Marla Janssen

Marla Loren Janssen was a Planetary Security systems analyst stationed on the Aegis VII mining colony, a gifted computer specialist who worked to decipher the meaning of the Marker text. She died during the Necromorph outbreak that consumed the colony, sealing herself inside the infested communications needle so that her partner Abraham Neumann could escape.

Early life#

Marla Janssen was born in the Scandinavian sector of Earth, but when she was ten her father took a job on Mars and moved the family there. Already bookish, she became a recluse in the unfamiliar environment, spending her spare time and money on computer technology, a field she excelled in at school alongside mathematics and physics.

When she was thirteen, Marla's parents grew suspicious that she had far more money than her weekend job could explain. Their inquiries drew in the police, and within weeks Marla became the youngest person on Mars ever arrested for first-grade hacking. She had been taking orders and payment from anonymous clients across the net, breaking into the central government's database to alter records on their behalf. Three years in a Mars juvenile prison set her straight. After her release her record was sealed, and on her sixteenth birthday she began working in the Mars shipyards as a systems designer and quality assurance officer.

While there she met Bram Neumann during a leave he had taken to visit his wife. He told her she could earn more and live more easily in P-Sec, where he happened to know that Commander James's squad was looking for a new control operator. Marla followed up the lead and was offered the post within days. She went on to work on two colonies with James's squad, and after Neumann's divorce the two developed a casual relationship.

The second Aegis VII incident#

By the time of the outbreak, Marla and Abraham Neumann were in a relationship. She had taken an interest in the Marker for largely secular reasons and steadily worked at deciphering the text inscribed on it, while Neumann joked about her chances given that the Church had failed to read it for centuries. She came to understand that the markings were a code for DNA and that the artifact infected dead bodies and mutated them. Marla eventually uncovered the text's meaning, but too late, as the Necromorphs emerged to overrun the colony following the planet crack initiated by the USG Ishimura.

After reuniting at her apartment, Marla set out with Neumann to investigate the situation. Hindered by the colony-wide blackout that the planet crack had triggered, they soon grasped the full extent of the threat, finding the rest of the P-Sec personnel dead and reanimated as Necromorphs. They resolved to escape to the Ishimura with as many survivors as they could gather, in defiance of Captain Mathius's no-fly order. The group reached the hangars only to find them overrun by other desperate colonists. The relief was short-lived: the first shuttle to launch carried too many passengers, then was hijacked by a colonist enraged at the pilot's attempt to set back down and lighten the load, and the resulting crash destroyed the remaining docked shuttles.

Death#

With the shuttles gone, Marla devised a plan to radio the Ishimura for help by going straight to the colony's communications needle and bypassing the failed comms systems. She and Neumann reached the needle after a long trek, only to find that Corruption had grown over the equipment and was causing interference. Marla broke down at the apparently irreparable damage before Neumann comforted her. Investigating further, they discovered a large biomass of Necromorphs bound to the wall by the Corruption, and Neumann was distracted by the sight of Vera Cortez, his former partner, fused into it.

Marla regained Neumann's attention, but a group of Slashers emerged and attacked the pair. As they raced for the door she struggled to reach it and was impaled through the chest by a Necromorph. In a last act of selflessness she activated the door lock, sealing herself in with the creatures so that Neumann could escape.