Cleaning Suit
Cleaning suits, once built with deliberately weak parts, are being sized and improved for the survivors’ proposed journey across the surface.
Story so far
Cleaning suits enclose their wearers in a one-piece body with integrated gloves, a carbon undersuit, back fastenings, and numbered pockets readable from above. Individually tailored, they are difficult to remove without assistance. Juliette questioned why generations of improvements never let cleaners travel farther. She suspected deliberate failure, and Supply’s substituted materials gave her a suit that lasted. She later found engineered weaknesses herself, including a gasket that split under her fingernails. Even an improved suit could not completely protect her against airlock fire.
Further experiments stripped suits of excess padding to make work easier and tested a shared oxygen tank that could supply them for days. Juliette estimated that two or three hundred suits remained in storage, with only a couple already modified. She used a suit and helmet to demonstrate her proposed surface escape. Nearly 150 suits have now been laid out for sizing and adjustment, more than the group needs.
Appearance
A one-piece protective body with integrated gloves, a black carbon undersuit, double back zippers, industrial Velcro, and a helmet collar. Numbered, color-coded pockets face the wearer; protective heat tape covers the exterior.
Role
Former instruments of fatal cleanings, now being adapted as protective equipment for a collective surface journey.
Relationships
Sources — 41 recorded facts, by chapter
- Holston wears a black carbon undersuit beneath the cleaning suit.
- Holston’s cleaning suit closes with two zips and industrial Velcro.
- The cleaning suit has numbered, color-coded pockets labeled upside down for its wearer to read.
- Allison’s cleaning helmet had a silver mask that concealed her face.
- Holston’s cleaning suit catches against the partially opened outer airlock doors as he squeezes through.
- The cleaning suit has integrated gloves and a one-piece body fastened at the back.
- The cleaning suit is not designed to be removed without assistance.
- Cleaning suits are individually tailored for the person waiting in the holding cell.
- The pockets on Juliette’s suit bear numbers oriented for her to read when looking down.
- Juliette feels the airlock pressure squeezing her suit.
- Juliette questions why centuries of suit improvements have never enabled cleaners to travel farther.
- Juliette believes her cleaning suit is designed to last through the cleaning and fail afterward.
- Juliette recognizes pump-style washers and seals in her suit and believes they are designed to fail.
- The suit has numbered pockets that the IT technician explains to Juliette.
- Juliette’s cleaning suit is made to last rather than disintegrate because Supply substitutes its materials.
- Walker alleges that the cleaning suits are designed to fail.
- Juliette regards her well-built suit as a gift from Walker and Supply.
- Juliette’s shiny suit gloves are wrapped in heat tape melted into a protective skin.
- Juliette’s gloves are too thick for her to operate the helmet latches by hand.
- The protective suit has double back zippers, Velcro, and extensive heat tape.
- The helmet collar is attached both to the charcoal undersuit and the reinforced back zippers.
- Juliette abandons the last of the cut-up protective suit outside level six.
- Bernard threatens to build Lukas’s cleaning suit personally so that he will die before reaching the hills.
- Juliette finds components deliberately engineered to fail in the cleaning suit.
- A gasket Juliette tests splits under pressure from her fingernails.
- Even Juliette’s improved suit does not prevent the airlock fire from burning her skin.
- The dead cleaner’s suit and charcoal liners burn away in places, exposing his body.
- Mission carried part of the cleaning suit up from IT for the most recent cleaning.
- Mission regards a cleaning suit as a bag made for someone who must enter it alive and die inside it.
- The suit worn by silo eighteen’s cleaner is reported to have been modified.
- Donald thinks cleaning suits are designed to break down at a particular time and place.
- Juliette’s project requires a further suit for an additional person in the second airlock.
- The suits used outside and during decontamination remain in the airlock, with only their collar radios recovered.
- Juliette and Nelson wear suits stripped of excess padding to improve their ability to work.
- Juliette tests a shared oxygen tank arrangement that can supply their suits for days.
- Juliette intends to use a modified suit for her overland journey.
- Juliette estimates that two or three hundred cleaning suits remain in the stores between levels thirty-four and thirty-five.
- Juliette says she modified only a couple of the stored suits.
- Donald wants to assemble another suit for a trip outside.
- Juliette uses a cleaning suit and helmet to demonstrate her proposal to escape across the surface.
- Nearly 150 cleaning suits are laid out for sizing and adjustment, more than the group needs.