A Rising Chorus: Act II

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A Rising Chorus: Act II
Game:	Episode: Echoes
Quest giver:	Ikora Rey

A Rising Chorus: Act II is the main quest in the Episode: Echoes Act II quest chain.

Steps

"And my vanquisher will read that book, seeking the weapon, and they will come to understand me, where I have been and where I was going."The following is a verbatim transcription of an official document for archival reasons. As the original content is transcribed word-for-word, any possible discrepancies and/or errors are included.

Ikora dispatches you to Nessus to investigate the redirected flows of radiolaria beneath its surface.

Unravel the secrets left behind in the wake of the Echo and discover the truth about the Conductor.

Step 1

Confront the enemies of humanity on Nessus in Battleground: Delve.

• Complete Battleground: Delve on Nessus.
  • Battleground: Delve

---

• Osiris: The Vex block our path. They are aware of our intentions.

• Osiris: Wherever the radiolaria leads will tell us what we need to know about the Conductor. We must delve further into Nessus. Failsafe?

• Failsafe (Cheery): The data contained in that Hydra will allow me to extract the authorization codes required to progress further into Nessus.

• Failsafe (Depressed): Bring it back to the H.E.L.M. and I can get started on cracking it open.

• Osiris: You heard her, Guardian.

Note

For a full transcript of the mission, see Battleground: Delve.

Step 2

Activate Planetary Pistons within Episode: Echoes activities to spawn Iridescent Radiolite Incubators.

• Your Radiolite Sampler can extract and isolate unique segments of mutated radiolaria within discovered nodes of radiolite.

Use your Radiolite Sampler to extract Vex code mutations from Radiolite Incubators within Episode: Echoes activities. Extracting from Iridescent Incubators provides the greatest chance to find the code mutations.

Failsafe will need these resources to upgrade her H.E.L.M. equipment and add more research bays before she can start her analysis of the Hydra tail obtained from Battleground: Delve.

• • Code Mutations collected: x/7

Step 3

Activate Failsafe's upgrade protocol at her remote uplink in the H.E.L.M.

• Return to the H.E.L.M. to activate Failsafe's upgrade protocol.
  • Failsafe upgraded

Step 4

Now that Failsafe and the Radiolite Sampler are upgraded, new forms of Radiolite can be found on Nessus.

• Speak with the newly upgraded Failsafe in the H.E.L.M.

---

Failsafe's lights gleam with excitement at your approach. The Radiolite Sampler feels heavy in your hands, full of collected samples.

"You're back, and with samples! I have performed a full system upgrade, and I am ready for action, Captain! Nothing can stop us now, not even a bug. Which I mention because there was one…"

Failsafe lowers her voice. "Like, a real bug. It crawled into the mainframe. Patched that sucker right out."

She offers you her patch notes.

Failsafe 2.1 Patch Notes:

• Upgrade bug exterminated
• Premium Research Bays installed
• Tuned Radiolite Sampler created
• Favorite colors chosen
• Processing power increased by 16.666665%
• Pride in shared accomplishments increased by 70%

Step 5

A new research bay can be unlocked by speaking with Failsafe in the H.E.L.M.

• Speak with Failsafe in the H.E.L.M. to unlock a new research bay.
  • Hydra Tail Research Bay unlocked

Step 6

Fight against the enemy forces gathering beneath the planetoid's crust in Battleground: Conduit.

• Complete Battleground: Conduit on Nessus.
  • Battleground: Conduit

---

• Saint-14: The radiolaria is flowing, but we cannot follow it further.

• Ikora: We need a plan. Following it blindly will take precious time. There has to be a faster way.

• Failsafe: The radiolaria here may contain abnormalities compared to the samples I have collected over my centuries of isolation. I’ve had a long time to study this stuff. Bring some back, and I’ll figure out what to do.

• Ikora: Failsafe, you need to know: if we succeed, it’ll be because of your hard work here.

