So a while back I made a post talking about which member of the nine let the Red Legion into the Sol system (https://www.bungie.net/en/Forums/Post/254841313?sort=0&page=0). I recently came back to that topic and though about the two factions within the Nine; and then started wondering who is represented within the two groups? For a refresher; Dust (a lore book introduced back in Season of the Drifter) revealed to us exactly what the Nine are; and that there are two factions that split the ideals and methods employed by them. The Nine, Dust: [quote]At first this is all the loop of dust can calculate. It is the hardest thing in the universe for the dust to make a loop at all, because, like a gust of wind or a river, it was only meant to move one way. For a mind to function, the end of one thought must alter the beginning of the next: so, like rivers, like wind, the Nine could not have minds until they could make loops. Lavinia Garcia Umr Tawil comprehends the Nine. They were already ancient when the first human beings named themselves. Their flesh was older than stars: the dark dust wind that blows through the galaxy, pinched by the gravity of Sol and its planets, drawn into their cores and exhaled again. These were the Nine. In time loops did form. Great arcs of outbound dust collapsed back to their sources to create circuits of shadow. The thickening and thinning of these circuits were the first thoughts of the Nine. They dwelt in massive indifference, unborn primordial gods. There was no force among them except gravity; no structure except the distribution of mass. Their hearts were in the cores of worlds, but their farthest streams faded out into the turn of the galaxy. They were the fountains of Achlys, the night before chaos. But life arose on the worlds at the heart of the Nine, tiny complicated motions of ecosystems and metabolisms and computations. That life left mass-shadows in the wind of the Nine, plucking at them like harp strings. From these trembles of structure the Nine learned to seed enormous resonating waves, thoughts vaster than worlds. So the Nine awoke. And in time they understood that they were as fragile as they were mighty; for if the life that seeded their thoughts ever passed away, they too would vanish. They had no eyes to catch light. They had no ears to hear. And yet they turned their wills upon the alien world of Matter, and strove to learn, for they knew they had to protect their hearts, or die.[/quote] The Witch, Dust: [quote]No. Of course she is not safe. Because there are factions among the Nine: one faction sent Xûr and Orin to study Guardians and the Light, to seek the secret of effect-without-cause and to protect the source of that secret, the last source, now that the Ahamkara are gone. Those five played at alchemy with the Cocytus gates, turning dark dust into energy and then into matter, but they could not unlock the secrets of our mad existence. They needed ambassadors. Go-betweens. The other faction walks a different path. A path of folds and needles slipped through spacetime itself, existential syringes yielding new spaces, to be remade as the Nine desire. They have tried to gather enough dark dust in one place to form a black hole, and found it difficult: when the dark mass collapses in gravity's fist, the dust passes through itself and scatters. But difficult is not impossible. And there is far, far more dark matter in the universe than bright. They will find a way to make new worlds of it. They will end their dependence on life, and on the Light of Guardians, which the falling veil will soon snuff out forever...[/quote] With the establishment of that information, we could potentially start to piece together who the nine are. For the discussion I will use the Eight planets in the Solar System: Mercury, Venus, Terra, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune as well as Sol (the sun). Lets start with the Four, the members who use methods that don't involve the Light and it's vessels. We know that one of these members was punished for letting the Red Legion into the system undetected, which I believe to be [b]Mercury.[/b] It suffered the most during the Red War, becoming a strip mine of power for the Almighty. It's also a planet inhabited by the vex which have terraformed most of it, which would create an interest for them to create a new body to inhabit. Now, the Four use methods that involve Dark Matter created Black Holes, which leads me to wonder is there a potential lead? Actually yes, sort of. We know that Dark matter is used for the Nine to speak out to others or to do other things like make black holes; Well in The Leviathan entry of Dust we get this from Paladin Kamala Rior: The Leviathan, Dust: [quote]"We should've thought to use this sensor earlier," Kamala muses. [u]"Our Queen invented it to assist navigation when we were losing ships near Rhea.[/u]A phaeton backscatter scan.[/quote] I'm going to interpret "losing Ships" as one's being destroyed; and they can see Dark Matter. Rhea is a moon of Saturn. I would like to add Saturn to the list of the Four based on this evidence, suggesting that [b]Saturn[/b] was trying to create black holes using Dark Matter, which ended up destroying Awoken ships out by Rhea. The third and fourth members are honestly very difficult to figure out. I originally wanted to propose the idea of Planets with little life being members of the four, based off this quote from The Nine, Dust: [quote]So the Nine awoke. [u]And in time they understood that they were as fragile as they were mighty; for if the life that seeded their thoughts ever passed away, they too would vanish[/u].[/quote] However i then realised that this idea of "life" is actually the planet itself and not the life on the planet. But then i realised that what if the bodies that inhabit the four are ones potential to be destroyed by their own accord; I.e [b]Sol[/b]. Sol is ever expanding and will eventually knock out a lot of Inner Sol when it goes through the latter stages of it's life cycle, before freezing over; this could promote the Dark Matter entity that embodies it to want to create a newer body. It also has no inhabitants fighting for it's control, so it would make sense for it to not feel a need to study the Light. A similar process could apply to [b]Neptune[/b]. It's the planet furthest from the sun, and (as far as we know) doesn't have anyone fighting for it's control; so again it wouldn't feel a need to study the Light. [spoiler]Now, Uranus and Neptune could be switched around given the reason i gave above. It would have more of a reason to be in the Four and is only in the Five because of the little evidence we have so it's just left to be picked[/spoiler] Now we move to the Five which have been left to easily identify. We know the Five favour the use of the Light and chemistry as well as their old use, Ahamkara to obtain their new bodies. [b]Terra[/b] is the home of the Traveler and thus makes sense for it to be one of the Five. [b]Venus[/b] was the major home for the Ahamkara which would make sense for this planet to be one of the Five also. [b]Mars [/b]also held Ahamkara so it would again make sense for it to be a member of the Five; Mars also has a Hive infestation problem with Xol and the Grasp of Nokris, which would summon the Light to the planet, needed to combat their existence and remove them from the sub-martian terrain. During a Pilgrimage to the Harbingers Seclude, Shuro Chi says [quote]Know this, Guardian. If an [u]Ahamkara has hidden itself away beyond Jupiter[/u], if the last of them did not die here in the Dreaming City… you can reveal their true intentions with reflective surfaces.[/quote] Now I understand the use of the word "beyond" could suggest one resides beyond Jupiter on either Uranus or Neptune; but part of me is choosing to believe that if an Ahamkara lives around [b]Jupiter[/b], the Dark Matter embodied within is a member of the Five (but this is also one i'm not too confident in but i'm including because i haven't got anything else). [b]Uranus[/b] fits within the Five because it's the last celestial body I haven't mentioned. [spoiler]but could be switched with Neptune based on no in lore mention.[/spoiler] So to sum this up; I believe that the Four are Sol, Mercury, Saturn and Neptune; and the Five are, Venus, Terra, Mars, Jupiter and Uranus. But i want to hear what you have to say, and what your theories are.