Guiding Hand


 * The Guiding Hand is a pantheon from Cybertron.

The Guiding Hand are supposedly five ancient deities created by Primus. They are featured in one of the more prominent myths regarding the creation of the planet Cybertron and its native people.

Members

 * Primus, the Light-giver and Life-giver
 * Mortilus, the Death-bringer
 * Solomus, Wisdom Incarnate
 * Epistemus, Knowledge Personified
 * Adaptus, Blessed with an Infinity of Shapes

2005 IDW continuity
According to some legends, Twelve million years ago, Primus was the first Transformer on Cybertron. He was marked by his unique serial number of "000000001" and the ability to generate the miraculous photonic crystals that made up the Matrix of Leadership, and capable of housing sparks. Primus was followed by four others like him, and together they formed the group that would become known as the Guiding Hand. Cybertronian mythology would later tell that the singular Primus became the Hand by "split[ting] his essence" into five vessels, although it remains unknown how closely this tale aligns with real events. These first five robots would go on to see the hot spots ignite, giving rise to the first generation of Cybertronian life, the group of Transformers that later generations of Cybertronians would remember as the "Knights of Cybertron."

Under the benevolent guidance of the Hand, the Knights of Cybertron were supposedly responsible for building the first of many Transformer civilizations to come, a golden age of peace and prosperity — and one that would ultimately come to an end during the disastrous event known as the "God War." Worried that their increasingly utopian lifestyle would ultimately result in the stagnation of the species and prevent their ascension to the "Higher Realms," Adaptus urged the other members of the Guiding Hand to take up arms and wage war against the galaxy. When Primus refused, Adaptus waged war against his comrades; though the four allies were able to defeat Adaptus, he retreated to Luna One and blasted the planet with an electromagnetic pulse that would leave the inhabitants of Cybertron confused and disoriented while he refitted the moon with planetary engines to make his escape. As a result, the four members of the Guiding Hand were robbed of their identities and memories, giving rise to the neurological condition known as "information creep", and as Cybertronain civilization reasserted itself, the four would inherit conventional names, believing themselves no different from the many other Transformers on Cybertron.

Over the years, the original account of the Guiding Hand would become distorted by myths and legends. Notably, these stories would remember Mortilus as the treacherous member of the Hand, whose betrayal had ripped Cybertron's first moon asunder; through clever tricks and traps, he was able to reduce his foes into their most basic essences: the Matrix, the brain module, the transformation cog, and Vector Sigma, the most important artifacts in Cybertronian mythology. Mortilus's "death" had supposedly rendered the Cybertronian race immortal; an alternate retelling espoused in the Keening Texts, however, claimed that all five gods had perished in the battle and reunited in the next life to create the Afterspark.

At some point afterwards, the Knights of Cybertron departed the planet so as to spread "enlightenment" across the cosmos, marching beneath the banner of Adaptus. Eons later, it was believed by some that each deity had one Knight clan formed in their honor.