Pyramid

Pyramid
Production information
Manufacturer:	Black Fleet
Technical specifications
Complement:	Pyramid Scales Resonant Splinters
Usage
Role(s):	Transportation Housing Envoys Planet Corruptors
Affiliation:	The Witness Disciples of the Witness

Pyramids are massive and commonly tetrahedral vessels that make up the armada known as the Black Fleet.

Overview

Pyramids appear to vary widely in size, but the ones most commonly seen are nearly twice the size of a Fallen Ketch. They all share a simple tetrahedral shape, broken up by lines of yellow-orange lights. They are accompanied by fleets of smaller craft known as Pyramid Scales, which are about the size of a jumpship. Additional small Pyramid-shaped craft can be seen alongside some of the larger Pyramids, seemingly intermediate in size between Pyramid Scales and full-sized Pyramids.

It is unclear to what degree the Pyramids are merely spacecraft or fully autonomous machine entities analogous to The Traveler. During Season of Arrivals, the Ghost states that the Pyramid on Io is actually a paracausal being, like the Traveler. However, they also appear to be used as vehicles by the Witness and its Disciples, with the Witness having commanded the Black Fleet from the Pyramid known as Essence, and Rhulk and Nezarec having commanded the Sunken and Lunar Pyramids, respectively. It is unknown at this point whether all other Pyramids are home to a single Disciple, or whether some contain armies or are empty of life entirely.

Design and architecture

All Pyramids thus far explored have interior spaces designed for roughly human-scale inhabitants. The architecture inside the Pyramids is minimalist and geometric, but with many intricate details and a variety of construction materials. The atmosphere within is generally oppressive and foreboding, featuring chambers and hallways illuminated by harsh red and white lights, deep chasms or pits whose depths are obscured by mist, and huge bleakly-illuminated open spaces stretching for many kilometers into the distance. Although the Lunar Pyramid had been left buried beneath the surface of the Moon for centuries, numerous sounds can be heard within its walls including harsh whispers, an ever-present hum of machinery, and distant howls. The Chantry of the Darkest Hour within the Lunar Pyramid contains a pair of colored stone statues and a huge room that then extends into an empty chamber.

Most of the Pyramids explored thus far have been seen to contain a room with a statue of a veiled humanoid figure, the significance of which remains unclear, but which is identical in form to the entity labeled by Clovis Bray I as "Clarity Control". All Pyramids have also been seen to contain what appear to be partially-completed statues made of colored stone; in general these vaguely resemble humanoid or equine figures, but it is unclear what, if anything, they actually represent. The Pyramids' interior spaces also contain what appear to be urns of various shapes and sizes, either arrayed in open spaces or stored in racks set into walls. Hidden agents have also reported that some explored Pyramids contain specimens of alien fauna placed on display, some of which give off biosigns despite having been cut apart or otherwise appearing to be deceased.

It was revealed by the creature known as Ahsa that the Pyramids were originally crafted by an ancient humanoid civilization that later became the Witness, and that they were used as starships. It is therefore possible that many of the artifacts seen within the Pyramids were left behind by the Witness' people when they transcended their physical forms and merged their consciousnesses into the Witness.

Within the Ionian Pyramid, a unique chamber was discovered in the form of a cavernous shrine. At its center, a stone idol of a Pyramid stood before numerous effigies of several races found within the Sol System, beyond which lay numerous pillars. These effigies included depictions of Hive, Fallen, Cabal, and Guardians of the Last City, all gazing up at the Pyramid. Shadows of the Pyramid stretched across the ground, reaching out towards the surrounding races, the largest extending out towards the Fallen.

Inside the Europan Pyramid, there are doors that open on approach and platforms that shift periodically. The various chambers within the Pyramid has displays of various structures resembling Mesopotamian and Egyptian architecture inside colored glass cases and blocks of colored stone stacked on top of each other. It also has a miniature Pyramid inside one of the rooms as well, and in some chambers contain floors of colored stone, glass, and the usual obsidian-like material used in all Pyramid architecture.

The Sunken Pyramid within Savathûn's Throne World seems to display a degree of personalization based on the aesthetic desires of its resident, the Disciple Rhulk. Many walls are adorned with murals or seemingly abstract colored shapes, some of which are explicitly representational and others whose purpose or meaning, if any, is unknown. Rhulk also has placed a number of displays throughout his domain, including a pedestal supporting a rib bone from the Leviathan of Fundament, which he personally removed from the beast during their confrontation. Inside one of the rooms, a cross section of a Worm can be seen inside multiple amber-colored glass cases, signifying Rhulk's role in the ascension of the Hive.

One Pyramid known as the Typhon Imperator lacks the tetrahedral shape as commonly seen with other Pyramids in the Black Fleet. Its profile is a flattened arrow-like shape, with a wide front and tapered wedge-shaped stern. It shares various interior aspects as other Pyramids like the Sunken Pyramid along with the extravagant and opulent fashion of Emperor Calus and his Leviathan with various depictions of the Emperor through memorabilia, statues and overflowing chests.

Inside the Witness's flagship, Essence, it contains a collection of planets and moons where the planetary bodies abducted by the Witness can be found and in one of the hidden rooms, fossils of a mollusk and a vertebra of an unknown species can be found. Murals of Earth organisms congregate around a statue of Nezarec. Otherwise, it is the same as most Pyramid architecture the Guardians have explored.

There are also structures that contain Pyramid architecture scattered throughout the world such as those in the Exo Challenges, Harvest, Disjunction, the Relic, the Ziggurat, and Metamorphosis

Capabilities and technology

As discovered by Asher Mir through his experimentation, Pyramids have a defensive mechanism where incoming projectiles appear to simply disappear on the point of impact, while still physically existing in some form. This defense also seems to suppress electromagnetic radiation to a degree, requiring a fully equipped relay system to remain detectable from the outside.

On various occasions, the Pyramids have been shown to emit fields of Darkness capable of blocking out visible light, as well as presumably stifling Light as well. They also appear to be able to manipulate gravitational fields on a massive scale, as seen when the Black Fleet caused apocalyptic tidal waves to roll across Titan during the Collapse.

During the Black Fleet's final assault on the Traveler, Pyramids were seen to emit waves of Resonance energy, which could destroy incoming ships and neutralize the Traveler when the latter tried to defend itself.

On Europa and the Court of Savathûn, several artifacts originating from the Pyramids have been encountered, including Stasis Locks, Cruxes of Darkness, Splinters of Darkness and Pyramid Spikes.

Known Pyramids

• Essence (Flagship)
• The Lunar Pyramid
• The Ionian Pyramid
• The Mercurian Pyramid
• The Martian Pyramid
• The Titanian Pyramid
• The Europan Pyramid
• The Sunken Pyramid
• The Drowned Pyramid
• Typhon Imperator