We all know the narrative in Destiny's campaign is a little on the light side, and not really very fulfilling. There's clearly a lot more going on, Bungie has had a long history of hiding exposition and background for their games in spots throughout their games (terminals in Halo, etc.). I personally, find it quite fun to read into these little tidbits of information and try to deduce what's truly going on, and what's happened. So, before I begin, spoiler warning, for those who haven't finished the campaign etc.

[Destiny spoiler warning]

First and foremost, I think that the story of Destiny is about time. More specifically time travel, and extra dimensional creatures that exist outside of time. The first big clue to that seems to be the name of the game: Destiny. The word, means the "hidden power believed to control what will happen in the future; fate." I think that the name of the game is referring to a couple of things: firstly, to a time travelers point of view, the events played out by the Guardian(s) in the game's narrative are fated, or must happen in a certain way to allow for certain future events, to avoid some catastrophe (I will revisit this). Second thing I think the title is referring to, is the Traveler, a being that transcends time, and is manipulating humanity's fate, leading us to a destination in the future that it has chosen.

"It doesn't matter who you were, only what you will become." -The Exo Stranger

To that end, the Vex, and the Exo Stranger, play an important role in my time travel theory. We already know the Vex travel through time, and exist "outside of time" in some sense. Early on, the Vex were described as time traveling robots. Check out this quote from Zydron's grimoire card:

"Warlock scholars believe that Gate Lords regulate traffic between Vex gates, and that their minds contain codes that might open the way into forbidden realms. An enormous amount of hope and anger has been spent on a particular debate - could we find a Vex gate that opens onto a place and time before the Collapse, and somehow forestall it"

I suspect that the Exo Stranger is a time traveler, and that she's observing and manipulating the past to serve her interest in the future. It's interesting that she isn't a Guardian, and it suggests, to me, that in the future the Guardians (and Ghosts, which she seems to be disdainful of) have all but disappeared and or become obsolete, or otherwise somehow compromised [I suspect it's the later]. Her vanishing at will, and her presence during key, important, story moments, seems to suggest some knowledge of future events. One of my favourite quotes from the Exo Stranger, to me, implies her time traveling nature:

"I don't even have time to explain why I don't have time to explain."

I speculate that, being short on time isn't the issue that she's referring to, but rather, the nature of time travel itself doesn't permit her the ability to explain her advanced understanding of time, and time travel, to you, a Luddite, in her eyes. The question is: what is she trying to stop, or what events is she hoping to manipulate in her favour? We know she doesn't much care for the Vex, and whatever that thing in the Black Garden is/was, but she suggests that the 'victory in the Black Garden' (I'm paraphrasing here) is a small step in the right direction. So what is her end game, and why isn't she a Guardian? I think the answers lie in what the nature of the Traveler and The Darkness truly are.

So what is the Darkness? According to Rasputin it is a "hostile, acausal entity", that it is to say, it's not governed by the laws of cause and effect, for example: if you throw a stone into a pond, it creates ripples in the water. This is a "cause and effect" relationship, the stone being thrown into the water is the cause, and the ripples are the effect. If The Darkness wanted to make ripples in the water, it could simply will it so, no need for the stone. This would suggest The Darkness has almost "Godlike power". When the game talks about The Darkness "causing the collapse", but with no explanation of how it did so, we needn't look for a cause, the Collapse is simply the effect it desired for which no cause is necessary, or for which the cause may come later.

"If, as they say, the coming events cast their shadows ahead of time, then the past events cannot but leave their reflections behind them." -Translation of one of Rasputin's transmissions

How can The Darkness escape some of the most fundamental laws of space and time? I theorize that it exists outside of time, that it is an extra-dimensional being from a place where time is non-linear, and as such it can appear in our space-time when and where it desires, thus it can act in an acausal manner.