• Failsafe: That is kind of you to say! However, if we fail, I abdicate all responsibility and will strike my involvement from our records. See you back at the H.E.L.M., Captain!

Note

For a full transcript of the mission, see Battleground: Conduit.

Step 7

An incoming message awaits you at the holoprojector in the H.E.L.M.

• A message awaits you on the holoprojector in the H.E.L.M.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

• Saint-14: Guardian. I hear that you are hard at work on Nessus, following the Echo and the Conductor. I know you do this in part for me, but… I do not know if I am worth the trouble. I was pulled through Nessus like a toy on a string. The Conductor's words still echo in my mind, "A copy of a copy of a copy." Osiris pushed through time to find his Saint-14. [sighs] He said he was careful, but… he reached blindly, and he pulled out… only me. And now… I live a life that does not belong to me. I am something left over from a broken timeline… a remainder. The Conductor whispered I should be thrown away… A solution as simple as, correcting an error. And maybe… that would— Ah! I-I do not know what to think anymore.

Saint-14's hologram shines before you on the projector, but his voice, usually boisterous, is deeply melancholy. He has heard you are exploring deeper into Nessus to learn about the Conductor.

"I do not know if I am worth the trouble," he says.

"The Conductor's words still echo in my mind," Saint confides. "A copy of a copy of a copy… Osiris pushed through time to find his Saint-14… and now, I live a life that does not belong to me."

"The Conductor whispered I should be thrown away," he murmurs. His words are heavy with pain and desolation. "A solution as simple as correcting an error."

"And maybe…"

"I do not know what to think anymore," Saint says, and abruptly ends the call.

Step 8

• Failsafe is processing the data you have gathered in an attempt to locate the mysterious Conductor. She will contact you when she has a new theory.

Step 9

Failsafe would like to speak with you at her remote uplink in the H.E.L.M.

• Failsafe, newly briefed on the Echo of Command, wishes to speak to you in the H.E.L.M.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

Failsafe: Greetings, Captain! Ikora briefed me on the Echo of Command. And while we AIs are constantly given commands we cannot refuse… I understand your problem conceptually. I have completed processing the various radiolaria samples you retrieved from Nessus. They contain no traces of abnormalities. Which is a huge disappointment. I was about to euthanize the samples, when I realized we could mix nanomachines into the radiolaria and reintroduce it to the planet! The nanomachines will get torn apart, but at least we can track 'em for a while. Maybe that'll help us figure out what's going on. Tell me when you are prepared, and I will have no choice but to assist you! …Kidding. I'd help anyway.

Ikora has briefed Failsafe on the Echo of Command, which the Vanguard believe the Conductor is somehow using to influence the Nessus Vex.

While your support has allowed her to greatly expand her research capabilities, Failsafe's studies of the Nessus radiolaria are yielding few results. "Which is a huge disappointment," she mutters, but she has developed a new approach.

"We could mix nanomachines into the radiolaria and reintroduce it to the planet!" she exclaims. The nanomachines won't survive in the radiolaria for long, but she'll be able to track their movements beneath the planet's crust.

"Maybe that'll help us figure out what's going on," she says.

Step 10

Excavate Radiolite to gather the materials Failsafe requires to fabricate her tracking nanomachines.

Radiolite can be most commonly found within Breach Executable and Seasonal Battlegrounds activities.

• Harvest Radiolite to gather the materials Failsafe requires.
  • x/10

Step 11

Bring Failsafe the materials you have gathered so she can fabricate her nanobots.

• Bring your collected materials to Failsafe in the H.E.L.M.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

Failsafe whirrs in appreciation as she uses the H.E.L.M.'s systems to process the raw materials you brought her.

"FABRICATING NANOMACHINES" her viewscreen reads, as a progress bar slowly fills.

After a few moments, the text changes to "CALIBRATING NANOMACHINES" as another, longer progress bar fills.

Finally, the process finishes.

"NAMING NANOMACHINES" appears on her readout above a frustratingly long progress bar…

You tap your foot impatiently.

