Quake (character)

Quake is the name of the ruler of the realm or realms where invasions from the slipgates occur. It may also be the codename for the "realms" themselves ("land of Quake") ruled over by Quake (as per Episode 1' s ending), which the hero is trying to reach.

Background
The hero (Ranger) learns that an enemy codenamed Quake is using his own slipgates to insert death squads inside Earth's bases to kill, steal, and kidnap. They have no idea where he's from, but the top scientist think Quake is not from Earth, but another dimension. They believe Quake's preparing to unleash his real army. The hero hears shouts at the base, and thinks "the Quake bastard works fast". He decides to fight his way through the base to use a Slipgate to reach Quake's hometown, he intended to get the asshole personally.

After defeating Chthon, and conquered the Dimension of Doomed, he was ready to complete his task to find a Rune of magic power that lied at the end of the each haunted land of Quake.

At the end of Episode 2, the hero learns that seemingly Shub-Niggurath is behind the invasion (leading to assumption that the creature is Quake itself). "Quake" is again brought up after the defeat of Shub-Niggurath. where it says you bested the power of Quake (at least seemingly). However, this isn't the end of Quake's attempted invasions of Earth.

In Scourge of Armagon, the hero has tried to return to a normal life, like from before the time he first heard the name "Quake", but finds only emptiness. Unfortunately a new invasion comes from slipgates, and the base commander warns that Quake's forces have again invaded, and infiltrated the base's weapons facility. The base commander orders everyone to evacuate, and ordered the base sealed to prevent Quake's forces from infiltrating further into Earth. The hero chooses not to cower waiting for Quakes' forces to arrive, but rather find a way of destroying the portal that allows Quake to perpetually send reinforcements. He discovers the base has been overrun with the twisted soldiers who follow Quake. Fighting his way through the bowels of the Research Facility, you discover the passage the followers of Quake used to enter the world. He enters through their slipgate. After fighting his way to Mortum's Keep he finds himself in a lavender liquid sea. He is held telepathically helpless by Armagon, Quake's general, and master of the realm he found himself in. Armagon is angry at his attempts to stop his invasion of earth, and transports him to another part of the realm.

After defeating Armagon, the hero finds a rift back to earth, returning to HQ. It says the "The minions of Quake have once gain fallen before your mighty hand. Is this the last you will see of Quake's Hellions? Only time will tell. Shortly after he discovers Command Central is quiet. He discovers a dead enemy with a charred book, the The Book of Common Prayer. It talks about their Master Quake, had brought forth from the void of order and light, a new existence of glorious darkness. He had fashioned a world of chaos, violence and pain. He controlled the past, present and future, and set up Ancient Guardians to tend the Chain of Time. The followers come before "Him" to pay their age-old debit, and pray their thanks for what He had brought to pass. To their Master Quake, they kneel before the Mark, to celebrate the The Day of Dissolution. Day 57, 1215 A.Q. ("After/Anno Quake"). He decides to enter a slip gate again to end things once and for all.

Fighting his way through another realm, he defeats the Overlord, and asks the question "Has Quakes oppressive reign ended?". Then his mind is filled with telepathic thoughts of others: "Forgiveness can yet be granted: Our Master remains to absolve your sins against his Chosen. Fall down upon your knees - pray for Quake' mercy.

Continuing to fight further he defeats Quake's High Priest, and fights his way through the realm to defeat the Dragon. After which Quake's Temporal Teleporter yielded to the hero's assault. The hero enters a time pod to return to his own reality, and realizes he has halted Quake's plans for the Dissolution of Eternity.

After halting Quake's plans for the Dissolution of Eternity, Ranger seeks vacation. However, Quake sends Chthon and large black spaceships to capture and research on people from the realms of the Dimension of the Machine. Ranger then jumps back into action and collects the five runes of the Machinists, Blacksmiths, Astrologers, Cultists, and Stonemasons before defeating Chthon yet again, and becoming more powerful than anything Quake can throw at him.

In Quake III Arena, Ranger mentions Quake again; "I'm surrounded by Quake minions. Laying down suppressing fire."

Behind the scenes
But is Quake defeated? In the unofficial fan pack Abyss of Pandemonium, after the hero defeats corpse of Quake's highest minion, Legond. She wanted to take revenge because you were the cause of the 'destruction of Quake, the center of her world'. The hero rests, at least for now...

Trivia
According to Sandy Peterson, 'Quake' originally was the name of John Carmack's Advanced Dungeons and Dragons character in his campaign play of a scenery. Sandy Peterson describes the character as a warrior with giant earth shattering hammer and a cube orbiting him to seek out enemies. It seems this design partly reflected later separately with Quake's expansion pack Quake Mission Pack 1: Scourge of Armagon by including Mjolnir and Quake 2's expansion pack Quake II Mission Pack: Ground Zero by introducing new power-ups.