Recap / Destiny 2 Season Of The Wish

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With the discovery the power of an Ahamkara can give them access to the portal, the Coalition turns to the last entity they ever thought they would have to deal with again: Riven of a Thousand Voices. Though slain, the body of an Ahamkara is still potent with wish magic, and with Riven's heart, Mara Sov is able to revive Riven as a spirit. Riven is in no mood to be helpful, but established a bargain conditioned on the retrieval of a clutch of Ahamkara eggs that were hidden from all parties. The curse of the Dreaming City remains a source of strife, while the Sol Divisive Vex have infiltrated the Queenswalk on behalf of defending The Witness.

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Season of the Wish contains examples of:

• Achilles' Heel: It turns out the one thing that can reliably kill an Ahamkara is... selflessness. Riven's mate Taranis made a wish for themselves in order to save their clutch, and resulted in him perishing in his lair in the Black Garden.
• Aerith and Bob: Warlord Naeem, the Only Friend of Hefnd. When Crow first reads it, he stumbles over it momentarily, clearly baffled that it's pronounced the same as the word "name".
• Ascended Meme: The 15th Wish was a MAJOR game legend during the Forsaken era, and players had to be told by Bungie that it wasn't a thing.^note Wish 15 existed in the API, with the evocative description "This one you shall cherish," but had no associated data in game and apparently existed solely to drive dataminers and ARG fans insane trying to find it. Here the 15th Wish is the key to following The Witness and about the most vital Chekhov's Gun you could imagine. Whether that was the original intention or adopted over the five-year gap is unknown.
• Automatic Crossbows: The exotic sidearm Buried Bloodline, a special ammo Sidearm that looks like a handheld crossbow. It fires two Void arrows per trigger pull that leech health from enemies they hit, and grants the Devour buff on multikills. When its catalyst is installed, any hits while Devour is up also applies Weaken to targets, making it very good at providing health for the user and softening enemies up for heavy fire.
• Back from the Dead: Of a sort. Riven is manifested as an apparition with Mara Sov's magic and is not entirely resurrected.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: While Ahamkara prey on this trope in general, Hefnd specifically has the misfortune of being on the receiving end of it when he tries to grant Naeem's wish to curse the House of Kings, since he desired the same thing as her. He winds up spending centuries as a frozen skeleton without outside contact since nothing he could think of satisfied him, degrading his mental state, and once he finds an out in the form of the Taken and Scorn, he nearly turns Naeem's castle into the site of a four-way conflict between his own forces, the Broken Knights, the Witness, and the Vanguard that could have by all accounts doomed humanity.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • The arsenal from Season of the Undying returns with refreshed perk pools and a new Origin Trait.
  • Fikrul, having gone MIA after being driven from the Tangled Shore, turns out to still be active, focused on expanding his Scorn away from the Witness' influence.
  • The Concordat, who have not been mentioned since their Comically Small Bribe to the player in Rise of Iron and its leader Lysander's possible connections to the Insurmountable Skullfort, return as the manufacturer of the new Skimmer vehicle type.
• Call-Back:
  • The Veil's connection to the Traveler, first mentioned in a Veil Containment transmission, is finally brought up in the event storyline, as Osiris is trying to harness it to recreate the portal into the Traveler.
  • When the Sol Divisive Vex managed to get ahead of the Guardian and capture an Ahamkara egg, they are able to track their departure to a location in the Black Garden. Crow mentions they have a way to follow, mentioning the head of a Gate Lord before revealing it to be a joke. This is in reference to the vanilla Destiny 1 where Uldren, Crow's past life, instructed the player character to retrieve a Gate Lord's head in order to travel to the Black Garden.
• Central Theme:
  • The Needs of the Many. With imminent disaster on the horizon and little options left, a Heroic Sacrifice seems like the only way to ensure at least something goes right. Taranis grants his own wish to scatter his eggs, dying in the process; Riven grants her end of the bargain even though this will use up the last of her power; Crow chooses to go into the Pale Heart to establish a connection outside, even though that means he will be on his own for a long time.
