Michelle Payne

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Michelle Payne (May 12th 1964 - August 22nd 1998) is the wife of the New York City Police Department detective Max Payne, and the mother of Rose Payne.

At some point at the early 1990s, Michelle began to work at a District Attorney's office. One day during the mid 1990s, while walking near an ally in New York City, Michelle was assaulted by two men, who attempted to steal her bag. She was then saved by the man who would become her husband, Max.

Following their first meeting, the two began to hang out together, drinking at bars, until they got married six months later, and had their honeymoon in Montauk. Nine years later, their daughter, Rose, was born.

Whlie working at the District Attorney's office, she found some documents related to a canceled government project, sent to her, by a mysterious senator. These documents were belong to the CEO of Aesir Corporation, Nicole Horne who saw Michelle as a threat and vowed to eliminate her.

On August 22nd 1998, Horne sent three valkyr subjects to kill both Michelle and her child Rose. They broke into the Payne house, and killed both Michelle and Rose. Max arrived at the time to the house, and killed the valkyr-addicted men, finding Michelle's corpse at their bedroom and breaks down to cries.

Max vowed to find the murder, and for the next three years, he investigates anyone who had to do with the valkyr. With the help of Alfred Woden, Max finds Horne, and kills her at the roof of the Aesir Corporation HQ, avenging Michelle.

Michelle's death kept hunting Max even after his revenge at Horne was done, and his affair with assassin Mona Sax did not help the situation. He finally accepted her death later in his life.

Biography

Early life

Michelle Payne was born on May 12, 1964. At some point during the mid 1990's, she began to work at a District Attorney's office.

Meeting her husband

"I thought I would be her knight in shining armor."

―Max on saving Michelle

One day in the mid 1990s, at Hell's Kitchen , Manhatten, Michelle was assaulted by two robbers who tried to steal her bag, but she was saved by a young NYPD officer called Max Payne, who had beaten up the robbers.

The two began to hang out together, with Michelle often teased Max, and married six months after metting each other. The two went to Montauk on their honeymoon. Nine months later, On February 4 1998, she gave birth to Rose.

Work at the D.A.

"An army dossier found its way to my desk yesterday. Valhalla? Isn't that about Vikings? I tried to tell Max about that, nut he was busy, that cute frown on his brow. Guess it's nothing just a mix-up at the courier servie..."

―Michelle in her diary, on her discovery.

Prior to 1998, Michelle Payne worked part-time at a District Attorney's office where she once came upon the Project Valhalla documents that Alfred Woden had sent to incriminate Nicole Horne. Michelle tried to tell Max about her find, but he was too busy to hear about that.

It was finding these documents that eventually led Horne to disperse several Valkyr test subjects into the Payne residence to kill Michelle and her family and seal the evidence leak a few days later, a grave mistake that would seal Horne's fate three years later.

Death

Main article: Payne residence massacre

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

―Max upon finding Michelle dead.

Michelle found dead in her bedroom by Max.

One 1998 summer evening, three green jumpsuit-wearing Valkyr-pumped maniacs break into the Payne family's New Jersey house and wreck havoc to it, destroying property and holding the terrified Michelle in her bedroom.

Her husband Max arrives at the Payne residence at the moment of its invasion and hears her screaming in terror for help. Although the detective rushes for her aid and kills the invaders in the progress, he arrives too late and, to his terror, finds Michelle and Rose shot dead.

Legacy

"We're only being married a short time.By now, she had been dead longer than I know her."

―Max Payne near Michelle's grave, 2012.

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Michelle Payne and her daughter's deaths are what sets Max Payne to begin his journey to get revenge on those who are responsible. He joins the Drug Enforcement Administration to build the Valkyr trafficking case. After three years of investigation, he starts to work undercover in the Punchinello crime family.

Michelle and Rose were buried in the Golgotha Cemetery, in a single grave. In 2012, Max comes to the cemetery to pay respects to his deceased family, before leaving New Jersey to Sao Paulo, following a job offer from an old friend.

A few hours before the events leading for his escape from New Jersey, Max set at Walton's Bar in Hoboken, and remembered much of his life prior to Michelle's death, including their first meeting, marriage, and daughter's birth.

Personality and traits

During her years prior to marring Max, Michelle was a rather talkative and witty woman, and seems to enjoy teasing her future husband in various ways. She was also more careless and relaxed, freely talks about various subjects. She was very sarcastic person, cynically laughing on her husband's name, which is a pon on the word 'Max(imum) Pain".

Following her marriage to Max, she became more serious and responsible person, devoted to her role in the family as mother, and deeply cared about her husband and daughter.

When she met and married Max, she had a rather shorter and spikey hair, similar to her husband's during this time. By the time of her child's birth, she still had a similar hairstyle, and by the time of her death, she had a bit longer and wavy hair. Her hair color was brown, though a family picture shows a blonde hair, hinting that she dyed her hair to blonde and then back to brown during the six months between the birth of her child to her death.

Max Payne's nightmares

Michelle in Max's nightmares.

Payne hears Michelle's voice many times during his haunting nightmares. When Max finds her diary in one nightmare he has, he reads aloud that Michelle had merely stumbled across the Project Valhalla documents and wasn't fully aware of the matter.

Michelle Payne appears in Max's nightmares during his 2003 Cleaner Case. In one nightmare, the NYPD detective forsakes Michelle in a bid to win Mona Sax. He immediately regrets the decision. Michelle's second appearance is in a dream Payne has after he has killed Vladimir Lem and witnessed Sax's death. In it, Max seems to finally make peace with her passing, as he mutters: "I had a dream of my wife. She was dead, but it was all right."

Trivia

• According to Max in "Hoboken Blues", Michelle used to drink gin and tonic.

Gallery

Payne family in 1998.

Appearances

• Max Payne
  • Prologue (The American Dream) _{(voice and corpse only)}

• Max Payne 2
  • Prologue (The Darkness Inside) (Mentioned only)
  • The Depths of My Brain _{(in a dream)}
  • That Old Familiar Feeling _{(in a dream)}
• Max Payne 3
  • Ain't No Reprievement Gonna Be Found (Gravestone only)
• Max Payne 3 comics
  • "After the Fall" (Appears in flashback(s))
  • "Hoboken Blues" (Appears in flashback(s))
  • "Fight and Flight" (Appears in flashback(s))

External links

• Max Payne 3 - Cemetery Map in Multiplayer

Max Payne characters