Covenant of Primus

The Covenant of Primus

The Covenant of Primus (or Book of Primus) is a databook containing numerous datatracks. It is a compilation of Transformers scriptural texts believed to be prophetic.

The original Covenant is the work of the great sage Alpha Trion, who has chronicled Cybertron since nearly its beginning with the artifact granted to him by Primus, the Quill. By its nature the Covenant chronicles even the future, but interpreting such things is difficult due to the symbolic phrasing the tome uses. As well, even Alpha Trion has difficulty reading too far into the future, as each section of the Covenant is written in the language of the era it represents. Thus, the most ancient sections of the book are scribed in languages long dead from the planet, and the far future is written in languages no Cybertronian yet speaks. It is unlikely that any copies of the Covenant retain this property, as they are presumably only transcriptions of the Covenant as it existed at their time of making.

I am that which is, which was, and is yet to come! And you will know my name is Megatron when I lay my vengeance upon you! — The Covenant of Primus

Fiction

Beast Wars cartoon

Only two copies existed. One was placed on the Ark prior to its launch. The other was found during the Beast Wars aboard the Nemesis, apparently having been placed there by Tarantulas. They speak of apocalyptic battles at the end of an age. It is believed that the Covenant of Primus foretold the Beast Wars, and it was from these scriptures that the Predacon Megatron took his name. Template:Storylink Template:Storylink

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Dreamwave Generation One continuity

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Aligned novels

The Covenant of Primus was a book in the possession of Alpha Trion. Alpha Trion wrote in the Covenant, being as it was never finished until the end of Cybertron, when he observed things that must be put into it that hadn't already. He occasionally changed the future that was written in the book using the Quill, but only to a certain degree. He also read ahead in the book to know the future, but only as far as he was able to understand it, for the Covenant changed language as the major language of Cybertronian changed. He was seen to have it lying open on his desk in the times Orion Pax, and eventually Optimus Prime, visited him for advice. Template:Storylink

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Prime cartoon

Optimus Prime learned that a planetary alignment spoken of in the Covenant of Primus was approaching in a few days. His teammates were skeptical of the truth in the prophecy, but Optimus was more worried about Megatron's reaction. Indeed, the Decepticon leader believed that the Covenant referred to him as "the rising darkness", and thus became obsessed with completing his newest plan before the planetary alignment occurred. Template:Storylink

Unfortunately, the prophecy's "rising darkness" was something far worse than Megatron: it referred to Unicron, whose body had been the seed of Earth itself. The Chaos Bringer's dormant consciousness had diffused into the new planet, but the gravitational forces of the planetary alignment had reawakened it; and he was not happy at all. Template:Storylink

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Ask Vector Prime

In Primax 489.0 Zeta, Horsehead dubbed the rampaging Scorponok/Zarak beast "Majin Zarak", after the ancient Predacon in the Covenant of Primus. Template:Storylink

Beast Wars: Uprising

The Book of Logos was claimed by its author, Logos, to be a vision from Primus, foretelling of apocalyptic wars, enslavement, betrayal, and the recurring number seven.

Scylla thought of one verse, Chapter 10, Book 3, before the battle for the Yuss Straits, during the Vehicon Apocalypse, despite not being a believer herself. Template:Storylink

While explaining the Unicron crisis to Rampage, Deluge clarified that he did not mean the religious fairy tale told to protoforms. Template:Storylink

Transformers: Universe

The Covenant of Primus appeared in Transformers: Universe.

Known Covenant of Primus verses

• "...and a mighty warrior came down from the sky...and a rainbow was on his head...and his feet were as pillars of fire...and the great dragon was cast out upon the Earth...and his followers were cast out with him."
• "...and as it were a great mountain, raging with fire, arose from the sea."
• "I am alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. I am that which is, which was, and is yet to come...and you will know my name is Megatron when I lay my vengeance upon you!"
• "...and the stone of their protection shall rise upward forever and ever, as they who live and war as beasts confront their final cycle."
• "...and there came a hero who said: 'Hurt not the Earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, nor the very fabric of time,' but the hero would not prevail, nor would he surrender."
• "In the spark of an enemy, there will be salvation, and in the darkest hour, there will be a light."
• "And the sun and its brother shall storm over the new world to reveal the beast and destroy it."
• The Sojourner's Passage: "Cursed curiosity compelled me to stay, to observe the enemy before the machine age. And now this demands my attention! My first responsibility is to those I left behind, yet I sense what unfolds below eclipses even that which cast me away. In the name of my creator, I will re-enter the void. I will seek that light which has fallen from the forges of our history."
• "Do not judge a warrior by stature or action until you truly understand that which drives him."
• "Great events find great Cybertronians. And other times, great events make great Cybertronians."
• "Humility comes before greatness, and where humility has not paved the road, greatness may not walk it."
• In Exodus there is a 21 page excerpt from the Covenant inserted between Chapter 15 and 16. It is written by Alpha Trion and describes the early days of the war. It is also mentioned in the novel that the Covenant forbid more than one Prime at a time, that someone would take the name Megatronus, and a Prime would lead Cybertron in a time of civil war, whom Alpha Trion correctly presumed to be Optimus Prime.
• "When the 47 spheres align, a perpetual conflict will culminate upon a world forged from chaos. And the weak shall perish in the shadow of a rising darkness."
• "Pity my Remaining Child, for he will be cast into the Mind of My Own Creation, He shall be used to engineer Dark and Wondrous Artifices …"
• Logos, Chapter 10, Verse 3:"Yea, and the leviathan would rise from the sea, and it's fury would be like unto the Inferno itself."

