What was Earth?

The classroom lights buzzed faintly overhead. Rows of children sat in silence, eyes fixed on Ms. Lera. Behind her, a wide panel displayed the words: History Module 7C – Planet Earth.

The room was clean. Too clean. The air was dry and smelled faintly of metal, like every room on Arca Nine. The walls were white and seamless. The seats were molded plastic, soft enough to sit but never soft enough to forget where you were.

Ms. Lera stood at the front. She wore plain gray like all the teachers. Her face was tired, not old. She had seen forty-five rotations, born long after the last ship left Earth. Still, her job was to teach what Earth was, even if she had never touched it.

She clicked her pointer. The display lit up with an image of a forest. The children stared. Their eyes followed the shapes—tall trunks, tangled green, beams of real sunlight.

“Does anyone know what this is?” she asked.

A few hands rose. Some shrugged.

“It’s fake,” whispered Juno from the front row.

“No,” Ms. Lera said. “This was real. These are called trees. They grew from the ground. Each one could live for hundreds of years. Some even more.”

A boy in the second row, Dax, frowned. “But what’s the point? What did they do?”

“They made air,” she said. “They pulled it from the ground and the sky. They gave shade. Shelter. Food. Animals lived in them.”

Another student, Mira, raised her hand. “Are these the things people cut down in old stories?”

“Yes,” she said. “We used their wood. Built homes. Burned it to stay warm. But we didn’t stop when we had enough.”

She tapped the screen again. It shifted to show a mountain range, deep blue skies, clouds scattered like cotton.

“This was the land. It stretched for thousands of miles in every direction. You could walk for days and still not reach the edge.”

“What about water?” asked Kenzo from the back.

She smiled faintly. “Good question.”

The next slide showed an ocean—vast, glittering, endless.

“This was called an ocean. It was saltwater, not like what we drink here. It covered most of the planet.”

“How big?” asked Dax again.

“Too big to cross without a ship. Whole countries sat across from one another, divided by this.”

“Did people swim in it?” asked Mira.

“Yes. And they fished. Some lived on floating homes. Some studied the animals inside. There were whales—giants longer than our classroom. Tiny glowing fish that lived deep below. The water held more life than the land.”

The students looked at the image in silence. None of them had seen more than a bath basin of water. Most had never touched water not filtered by the ship’s core.

A hand rose in the back. “Why don’t we just go back?” asked Jax, a quiet boy who rarely spoke.

Ms. Lera’s face changed slightly. She tapped the screen again. Now the images darkened—flooded cities, cracked earth, orange skies.

“You’re asking what every generation before you has asked, Jax,” she said. “Why can’t we return?”

She paused. Let the room stay quiet.

“Earth is gone.”

The words hung there. Sharp. Final.

“It died?” asked Isla.

“It collapsed,” she said. “Not in a single day. Not from a single cause. But over time, it became unlivable.”

She clicked again. Storms. Fires. People in masks. Dying crops.

“It started with the heat. We burned fuels—oil, coal, gas. To power machines. To travel. To grow. But it added up. The air thickened. The planet warmed.”

“Didn’t they know?” asked Dax.

“They did,” she said. “Scientists warned them for over a hundred years. But it was hard to stop. Money, power, comfort—it got in the way.”

“So they let it happen?” said Mira.

“Some tried to stop it,” Ms. Lera said. “They built wind farms. They used solar energy. But it wasn’t fast enough. Too much damage had been done. Ice caps melted. Seas rose. Food ran out.”

“Then came war?” asked Kenzo.

“Yes,” Ms. Lera said. “Nations fought for what was left. Water. Soil. Clean air. Billions died.”

The room was still. One boy, Ty, shifted in his seat, uncomfortable.

“What about animals?” asked Isla.

“Gone. Most couldn’t adapt. Forests burned. Oceans turned to acid. One by one, they vanished. Some survived in labs. But even those labs lost power in the end.”

She tapped again. The image showed people boarding sleek ships. Chaos. Crowds. Fire in the background.

“Only a few had the means to leave. These are the exodus ships. Arca Nine was one of them.”

“And the rest of the people?” asked Juno.

Ms. Lera didn’t answer right away.

“They stayed behind,” she said quietly.

“But why didn’t they save more people?” asked Kenzo again.

“There wasn’t time. Or space. And the planet was already falling apart. Each ship held maybe ten thousand. Out of billions.”

“That’s not fair,” whispered Mira.

“No,” Ms. Lera said. “It wasn’t.”

She walked to the side of the room and opened a small drawer built into the wall. From inside, she took out a sealed box—clear, thick glass, vacuum-locked.

Inside was a chunk of dark soil. Crumbly, dry.

“This is Earth soil,” she said. “Real soil. Not synthesized. Not processed. It’s one of the last samples left.”

She passed it to the first row. Each student held it like it might vanish.

“It smells like... nothing,” said Ty.

“That’s because it’s dead,” she said. “No microbes. No moisture. It’s just dirt now. But once, it was full of life.”

“Can we make more?” asked Isla.

“No. Soil like this took millions of years to form. It’s not something we can build.”

She let that sit.

“I brought it today to remind you of what we lost. And what we had.”

“Do you miss it?” asked Jax again.

“I never saw it,” she said. “I was born on this ship. Just like you. But yes—I miss it. Even though I never knew it. I feel it in my bones.”

“Like a ghost?” said Kenzo.

She smiled. “Maybe, Kenzo. The Earth haunts all of us, even now.”

Another student, Mira, raised her hand. “Is there a new Earth out there?”

She walked back to the screen and tapped again. It showed stars. A map of the galaxy. Dots marked with numbers and long designations.

“We’ve found planets. Some have air. Some have water. But none are quite right. Not yet.”

“How long will it take?” asked Dax.

“No one knows,” she said. “Some say we’re close. Others think we’ll never find it.”

“What if this is it?” said Isla. “What if we never leave the ship?”

Ms. Lera didn’t rush to answer. She looked at their faces—ten, maybe eleven years old. Smart. Sharp. But still kids.

“Then you learn to live,” she said. “You make this place better. You treat it like home. Because it’s the only one we’ve got.”

The classroom was silent.

She clicked to the last slide. It was an image of a single daisy, growing out of a crack in the sidewalk.

“This was one of Earth’s flowers,” she said. “Simple. Common. But beautiful.”

A long silence passed. Then the bell chimed softly—three tones. Class over.

The students rose slowly. A few looked back at the screen. Juno lingered near the soil box, tracing her fingers over the glass.

Ms. Lera didn’t rush them. She stood there as the room emptied.

When the last child left, she walked to the console and dimmed the lights. The screen faded.

She picked up the soil and held it close. Heavy for its size.

Earth was gone. But in that room, for a little while, it had almost come back.