Opening his eyes, Atlas recognized the white ceiling of the hospital room he is in. Remembering the last night and how he got caught using his ability, he instantly looked left. He saw her.

Her name was Alice. She was the person who Atlas was interested in and at the same time got very irritated by. And today was no exception. Before he could realize what she was holding in her hands, a soundwave passed through the room, almost shaking the walls.

Alice was holding an electric guitar which was already connected to an amplifier. The music she played was so loud Atlas had to cover his ears.

“Stop It!” Atlas tried to outshout the music. No effect. *I have to unplug this thing*.

Walking to the other side of the room, he was near the outlet the guitar was connected to. Grabbing the plug he wanted to pull it out, when the music stopped and all he could hear now was: “If you unplug my guitar, I am gonna plug it back in your ass!”

Atlas proceeded to unplug the guitar, as if the threat was non-existent.

“Man, you could try to look somewhat scared, am I not menacing enough for you?” Alice sighed.

“Sorry, I could not hear you, the music popped my eardrums open.”

“Haha… Funny guy. Wonder why you are still not doing stand up comedy.”

“Those suck, at least in this town” Atlas replied.

“You seem like a guy who is quite experienced in boring stuff, aren’t you?”

“Don;t care what you say anyway. Where did you get the guitar?” Atlas asked, since he knew it was kind of hard, getting stuff into the hospital unnoticed. And he doubted that doctors allowed it.

“I have my ways, '' Alice replied. “By ‘my ways’, I mean friends, obviously. Cool stuff, trust me.”

“What Makes you think I have none?” Atlas was somewhat offended.

“Dude, you got beat up by some thugs, all you do here is eat and sleep. No one visited you yet, except for the cops and that chick, who is probably your relative. So, what's your excuse now?”

“Although Atlas was pretty offended, he did not reply. What she said was quite true. No one came to visit him, there was almost no one he could call or text. He was alone.

His parents died when he was very young, And he was raised by relatives. They were not bad people, but he never felt connected to them. They already had a daughter, so all the attention and life was given to her. She had the best clothes, best schools and even the abilities were given to her. Atlas made it to 14 years, and then ran away. Not really running away. He found a school in another city which provided need based dorm rooms and he applied. He got accepted and now he has been living there for 2 years. He had some friends in middle school, but lost contact with them later on. Thinking about it was making him sad, even though he did not even realize it himself.

But for now he was more annoyed than sad.

“Oh trust me, I have a pretty interesting life and funny friends,” he replied without really thinking.

“Oh how cute. You have funny friends whom you have never seen outside video games? Oh and girlfriend - your beloved hand.” She winked to Atlas after saying it

“Even so, let's imagine you have friends. Why did they not help you, when you got beaten up? Or why did they not even bother to visit you here…” as she was about to finish her sentence, the door to their room was knocked. And after about 2 seconds it started to open.

*Someone has no patience* thought Atlas.

At this point, Atlas was expecting an angry nurse to barge in from all that noise Alice made. Yet he was wrong. Instead of a nurse or a doctor, it was a boy. Or rather a young man with bright green hair. Atlas instantly recognized the guy. It was the same guy who got beat up by a hunter with some kind of zapping ability. What was he doing there? Did he come to see him, or was he one of Alice’s friends? Looking how both liked to dress up, they actually might be.

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“Wassup, Atlas my man. Big A, how you feeling?” said the green haired man. He was about 190 cm tall, which was higher than Atlas by about 15 cm or so. He was wearing what looked like a high school jacket and slim jeans. He looked like he had a pretty bright persona, but at the same time a very chill guy.

However Atlas was more concerned about the other thing. How did he know his name? How did he find him?

“Why the long face, it is me, Bond. Your best friend. C’mon, don’t be angry at me for not visiting you earlier? Well, how about we go get a drink or something? You like coffee?”

“No…” Atlas wanted to reject the stranger he met the second time, but then looked at the girl with guitar, who was looking at the scene carefully.

“Ah, well, how can I be angry at you, Bond. I am a merciful friend, you know” Atlas played along and both exited the room.

