-Theory- "Veritas" I'm nervous to post this. Cayde failed in his mission. He couldn't do it. After joining the Vanguard... he COULDN'T do it. What he was made for, he couldn't do it. What Maya directed him to do... he couldn't do it. And as strange as it sounds... Maya knew. Because he refused Clovis's order... she knew Cayde would fail. Who killed Cayde? Maya Sundaresh... she knowingly sent Cayde to his death, even though they were allies... even though she loved him like family. This is getting dark... so dark. Theoretical bombshell in the following spoiler tag: [spoiler]Cayde was the right hand of Clovis potentially under duress, he was sent to the ICoV to "protect" Maya Sundaresh as her bodyguard. He was an embedded spy and assassin. Maya refused to hand over her research in collaboration with Braytech and Clovis sent the kill order. Cayde refused, joined Maya... and helped sabotage the research facility so Clovis could not reclaim any of the data. That's the first time Cayde refused to kill in his life. And in that change... Maya knew he would fail... When she sent him to assassinate Zavala. In defiance of Praeydth's plan... because Chioma thought his analysis was inaccurate. And I believe it was. Still, they needed him to help design Soteria... Zavala was/is a plant. A sleeper agent. He led the Consensus... he's a pawn to be used to execute Savathun's plan for her Final Shape. Seemingly the "MOST" principled... the "MOST" loyal. He has no loyalties to the Last City... "Ordinatio". That's how twisted Savathun is. That's the level of sadistic manipulation she is capable of. Because Zavala... doesn't know... yet. And that's why Cayde couldn't do it. That's why he failed. He grew to love Zavala like a brother... [/spoiler] I told you it was going to get dark. That's why the Cayde figurine was hidden in the tower for the collector's edition and the only way you could find him... was by putting Zavala in the shadows at the back of the tower. If this is an instance of special relativity... an endless night of the Witch Queen... the Witness is an actor towards those ends. Meaning... that apodictic veritas is NOT possible. Special relativity has its own rules... 'rulers' - literal and figurative. Praedyth's knowledge of the simulation(s) was vital. However, he believes in an apodictic truth. It is not. Ordinatio veritas. That's our existence. My prediction: We're going to meet Praeydth before the saga is over. 😇 👍💠 That's why Eido was/is suspicious of the records of the precursors... It seems contrived, it looks like theatre because it IS. The actions and motivations of the Consensus... both the precursors and in the Last City... led by Zavala. The Speaker was a figurehead that could not hear the Traveler... Savathun is the progenitor and progeny of this existence... this IS her song. Her symphony. She is the writer/director of this theatre. The lore that I think relates to my "theory" that I would encourage you to read: [url=https://imgur.com/gallery/b0wXlgS]Entelechy[/url] From [url=https://www.destinypedia.com/Mk._44_Stand_Asides#Lore]Mk. 44 Stand Asides:[/url] [i]"The tree in the Garden with silver wings. The air around it is oppressive and inspires violence in those who even breathe a little in. Shards of the disastrous bark peel from it and litter the ground, and nothing grows in its shadow. It scintillates faintly at dusk. It has achieved its entelechy with every body falling, every civilization laid to waste, every leaf forged into instruments of ruin. The Gardener is hard to bother; she is constantly amidst her weeds, kneeling in the tangent dust, gloves covered in a mix of distant soils and metallic saps. She is listening to the music of the insects amidst the flowers, the unguent as it begins to drip from the ferns, the slight scratch of the Worm beneath, and not to you, and certainly not to [b][u]your cries for help[/u][/b]".