Eventually, Failsafe dispenses a tube of synthesized radiolaria teeming with microscopic nanomachines. Even on the H.E.L.M., their tracking signals are strong and clear.

Once you deploy them, she will be able to follow their movements through Nessus with ease.

Step 12

Deploy the nanobots in the Chamber of Stone area of Nessus.

• Deploy the nanobots at the specified coordinates.
  • Nanobots deployed: x/3

---

• Failsafe: All right, Captain. I've added nanomachines to the radiolaria that will allow us to track its progress down through Nessus. Please reintroduce the samples to the planet at the designate sites.

The Guardian deploys the nanomachines.

• Failsafe: Nanomachines away! I miss them already. Hmm, the natural flow is being altered. Let me mark the next site for you.

Step 13

Deploy the tracking nanobots in the radiolarian spring in The Conflux Lost Sector on Nessus.

• Deploy the nanobots at the specified coordinates.
  • Nanobots deployed: x/3

---

• Failsafe: And they're off! Tracking… Captain, the radiolaria is being redirected deeper into the core of Nessus.

Step 14

Fight against the hostile powers attempting to control the flow of Nessus's radiolarian in Battleground: Core.

• Complete Battleground: Core on Nessus.
  • Battleground: Core

---

• Saint-14: This was here the whole time? Failsafe did not know?

• Ikora: Failsafe's sensors couldn't reach this far beneath the surface of the planet.

• Failsafe (Cheery): Now they can! Assimilating data…

• Failsafe (Depressed): Wow… wow. WOW. This was here the whole time?

• Ikora: Maybe. Or it could be something new. Something the Conductor built when they grasped the Echo's power.

• Failsafe (Depressed): So, uh… speaking of? Those nanobots aren't responding to my signals. There's a pretty high chance that the Conductor hijacted them.

• Failsafe (Depressed): It ends here, Captain. Sorry.

• Saint-14: It's all right, Failsafe. We can figure out another plan.

• Ikora: Return to the H.E.L.M., Guardian. Failsafe and I will coordinate and find out our next steps.

Step 15

Failsafe wishes to speak with you at her remote uplink in the H.E.L.M.

• Study the nanobots' progress with Failsafe in the H.E.L.M.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

Failsafe's display lights up as she maps the new areas of Nessus you charted while fighting through Battleground: Core.

You study the readout together, following the glowing channels of subterranean radiolaria as they flow ever downward.

Suddenly, Failsafe highlights a section of Nessus's surface: she has triangulated the location of an unknown research specimen!

The lights in Failsafe's research bay flicker in anticipation…

Step 16

Failsafe believes she has located a new research specimen in the Watcher's Grave area of Nessus.

• Search the coordinates for a new research specimen.
  • Location scanned

---

• Failsafe: Captain, I am attempting to locate a particularly interesting research specimen. I will re-engage my detection protocol. Location locked in!

The Guardian activates the scan.

• Failsafe: …where is the specimen?! It's supposed to be right here, I swear! I've been practicing! Ugh, you heard me do the beep-boops and everything!

Step 17

• Search the coordinates for a new research specimen.
  • Location scanned

---

• Failsafe: Okay, okay, refining parameters. Adjusting for the unlikely event of specimen locomotion… [Failsafe proximity detection]

Step 18

You have unearthed an unusual specimen. Collect it so Failsafe can analyze the changes taking place on Nessus.

• Collect the research specimen.
  • Specimen collected

---

• Failsafe: Ha! Gotcha! Captain, the specimen appears to be biological in nature! Which explains how it was able to evade my earlier detection. Clever little thing.

Step 19

Deliver the research specimen to Failsafe's remote uplink in the H.E.L.M. for processing and analysis.

• Take the research specimen to Failsafe in the H.E.L.M. for analysis.
  • Specimen analyzed

Step 20

Failsafe wishes to speak with you at her remote uplink in the H.E.L.M.