They walked through the hallway in silence and Bond was to speak first, when they finally left the hospital. They were allowed to leave for a day.

“We finally out. Can’t stand that place” breaking the silence Bond said “So, you want coffee, pizza or you wanna play some games?”

Atlas was still trying to understand what was going through Bond's head, but gave up soon, realizing he is unable to analyze this type of person.

“You are that guy from the fight a few days ago. How do you know my name?” Atlas said.

“Well, why should I not know the name of my savior? I came here to thank you personally for saving me back there. Nice shot by the way. It was kinda hard to find you, but I was lucky you got in the same hospital as me.” Bond said with a very genuine face.

“But how did you know my name in the first place?” Atlas started to get worried, when a certain thought came to his mind.

“When that ahole got hit in the head, someone from the crowd said your name. I remembered it.”

That is when Atlas became very nervous.The moment of realization hit him harder than the monster he fought on the planet zero.

“Dude, you’re okay?” Bond asked, looking at Atlas standing.

“Nonono, do you know what that means? You know my name, that means that guy knows it as well. He will definitely come for me.” Atlas started to think about how that miscalculation happened.

“Oh… yeah, the guys an arse, but a strong one. But don’t worry, you saved me, I will at least try to save you.” Bond claimed with what looked like a mix of proud and brave face “If you want, you can chill at my place while he is looking for you.”

Atlas could not believe there are people who are willing to invite people they never met to live at their houses, like that.

The idea was not bad,to be fair. Atlas did not want to be seen exiting dorms in the evening, when he would be going back to the tunnel.

“I will think about it.” he replied.

“Well, we should exchange contacts. You have ‘sleepchat’?”.

Sleepchat was the name of an app, people used to talk to each other. Obviously Atlas had it, but he did not log in in the past year. Neither he wanted to. There was usually no one he could talk to. But what harm could it do?

Taking his phone out and opening the app, he was greeted by an interface he has not seen in a pretty long time. A place he used to chat with some of his gaming buddies. Back when he used to play some games. But what he was not expecting was the 147 unread messages.

“Wow dude, you are ghosting this beauty so hard, it feels like blasphemy” said Bond, looking at Atlas phone.

Atlas could not hold a chuckle, hearing the joke from Bond.

“A beauty? This annoying girl is my sister.” Atlas did not know, she was trying to reach out to him after he ran away. He was curious about what she wrote. 147 messages was a lot. Yet at the same time, he was afraid to read. Maybe she aws apologizing for not caring enough for him, or cursing him. For now he did not want to guess nor check.

Atlas and Bond added each other in sleepchat and went to a nearby coffee shop.

The whole time they spoke mostly about abilities and hunters. Bond told Atlas about his abilities. His first ability was a support one. He could place invisible marks onto different objects or animals/humans. The mark would stay for 24 hours and in this time he could trace from any place. His second ability was the infamous explosion he used in a fight against the shock user. He said that he can explode oxygen, present in the air. That sounded like a very strong ability to Atlas.

Atlas himself did not want to speak about his ability, and he was sure Bond noticed it and did not push the matter any further. Despite being so different, they had a lot of stuff in common.

After the cafe they wandered around the city doing what young adults would usually do. They played games, sang karaoke and all other stuff they could think of. It was the first time in a long time, when Atlas felt genuinely happy. In the evening, they went back to the hospital.

“Well, it was a pleasure talking to you, I will send you some funny videos tonight. G’night, Atlas”

“Good night, Bond, James Bond,” said Atlas smiling.

His mood was good, all day, he was having fun and relaxing, a much needed break after all his struggles. And even more needed a break before he returns to planet zero.

Entering his room, Atlas saw that Alice was already asleep. Hugging her guitar she was snoring almost as loud as the guitar she played.

Dropping on the bed, Atlas took out his phone. He opened the sleepchat and looked at the very first chat in his feed. ‘Claire the princess’. It was how his sister saved herself in Atlas’ phone. Looking at the number 147, he finally tapped on this chat.

“Well, let's read you what you wanted from me, sis”