  • The Power of Trust. Neither Riven nor Mara and company have any reason to trust each other, but decide to do so anyway, if only to ensure they avoid annihilation. In the end, Riven grants the wish as requested, and though there's a risk of her whims potentially causing trouble later in life, they are still given grace to let them choose their own path.
  • The gift of grace. Despite the huge risk of letting the Ahamkara return via Riven and Taranis' clutch, Mara and company decide against destroying the eggs, reasoning that just because they can grow into deceptive genies doesn't mean they will. The whims are given a chance to forge their own way, so they can avoid their parents' fate.
    • This one in particular ties to the overall theme of the Traveler granting the Light to anyone, even those one would find to be totally monstrous (like the Hive). The Traveler graces any and all dead presented to it, letting them have another chance at life, but without coercing them to do anything, letting them make the choice to be either heroic or monstrous.
• Cutting the Knot: A metaphysics version. Using Riven to grant a wish and allow safe passage into the Traveler portal is viewed as brute forcing the problem and uses the extremes of an Ahamkara's power, even then only allowing one to enter. Osiris speculates that it would take an impossibly long time to enter the portal through traditional study of the Veil and replicating what the Witness did, but being able to slip someone through this way might accelerate the process and allow them to open the door from the inside.
• A Day in the Limelight: Riven was always a very mysterious figure and Ahamkara in general have very unpredictable and undefined powers. With Riven actually communicating with us in (mostly) plain language we're given a more insight to Ahamkara and their underlying nature.
• Deal with the Devil: Riven is able to grant a wish that will allow safe passage into the Traveler, but she won't do it for free. She requires that all her uncorrupted eggs be found and brought to safety before she agrees to use her powers. Given how Ahamkara were hunted to extinction because of their Jackass Genie powers, it's an incredibly one-sided bargain that the Coalition takes because there's no other option.
• Empowered Badass Normal: After being Brought Down to Normal with the death of Sagira, Osiris reveals this season that he has come to understand and use strand on a similar level to the empowered Guardians.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Riven's only request is for the Vanguard to retrieve eggs from her clutch that were spread across the ascendant plane. Still technically dead, the parental instinct remains the only thing of importance to her. It's later revealed that her eggs were scattered due to a wish from Taranis, her mate who perished in the act. A dedicated cutscene shows their relationship and the weight of the events that transpired is palpable in their voices.
• Everyone Has Standards: While Mara accepts her responsibility in aiding the Great Ahamkara Hunt and does not regret her actions in it, she admits her disapproval of the Hunt occurring in the first place, saying that the Vanguard had no right to exterminate an entire species, no matter how “good” their intentions were.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Well, though she’s more Blue-and-Orange Morality rather than outright “Evil”, Riven fits here.
  • It’s a bit of a Justified case in that, being an Ahamkara, a species noted as being intrinsically selfish and self-serving, it makes sense that Riven would be stymied by altruistic actions and desires. However, she does show that she’s intrigued by altruism. Her mate, Taranis, is the most prevalent example. Taranis, unlike the rest of their kind, was a Benevolent Genie who fulfilled wishes as they were asked of him, no strings attached. Later, after his mate Riven is Taken, he sacrifices himself to scatter their eggs across the Ley Lines. While Riven didn’t understand his kindness, she admits that it was what attracted her to him and helped fuel her love for him.
  • Similarly, Riven is confused by the Sov siblings’ Character Development. Mara, once a stoic and cunning Chessmaster who kept to herself, was now becoming open with her emotions and placing her trust in others. Crow, formerly Uldren, a man who always pushed as far as he could for his sister’s approval, was now willing to sacrifice himself for his new friends. Riven, for all her life, had been at peace with her nature as an Ahamkara, which provided for her needs and kept her alive, so it makes sense that she’d be confused by the Sov siblings growing beyond their original selves for “the greater good”. Riven admits that their newfound altruism is a trait she wouldn’t subscribe to, believing that it makes one vulnerable. That said, she gives a few words on how altruism can be an advantage for “Good” over “Evil”. Namely that, someone who puts others over self-preservation can’t be predicted, and if they can’t be predicted, how can they be countered?
