Quintesson

"*We are* Quintessons*!* Arrogance *is our life’s blood,* ambition *is our food and drink, but most of all,* hubris is the air we breathe!!'**"**
―Al-Badur
The **Quintessons** are a bizarre and ancient race, whose dark history and shadowy machinations are bound up with the history of the Transformers, with connections to both Primus and Unicron. They are known galaxy-wide as traders, entrepreneurs and businessmen, but their dealings are very rarely on the level, often laced with intrigue and betrayals. They prefer subtle manipulation, scheming, and advanced technology over brute force, but if those don't work, they can fall back on the legion of deadly Sharkticons and Allicons at their command and a fleet of battle-ready spaceships as well. However, the Quintessons themselves have zero fighting abilities and are absolute cowards if they have nothing to hide behind. For example, they are seen to be powerless against a Sharkticon revolt.

## Types of Quintessons

The Quintessons appear to be mostly (if not entirely) mechanical beings. They come in several distinct forms, some of which are identified by their place in the Quintessons' bizarre court system.

* Quintesson Judge
* Quintesson Bailiff
* Quintesson Executioner
* Quintesson Prosecutor
* Quintesson Scientist

### History

The Quintessons were small, organic, squid-like creatures. Physically frail, easily injured, and extremely cowardly, the Quintessons themselves were rarely seen, and did most of their dirty work through various proxies, willing or unwilling. When the Quintessons did need to expose themselves to further their own ends, they frequently encased themselves in mechanical suits styled after their various slave races, often claiming to be representatives of other races.

At some point after the creation of the first Transformers, Quintus Prime left Cybertron to seed other worlds in the universe with life with the Emberstone, in the hopes that other peaceful, space-faring civilizations would one day contact Cybertron to form friendly alliances. Among his earliest creations were the Quintessons. So that didn't work out too well.

After creating the Quintessons, Quintus Prime was never heard from again; Alpha Trion idly speculated that the Quintessons may have killed their creator.

The Quintessons developed interstellar travel before the Transformers. At some point in the past, the Quintessons stole and reverse-engineered space bridge technology from an unknown source. They eventually discovered Cybertron toward the end of that planet's Age of Origins. As the first alien beings ever to make contact with the planet, the arrival of their ships awed the young Cybertronian race. The Quintessons claimed to be benevolent entities sent to "uplift" the Cybertronians from their primitive existence, so that they could join the galactic community. By giving Cybertronians the "gift" of transformation and the power to assume alternate modes, the Quintessons won Cybertron's public support. In reality, though, the Quintessons had simply learned to manipulate the dormant transformation cogs present in every Transformer. The dispersal of Quintesson technology and tutelage turned the feudal, tribe-based planet into a sophisticated spacefaring civilization almost overnight. The Quintessons established rule of law and eventually a global order overseen by the Elite Guard member Sentinel Zeta Prime and the High Council.

Secretly, the Quintessons aimed to slowly rob the Cybertronians of their individuality, then sell them into slavery as mindless drones. To further this goal, they began implanting various Cybertronians, such as the Seekers, with cockpits intended to house Quintesson pilots. The Quintessons organized other Cybertronians into working collectives and attempted to tamper with the Well of All Sparks itself; newborn Transformers began emerging without names or identities, and instead received alphanumeric designations. The Quintesson's twisted, bizarre sense of justice led to the construction of the Supreme Court on Cybertron, a kangaroo court where innocents could be sentenced to life imprisonment or death.

Eventually, a resistance movement formed, and the Quintessons were defeated in a rebellion led by Sentinel Prime, who led Cybertron into a subsequent Golden Age. Traces of their rule, such as the cockpits implanted in many Cybertronians, would remain even as Cybertron slowly rid itself of their influence. Some of the Cybertronians who had lived through this disturbing period- including a young librarian named Orion Pax- suppressed their traumatic memories of Cybertron's occupation, and eventually forgot about the Quintessons almost entirely. Generations later, Orion Pax claimed Sentinel and the High Council had enslaved Cybertron with the caste system instead of having it forced on them by the Quintessons.

The Quintessons never forgot about their humiliating rout at the hands of their former servants, and for many centuries the embittered race enviously regarded the planet and its inhabitants as rightfully theirs. At some point after Cybertron's Golden Age, the Quintessons discovered and colonized the Transformers's ex-colony world of Aquatron, modifying the bodies of its inhabitants to produce techno-organic monstrosities such as the Gamekeeper and the Hydratron. Aquatron was eventually subsumed into the Quintesson Imperium, and the Quintessons used their new Sharkticon slaves as aquatic shock troopers.

When the *Ark* entered the Aquatron system during Optimus Prime's search for the AllSpark, the Quintessons awakened Inquirata and his associate Xeros to carry out their deception that would eventually lead to the second invasion of Cybertron. Manipulating both Optimus and Megatron to the planet's surface under the guise of a peace treaty, the Quintessons were eventually able to place both Autobots and Decepticons under arrest and take them to court. During the trial, the Quintessons claimed that they had colonized Cybertron and literally built the first Transformers; Optimus quickly saw through their deception and maintained that all Cybertronians were creations of Primus alone. The Quintesson judges found Optimus innocent, and forced him to duel to the death with Megatron; siphoning energy from the two leaders, they powered a Space Bridge to Cybertron and launched a second invasion force to re-colonize and enslave Cybertron. Their genetically engineered leader Tyrannicon spearheaded the Sharkticon invasion and was able to swiftly overwhelm the weakened planet. The invasion was only defeated after Megatron, forced into a temporary truce with his archenemy, discovered the Sharkticon Matrix of Leadership and used it to override Tyrannicon's hold on his troops. In the ensuing fight, Xeros, Tyrannicon, and Inquirata were all killed, and Aquatron itself was freed of Quintesson control.

The Mutacons knew of the Quintessons but considered the law-bound Quintesson way of life to be boring and a worse fate than death.

1. ↑ *Wreckers: Finale Part II*
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 *Transformers: The Covenant of Primus*
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 *Transformers: Retribution*
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 *Transformers: Exodus*