• Deliver the research specimen to Failsafe in the H.E.L.M.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

• Failsafe: Captain, I am analyzing the latest research sample you brought me, and it is a frog! Technically one of the Nessus proto-amphibians that developed adjacent to the Vex, but… yeah, pretty much a frog. I love him! …Of course, I don't really know him yet, but he seems likeable. I can finally bring my nurturing subroutines online. He should have a name! In honor of my original commanding officer, Captain Jacobson, I will name the frog… Captain Jacobson! Don't worry, it's an honorary title. The frog will have no real authority. Oh, this brightens my day, especially after Ikora's concerning response to my theory on how I could locate the Conductor. She was aghast — it seemed to cause her emotional distress. She asked me not to mention it to anyone else… so I won't! Thanks again for the frog!

Failsafe is delighted that the latest research specimen you have brought her is a small frog.

"Technically one of the Nessus proto-amphibians that developed adjacent to the Vex, but yeah, pretty much a frog," she says.

In honor of Captain Jacobson, Failsafe's original commanding officer, she decides to name the frog Captain Jacobson.

"Don't worry," she reassures you. "It's an honorary title. The frog will have no real authority."

Failsafe is so pleased with the frog that she divulges something that has been weighing heavily on her mind: she proposed a new theory on how to locate the Conductor, but it troubled Ikora so deeply that she asked Failsafe to keep it to herself.

"Thanks again for the frog!" Failsafe says, while you decide to speak with Ikora and learn the details of this disturbing new theory yourself.

Step 21

Visit Ikora in the Tower to learn more details about Failsafe's new theory.

• Speak with Ikora in the Tower.
  • Speak with Ikora Rey

---

• Ikora: Guardian, there is something I should discuss with you. Something I'm… reluctant to suggest to Saint and Osiris. I think you'll see why. Failsafe believes she could open a portal straight to the Conductor. She says she could extrapolate the coordinates by combining the new Vex data you've been collecting… with her years of observations of the Nessus Vex. But she would need to compare it against control data, gathered from Vex isolated from the Nessus network. She'd need an enormous amount of data, centuries of it, captured with perfect clarity and preserved by the Vex themselves. Our options are limited, and dangerous. There is only one accessible database with that kind of fidelity… The mind of Saint-14 — the deceased Saint-14, who is still laid to rest in the Infinite Forest. Our future may depend on Saint… again.

Step 22

• Failsafe is processing the data you have gathered in an attempt to locate the mysterious Conductor. She will contact you when she has a new theory.

Step 23

Failsafe wishes to speak with you at her remote uplink in the H.E.L.M.

• Meet Failsafe in the H.E.L.M. to discuss her theory of how to locate the Conductor.
  • Speak with Failsafe

---

• Failsafe: Hello again, Captain! We have an interesting metaphysical task ahead of us today! As I understand it, years ago, Osiris rescued the Saint-unit we are familiar with from a Vex simulation. In doing so, he created a paradox: the Saint-unit is alive with us now, but simultaneously dead within the Vex network. The databanks of that deceased Saint-unit are filled with information — information I believe I can use to locate the Conductor. The thing is, Saint-unit will have to download the memories of his other self… experience years of suffering, his own death… It'll be kind of awful, and he hasn't really been in a good place lately, y'know? But the Conductor must be confronted! I'm sure Saint-unit will understand. Won't he?

Failsafe greets you cheerfully. "Hello again, Captain!" she says. "We have an interesting metaphysical task ahead of us today!"

She is only too happy to explain. "Years ago, Osiris rescued the Saint-unit we are familiar with from a Vex simulation. In doing so, he created a paradox: the Saint-unit is alive with us now, but simultaneously dead within the Vex network."

The databanks of the dead Saint-14 hold the data Failsafe needs to locate the Conductor's coordinates.

But the only way to access that data is for Saint-14 to interface with it himself.

