept.

With about a month and a half of time allotted for the project and 50 verses, there was a lot of stuff I had to cut despite how much it hurt - in a complete version I would have wanted a painting for every verse, but specifically I would have liked to draw Akka in full, the Dakaua War Angels, the Harmony/Gift Mast,  the Qugu; basically I would have given form to the many species and cultures Seth conjures up with a few phrases and a loose description but still manages to make incredibly evocative.

WiL: Do you think you'll ever return to the project and draw those images, either as standalone pieces or as an update to the PDF you've already made?

FB: An update to the .pdf itself is unlikely. I tend to consider projects released to be complete, and usually by the time I revisit a subject I'm not obligated to work on it will have been a few years at the very least. I tend to have developed my technique and approach enough that new pieces inserted retroactively would look somewhat disjointed in terms of quality and style. The chance of releasing standalone paintings - especially of points of specific interest for me like say, Akka in his entirety, the Dakaua war angels, the Qugu, etc. -  is significantly higher. Whether that happens sooner or later depends entirely on what my current workload looks like, and aside from the incredibly generous and supportive response to the project from the larger community the Books are very much a passion project and have to be weighed against, say, contract or school work going forwards.

WiL: That makes sense. What other projects do you have going on right now, if any?

FB: Just this morning I decided on the subject of my final degree project, which I'm also planning to run as my second artbook with an accompanying Kickstarter and print run - something I can actually sell as well as being material that excites me! It's entirely too early to disclose any specific details about it though.

Other than that, I continue to produce odd pieces of fanart in between a regular flow of client work both from private individuals and studios. I guess I can safely say I'll be doing more work on the second Homestuck game after contributing to the first, as well as doing some designs for a music video I was contracted for, and also finishing my thesis for the aforementioned degree.

The key thing, I think, is to keep moving - I get very anxious when I'm spinning my wheels between projects, and the temptation to linger on the threshold a while longer is incredibly strong, especially when there's always the fear your new work will fail to surpass what's come before. Reaching a personal peak like some of the paintings I did for the Books of Sorrow is a double-edged sword, and it can signify both a great accomplishment and a raising of the bar that can be daunting to follow. I'm confident that whatever you see from me next will manage it, though!

WiL: Believe me, after talking with you for a while, I'm confident your next project will meet your expectations. You are a very talented and very ambitious artist, and we can’t wait to see where your career takes you! It’s been a pleasure to talk to you, and we’re looking forward to your next Destiny passion project.

//

This interview has been edited for length and clarity

All images courtesy Francine Bridge

[thefirstknife]

I'll also add that the first time I read the lore where Drifter mentions that it "whispers," my brain immediately shot to "Darkness-related."

While Ahamkara bones do whisper, to me, whispers are far more closely linked to things that are related to Darkness. Especially after we've been to the Pyramid and interacted with multiple statues that quite literally constantly whisper. Not to mention the deep (hehe) link of whispers noted by pretty much everyone who interacted with Darkness, even back before the Collapse.

It is also what was largely responsible for the corruption and fall of Rezyl Azzir to the Darkness and more recently directly described as whispers from an artifact we discovered inside the lunar Pyramid that transmits messages that Eris decrypts.

It's also worth noting that both Osiris and Oryx had "Echoes" that functioned in pretty much identital way, which is why he refers to Oryx when describing the difference between echoes and reflections to Saint. The fact that he specifically says echoes are better used for the Sundial because of what it lies in its core definitely alludes to the powers of Darkness and Taken, rather than anything to do with the Ahamkara.

Osiris' main interests are the Vex and Darkness. People often forget, but he was one of the first people to talk about researching Darkness and trying to convince others to believe him that they'll return (one of the reasons for his exile). Vex and Darkness are also very closely linked; the entire plot with the Black Heart in D1 and Garden of Salvation raid in D2 is all about the connection between the two. And ofc, there's Quria, the prototype Taken Vex that actually holds some form of agency and leadership. Darkness and Taken have also been heavily interested in the Pyramidion, another one of Vex simulation spaces and hubs.

There's not much Ahamkara related business here, besides Riven, who was Taken because Oryx is petty. But so far Osiris has not really been in any way connected to the Ahamkara. I'm not sure if he even participated in the Great Ahamkara Hunt.

i Am thinking about the implication that osiris had a taken heart as the core of the sundial