Vindicare Temple

"Exitus Acta Probat; The outcome justifies the deed."

- Dictatus Vindicare, the maxim of the Vindicare Temple

The Vindicare Temple is one of the temples of the Officio Assassinorum. The motto of the temple is Exitus Acta Probat, "the Outcome Justifies the Deed." Vindicare operatives are the most skilled snipers in the Imperium of Man and are usually directed to assassinate targets who are believed to have been possessed by daemonic entities or to have been corrupted by the Ruinous Powers of Chaos.

History
Like the other temples of the Officio Assassinorum, the Vindicare Temple was originally the Vindicare Clade, created some time during the Great Crusade in the late 30th Millennium at the behest of Malcador the Sigillite, the Regent of Terra, who was secretly the Grand Master of Assassins, and its first Director Primus, who was known only as Sire Vindicare. The Vindicare Clade was established in a secret location on Terra at the direction of the Grand Master of Assassins and was tasked like all of the other Assassin Clades with killing those who opposed the formation of the Imperium of Man and the will of the Emperor of Mankind. During the Horus Heresy it provided members to the secret Execution Force that contained six Assassins from all six Clades of the Officio Assassinorum to try and eliminate the Warmaster Horus. This mission ultimately failed, much to Mankind's ill fortune.

Operatives
The most prominent feature of the Vindicare Temple of the Officio Assassinorum is that it trains its subjects to near-perfection in the art of marksmanship; they aim to kill the Emperor's worst enemies with a single bullet. In addition to the art of sniping, Vindicare Assassins are also trained in stealth and evasion techniques in order that they may get into the most advantageous position from which to take their shot and to successfully elude capture and disappear once their target is eliminated. The necessity for these skills is determined by the fact that a kill can only be made from the best position. Indeed, Vindicare Assassins have been known to occupy a position for days, or even weeks, before taking their shot.

The Vindicare are often employed in eliminating individuals for the Imperium who are suspected of harboring daemonic entities. The hope is that they can eliminate the host before the daemon is able to manifest itself on the material plane. Characters of great charisma, many false prophets and false messiahs among them, have fallen to the Vindicare's bullet, most commonly whilst they are preaching their false beliefs to their followers and spreading heresy against the Imperium. Upon this swift, brutal, and yet simple death, the erstwhile followers of such a heretic soon become disheartened and afraid. Countless heresies against the Imperium have been prevented with a single, well-aimed shot where legions of men would have failed.

Exitus Rifle and Pistol
The signature weapon of the Vindicare Temple, this rifle is amongst the finest examples of Imperial weaponsmithing. Hand-crafted by a Magos-Artisan of the Adeptus Mechanicus, each Exitus rifle is part of a matched set—both pistol and rifle customised to the specifications of the individual Assassin. The Exitus weapons contain sophisticated Machine Spirits and utilise ammunition constructed from special heavy-gravity alloys to penetrate nearly all forms of known protection. All Exitus weapons incorporate a silencer and a selector switch. The Exitus rifle has a built-in telescopic sight.

Vindicare Assassins are also issued a high-powered weapon known as an Exitus Pistol for close-quarters work, if necessary. The Exitus Pistol is a masterpiece of craftsmanship, a weapon as elegant as it is deadly. Unlike the larger rifle, the Exitus Pistol is mainly considered a backup weapon for a Vindicare Assassin, primarily used in those rare circumstances where the Assassin is discovered, cornered, or in need of rapid-fire capability. Under those circumstances, the Exitus Pistol performs admirably, and more than a few Vindicare Assassins owe their lives to this weapon. The Exitus Pistol has a built-in silencer and is among the highest quality weapons crafted by the artificers of the Imperium of Man.

Exitus Ammunition
All Exitus ammunition (including all special rounds) contain miniaturised Cogitator targeting-spirits (guidance computers) that make them nearly impossible to avoid. Exitus rounds can also be programmed to self-destruct. The rounds are disintegrated, consumed as if destroyed by a virus, and leave no trace behind.

Vindicare Assassins are normally issued special ammunition when sent on an assignment. These unusual rounds are very rare, and each is extremely difficult and time-consuming to craft. Therefore, the Assassin is usually given a single round of each type. Occasionally, other special rounds (such as the Hyphosphus Incendiaries) are issued in their place. The ammunition described below may only be utilised by the Exitus Rifle and the Exitus Pistol:
 * Shell Breaker Round - A Shell Breaker Round is used by Vindicare Assassins for bypassing a high-value target's personal energy shielding, such as a Conversion Field. This round is specially-treated with a psychically-charged imprint, and contains a complex circuit of anti-phase technology that is little understood even by the Tech-priests of the Mechanicus. The Shell Breaker is employed against a variety of targets such as the protective Warp fields generated by a Tyranid Zoanthrope, an Eldar Warlock's Rune Armour and the psychic shields often employed by powerful psykers.
 * Hellfire Round- The Hellfire Round has devastating effects on organic matter, specifically the Tyranids.The core and tip of the standard Exitus round are replaced with a vial of mutagenic acid. Thousands of armour-piercing micro-needles inject the target with this acid upon impact and the needles pierce the victim's flesh, pumping the acid into the target, eating away flesh and metal alike with horrific speed.
 * Turbo-penetrator Round - The Turbo-penetrator Round is a hypervelocity, Adamantine-jacketed bullet surrounding a special magno-sealed flux needle. These special rounds are renowned for their ability to pierce nearly any armour, and the hypervelocity round wreaks havoc upon any target, often by the secondary effects of its phasing passage through the target’s molecular structure.