Interpretation

The first six quotes above were believed by Optimus Primal and Megatron to be prophecies relating to the climax of the Beast Wars.

• The "mighty warrior" is Tigerhawk.
• The "great dragon" is Megatron.
• The "great mountain" was the Nemesis.
• The quote about Megatron refers to how the Megatron of the Beast Wars was, at the time, also carrying the spark of the original Megatron, and was thus "alpha and omega".
• The "stone of their protection" was the mountain over the Ark, which Megatron partially lifted away.
• The hero who "would not prevail, nor would he surrender" was Optimus Primal.
• The enemy whose spark brought salvation was Dinobot II, who in the end betrayed his leader.
• The "sun and its brother" are Sunstorm and Starscream.

The following quotes were believed by Optimus Prime and a different Megatron to be a prophecy relating to the end of the Transformers' battle on Earth.

• The "47 spheres" are a series of planets and stars which includes Earth and Cybertron. Their alignment creates gravitational distortions that awaken Unicron from his resting place.
• The "world forged from chaos" is Earth, which formed around the comatose body of Unicron after his defeat on Cybertron.
• At first, the line about "the weak" perishing seems to refer to Raf Esquivel and Carlos Lopez, who are critically wounded by a Dark Energon-enhanced blast from Megatron. Later on, Megatron implies that it refers to Optimus Prime, and by extension, anyone who opposes him. After Unicron is revealed, "the weak" appears to refer to all of humanity in the alternate universe, which is in danger of being destroyed if the Chaos Bringer fully awakens.
• The "rising darkness" refers to Unicron.
• The "world without a name forged from chaos" is the Nameless Planet, which formed around the comatose body of Unicron after his defeat on Cybertron.

Logos seems to be predicting, among other things, the events of Beast Wars: Uprising, including the enslavement of the Maximals and Predacons at the hands of the Builder Assembly, Lio Convoy's assassination of Supersonic, and Galva Convoy's Vehicon Apocalypse.

• Chapter 10, verse 3, seems to be referring to Claw Jaw, the Maximal is identified later in the story as having a squid-based alternate mode, and is described as "a horror", something a giant, angry prehistoric sea-beastie would be, and is part of a battalion of ocean-going Resistance fighters who make mince-meat of the Builder forces they're up again, likely the "fury" mentioned in the passage.

Notes

• When Rattrap holds up the Covenant of Primus in "Nemesis Part 1", Maximal writing can be seen. It reads "7 613", then "were cast out with him a cork one fork and a bowl of beans between them". This presumably follows the portion of the Covenant read by Primal, Datatrack 7.613: "And a mighty warrior came down from the sky, and a rainbow was upon his head, and his feet as pillars of fire. And the great dragon was cast out onto the earth, and his followers were cast out with him." The animators often inserted jokes into the Maximal text, so the canonical nature of this quote is dubious at best.
• Curiously, this same passage is nearly a carbon copy of Revelation 10:1 and 12:9 found in the Bible.
• The passage about Megatron is seemingly a combination of Revelation 1:8, as well as a reference to a fictional rendition of the Bible verse Ezekiel 25:17, as quoted by Samuel Jackson in the film Pulp Fiction. The same made-up passage also serves as the motto of Onyx Primal, because BotCon 1996 organizers Men in Black Productions really liked Pulp Fiction.
• The books are small. The guzzler-sized crews of the Ark and the Nemesis would probably have a hard time reading them.
• It has a standard-size (not Mini-) cassette inside.
• Energon Downshift's Cyber Key Code info states that he and his life partner "joined together under the Covenant of Primus", apparently referring to Cybertronian marriage rituals.