There was a boy and a girland a strange new planet;the planet was alive withhideous dangers. But the boyand girl were very young andall Robin wanted to knowwas: "Who stole my doll?"
A
WORLD
CALLED
CRIMSON
By
DARIUS JOHN GRANGER
When the starship Star ofFire collided with a meteorswarm six parsecs stellarnorth of the galactic hub inthe year A.D. 2278, it lost itsatmosphere within forty-fiveminutes. At first it wasthought that every man,woman and child of the fourthousand, one hundred andsixty-six aboard were lost, inthis the greatest of all interstellardisasters. But as wasdiscovered twenty years laterin the Purcell exploration,this was not quite the case.(See PURCELL)
—from The ANNALS OF SPACE, Vol. 12
The Cyclops—not hungry at the moment—regarded Robin as a new toy.It was the nasty little boyfrom B Deck who hadstolen her doll. She hatedhim. He was horrid. She slippedout of their stateroomwhile her Mom and Dad weredressing for dinner. She'dfind that horrid little boy onB Deck. She'd scratch hiseyes out.
Her name was Robin Sinclairand she was five yearsold and mad enough to throwthe boy from B Deck out intospace, only she didn't knowhow to go about that.
She went down the companionwayto B Deck, wherethe people dressed differently.The colors weren't as bright,somehow, the cloth not sofine. It was a major distinctionin the eyes of a five-year-oldgirl, especially one wholoved to run her fingers overfine synthetics and who evenhad a favorite color. Her favoritecolor was crimson.
"'Scuse me, mister. Didjasee a little boy with a dollwith a crimson dress on?"
A smile. But she was deadlyserious. "Not me, younglady."
She walked for a whileaimlessly on B Deck. She sawtwo little boys, but they weren'tthe right ones. Poutingnow, almost in tears, she wason the verge of giving up.Mom and Dad could buy hera new doll. Mom and Dadwere richer than anybody,weren't they?
Then, all of a sudden, shesaw him. He was just duckingout of sight up ahead.Under his arm was tuckedthe doll with the crimsondress, her favorite doll.
"Hey!" she cried. "Hey,wait for me!"
Her little feet pounding,she raced down the companionway.As she reached theirising door in the bulkhead,an electric eye opened it forher. She had never come thisway before. It was not asbright and clean as the restof the ship. She had not evenseen the sign which saidPASSENGERS NOT PERMITTEDBEYOND THISPOINT. But then, she couldbarely read, anyway.
She caught a quick secondglimpse of the boy, and startedrunning as he rounded aturn in the corridor. Shoutingfor him to stop, she reachedthe turn and saw him upahead. He looked back at herand stuck out his tongue andkept running.
It was then that the wholeworld shuddered, like it wastrying to shake itself topieces.
Alarm bells clanged everywhere.Whistles shrilled.Pretty soon uniformed menwere running in all directions.Robin Sinclair was suddenlyvery frightened. Shewanted to go back to A Deck,to her Mom and Dad, but shehad followed the boy throughso many twisting, turningcorridors that she knew shewould be lost if she tried. Shelooked ahead. The boy seemedconfident as he made his way.She followed him. But shewas really mad at him now. Itwas his fault she was so farfrom Mom and Dad when athing like this happened.
Uniformed memb