Q

The being known as Q is an extremely powerful and ancient god-entity that has taken an apparent interest in humanity.

Q and other members of the Q Continuum claim to be omniscient and omnipotent, and by human standards, this would appear to be true. With the extreme age of the being known as Q, confirmation of any of the following history is impossible. It is based on accounts given by Q to various Starfleet officers such as Captains Jean-Luc Picard and Kathryn Janeway, Commander Data, Lieutenant Tom Paris, and Ensign Harry Kim.

However, it is important to remember that the people of the Gamma Quadrant world of Brax refered to Q as "the god of lies", and that anything he says is suspect.

"Early" Life
Q claims to have come into existence - or been born - about 7000000, 000000, 1200 years ago(TNG novels Q-Zone and I, Q).

Early in Q's existence (on the order of billions of years ago), Q in an act of defiance toward the Continuum, fell in with a cosmic "bad crowd". After an encounter with the time travel portal known as the Guardian of Forever, Q encountered the malevolent extra-dimensional entity known as 0. After bringing 0 into this plane, 0 and Q became traveling companions.

They soon gained the enimity of the cloud-like being known as the Coulalkritous (Later known as the Calamarain). The cloud entity would carry its grudge against Q and 0 for eons, well into the modern era.

With Q's assistance, 0 soon used the Guardian of Forever to bring into this plane the beings known as Gorgan, The One, and (*). Among the many atrocities commited by the group in the following decades included the destruction of the ancient T'Kon Empire.

The groups misdeeds soon came to the attention of the Q-Continuum. The Continuum hunted the group down and banished 0 beyond the galactic barrier, The One at the center of the galaxy, and sent the substantially depowered (*) and Gorgon fleeing into unknown parts of the Milky Way Galaxy.

The entities known as Gorgan, (*), and The One were all eventually confronted and defeated by the legendary Starfleet captain, James T. Kirk. As punishment for his mis-deeds, Q was assigned to study the beings of the planet Earth, which was badly damaged during the conflict with 0 and his cohorts.(TNG novels: The Q Continuum, Book 1: Q-Space, Book 2: Q-Zone, Book 3: Q-Strike; TOS episodes: And the Children Shall Lead, Day of the Dove; movie: Star Trek V: The Final Frontier)

Approximately 200,000 years ago, Q and the Continuum became interested in the race known as the Iconians, and shared with them enough secrets that they were able to create their legendary network of Gateways. (Star Trek Gateways book seven, VOY short story "Into The Queue")

Q, and all other of the Continuum must attend a college of sorts called Q U, that Q described to Tom Paris and Harry Kim as, "an organization that provided opportunities for the Q to examine and refine their "Q-ness" under the auspices of the most exteemed Q in the Continuum." (VOY novel, String Theory book three: Evolution)

1999
At one point, the Federation utilized the Guardian of Forever to send Ambassador Spock to planet Earth in the year 1999, when it was determined that divine intervention was needed to keep an asteroid from destroying the planet. Spock encountered Q, and convinced him to use his power to move the asteroid back 30 years distance from the planet. (Star Trek audio plays, Spock vs. Q and Spock vs. Q: The Sequel)

(Spock travelled back from a point in the timeline after the Enterprise's first encounter with Q, as Spock had studied reports by Picard, Data, and Commander William T. Riker about Q before embarking on his journey.)

The Enterprise-D (2364-2370)
The first known modern encounter (barring time-travel) with Q was in 2364, when he put humanity, in the person of USS Enterprise-D captain Jean-Luc Picard, on trial for the "crime" of being a "savage, child race". (TNG episode and novelization: "Encounter at Farpoint") The following year, Q transported the Enterprise to Borg territory in the Delta Quadrant, to impress upon them the unknown dangers of the galaxy. (TNG episode "Q Who?")

