In the book “A Sound of Thunder” no matter in real life or a book, time travel is one of the greatest obstacles that any of us humans have faced before. It is also one of hardest things to understand as one small mistake back in time could affect the whole future of the human race and change everything.

In this story a character called Eckels pays ten thousand dollars to a company that takes people back in time to shoot an animal of their choosing, Eckels is going back in time to shoot the king off all dinosaurs, a tyrannosaurus rex. The guide of the time travel trip called Travis, specifically tells Eckels not to step off the path that they are going to be on, because if they do and they kill an animal even as small as an ant, they might change history as we know it. When Eckels sees the tyrannosaurus rex he is scared so he runs off the path, killing a butterfly.  After the group returns to the future, they find that the future is very different, the English language is changed as well, all because Eckels stepped off the path.  The group guide is furious and takes out his rifle then kills Eckels, the story ends with “There was a sound of thunder”. Even though the story A Sound of Thunder has many different theme ideas, but the one that I strongly support has to do with our actions and how it can affect the future, not accounting for the idea of the book.

In the story A Sound of Thunder, by Ray Bradbury, the author believes that the main theme is “A small thing can make an extensive impact”. “Say we accidentally kill one mouse here. That means all the future families of this one particular mouse are destroyed right?” “Right.” “And all the families of the families of the families of that one mouse! With a stamp of your foot, you annihilate first one, then a dozen, then a thousand, a million, a billion possible mice!” (Bradbury 226). This quote shows that by eliminating just ONE mouse, it can affect a whole line of mice lasting more than a million years. This connects to the main theme of “A small thing/action can make an extensive impact.” This not only connects to the story it also is an example of how much impact there is in real life. Further along in the story, Eckels still doesn’t get the idea of the specific time travel rules and specific instructions they have to follow, he then makes a big decision that causes a huge time disturbance. “No, it can’t be. Not a little thing like that. No!” “Embedded in the mud, glistening green and gold and black, was a butterfly, very beautiful and very dead.” “Not a little thing like that! Not a butterfly!” Cried Eckels. It fell to the floor, an exquisite thing, a small thig that could upset balances and knock down a line of small dominoes and then big dominoes and then gigantic dominoes, all down the years across time. Eckel’s mind whirled. It couldn’t change things. Killing one butterfly couldn’t be that important! Could it? (Bradbury 236). These quotes show how important it is that Eckels had followed the specific instructions by the guide, because the guide Travis knew that if Eckels stepped off the path he would kill a seemingly insignificant creature/animal then change history and time as they know it.