important?

Without further information, you cannot make any concrete suggestions. Nevertheless, here’s some inspiration how you could still rewrite people:

• You could use the profession, so your figures also call “the baker”, “the teacher”, “the job killer” etc.
• You could use relationships: “Nics fiancée”, “Nics Mother”, etc.
• You could take noticeable and unambiguous features. So, for example, someone also calls “the red-haired”, the “Tätowierte”, “the blind” etc. In the case of external features, however, I would be a bit cautious, because, of course, there are more doubling and people forget such things again. Whether a side figure has brown or gray hair is usually less relevant. In a close connection with a description, of course, it is still very good.
• Otherwise, you can think about what Nic just describes in the situation. For example, something like “the injured.”