2366
Q would appear to the Enterprise crew on a fairly regular basis in the years that followed. During one such encounter in 2366, Betazoid Ambassador Lwaxana Troi developed romantic feelings toward Q. Q used this to his advantage to perform a cruel experiment on the nature of the human emotion called 'love'.

Q briefly shared his vast power with Lwaxana, and when he was finished with his experiment, he tried to take the power back without success. Lwaxana used her power to thoroughly humiliate Q as he had humiliated her. It was later revealed that another member of the continuum had prevented Q from removing Lwaxana's powers as a way to teach Q a lesson about interfering in the lives of mortals. (TNG novel: Q-in-Law)

2370
In 2370, Q came to Picard to ask him for help dealing with the young Q who called himself Trelane. Trelane had seemingly gone insane and had caused three distinct timelines to merge, causing considerable temporal havok.

Trelane managed to discorporate Q, and sent him back to the beginning of his own existence. Q spent the next several eons regathering his power and re-teaching himself how to phase himself back into reality.

Upon arriving back at the scene of Trelane's breakdown, Q instructed Picard to confront Trelane on the world Terminus. There, Trelane challenged Picard to a duel. Unknown to Trelane, the sword Picard used was imbued with the essence of Q himself. A thrust by Picard with this sword through the body of Trelane caused him to discorporate, ending the threat. (TNG novel: Q-Squared)

2374
Q is believed to have been involved when the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-E) encountered a team of super-powered mutants from the early 21st century of an alternate timeline of planet Earth in the year 2374. (TNG/X-Men novel: Planet X) Soon after, Q appeared on the Enterprise-E with his wife and child- both members of the Q-Continuum- when an experiment by Betazoid scientist Lem Faal to create an artificial wormhole in order to breech the barrier at the edge of the universe threatened to release 0 from his confinement.

0 manipulated Faal into completing his experiments and was unleashed upon the galaxy once more. Q did not have the power to take on 0 by himself. He convinced the Calamarain that what happened all of those millenia ago was the doing of 0, and that they had a common enemy. Then Q joined his essence with that of the Calamarain, enabling them to defeat 0 together. (TNG novels: The Q Continuum Book 3: Q-Strike)

2375
In early 2375, Q enlisted the aid of Voyager officers Tom Paris and Harry Kim when he needed assistance finding the missing Keeper of the Light without the rest of the Continuum or the Nacene finding out that he had lost him. (VOY novel, String Theory book three: Evolution)

Later that year, Q enlisted the aid of Jean-Luc Picard and Commander Data, when it seemed as if all of the multi-verse itself were about to be sucked into a cosmic sinkhole. Q's defiance in the face of The End Of Everything was part of what saved the cosmos from destruction. Furthermore, in the final face of obliteration of existence, Q, the proud and powerful being from Q-Continuum who never believed there are forces beyond the Q-Continuum, also had a revelation that seemed to conclude that it is not the Q that have total power and control over the universe, but that some other ultimate supreme force or being is at work and even beyond even the Q.(TNG novel: I, Q)

2376
Two members of the crew of the USS Excalibur (NCC-26517-A), Lieutenants Mark McHenry and Zak Kebron, encountered Q on the planet Liten in the year 2376. Q claimed that with his new responsibilities as husband and father, that he missed his old self and was toying with the people of Liten simply for old times sake.(New Frontier: novel, Excalibur: Requiem)

Soon After, Q made one of his several appearances to USS Voyager (NCC-74656) captain, Kathryn Janeway, after she stepped through an Iconian Gateway. Before sending her back to Voyager, Q explained to Janeway that it was the Q who gave the Iconians their incredible teleportation technology over 200,000 years previously. (Star Trek Gateways book seven, VOY short story "Into The Queue")

2379
Q is believed to be responsible for the destruction of the gelatinous realm of the species known as the Teuthis and the Bolgar in late 2379. (New Frontier novel: Missing In Action)

2380
Q will be appearing in the TNG novel Q & A, by Keith R.A. DeCandido, to be released in 2007.