Second Variety

“Second Variety”

-- Philip R. Dick

            As the Tassos reached for him, a last ironic thought drifted through Hendrick’s mind.  He felt a little better, thinking about it.  The bomb.  Made by the Second Variety to destroy the other varieties…They were already beginning to deign weapons to use against each other

            Never have I ever read before this one, a more powerful ending.  I am almost twenty-one years old and I know my time to walk the surface is not the length of my elders.  Thankfully, I have not endured much sadness universally as those who have been here before me.  But if I were to make a relation between myself and someone twice my age, I think the term, “war” and “fighting” is something that any generation is able to relate to, whether it be personal, regional, nationally, or universally.  Here in Dick’s story, Second Variety different countries are fighting against each other for what?  More power?  Freedom?  Money? People are dying because of disagreement.  To be able to read an outstanding story on machinery, the ideal war tactic tool to be used in defense against the enemy, and how it achieved not only want Hendrick and the others wanted, but also went beyond.  It doesn’t have to necessarily be a breathing soul to end up all the same.  Do we end up all the same?  To watch two sets of people or things in this situation turn against one another speaks so much more than just a fight in beating the enemy.  It makes a statement for merciless, brutality, motivation by rage in terms of wanting more power, wanting superiority, wanting to the ones feared of.  And this whole time, to show through person or machinery, that betray is one of the most effective tactics in getting what you want.  To build that trust, to build that loyalty and defense together and learn to be honest with a stranger you only just met only to find out in the end that they were the enemy makes me laugh cynically.  Because if this were to be the case, who can we trust?  Who can we tell all of our secrets to?  And if you hesitate on any one of those questions, consider this:  can you trust anyone?