"All right, have fun!" Caroline said, leading Chell and her potato into the room.
"Bye Mommy! I'll make the BEST potato battery!" she responded, grinning like the innocent young girl she was.
Caroline waved to her daughter and walked out the door, leaving Chell to pick up her poster board, which was almost as big as her, and sit on the benches with the other children.
One of the Aperture employees, Greg, walked into the room purposefully; behind him was a happy but somewhat timid young man of about eighteen with a smile on his face.
"Hi girls!" he exclaimed. "Welcome to Bring Your Daughter To Work Day! Are you all ready to make your projects?"
Chell chorused "Yes!" with the rest of them.
He continued, "Well, good, because you're going to have lots of fun today. I'm Greg, and I'll be helping you today, along with Doug here."
Doug waved to the young girls, and Greg continued. "Well, if you want to get started, pick a place on these tables behind me, and get going! We're going to do some science!"
They cheered and got up, swarming the tables for a spot.
Caroline strode down the hall, the clacking of her heels matching the pounding of the blood in her ears. She opened a door to the inner workings of Aperture, dodging the flying Weighted Storage Cubes and the low-hanging gel pipes, and entered a circular chamberlock, resting her arms on the railing.
Her hands, hanging off the edge of the railing, were shaking ever so slightly.
Chell stuck the last wire into her potato and admired the way her yellow LED lit up. Scribbling something on her worksheet, she took a picture of the setup.
Doug turned the corner and wandered up to her battery, then stopped in surprise.
"You figured it out by yourself!" he said. "Without anyone's help!"
Chell grinned widely and giggled.
Doug lowered his voice and pulled out a vial from his pocket.
"Hey, do you want to know a secret? It'll make this battery even better."
Chell accepted and he continued. "I've got some acid here. It's supposed to be secret Aperture stuff, but you can handle it, right?"
Pulling one of her wires out, he dipped it in the strange liquid and stuck it back in the potato. The light became slightly brighter.
Chell giggled. "That's cool!" she said, in the high-pitched voice of a young girl.
Doug carefully placed the vial on the table, next to Chell's project. "It's actually supposed to react with Aperture neurotoxin and make a potato fertilizer. But it also conducts electricity."
He walked on and Chell excitedly started pulling out her other wires and coating them with the acid.