Yes I know what vacuum decay is, and the thing I referenced, the inflaton field, is a hypothetized false vacuum near the very start of the universe, that went through this exact process, giving rise to our current vacuum and ending the hypothetized inflation era

I know there's a hypothesis that our current vacuum could be metastable as well, but that's a seperate thing

Those are all really interesting factors to consider and I appreciate the response!

I'll come clean, when I wrote it, I was just making a funny, like... A "decaying vacuum" would suck less over time. . .than a black hole. Lol XD

To your point though, less likelihood of finding other life is such a wildcard, for sure. (Less likelihood of meeting cool benevolent spacefarers...but also less likely to be spotted by something like Mass Effect's Reapers, or accidentally bring home Xenomorphs or extragalactic pathogens lol)

And...not being able to ever see the beginning of everything...my curious mind says that'd be such a bummer but also...oddly beautiful? I'll have to ponder that...