Everlost by Neal Shusterman Read Free Book Online Page A

stretch out and sleep.
    â€œI’m tired of sleeping every night,” Nick said. “We don’t need it. We don’t get tired,” and then he said the real reason why he didn’t want to sleep. “I don’t like not dreaming.”
    Allie felt the same way, but didn’t want to say anything about it. Once, many years ago, her appendix had burst, and she had gone under general anesthesia. It was a strangesensation. She started to breathe in the anesthetic, and boom, she was out. Then suddenly she was awake again, and it was all over. There was just a hiccup of time, some groggy confusion, and she was back, with an ache in her side and some stitches. It was like … not existing. Sleep here was the same way.
    â€œWe sleep because we
can,”
she told Nick. “Because it reminds us of what it’s like to be alive.”
    â€œHow can eight hours of death remind us of being alive?”
    Allie had no answer for him, only that it felt right. It felt natural, and in their unnatural state, anything that felt natural was a good thing. In the end Nick stopped his grumbling, and lay down. “I’ll lie here, but I’m not going to sleep. I’ll stay awake and watch the stars.”
    The stars, however, were not sufficiently exciting to keep him awake. In fact, they were sedating. He fell asleep before Allie did, leaving her to ponder their predicament. What if she got home, and her parents weren’t there? What if her father had died in the accident, and her mother had moved away? She wouldn’t be able to ask anyone about it, she’d have no way of finding out. She was thankful when the anesthetic sleep of Everlost finally overtook her.
    The ambush came without warning in the middle of the night.
    Nick and Allie opened their eyes to four stern, glowing faces looking down on them. In an instant they were grabbed and hauled to their feet, roughed up and manhandled. Allie tried to scream, but a large hand covered her mouth. Ahand like that of a monster. Only these weren’t monsters; these were boys no older than she.
    â€œNick!” she called. But Nick was too busy fighting off two boys who were struggling to hold him as well.
    â€œWhat’s your problem?” Nick shouted. “Who are you? What do you want?”
    â€œWe ask the questions,” said the boy who was apparently in charge. He was smaller than the rest, but clearly the toughest of the lot. He wore baggy knickerbockers, not much different from Lief’s, and from his lip dangled a cigarette that never got smaller and never went out. But by far the strangest thing about him was his hands. They were the size of a man’s hands, big and knobby, and when he curled them into fists, they seemed as large as boxing gloves.
    â€œI think they’re
Greensouls,
Johnnie-O,” said one kid with a weird mop of candy-apple-red hair that made him look like a Raggedy Andy doll. “A week old, maybe less.”
    â€œI can see that,” Johnnie-O said. “I’m not stupid, I know a Greensoul when I see one.”
    â€œWe’re Afterlights,” Nick shouted out, “just like you, so leave us alone.”
    Johnnie-O laughed. “Of course you’re Afterlights, idiot. What we’re saying is that you’re new arrivals. Greensouls. Get it?”
    â€œThey might still got stuff,” said Raggedy Andy. “Greensouls always got stuff.”
    â€œWelcome to Everlost,” Johnnie-O said in a voice that wasn’t welcoming at all. “This here’s my territory, and you gots to pay me for passage.”
    Allie gave the boy holding her a punch in the face to gethim to let go. “Is this how you always greet visitors?” Allie said.
    Johnnie-O took a suck on his cig. “Visitors ain’t always friendly.”
    Nick shrugged off the two boys who were holding him. “We don’t have anything to pay you with.”
    â€œYeah, so I guess you’ll