The Skull by Philip K. Dick Episode #51

Philip K. Dick | January 3, 2023

The Skull by Philip K. Dick Episode #51
Philip K. Dick

THE SKULL

Episode #51 · Written by Philip K. Dick · Narrated by Scott Miller

A hardened hunter is offered his freedom in exchange for one impossible job—track down and kill a man who’s already been dead for two hundred years. But once he learns who the target truly is, the real hunt begins inside his own mind.

In a bleak future where weapons are outlawed but inequality thrives, the ruling Council offers imprisoned trader and hunter Conger a chance at freedom—if he can do the impossible. They want him to assassinate a man who’s already been dead for two hundred years. A man whose teachings ended war, overturned power structures, and reshaped civilization. A man known only as The Founder. If he had lived, the Council claims, their world wouldn’t be crippled by pacifism and stagnation. So Conger is sent back in time—not to witness history, but to break it.

His only clue is a skull, unearthed from a forbidden church. It’s all that remains of his target, and the only way to identify the man before he speaks the words that will change the world. Arriving in 1961, Conger blends into a small Colorado town full of Cold War suspicion, gossip, and fear of outsiders. The closer he gets to his target, the more the mission twists, until the hunter begins to recognize something horrifying: the man he must kill is more familiar than he ever expected.

What begins as a mission of violence becomes a philosophical trap—one that only Philip K. Dick could build. Fate, identity, looping time, and the cost of belief collide in a story that races toward an ending you will feel long after it’s done. “The Skull” is a perfect introduction to the core of Dick’s writing: the moment when reality fractures, and the truth is more unsettling than the lie.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) was one of science fiction’s most influential authors, with more than 40 novels and 120 short stories. His work inspired iconic films like Blade Runner, Total Recall, A Scanner Darkly, and Minority Report, along with television series such as The Man in the High Castle. Dick’s stories were never just about future tech—they were about what it means to be human in a world where reality, identity, and morality are constantly shifting.

Originally published in If: Worlds of Science Fiction magazine in 1952, “The Skull” stands as a blueprint for the themes that would define Dick’s career: destiny versus free will, the unreliability of perception, and the terrifying possibility that our lives are not entirely our own.

LISTEN TO THE STORY

Listen to The Skull by Philip K. Dick — a gripping blend of time travel, mystery, and vintage science fiction that asks whether changing the past might destroy the future.