• Evil Is Deathly Cold: A downplayed example. During the encounter with the Locus of Wailing Grief, periodic ice storms kick up, slowly freezing the fireteam unless they reach torches to stay warm. This is no ordinary ice storm, though, as they're really manifestations of Stasis, brought to life by Hefnd's Taken-corrupted bones causing unnatural snow and ice formations to appear on the mountain.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: Hefnd tried to use the Scorn's Dark Ether as a tool of justice, dooming the House of Kings to an Ironic Hell under his rule as punishment for killing his master and terrorizing the innocent villagers surrounding their castle. Unfortunately, Petra makes it abundantly clear that the tug-of-war between Fikrul and the Witness could have made his schemes spiral into something much worse if he wasn't trying to get himself killed on purpose.
• Godzilla Threshold:
  • Taken up to and past eleven - while working with Immaru was already taking an enormous risk, seeking the aid of an Ahamkara goes beyond even that, as it is physically impossible to not have a wish granted in an Ahamkara's presence, and said creature is a Jackass Genie who will warp the intention of a wish to make the wish stronger. But with a second collapse literally teetering over their heads, the Vanguard can't afford to be picky.
  • Hefnd was so desperate to give the House of Kings a fitting punishment for Naeem's murder and their other crimes against humanity per the terms of her dying wish that he spent centuries searching for one that satisfied his rage. He eventually resorted to absorbing a Taken blight and creating Dark Ether, which allowed him to terminate Naeem's contract at the cost of the Young Wolf sealing him forever — though this is what he had wanted the whole time.
• Good All Along: Hefnd initially presents himself as a haughty, taunting Ahamkara goading you to destroy him. Later repeat runs reveal that this is actually a Suicide by Cop situation, as he's a genuinely compassionate and friendly wish dragon who became consumed by grief ever since he lost his one true companion. This has led to him begging to be laid to rest, wanting to be reunited with his friend.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Week 4 reveals that Oryx, though long dead, is responsible for the season's conflict - his taking of Riven was sensed by her mate, Taranis, who granted his own wish to scatter Riven's eggs across the Ley Lines. Due to how the Ahamkaras' Reality Warper powers work, this ended up killing him.
• Hand Cannon: An interesting example with the Indebted Kindness sidearm found in Warlord's Ruin. It uniquely uses Special ammo and is the only sidearm in the game with the Rocket-Assisted Frame, making it a handheld micro rocket launcher. The rockets hit fairly hard, and are especially devastating against bunched up minor enemies or mid-tier targets.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: Riven admits that, with her mate Taranis, she saw a potential freedom from a life of twisting wishes for power. Then the Great Ahamkara Hunt happened and Riven was imprisoned by Mara, forever separating her from her beloved. Seeking vengeance, Riven agreed to let Oryx Take her, resulting in the “Forsaken” storyline and Riven’s eventual death. She outright admits to this at the end of the Season, saying that, if she had been trusted not to turn on the Awoken and allowed to be with Taranis, she could’ve maybe helped humanity, and maybe even found genuine friendship with the Guardians.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Taranis, Riven's beloved mate, gave his own life to save their brood, granting a wish for himself to scatter Riven's eggs across the Ley Lines, taking his own life in the process.
• Hidden Depths:
  • As it turns out, while Ahamkara are extremely dangerous due to their capacity to grant any wish they sense, even unspoken ones, there was never any indication they did this by choice. In this season, Riven, at least, reveals that it is possible for an Ahamkara to ignore a wish being requested if they're not interested.
  • Hefnd's lore reveals the Ahamkara also have the capacity to feel compassion and love, as it's all but stated that he really was friends with the Warlord that made wishes with him. While he was only following the orders of Naeem's first wish, he later finds that he did have a platonic love for her after all.
  • Riven's mate, Taranis, also displays the ability to feel love for another, alongside another interesting tidbit - instead of happily twisting a wish to hurt the wisher and feed on the deception, he instead granted all requests with no drawbacks whatsoever. Being one of the few Ahamkara who wasn't a Jackass Genie got Riven's attention, and even in death, he still has a great degree of affection for his mate.
