Let me start off by saying I love your post. I love all posts like this, because they get the wheels turning and tap into our inquisitive/creative side (I'd like to think that I play a Warlock because I share that same hunger for knowledge). I think you're on the right track. I was about to rebut your theory, but, after thinking about it for a bit, I realized it fits in with my own quite well. For simplicity's sake, I will state all points of my theory as fact, just to cancel out any tired, repetitive statements like "I think/in my theory." I've posted this and things of this nature multiple times, but it keeps disappearing. Please secure your tinfoil hats for the following statement: Maybe I'm onto something and my posts keep getting removed because they don't want people catching on. Here it is: [quote][b]The Darkness[/b], or its origin, is something much more simple than what most players are speculating. It is said that the Darkness is pursuing the Traveler across the galaxy, and we all assume that it is some big evil race/being/entity driving destructive forces towards the Traveler. On the other side, some have posted threads to the tune of "Are we/the Traveler the bad guys/Darkness?" These two concepts are [b]not[/b] mutually exclusive. Here it is: The Darkness is in the Fallen/Hive/Cabal as much as it is in us (humanity). We are the Darkness, and so are they. The Traveler has created the Darkness, but not intentionally. The Traveler possesses great power that it has bestowed on us. But we were not the first. We were the most recent hosts for its power, and, if we succeed in protecting it, may not be the last. The Traveler journeys through the galaxy searching for a race that is worthy of its vast gifts. We have proven unworthy, like those races before us. We received these gifts eagerly and with open arms. We ate them up, and drove our civilization to new heights. When we reached this greatness, we thought ourselves gods, and sought to crack open the Traveler in search of more. [quote]ENEMIES//The Darkness: "The Speaker tells of a cosmic force that swept over us and caused the Collapse.[/quote] (Read as: overcome. i.e. overcome with grief/joy/fear) [quote]Legend calls it the Darkness, the Traveler's ancient enemy, which hunted it across space."[/quote] As stated before, this has happened before. The Traveler visited the Fallen, Hive, and Cabal, gave them wondrous gifts, and was thanked only by being assaulted in a greedy search for more power. Time to de-conflict some things. [quote]ENEMIES//The Darkness: "Only the Traveler saved us, and at a shattering cost."[/quote] The above entry - at a glance - may confuse those who have read the new Rasputin card: [quote]RASPUTIN//GHOST FRAGMENT: RASPUTIN 3 "V120NNI800CLS000 CLEAR MORNING OUTCRY AI-COM/RSPN: ASSETS//FORCECON//IMPERATIVE IMMEDIATE ACTION ORDER This is an ALL ASSETS IMPERATIVE (unsecured/OUTCRY) CAUTERIZE. DISPERSE. ESTIVATE. Total strategic collapse imminent. FENRIR HEART reports complete operational mortality. SURTR DROWN in progress but negative effect. Forecasts unanimously predict terminal VOLUSPA failure. As of CLS000 a HARD CIVILIZATION KILL EVENT is in progress across the operational area. I am declaring YUGA SUNDOWN effective on receipt (epoch reach/FORCECON variant). Cancel counterforce objectives. Cancel population protection objectives. Format moral structures for MIDNIGHT EXIGENT. Execute long hold for reactivation. AI-COM/RSPN SIGNOFF STOP STOP STOP V120NNI800CLS001"[/quote] This card implies that when Rasputin saw the Darkness coming, he sacrificed a significant portion of the human race in order to keep a small amount alive. Keep in mind that Rasputin was built in the Golden Age, from technology given to us by the Traveler. It is likely that Rasputin communed with the Traveler at that point in time, or that Rasputin is a sliver of the Traveler itself. Therefore, by extension, the Traveler [i]did[/i] in fact stop the Darkness. Anyways, upon clearing that up, we can approach the meanings of these two cards. Why would Rasputin need to sacrifice billions of people in order to stay alive? I've seen a great theory by one of my favorite lore authors (Tut813275) that Rasputin needed the light resident in all of us to power his final attack on the Darkness. That theory was predicated on the assumption that the Darkness and Light are physical/metaphysical things. (We do not know what we were using to assault the Traveler, but we do know that we had great technology, space travel, and numerous settlements on other planets. That said, whatever was rapidly approaching the Traveler from outside Earth's atmosphere was human in origin.) Now, consider the Darkness is a now-insatiable greed, inherent to the human race. How would you stop that? Rasputin, in defense of the human race - and the Traveler - all but threw us into extinction. It was a great bloodletting in order to cleanse us and make us forget. Why do you think that Guardians, upon resurrection, have no recollection of their past lives? Flash to present. Here we are, resurrected with no memory, told our race is facing elimination. We defend our home from all the Traveler's previous beneficiaries, who are only out to scour its shell in search of any lingering drop of power. The tie-in: All these races were once human, originating at the point in history we are at now - evolving differently along separate timelines, and brought back by the Vex (the Traveler's own master race, created by it in a last ditch effort to find the worthy ones) into a continuous loop in time. Well, that's it. Let me know what you think of my theory. Feel free to poke holes in it, I'm completely open to criticism. The only way we better ourselves is to challenge each other's intellect, so have at it.[/quote]