To truly understand how and why our present world is the way it is, look to history for answers

Focus. Breathe.

The photo. It’s always been there.

Grandpa, in that burnished black suit, helmet at his hip, wearing just the slightest frown. Easily lost in the sea of hundreds of personnel if efforts weren’t made to point him out.

Behind them, what looks like a slick sheet of metal. That glint masking the groundbreaking scale of ‘Genesis’.

At almost 1,641 ft, spanning 67 decks, ‘Genesis’ was the flagship, the star of the fleet, capable of holding a crew of 1,800.

More than enough to establish a new world.

But he was never one to reminisce, not grandpa. Whenever we gathered, he carried a twinkle in his eye despite and an invisible weight that made him seem smaller in stature than his 6 ft frame.

A singular photo now serves as the sole reminder, our family heirloom of how it all unfolded.

That, school, tall tales, and hushed whispers during family gatherings. That was the limit of all knowledge from those days.

Think, damn it, think.

Some say we were warned, that the asteroid showed signs of life. It was too big a coincidence it came straight for us. Some even claim there was a strange transmission but no one was willing to listen.

Others vehemently believe it happened in an instant. It unfolded before our eyes, a textbook invasion – we didn’t know; we couldn’t have prepared enough.

Then, there are far fringes that prattle on about how it was all planned by the regime. “They invited them here”, they say. “They were losing their authority in the far provinces; they needed something to unite us!”.

Nutters.

Regardless, so much was lost. Wave after wave over two of the longest years of Terra’s existence.

We gave it everything we got. One thing those fringe fanatics got right was – it really did give everyone in the regime a common goal.

Over the last 5 decades, we diverted all resources to make sure something like that never happened again.

We banded together and rebuilt Terra, and much, much, more.

From the greatest minds came the most advanced ships and tools to sustain life and traverse vast distances. From the strongest came a disciplined and proficient army.

Then, nothing happened. We waited and the years went by. 5, 10, 20 – still nothing.

How did that saying go? Something about comfort making us less curious, more complacent?

And now history is repeating itself. We’re forced once again to face our potential extinction.

We need to leave Terra. Now.