Cici Johanssen

Analyst at an unnamed facility on Route 123 in McLean; eleven weeks assigned to the suit. Not a physicist, engineer, archaeologist, or soldier: her job is reading everyone else's relic reports and finding where they disagree or never talk to each other. Pre-attack badge opened four surface doors, one door on U1, and the vending machine; she had never been to U2. Narrow-shouldered, stands with one hip out. Face flushes hot when singled out. Her name appears on a shipping label as 'C. Johannsen, cc'.

After the attack: survived the collapse of Conference B and the loss of the facility. Wears the yellow hexagon-patterned alien suit (neck to wrists; bare hands), fitted snugly. Two smooth warm rivet-like bumps behind her ears (drilled holes in the skull), a collar and spike port at the base of her skull. Injuries (left arm shattered, shoulder dislocated, ribs, right thigh gash, right ankle) were held and healed by the suit's frame; the left arm is now fully healed, leaving three small dark anchor marks. She feels no pain. Skin resists cutting after repeated injury. Ornament AR-0916-CE is clasped on her right hip.

Has since accepted the suit's bond (operator/VEN) and been encased in slate-gray armor reshaped to her body (slightly taller in the boots, a little broader through the plates). Carries a long blade at her left hip, a short blade in a holster-ornament at her right, and an electromagnetic rail rifle on a bracket between her shoulder blades. Also carries a canvas bag (water, drinks, granola bars), a legal-pad notebook, pens, and Benny's keys. Can sense hunters' positions as a pressure map across her back. Her phone is dead.

Compulsive cataloguer, counter, and documenter. Reads everything (raw logs, cc'd emails), prints reports to lay side by side, and jots times and places on the back of pages, which is how she spotted the attack pattern. Under stress she inventories her body, times hunter sweeps, runs mental lists, and keeps a legal-pad glossary of the suit's words, crossing out wrong translations hard enough to tear the paper. Tests hypotheses by experiment (cutting her own hand, touching the vending machine and batteries) and watches what happens rather than trusting the suit's instructions. Shows the suit what she wants by physical demonstration.

In crisis she freezes and obeys, then analyses; takes cover reflexively on the suit's buzz; sets personal rules (eyes on the floor, don't look in the cars, look only for keys). Talks aloud to the suit, objects, and nicknames ('the Nag'). Deflects feeling with dry understatement. Eats granola bars over classified papers; procrastinates on family obligations (Sunday dinner, her mother's calls). Compartmentalises grief behind a 'door' in her head. Treats hard decisions like a report someone will read later.

First-person narrator: dry, observational, self-deprecating, and precise. Briefs in exact figures ('forty-one percent less deeply... identical force'). Deadpan with Kevin ('It's called reading'), wry with Jules, quietly mortified around Remy and avoids his first name aloud. Frames things as records and catalogue entries ('Pain: none', 'Instrument error', 'I want it on the record'). Terse notebook shorthand with equals signs and question marks. Profane under stress ('Slow the fuck down'). Talks aloud to the silent suit and objects ('Hi, Nag', 'Not now', 'Fancy space gun', 'Noted'); speaks the suit-word 'Thel' (yes). Uses plain similes (dryer, ice bag, snowsuit). Closes the arc's last scene with 'My turn.'