"Saint-unit will have to download the memories of his other self… experience years of suffering, his own death…" Failsafe says, clearly worried. "But the Conductor must be confronted! I'm sure Saint-unit will understand."

"…won't he?"

Step 24

Failsafe requires an access code to enter the simulation hiding Saint-14's body.

• Explore the Sunken Cavern on Nessus and defeat the Vex who holds the code Failsafe requires.
  • Vex code obtained

Step 25

Visit the H.E.L.M.

• A message awaits you in the H.E.L.M.

---

• Saint-14: Guardian. Osiris. Ikora and I have made a plan. We can use what we know about the Veil and the VexNet.

• Osiris: The Veil? Why would you need to—

• Saint-14: We will go to my tomb. In the timeline where I died fighting the Vex. [inhales shakily] My… true death.

• Osiris: When you were taken from me.

• Saint-14: Yes. I can use the memories of that Saint-14. My memories.

• Failsafe: I remember when the Vex killed my crew! Those memories will haunt me forever.

• Osiris: Failsafe.

• Failsafe: I mean… it's not so bad. Except for the horrors.

• Saint-14: Yes. Everything I learned, everything I did. [sighs sharply] I fought the Vex for… [inhales] many, many years.

• Osiris: I remember.

• Saint-14: Ikora thinks we can use the data to find this "Conductor", and secure the Echo.

• Osiris: No. I-I won't… We can find another way. Failsafe—

• Saint-14: It must be done, so I will do it. Ikora told me I was once the Vex's greatest opponent. She said I should remind them.

• Osiris: I-I… I need to think. This can't be the only path left to us.

• Failsafe: The Saint-unit has already made up his mind. He needs you right now. You know he can't do it without you, right?

Step 26

Venture into the Vex network and help Saint-14 reclaim the data he needs to locate the Conductor.

• Enter the Vex network with Saint-14 in Mission: Shell on Nessus.
  • Mission complete

Note

See Mission: Shell for a transcript of the mission.

Step 27

Saint-14 wishes to speak with you in the Hangar are of the Tower.

• Speak to Saint-14 in the Tower Hangar.
  • Speak with Saint-14

---

• Saint-14: Maya Sundaresh, risen from the Vex Network. She has Lakshmi's face… Osiris tells me it must be a mask she feels comfortable wearing. Well, it did not comfort me. And today was already filled with ghosts of the past. Guardian, before I claimed the memories of… the other me, I was afraid. I was already filled with doubt, and I thought, I might lose myself. But as his thoughts merged with mine, it was as though I lived through his centuries of struggle. And my feelings — our feelings — were in perfect harmony. And suddenly, all questions the Conductor put in my mind were answered. It does not matter if I am the "real" Saint, or the "true" Saint. Every me, is me! So when Maya tried to command me again, I used my truth to push her away… but she still forced me to my knees. She is growing stronger. We must return to stop her, but she has blocked our access. Failsafe is working on a way through. And when she finds it… I will be ready.

Saint-14 stands in the Hangar, tall and proud, his voice strong.

"Maya Sundaresh, risen from the Vex network," he says, shaking his head. Saint recognized Lakshmi-2's face, though Osiris explained to him it is just a mask Maya feels comfortable wearing. Saint shivers at the thought.

He tells you that he thought his personality might be lost completely when he accessed the mind of his other self.

"But as his thoughts merged with mine, it was as though I lived through his centuries of struggle," he says. "And suddenly, all questions the Conductor put in my mind were answered."

"It does not matter if am the 'real' Saint, or the 'true' Saint," he exclaims. "Every me, is me!"

Fully self-realized, when Maya attempted to command Saint again, he was able to resist.

"But still she forced me to my knees," he snarls. "She is growing stronger."

Failsafe is working to reestablish access to Maya's stronghold at the core of Nessus.

"And when she finds it… I will be ready."

Step 28

• Episode: Echoes Act II complete. Failsafe will contact you when Act III begins.

Appearance

• Destiny 2: Episode: Echoes (First appearance)