I Went to the Eververse for Loot and Accidentally Adopted a Laser Dog
Destiny 2's Loyal Companion emote raised 100% for the Bungie Foundation—a charity dog with a real backstory and a crash bug.
I am not usually an impulse buyer in Destiny 2. I am, however, a person who will absolutely spend real money on a glowing dog if the dog is cute enough and the proceeds go to charity. That is the exact trap Bungie set for me back in Season of the Haunted, and I walked into it with my wallet open and my Ghost sighing in the background.
Season of the Haunted kicked off with new loot, an old villain, and a brand-new story on the infested Leviathan. I was there for the loot. I stayed for the space dog. The Eververse added the Loyal Companion emote, which summons a pupper made of pure Light so your Guardian can kneel down and pet it like a normal, emotionally stable person. Reader, I am not normal or emotionally stable when a holographic dog looks at me.
Here is the twist: this was not just a random cosmetics-shop cash grab. The Loyal Companion was a charity item, with 100% of the proceeds going to the Bungie Foundation, Bungie’s non-profit group that supports charities including iPads for Kids and the Make-A-Wish Foundation. That made my purchase feel noble instead of reckless, which is my favorite kind of purchase.
And the dog was based on a real dog. According to Bungie Foundation’s Christine Edwards, the Loyal Companion represents a real-life Belgian Malinois named Artemis, the best friend of a very special Guardian. The full story was promised for Bungie Day on July 7, and it was described as a story of resilience, recovery, and triumph made possible by the Destiny community and Artemis. I do not know about you, but I can resist a lot of things. I cannot resist a charity dog with a backstory.
Of course, because this is Destiny, the good boy came with patch notes. The TWAB noted a bug where using the Loyal Companion emote could sometimes cause the game to crash. So the dog arrived without all its shots, metaphorically speaking. It was a pupper made of pure Light and at least one significant flea. I still loved him. I just loved him carefully, from a distance, while saving my game.
| Loyal Companion dossier | Details |
|---|---|
| Name | Artemis, apparently |
| Species | Belgian Malinois, but also pure Light |
| Function | Emote that lets you kneel and pet a good boy |
| Price | Silver only, not the usual free-currency later route |
| Charity | 100% of proceeds to the Bungie Foundation |
| Known issue | Sometimes crashes the game |
| Story drop | Bungie Day, July 7, back in 2022 |
Looking back from 2026, this whole thing feels like peak Destiny weirdness: a charity dog, a real dog, a crash bug, and a community that collectively said, “Yes, I will pay money for this, but please fix the part where my game dies.” Years and expansions later, I still think the Loyal Companion was one of the more memorable Eververse items precisely because it was not just an Eververse item. It was a donation with a pet animation attached.
At the time, there was also plenty to do besides petting a possibly cursed dog. A new dungeon had just dropped, and a new Exotic weapon was hiding somewhere inside it for Guardians brave enough to go looking. Because Bungie never lets us have a nice dog without also making us sweat through a dungeon encounter. That is the trade-off, I guess: charity dog in the store, pain and suffering in the activity.
My personal experience with the Loyal Companion went exactly like this:
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See dog. 🐕
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Buy dog. 💸
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Equip dog. ✨
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Pet dog. 🥹
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Game crashes. 💀
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Blame dog. 😤
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Read TWAB. 📰
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Apologize to dog. 🙏
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Donate anyway. ❤️
That is the Destiny loop, baby. I can complain about a bug and still hand over money for a good cause. I can call the dog a menace and still defend him in the group chat. I can look at a 2022 charity emote in 2026 and feel a tiny bit nostalgic for a time when my biggest problem was whether petting a laser dog would disconnect me from the servers.
So if you are a newer Guardian and you stumble across old footage of a Guardian kneeling to pet a glowing Belgian Malinois, know that it was not just a cosmetic. It was a charity drive, a real dog’s story, and a bug report all wrapped in one very good boy. The Loyal Companion may have had fleas, but he also had heart. And honestly, that is more than I can say for most things in the Eververse.