Vok

The Vok are a race of fictional aliens from the Transformers universe.

Beast Wars
In Transformers history, the Vok were mysterious and powerful aliens who had evolved beyond the corporeal world. Their base of operations—be it another planet, location in space, or entire dimension—is dubbed "Nexus Zero". The Vok's influence was present on prehistoric Earth during the Beast Wars period of Earth's history (approximately 70,000 BC). They have had some previous dealings with Transformers, or at least the Tripredacus Council, who know of their power and fear them.

During this time, they were running an experiment on Earth, for reasons yet to be revealed. The Vok were responsible for a second "moon" in orbit around Earth which was actually a monitoring station/planet killer, the seeding of the massive amounts of energon on the planet and the creation of various monuments on pre-historic Earth including a collection of standing stones, the floating island, the stone square and a hidden "Metalhunter" ship. Additionally, the second golden disk that served as a master key to the above monuments was hidden on the planet. After the destruction of one of their probes and the Floating Island and the sending of a signal prior to its destruction, they investigated remotely, and found the planet infested with the time-travelled Predacons and Maximals. Taking the form of Unicron and rendering judgement, they turned their "planetbuster" on the Earth, which began detonating the massive deposits of energon on the planet, only to have the planetbuster destroyed by Optimus Primal in a transwarp explosion.

Alien influence was next felt when Airazor and Tigatron tripped an alien device located in a lush valley. The device, in the shape of a peculiar plant, generated a signal beam that shot the two into space. When the Maximals and Predacons came to investigate, another signal emerged from the depths of space, converting the plant into the Metalhunter base, which Megatron then used the Golden Disk to control, only to have both artifacts be destroyed in a Transwarp explosion. However, the Vok were unaware of this, and believed their experiment to have been wiped clean. However, when they became aware of the continued existence of the Transformers and Megatron's increasingly dangerous attempts to interfere with history, they chose to combine the bodies of Airazor and Tigatron into the demigod Tigerhawk, and possess the body, using it with the intent of passing judgement on Megatron. They were unable to pass judgement on Megatron, as Optimus Primal tried to prevent them from destroying Megatron, due to him carrying the original Megatron's spark inside his body, which meant that destroying him would alter history as much as Megatron plotted to. He failed as Tigerhawk opened the earth underneath him. Tigerhawk was however felled by Tarantulas' devices—Tarantulus being an agent of the Tripredacus Council who knew much about the Vok. In an attempt to gain Tigerhawk's demigod powers, Tarantulas sought to extract them from his body. Instead, the Vok left the body, entering Tarantulas', just as a weapon was misfired on him, killing them both and leaving the minds of Tigatron and Airazor to share the combined Tigerhawk body.

Origins
Beyond the fact that they were aliens, no real origin or explanation for the Vok was given in the animated series. The two story editors of Beast Wars, Bob Forward and Larry DiTillio have their own explanations. Forward views the Vok as the ultimate evolution of either mankind, or sentient life in general, while DiTillio conceived of an origin more closely tied to Transformer history - he thought of the Vok as the evolved, purified version of The Swarm, a destructive, dark byproduct of Transformer reproduction, as seen in the Transformers: Generation 2 comics. At the conclusion of that series, the Swarm was purified by Optimus Prime and the Matrix. Since in Primeval Dawn the Vok refer to themselves as being trapped in darkness and without purpose until seeing the Matrix, the latter would seem to be the more accurate, although it is more than likely that they are merely yet another alien race in the Transformers Universe and should be viewed as such.

3H Enterprises
In the BotCon Beast Wars: Primeval Dawn comic, the Vok later return to Earth to create defenders against an undead Tarantulas. Splitting the recovered Spark of Tigerhawk, they revived Tigatron and Airazor in transmetal bodies. They then use the Matrix of Leadership to bring to life the suit used to control Optimal Optimus. This warrior is Primal Prime, the Prime of Justice, Living Matrix, and Emissary of the Vok. Primal and his companions must then gather new allies to face down Tarantulas and the apparently alive Ravage, who was in fact recovered and rebuilt by the Vok. The two Vok that had come from Tigerhawk into Tarantulas' body were also apparently corrupted by Tarantulas, giving him powers far beyond his old abilities.

Transformers: Animated
In the Transformers Animated episode "SUV: Society of Ultimate Villainy", the Vok and their homeworld of Nexus Zero are briefly mentioned by the Decepticon arms dealer Swindle, who refers to their race as "nice creatures".