  • Ahamkara are beings capable of granting any wishes and altering reality. So, why can't they use this power to grant their own wishes? The answer is that they'll die as a result. Taranis, Riven's mate, granted a wish for himself - to scatter and conceal Riven's eggs in the first place. As a result, Taranis took his own life.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Mara takes this stance in regards to her actions in the Great Ahamkara Hunt, including imprisoning Riven to use her as a weapon, and all the consequences that happened as a result of that. While Mara fully accepts responsibility for her actions and doesn’t try to defend herself, she admits that she does not regret what she had done.
• Jackass Genie: The Ahamkara were hunted to extinction because their Wish magic was intensely powerful but ALWAYS misinterpreted. It's actually part of the lore that the more Ahamkara can warp the intentions of the wish, the more powerful it becomes, and the Wish Wall was a method of affirming exactly one interpretation of a wish. This makes the prospect of bringing the Ahamkara back very unsettling due to the possibility that none of them will be restrained by measures like the Wish Wall to minimize the damage they cause with their wishes.
  • As the season goes on, this aspect of the Ahamkara is examined and revealed to be a more deliberate personality quirk than an actual species-wide trait. Ahamkara can indeed grant a wish as requested without harming the wisher, as evidenced by Taranis. Ahamkara can also display affection for another, instead of simply screwing with them, as seen with Hefnd.
• Kill It with Fire: The centerpiece exotic weapon, Dragon's Breath, is a rocket launcher with projectiles that don't overtly explode on impact but stick to the enemy or scenery while spewing out fire. The fire causes scorch and eventual ignitions, making the weapon quite deadly with damage over time as well as a feature where it reloads automatically when dealing scorch to enemies so it syncs well with a solar class (also making it more useful with weapon and ability swapping tactics like with Anarchy and Witherhoard than just firing the rockets and manually reloading).
• Last of His Kind: Riven's clutch are the only uncorrupted Ahamkara eggs remaining in the system, hidden away for ages until now.
• The Lost Lenore: Following Hefnd's Good All Along reveal on a repeat run of Warlord's Ruin, it turns out he had a friend in a Warlord named Naeem who died fighting against House of Kings after they stormed the castle where Hefnd's bones were entombed in, and it's left a pretty big hole in his heart as part of the reason he wishes he could just disappear with her. Upon completion of the dungeon's Collection Sidequest, Hefnd finally has his own wish come true, and he passes on to the afterlife to see Naeem again.
• Mama Bear: When the Vex prevent the Coalition from getting the recently detected egg in Week 4, Riven goes ballistic, snarling and roaring in sheer rage. It's a stark contrast to her previously affable demeanor.
• Mission-Pack Sequel: Due to the Schedule Slip of The Final Shape, the time period where the full expansion would have been dropped was replaced with a couple of other events to fill the gap. The first was the "Guardian Games" event was moved up a couple of months. The second was a specialty event called "Into the Light" which features a light story progression with a gametype where you defend the Last City from a Black Fleet invasion trying to keep everyone from following the Witness. This serves as basically a replacement content drop similar to the "30th Anniversary Pack" but is free-to-play, thus is not as elaborate but does feature a number of returning weapons that were sunset, overshadowed by Power Creep, locked behind endgame questlines or all of the above.
• My Death Is Just the Beginning: Ahamkara are Reality Warper entities by their very nature and their Wish magic always has Unpredictable Results. Numerous exotic armor across the saga utilize Ahamkara bones because their magic is still potent after death. The death of Riven in the Last Wish raid caused the Dreaming City curse of time cycles, and the Warlord's Ruin dungeon shows an Ahamkara skeleton draw Taken and Scorn to an old castle from the Dark Age. How much of this is intentional by the Ahamkara is shrouded in mystery.