Vindicare Stealth Suit
This item of Vindicare wargear appears as a matte-black bodyglove, specially fitted for the individual Assassin. The Vindicare Temple has a long-standing pact with the Adeptus Mechanicus to craft these exquisite suits, each one combining Cameleoline-laced materials with a complex version of "synskin" to allow its wearer to blend in with his environment. This material bonds with the Assassin’s body, enhancing his reflexes and protecting him from poisons, gases, and other hazards of the battlefield. Each suit is supple and silent, allowing the Assassin to move with perfect freedom whilst still retaining its protective and chameleon qualities. It should be noted that the wargear of a Vindicare Assassin is often gene-coded to that individual and no other, and that it would take a great deal of effort to adjust the gene-coding for another user.

Vindicare Spy Mask
Issued to Imperial Assassins of the Vindicare Temple, this item's systems are incredibly advanced and sophisticated. It is said that the design for the Spy Mask is little-understood even by the Tech-priests of Mars. The Spy Mask contains cartridges of concentrated food and water for extended operations, and a multi-channel communications sensor (both Vox and Pict) for monitoring enemy communications. Its main feature is a wide-spectrum visor which can pick out heat and energy sources at tremendous distances. The mask includes a built-in Auspex scanner and readout, advanced, high-quality magnoculars, a good-quality photo-visor (making the wearer immune to the blinding effects of Photon Flash Grenades), Pict-recorder, Re-breather for hostile environments, and Vox-caster. Like their stealth suit,a Vindicare Spy Mask is also gene-coded so that it can only be activated by a specific Assassin.

Notable Vindicare Assassins

 * Sire Vinidicare - The founder and first Director Primus of his clade, Sire Vindicare was the namesake and founder of the Vindicare Temple. He was the foremost sniper-assassin of his age. He, along with the other founders of the various Assassin clades that would become the Assassin Temples, was present on Mount Vengeance. With his fellows he swore a pact in the shadow of the Great Crusade, an oath that breathed life into the creation of the Officio Assassinorum. The newly created clades hunted down the enemies of the Emperor through stealth and subterfuge, establishing the fact that there was no safe place to hide in the galaxy from the Emperor's justice.
 * Eristede Kell - Brother to Clade Venenum Assassin Jenniker Soalm, Eristede Kell was a Vindicare Assassin during the Great Crusade and opening days of the Horus Heresy. He was an Assassin-at-Marque of Clade Vindicare who was ranked an Epsilon-dan, the senior-most rank within his order. He was dispatched with the first ever Imperial Execution Force composed of Imperial Assassins from every clade, who were attempting to assassinate the Traitor Primarch Horus upon the world of Dagonet. Ultimately, their assassination attempt failed and all the Assassins were slain by the Traitors.
 * Morias Skult - In 924.M40, 2nd Class Assassin Skult was dispatched to the Roxanzand System to eliminate the threat of the Ork Warlord Urgak "the Unstoppable" who was uniting the disparate Ork tribes of the northern continent of the world of Roxanzand into a mighty Ork WAAAGH! The Orks conducted a massive military build-up unabated, and most worringly, were in the process of constructing a mighty Gargant. Skult deployed without detection as a lone operative via a standard one-man Drop Pod and infiltrated the Ork camp. After killing five Ork sentries, their bodies were disposed of with hyphosphus quick-burning incendiaries. Skult then proceeded to insert himself into the near-completed Gargant. Planting high-charge, low-mass explosives throughout the various vulnerable points on the structure of the Gargant, he then extricated himself and took up a position at the top of a nearby cliff where he held a commanding view of the encampment. The next morning, Skult assassinated Urgak with a single head-shot from his Exitus Rifle. He then proceeded to fire upon the Gargant, igniting the carefully placed explosives, which caused a chain-reaction. The Gargant exploded spectacularly and Skult made good his escape. The Assassin then made his way back to his Drop Pod and was picked up. Despite this tremendous display of skill at infiltration and accuracy, Skult's mission was declared only 86% successful, for the damage dealt to the Gargant was not total enough to prevent reconstruction. However, the death of the Warlord and the delay in rebuilding the destroyed Gargant caused a slow down in the Ork's war efforts, allowing time for Imperial Navy vessels to arrive and bombard the site from orbit, effectively eliminating the Greenskin threat. Later in his career, he was part of an Imperial strike team of Officio Assassinorum operatives sent to the strife-ridden Imperial world of Opis to eliminate the rogue assassin Legienstrasse, formerly of the defunct Maerorus Temple. Though he attempted to kill her on several occasions, he ultimately failed in achieving his objective. While attempting to kill the rogue assassin one final time from an Imperial Fists Thunderhawk gunship, Legienstrasse leapt upon one of the flyer's wings and badly damaged it, causing the gunship to crash and kill everyone aboard.

Dawn of War
In the real-time strategy games for the PC Dawn of War - Winter Assault and Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, the Vindicare Assassin (simply called the Assassin in the game) is the Imperial Guard's only infiltrator unit, armed with a high-powered Sniper Rifle. Imperial Guard commanders can temporarily double the range and damage of the Vindicare's sniper rifle by ordering the unit to activate the rifle's Assassination Scope for a limited time (as prolonged use of the scope causes the rifle to overheat).