This is where I go from the wild theories, to the insane conspiracy theories. I'm going to incorporate a little of the "We Are The Darkness" theory here, which hinges a lot on a player overhearing a Fallen Dreg refer to the player as "The Darkness!" Now, I'm not verifying this fact, as to the best of my knowledge, no one has video of the Fallen actually saying the quote in question, but it does fit in nicely with my theory, which is: there is more than one "Darkness", they are a number of, discreet, extra dimensional beings, of which the Traveler is one. That's right, there's more than one Darkness, and The Traveler is "a Darkness". I suspect, at the heart of the giant sphere that we call The Traveler, is one of those throbbing, weird looking, things, like the Heart of the Black Garden.

These, godlike, extra-dimensional beings, are at war, and have reached a stale-mate of some kind in their own dimension, and so, are co-opting races in our galaxy to wage war with one another. This is why the Vex, Cabal, Fallen, The Hive, and The Guardians, are all at war with one another. Each race is working as agents of an extra-dimensional being, and the war has just happened to migrate to our solar system. Part of the power of the beings is to cloud the minds of their soldiers, to use their godlike power to inspire worship, and instill in them, a godlike reverence and dependence on them. This is why the Vex worshiped the Heart, and the Black Garden itself, and this is what the Traveler is doing to humanity. It may mean nothing, but I think the Queen's Emisary gives us a hint to this fact:

"'They have no idea what surrounds them..." and "It's hard to see, this close to the light."

She could be referring to the hostile forces closing in around us, and being so close to the sun, but what I think she's really referring to is the distorting effect of the Traveler (for whom "The Light" seems to be a popular nick name), manipulating the minds of the people of The City and The Tower. To this end, I think this is why the Awoken are named as such. The Queen of the Reef, and her pals, clearly know more about the goings on of the solar system, and the forces in it, than The Guardians do. What really happened to the people trying to flee the solar system that made them the Awoken? I think they got far enough away from The Traveler that they realized it's manipulative powers, perhaps during some catastrophe. How they got funky hair and skin, I don't know, but I think they know the truth about The Darkness and The Traveler, and Awoken that have returned to Earth are subject to The Travelers influence, which is why they don't trust Earth-born Awoken.

That's it for now. By no means do I think this theory is flawless, I'm sure it's full of holes, and I don't know if we'll ever get all the answers to what The Darkness or The Traveler are, but I find it fun to speculate. I have some more "evidence", and I may add more to this blog, or a subsequent blog, especially if expansions reveal more story elements.

That is interesting theory you have here but have you check out the cards about the Darkness yet ?

I've seen a few of them, not all. The one on the various theories of what The Darkness is, and the one about The Black Garden, are interesting, and vague. These two quotes come to mind:

"Certain positions - often labeled heretical - imply that the Traveler itself triggered the Collapse, or that it knew the Darkness was coming for it and hoped to use the Solar System as a sacrifice or a proxy army. The Binary Star cult is one notable example" -The Darkness Grimoire card

and

"The Garden grows in both directions. It grows into tomorrow and yesterday. The red flowers bloom forever....The Traveler is life, I said. You are a creature of Darkness. You seek to deceive me. But I looked behind me, down the long slope where the blossoms tumbled in the warm wind and the great trees wept sap like blood or wine, and I felt doubt." The Black Garden Grimoire card

I haven't unlocked anything more than that, so I don't know if anything directly contradicts my theories or not, at this point.

Cool stuff. Keep bringing on the crazy theories. I'm into it.

So is part of your theory that each of these races has their own "light" or god that they follow? That they are all equally dark/evil/light/good. They're just a bunch of hopped up super beings who are just too powerful to ignore each other and thus cannot coexist.

I'm uncertain on the nature of the conflict between the "Darknesses", but there has been some speculation by the characters in Destiny itself:

"Everything is becoming more ruthless and in the end only the most ruthless will remain (LOOK UP AT THE SKY) and they will hunt the territories of the night and extinguish the first glint of competition before it can even understand what it faces or why it has transgressed. This is the shape of victory: to rule the universe so absolutely that nothing will ever exist except by your consent. This is the queen at the end of time, whose sovereignty is eternal because no other sovereign can defeat it. And there is no reason for it, no more than there was reason for the victory of the atom. It is simply the winning play." - Toland the Shattered, Ghost Fragment: Darkness 3 Grimoire card


It's one of those things that's so fundamental, so atomic, the answer will likely never come.