Mona Sax

"Max. We gotta stop meeting like this."

―Mona Sax

Mona Sax was a contract killer who operated in New York City. She was also romantically involved with Max Payne during the Cleaner Case. She is a minor character in Max Payne 1 and the deuteragonist of Max Payne 2.

Biography[]

Crime Life[]

Not much is known about Mona's life except that she had a twin sister, Lisa who married a Mafia Don, Angelo Punchinello.

She hated Angelo for abusing and torturing her sister and was willing to accept a hit contract on him. It is unknown how long she worked as an assassin. She worked with many parties that got her involved in bigger cases.

Contract with Aesir[]

"Mona Sax, Lisa's evil twin."

―Mona introducing herself.

Mona's target during the Valkyr Case is Angelo Punchinello, hired by Nicole Horne to cut her ties with the Mafia and removing any evidence. She headed to RagnaRock, the nightclub to find Jack Lupino, instead meeting a rogue undercover cop who shoots Lupino's corpse multiple times.

Mona and Max have a hostile confrontation at gunpoint. She explains that Angelo is responsible for Alex's death and Max's frameup. Despite their common enemy and cooldown, she drugs Max to ensure that Lisa won't get hurt during Max's rampage.

Mona heads to the manor and attempts to kill Angelo, but is overpowered and caught by his bodyguards. The Trio torture Mona, but she manages to escape and kill some mobsters along the way. Because of this, Nicole and her Killer Suits personally deal with Punchinello.

She is seen again at Aesir as she is still under Nicole's contract and meets up with Max at the elevator. Nicole orders Mona to kill Max, but Mona refuses as she thinks Max is a 'nice guy'. Nicole repays her by having one of the Killer Suits shoot her in the head. Mona is presumed dead, but her body is missing from the elevator after Max returns, hinting at her survival. She escapes Aesir and avoids the cops. She still has the bullet in her head from the shootout.

Involvement with the Inner Circle[]

Between 2001 and 2003, she most likely continues her job and is hired by various deep-pocketed employers. She soon gets herself involved in a civil war as she is hired by Alfred Woden, head of the Inner Circle, to fight on his side against Vladimir Lem and the Cleaners. She is tasked with protecting any Inner Circle members on Woden's side while killing members who are on Lem's side. Before Max's involvement, she shoots Lem's arm during the murder of Senator Gate.

She meets Max once more in the gun workshop. She visits Max in his apartment, warning him about the Cleaners.

She leaves her phone number at Max's office and gives Max the address of her home, the Address Unknown Funhouse in Coney Island. Mona is showering when Max sneaks into her home and traverses the funhouse. She explains that the Inner Circle is killing anyone who knows of their existence and offers to introduce him to her Inner Circle contact. Max suspects that she isn't being entirely honest. They head to Upper East Side apartments where many Inner Circle members live, including her contact. However, the Cleaners arrive first and kill the Inner Circle members. Mona operates the security cameras and elevators while Max deals with the Cleaners. They find their contact dead and Mona tells Max to escape. The NYPD arrives at the scene, and Mona is arrested for being a suspect in Senator Gate's murder while Max is reprimanded for his actions.

Mona is the seen in the interrogation room for a witness to identify the murderer of Senator Gates. The witness places Mona at the scene and she is incarcerated in the station cells. Max visits Mona in the cells and she warns him again about the Cleaners. The station comes under attack and Mona avoids them by hiding under the bed in her cell. She escapes back to her hideout.

Mona and Max meet again, their long-suppressed attraction they held for each other exploding in an intimate moment, but they are interrupted by the attacking Cleaners, who Max had unknowingly led there. The two fugitives together fight off the Cleaners, with Max entering the Cleaners' van. Max still has the earpiece from the condo and is contacted by Mona. With this, Mona enters the Cleaners' hideout from the other side with Max attacking inside. She fought some of the Cleaners in the hideout and protected Max with her sniper rifle after he exited from an explosion. After clearing some retreating Cleaners, she meets with Max but with Valarie in the scene pointing her gun. Mona reveal that Valarie is working with the Inner Circle while Valarie denies. They both ready their guns, but Max quickly shoots Valarie to allow Mona to escape. She soon flees the scene with her location unknown.

Final Work and Death[]

Max attempt to find Mona but to no avail. After shooting his way through Vlad's restaurant, Max figures that in order to find Mona, he would have to find Vlad, and the only one who might know is Vinnie Gognitti, as he is Vlad's enemy and may be working with Mona. It is revealed that Mona has Vinnie weakening Vlad's forces and like Max, doesn't trust the underboss. Mona is at the funhouse, ready to kill Vlad, but there is a change of plans when an explosion occurs, and she rushes in to rescue Max. She later is able to rescue him and tries to convince him to leave the mess. However, Max decides to end the matter and together with Mona heads to the manor to stop Lem and the Cleaners.

Inside the manor, they fight their way through the remaining Cleaner commandos with the goal of finding either Vlad or Woden. They reach Woden's panic room, where Mona, with Max unable to open the door, steps in and unlocks it using a discrete button in a serpent, confirming that she is indeed working with the Senator. Inside, Mona betrays Max by pistol-whipping and disarming him with Woden watching over the camera; however, she is unable to eliminate him and drops her gun, causing Lem to fire at her behind her back while she tries to embrace Max, who holds her while she drops to the ground.

While Max struggles with Lem, eventually eliminating him, Mona remains on the ground and bleeds out from the inflicted gunshot wounds. In the final scene, Max kisses her for the final time while she passes away, uttering her final words: "God! I turned out to be such a damsel in distress", before being closed in on by the NYPD.

Competing the game on Dead on Arrival grants an alternate^[1] ending in which Mona survives.

Legacy[]

At Golgotha Cemetery, whilst paying his respects to his wife and child's shared grave^[2], Max mentions how he had "never quite forgiven [himself] for the Mona business", indicating a sense of guilt over his attraction to Mona during their interactions. However he knows that this guilt was just grief talking in him, "the insanity that comes with losing the life you had built."

Three months after leaving the United States, whilst escaping the Crachá Preto^[3], there can be a brief moment of diversion in which Max finds a TV that can be turned on and will eventually play a commercial for Hotel Mona, with its slogan of "An unforgettable place to stay" being voiced in English by a woman who sounds exactly like Mona. Unnerved by this realization, Max will shut off the TV, thinking that "[he] must be losing it".

Personality[]

Mona Sax is an efficient stone-cold contract killer; who when in doubt, kills. The femme fatale's lack of remorse has led to a body count second to only that of Max Payne himself. The only exception to this is Max, towards whom she points her gun but does not fire. From the very first game, it is apparent that Mona has strong feelings for Max.

When Mona first meets Max, she proclaims that "Lisa's the damsel in distress, I'm the professional." Her last words reflect this, as she confesses to being a "damsel in distress" herself.