• My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Ahamkara are feared for their ability to twist any wish they sense to empower themselves while harming the wisher, and a Great Hunt was conducted to exterminate them to put an end to their threat. This season reveals at least two Ahamkara who went against the perceived species-wide aptitude for deception:
  • Hefnd, the Ahamkara discovered in the castle of Warlord's Ruin. He was Naeem's closest friend, and chose to grant Naeem's request to curse the House of Kings, only to condemn himself to losing his mind from the ages of solitude and the sheer grief of losing her. He's revealed to want the Guardians to kill him and finally end his suffering.
  • Taranis, Riven's mate. In life, he was known to be a Benevolent Genie, never once betraying those who made wishes to him. Riven was drawn to him because of this, and she notes that in his lair, she no longer felt joy at the prospect of twisting wishes - instead, she felt peaceful. When the Great Hunt was in full swing, Taranis made a Heroic Sacrifice by wishing to scatter his and Riven's eggs across the solar system, giving their progeny a chance at survival, but killing himself in the process.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Seems to be a recurring theme for the Ahamkara. Case in point, Hefnd, the Ahamkara who befriended Naeem, and Taranis, Riven's mate, both fell afoul of this. Hefnd chose to grant Naeem's final wish to curse the House of Kings, wanting to avenge his Only Friend. In doing so, Hefnd consigned himself to centuries of misery and isolation, to the point where all he wanted was to die and rejoin Naeem. Taranis, meanwhile, granted a wish for himself to scatter his and Riven's eggs across the Ley Lines in order to protect them. Unfortunately, as Riven reveals, Ahamkara cannot grant wishes for themselves, and in granting his own wish, Taranis killed himself.
• Old Shame: Petra expresses regret for organizing the hunt to kill Riven, which was the Last Wish raid, as she saw it as Revenge Before Reason because of the grief over everything that happened with Cayde and Uldren. The defeat of Riven causing the curse on the Dreaming City is a constant reminder of that failing.
• Our Dragons Are Different: Ahamkara existed in the lore from the beginning, they are called wish dragons only because they evoke a mythological element and feed on the desire of others, but are actually shapeshifters who can take on other forms. Their wish magic is among the most potent power in the setting but near impossible to control. Riven is the only one we meet in person who took on more of an Eldritch Abomination-type appearance.
• Passing the Torch: Riven outright says that, with her gone, the future of the Ahamkara is passed on to a new generation, to her children. Indeed, with Riven and her mate Taranis dead and gone, the first generation of Ahamkara in the Sol System has been extinguished at last, leaving behind Riven and Taranis’ children to make their own paths.
• Power at a Price: Surprisingly, an example of this is revealed for the Ahamkara. Ahamkara cannot grant wishes for themselves. If they do so, they'll die. Just ask Riven's mate Taranis.
• Quest for a Wish: The plot of Wish involves making a bargain with Riven in order to use her wish magic to finally allow for a way to go after the Witness.
• Reality-Breaking Paradox: A defied variant. Ahamkara feed on deceiving others that make wishes to them, but there's nothing stopping them from making their own wishes. However, doing so causes them to die as a result, implied to be their wishing powers backfiring horrifically on their entire existence.
• Reclaimed by Nature: Years after her death, Riven's body remains in the same position with only mild signs of decay but colorful plant growth growing on her. It's implied her paracausal nature is how she's able to look like this to start with, instead of looking fresh and unblemished while still in the cursed loop of the Dreaming City.
• The Reveal:
  • The lore for the Unforeseen Consequences jumpship has Crow talk with Mara about his past, before admitting the one thing he wishes he could take back was Cayde's death. As soon as he leaves the room, Mara fades away, but not before saying ''O brother mine'', revealing that he was speaking to an Ahamkara (implied to be Riven's soul) and indicating that Cayde's return in The Final Shape is due to Crow's wish.
  • As the season progresses, it becomes apparent that someone other than Riven or Mara scattered the former's clutch across the system, but who is unnamed. Week 4 finally answers the question by revealing them to be the previously unknown Ahamkara named Taranis - Riven's mate, who sacrificed himself by granting his own wish to spread their brood to some place safe after Riven was taken by Oryx.
