Darwintine Festival: ‘Natural Selection’, Part 4

Black-and-white art of a squid drifting over a desert of human skulls. Text reads: 'Natural Selection' This is part 4 of “Natural Selection”, FtB’s Darwintine Festival story chain. If you enjoy being part of our community and appreciate the work we do here at FreethoughtBlogs, please consider making a donation to our legal defense fund.

For the next few hours, everyone scrambled about on their assigned duties, trying to get something, anything, concretely understood before the blizzard hit. For security, it was a constant struggle to keep the creature – which the security personnel had taken to referring to simply as ‘That Thing’ – contained, while the scientists took inconclusive samples and measurements and racked their brains about what to do. The cephalopod squirmed constantly and flailed its arms whenever they got loose. An observer from above would think Beagle Station was doing much the same as pressure mounted on its desperate people. [Read more…]

A Dark Web: Part Three

As a fun little experiment for Halloween, some bloggers here are writing a story in a chain form.

This story starts at The Bolingbrook Babbler. Previous section at Freethinking Ahead.

In the distance down Highway 1, a set of headlights flicked into view. That had happened plenty of times during the evening, but this was the first since the sun slipped below the horizon and also the first that caused all of the pickup’s occupants to tense up. Mateo lifted a pair of field glasses to his eyes and peered toward them.

“Is that them?” Connie and Kyle asked in unison, then gave each other a disconcerted glance. [Read more…]