M'Shen
M'Shen was the Callidus assassin who killed the rebel Primarch Night Haunter.
Biography
During the early Horus Heresy, when the Officio Assassinorum was still attempting to kill Horus through their standard method of sending lone operatives, Siress Callidus suggested sending M'Shen to kill Horus after the failure of the Venenum Assassin Tobeld, referring to her as "...one of the best of my clade...". Ultimately, however, the Master of Assassins decided to instead assemble the first ever Execution Force (a team made up of assassins from multiple clades).[3a] M'Shen was not chosen as the Callidus' representative (that role instead being assigned to Koyne).[3b]
By the end of the Siege of Terra, M'Shen was only one of two surviving Callidus Assasins on Terra. Either her or this other assassin were used by Khalid Hassan to coerce Master of the Administratum Simion Pentasian into granting him a seat on the Grand Council of Reconstruction and unite the High Lords as a counterbalance to the Primarchs.[5]
Later, M'Shen was assigned to assassinate the Traitor Primarch Konrad Curze. Evidentially he already knew he was the target of an assassin, and only allowed himself to be killed to "vindicate" his rebellion against the Imperium, and show that he was right to destroy Nostramo. She took many of his precious items as personal trinkets, and cut off his head to take to her masters. She later declared to the Soul Hunter she would be remembered as Godslayer. On her way back to her ship, she briefly fought Soul Hunter, but made it back to her ship.[1]
Ultimately M'Shen was brutally killed and mutilated by the Soul Hunter as he pursued her from Tsagualsa. Her death was foreseen by the Night Haunter, who although he ordered his legion to allow her to escape, knew that first the Soul Hunter, and then the rest of the legion would disobey his final order.[1] However, the vid-log built into M´Shen's vambraces somehow managed to reach Terra, showing the screaming gallery and containing the alleged final words of Night Haunter.[2]
Trivia
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- M'shen is likely a reference to the real-life actor Martin Sheen, whose character, Captain Benjamin Willard, is sent to assassinate rebel Colonel Walter E. Kurtz in the film Apocalypse Now (who himself is an inspiration for the Primarch Konrad Curze).
Sources
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- 1: Soul Hunter (Novel),
[Help] - 2: Index Astartes II, pgs. 26-27
- 3: Nemesis (Novel):
- 4: The Horus Heresy: Legions
- 5: Ashes of the Imperium (Novel) - Chapter 39
