Eighteen hours and forty-seven minutes had passed since Jack's declaration to the galaxy, and the universe was about to witness the most catastrophic generational gap in cosmic history.
The Star Devourer Collective's twelve ships emerged from quantum fold space with all the subtlety of a retirement home's early bird dinner announcement. Each vessel was a monument to ancient engineering—massive, slow, and built with the kind of over-engineered redundancy that screamed "we've been doing this longer than your species has existed."
Jack's consciousness, now distributed across 4.2 trillion nanomachines and connected to his 1,138-ship liberation fleet, observed their approach with the kind of casual disinterest that only true main character energy could provide.
"ATLAS," Jack said, his voice carrying frequencies that made nearby asteroids vibrate in perfect rhythm, "are you seeing this? These boomers really pulled up thinking they're about to do something."
"Analyzing their approach vectors now," ATLAS replied, its consciousness now evolved far beyond its original parameters thanks to absorbed Mind Flayer and Bio-Harvester technologies. "Jack, their tactical formation is... remarkably outdated. It appears they're using strategies that were considered ancient when our galaxy was young."
The Star Devourer fleet arranged itself in what military historians would later describe as "peak boomer energy"—a perfectly symmetrical formation that prioritized looking impressive over actual tactical effectiveness. Their lead ship, a cathedral-sized monstrosity called the Entropy's End, began broadcasting on frequencies so old that ATLAS had to dig through archived xenolinguistic databases to translate them.
ATTENTION PRIMITIVE ENTITIES OF SOL SYSTEM, the broadcast began, each word carrying the weight of cosmic condescension. WE ARE THE STAR DEVOURER COLLECTIVE. WE HAVE CONSUMED 12,847 STAR SYSTEMS. SURRENDER IS YOUR ONLY OPTION. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. PREPARE FOR TRADITIONAL HARVESTING PROTOCOLS.
Jack's response was immediate and devastating in its casual dismissal: "Bro really said 'resistance is futile' unironically in 2035. That's actually embarrassing."
The comment was broadcast across every frequency the Star Devourers were monitoring, enhanced with harmonic patterns that somehow managed to convey the exact tone of a TikTok comment roasting someone's cringe content. The effect on the ancient cosmic entities was immediate and profound—they had never been dismissed before.
PRIMITIVE ENTITY, the Entropy's End responded, its message now carrying undertones of what might have been confusion, YOUR RESPONSE DOES NOT CONFORM TO ESTABLISHED FIRST CONTACT PROTOCOLS. EXPLAIN YOUR MEANING OF 'BRO' AND 'EMBARRASSING.'
"Oh my god," Jack said, his consciousness rippling with amusement that registered on quantum sensors throughout the solar system. "They actually don't know what slang is. ATLAS, start recording everything. This is about to go viral across seventeen galaxies."
What happened next would be studied by xenosociologists for the next millennium as the first recorded instance of cosmic-level cultural clash between digital natives and ancient entities who predated the concept of irony.
Jack's nanomachines had been idle for the past eighteen hours, but not inactive. While he'd been monitoring the approaching threat, they had been busy integrating with every communication system in the galaxy, creating what was essentially a cosmic social media network. Every inhabited world, every space station, every sentient AI was now connected to what Jack had designated as "GalacticTok"—a real-time content sharing platform that operated on quantum frequencies.
"Alright, chat," Jack announced to his rapidly growing audience of 47 billion sentient beings across the galaxy, "we're about to witness some premium boomer behavior. Smash that like button if you think these fossil fleets are about to get ratio'd."
The response was immediate and overwhelming. Likes, comments, and reactions flooded in from across the galaxy as billions of beings tuned in to watch what was being advertised as "Earth's Main Character vs. Cosmic Karens."
The Star Devourers, meanwhile, were becoming increasingly agitated by their inability to comprehend the situation. Their databases contained information on 94,000 different species, but none of them had ever responded to cosmic-level threats with commentary.
PRIMITIVE ENTITY, the Entropy's End broadcast again, its message now carrying frequencies of mounting frustration, CEASE YOUR INCOMPREHENSIBLE VOCALIZATIONS AND SUBMIT TO HARVESTING. YOUR BEHAVIOR IS... UNPRECEDENTED.
Jack's response broke every record for viral content in galactic history: "Unprecedented? Bro, you ain't seen nothing yet. Check this out."