The next morning Chell woke up coughing and grabbed a bottle pills off of companion cube. Healthy enough to go home, but not fully recovered, she was weak and still wheezing. Even so she had to go to work; the rent was not going to pay itself, and had already been away for two months. After getting dressed she walked out the door to see Jonathan wearily walking back to his apartment completely exhausted, having spent the entire night outside with his telescope trying to figure out just what exactly Rick was.
"You're not gonna believe it," He said as he unlocked his door, "I saw two more of those satellite things last night." This was by no means news to Chell; after all she was there when they got sucked into space, nearly ending up there herself. She turned to leave for work as it was clear Jonathan was too tired to continue talking as he stumbled into his own apartment.
As soon as she walked into the book store her co-worker, Gordon, handed her a box of books. Gordon also lived in the same building as Chell and Jonathan. He had short brown hair a bit of a beard, black glasses, green eyes, and persisted to carry a crowbar on his belt at all times. If it were not for their nametags on their uniforms she probably would not even know his name for he spoke about as much as she did, He pointed to some shelves that needed stocking and then left for the back room. She quietly began organizing the books on the shelves, not many costumers were in that day so it was very quiet as she organized the shelves. The quiet peaceful bookstore almost seemed unreal, even though she had been out for months she sometimes still could not believe she had escaped after being trapped in Aperture for years, although conscious for only a few hours, but so many things can happen in a moment. So many things can go wrong, it may have just been a few hours but the events would most definitely scar her for years to come. She remembered her first day free, after the shock of actually being let go wore off she hoisted up the companion cube, with slight difficulty as it seemed much heavier than when she had the tractor beam of the portal device, but as soon as she got a good grip and steady balance she ran. She ran as fast as she could, no matter how far she ran it was not far enough. She could trust GLaDOS about as far as she could throw her, (as a potato that was quite far, but know she had regained power the thought alone was nearly inconceivable.) Chell was half expecting a robotic arm to reach out of the shed and pull her back in as if letting her see the sun was just a way of torturing her by showing a life she could never have, or that if she ran far enough she would hit a wall and find out that the blue sky was just a projection and she was still inside Aperture, but eventually she had to stop running due to pure exhaustion, she had become so used to the adrenal vapor in the air she was easily fatigued without it. The feeling that GLaDOS was just toying with her and that she might wake up in an Aperture Science relaxation center any minute did not fully disappear until she ran into other humans in a town a few miles from where she collapsed from exhaustion. At first it was difficult to get assimilated into the new environment, being a random stranger popping into town who will not say where she is from, if she has any relatives, past experiences, or give any indication of a personal history what-so-ever. However she eventually managed to get a home a job and a new life.
When she finished stacking books on the shelf she proceeded to the check-out station, noting Jonathan looking at books on space and satellites. Over the next few days she noticed him out in the field spending long hours looking up at the sky with his telescope ever fascinated by the cores floating around the moon. Chell did not go down to see him, how someone could stay so fascinated with space junk for so long she did not know. If she had to guess, curiosity, no way of knowing what they are, he can only observe hoping to gain more knowledge. Chell already knew quite well what they were and how they got there, but she would never tell him.