  • In Week 5, Riven reveals the specifics of what the Last Wish entails: Riven will manipulate the Ley Lines to allow one to pass through the Portal, as Riven herself is not powerful enough to fully replicate what the Witness did. However, Savathun specified that only one person may pass through the Portal. While Mara is initially incensed at this revelation (to the point of nearly attacking Riven) Osiris realizes that this will essentially "open the door" of the Portal, and he can then replicate what the Witness did thanks to his studies of the Veil.
• Sequel Episode: To Season of the Lost, the last Dreaming City themed season where we rescued Mara Sov's techeuns who were scattered across dimensional planes. Petra comments that we've basically done the same thing before when it comes to tracking the Ahamkara eggs.
• Shout-Out:
  • The "Warlord's Ruin" dungeon is heavily Dungeons & Dragons inspired, between the medieval castle motif, decoy chests that contain mimics (screebs), a jail cell you have to solve a puzzle to escape, a final boss that resembles a Beholder, a dragon (Ahamkara) skeleton at the heart of the chaos, and a sidequest about helping his disturbed spirit find closure through the region's latent magic.
  • Both "Warlord's Ruin" and the seasonal activity environment of "Riven's Lair" / "The Coil" have motion sensitive spike traps, while such things have existed elsewhere in the game their depiction here more resembles their use in Prince of Persia.
• Sins of Our Fathers: Defied. Though Mara and the Vanguard are reluctant, they eventually decide to care for Riven's clutch and let them grow, in the hopes of letting them find their own way without being held back by what their parents did. It does mean the Great Hunt's objective is rendered meaningless, but it also fits with one of the themes of Destiny - giving grace to a person or species that you believe deserves a second chance.
• So Proud of You: Mara gives this to Petra, telling her how thankful she is to her for leading the Awoken and keeping their people’s hope alive after they believed that their Queen was lost forever. She even tells her how she has surpassed her predecessor, Sjur Eido, as Queen’s Wrath. While Sjur succeeded as a warrior, Petra succeeded not only as a warrior, but as a leader too.
• Storming the Castle: Warlord's Ruin is set in a decrepit, decaying Dark Age castle, where the Scorn and Taken are mobilizing to try and secure the bones of an Ahamkara buried in the ice and dirt.
• Suicide by Cop: Hefnd outright tells the fireteam traversing Warlord's Ruin to kill him and put him to rest, as he's spent centuries mourning the death of Naeem and trying to satisfy their collective desire for revenge against the House of Kings to the point of madness. By the time he finds a solution in the form of infecting himself with a Taken blight and recreating the formula for Dark Ether, he's mad with grief and just wants to die so he no longer suffers.
• Unfinished Business: Double subverted. Hefnd is lashing out in the Warlord's Ruin dungeon because of lingering mental trauma from Shaxx murdering him and his Only Friend Naeem being slain by Fallen. While Naeem tried to wish away his wounds so they could start a fresh life together, she spent her last moments telling Hefnd to curse the House of Kings, causing him to once again drive himself to madness trying to satisfy those terms.
• Voice Changeling: While normally played straight, Riven's spirit ceases speaking in the voice of others to reveal her true voice to the Vanguard. She describes it as a gesture of trust towards them. That said, she's still able to do this as a spirit, mainly just to fuck with people's heads. Thankfully nobody buys it and calls her on it as soon as she finishes speaking.
• Weird Weather: Due to Hefnd's infection and wish magic affecting the castle in Warlord's Ruin, that's not regular snow and ice in the blizzard atop the mountain — it's Stasis. While fighting the Locus of Wailing Grief, the storm will periodically kick up enough for the effects of this to become palpable; without the torches and Hefnd's blessings, you aren't freezing to death so as much as you are having your life energy sucked out of you and then shattered like glass.
• Wham Line: Spider revealing to Pra'kesh that the Skimmers (basically Strand-infused hoverboards) were assembled and donated by the long-forgotten Concordat, presumably to once again try and bribe Guardians to their side.
• Worthy Opponent: In her last words, Riven admits to Mara that she always saw her as this, for her wishes, her cunning, and her push to fulfill her desires. She even says that Mara could be a good guide for her soon-to-be-born children, and gives her a sincere farewell.