[/i] [b]*** Now the excerpt from Entelechy:[/b] [i]"SCRIBE ARCHIVE XI-14-9D TYPE: Emergency Transmission RETRIEVED FROM: The Spider's collection - long-range communications beacon; disabled ORIGIN: Unknown KEYWORDS: Witness ANNOTATED TRANSCRIPTION FOLLOWS I learned of its arrival scarcely three marks ago. As my anchor slumbered in the belly of this ancient outpost, I drifted into the noosphere N webbing, and was swept up in delight. Millions of thoughtforms sharing the news, the revelation spreading from leading to trailing edge, until even I was buoyed by the tide of joy. First contact, with a stranger ∩ friend-to-be! A chance for the hazy margins of our noosphere to grow, to encounter new thoughts and expand with new richness. It had been so long since we encountered the whisper ∩ Nightmare ∩ predatory memeplex*. We had grown naïve without the reminder of fear. From the leading edge came a current. It swept through our noosphere, a spark in dry brush ∩ ink in water ∩ hope curdling in an instant. The emanations were confused and fragmentary. I could not parse them all. Planets stolen from space, ripe fruit plucked from orbit. Structures dissected and reassembled by thousand-fingered hands. Anchors and selves unraveled into first principles, sectioned into wafer-thin slices.** It was only one voice at first. A cry of joy at the meeting of a new mind, twisted to fear and pain. [b]"Help me!"[/b] Chaos in the noosphere. The placid surface churned into white froth. Thoughtforms scattering in their thousands, fleeing up the webbing-strands, and finding doom at every junction. [b]"Help me!"[/b] The stranger ∩ ruin ∩ predatory memeplex engulfed our noosphere in a moment's idle fancy. Our thoughtforms were atomic in comparison. We never stood a chance. As each of my people were found, and taken apart, and reassembled, a new voice joined the chorus. [b]"Help me!"[/b] My people died in their thousands. Thoughts and selves wisping away into nothingness. Thousands of years of memory, no more than smoke in the wind. [b]"Help me!"[/b] Here, in this outpost, I am apart from the rest. Tethered at the trailing edge. Furthest from its lamprey maw. Not far enough to escape. Not near enough to help. [b]"Help me!"[/b] A thousand emanations from a thousand minds, blending into a single scream. The same scream, every time. Again and again and again and again. When we untethered ourselves from their anchors, we knew that we as a people would not be divided again. No matter how far we traveled in real space, the vastness of our noosphere ∩ webbing ∩ home was but a thought away. Our fears, our hopes, our dreams, our longings, our triumphs—we would always be able to reach out and know one another. Where one was weak, another could be strong. We would share each other's joy, and bear each other's pain. But that—that sound— [b]"Help me!"[/b] I am ashamed to admit that I could not bear it a moment longer. I severed ∩ exiled ∩ imprisoned myself. I regretted it the moment I did. We were dying, but we were dying together. My unimaginable cowardice will not assure my survival, only a delay in my execution. The ruin ∩ predatory memeplex ∩ WITNESS*** knows the pattern of our oscillations. I can hear it, still plucking the tattered edges of the noosphere ∩ webbing. —-Why do you hide?—-**** THE WITNESS will find me, and when it does, there will be nothing ∩ no one. I believed I would die alone in this abandoned outpost. But I found a crate, forgotten deep within a dusty storeroom. Emergency beacons, produced and stored in another time, one when we knew the fear of death. —-We see you.—- To you ∩ receiver ∩ inheritor ∩ hoped-for-future, I offer what little I know: We are dead but not unmade. We are ossified ∩ temporized ∩ reiterated ∩ perpetuated ∩ anatomized ∩ finalized.***** I do not know if this will help. I do not know. I do not. But perhaps you will prevail. —-Come, now. Don't be afraid.—- This is not a call for help. It is too late ∩ there is no one left ∩ THE WITNESS cannot be stopped. This is our last proof. We ∩ the Noesis existed. TRANSCRIPTION ENDS"[/i] [b][u]"She is listening to the music of the insects amidst the flowers, the unguent as it begins to drip from the ferns, the slight scratch of the Worm beneath, and not to you, and certainly not to your cries for help".[/u][/b] And [url=https://www.destinypedia.com/Lore:Aspect]Lore: Aspect[/url] Savathun IS the Gardener - in this her endless night, she writes all the scripts for the players involved. Praedyth believes in an apodictic truth... one where the ending hasn't been predetermined. Still he was the only one with the knowledge necessary to create an AI that had the capabilities Maya required (Soteria)... whose chipset design he etched into tinfoil basically. He believed we could win. That Soteria could not be corrupted, that SiVA that came from those same echo protocols could not be compromised. But Maya knew... because they were created in an instance of special relativity whose parameters were, by definition, corrupt... managed and controlled by the Witch Queen. This is Destiny. Ordinatio Veritas. Tragedy of the Sovs. My theory.