Making Contact
Bann retreated to an empty hallway and took out his communicator.
He typed in his Tallest's number and waited.
If the line didn't connect he would try again in a little while.
To his surprise the Tallest's face appeared on the screen. There were circles under the Irken leader's eyes, his face was pale, and his crimson ocular implants were duller than they usually were.
"Who are you?" the Tallest asked him with an edge of impatience in his voice. "What do you want?"
With a smile and a quick salute Bann answered: "I'm Filik sir; the navigator you sent to Vort with that Vortian you maimed."
"Oh...?" the Tallest's eyes narrowed. "Why are you calling me?"
"Well sir, the Vortian has been asking me over and over and over again if he can speak with you," Bann responded, shrugging and shaking his head. "I told him you were busy. I told him he wasn't important enough, but that guy really doesn't shut up."
He stopped talking for a little while as he tried to read his leader's expression. He couldn't.
"Is that why you stabbed him?" he asked since a part of him wanted to know and the other part of him wanted to annoy Irk's leader a bit.
"What...?" Tallest Red's antennae flattened and he rubbed his temples. "No... I stabbed him because... it doesn't matter why."
The Tallest glared at the screen.
"Why does he want to talk to me anyway? I almost killed him, so talking to me is kind of stupid."
"Well... from what I understand, he called Zim because he knows about the worms, but the banished disgrace will only talk to you, so the Vortian wanted to talk to you about talking to him."
"Zim won't help anyone..." The Tallest muttered, resting his face on his hand. "It's impossible to get anything useful from him. He'll just blabber on uselessly and somehow make something in the Empire explode."
"Yeah, that's what I said too! That guy is really..." Bann remarked. He quickly covered his mouth and this muffled his words a bit. "Sorry my Tallest... I spoke too quickly."
The corner of the Tallest's mouth twitched.
"That's fine... I have new orders for you..."
"Yes sir!" Bann immediately perked up and pretended to listen eagerly for his new assignment.
"I... I think I was too quick to... I mean... if you can offer the Vortians some help... you can do that..."
"Help the Vortians?" Bann blinked in confusion. "I... I don't mean any disrespect my Tallest... but they're inferior and gross and I hate them... why should we help them at all?"
"Because I'm the Tallest and you're not," Irk's leader answered him easily.
Bann dipped his head. "Sorry sir..."
He didn't have to fake this reaction. He actually felt uncomfortable.
"It was stupid of me to ask that question... I will follow your orders no matter how I feel about the situation. No problem."
The Tallest sighed. He closed his eyes and rubbed them.
"If Laes wants to talk, I'll talk to him one more time before the final barrier closes."
"Oh..." Bann gestured towards the cafeteria. "Should I get him?"
"Yeah sure. Go ahead."
Bann didn't end the call, but he did return his communicator to his PAK before leaving the hallway.
He scanned the cafeteria for Laes... the Vortian wasn't by the junk pile and he wasn't among the working teams.
There he was... Bann squinted. Lying on the floor for some reason?
He hurried over before Laes' parents could help him up. He grabbed the collapsed Vortian around the waist while all four metal limbs sprang from his PAK.
Using these he was able to launch himself and Laes into the air.
"Sorry, I need to borrow him for a minute!" He called back to Laes' mom and dad.
Freedo cupped his mouth so he could project his voice.
"Ok! Just have him back by midnight!"
Laes didn't speak at first. He was probably surprised.
Then when they stopped moving Laes pushed himself away from him and ended up face-down on the floor again.
The Vortian propped himself up a little with his good...only hand and frowned up at the Irken.
"Why did you...?" he began, but he was silenced when a communicator was shoved into his face without any explanation.
The Tallest was on the screen.
Laes balked and then gawked for a minute before clearing his throat and trying to adopt a normal expression although he was smiling much too weird.
"Tallest, hi," he attempted to greet the Tallest normally, but his voice was a bit too strained and he was grasping the communicator so tightly Bann worried it might break. "I uh..."
"I don't know how you got Zim's number, but you need to stop calling him right now..." Irk's leader told him plainly.
"I know he's a little... eccentric... but he knows a lot about the worms and maybe if I phrase it the right way he might..."
"Laes..." Tallest Red spoke, cutting the Vortian off. "His programming was created to upset the entire Irken system... I won't call him. I'll never call him... and if you want your planet to not explode, you'll stop calling him too."
"But..." Laes deflated which almost meant his face hitting the floor again. "But the worms could attack us any minute, and if they have a weakness..."
"Their weakness is blowing them up from the inside," the Tallest explained, though he sounded annoyed while doing it. "When an Irken soldier self-detonates inside one of those creatures, it usually dies... of course the soldier dies too, so there's a limited amount of times it can be done that way."
"Oh..." Laes looked around at the craters in the floor. "That's kind of a bummer... also if that's true, where's all the worm gross?"
"Is that all you wanted to know?" Tallest Red asked, ignoring the question.
"I just have one more question..." Laes began, and he pushed himself into a sitting position. "Why are you suddenly telling me everything again...? I um... kind of thought you hated us... or me."
"Because..." Tallest Red breathed a sigh and covered his eyes with one hand. He rubbed them, and then ran his hand down his face. "When I returned to Irk, one of the advisers I had searching for more lost history uncovered something disturbing..."
"You can't tell me what it is... can you?"
"I can, but I won't."
"Please?" Laes asked, grabbing his stump. "I already know everything else anyway."
The Tallest stared at him for a few long awkward moments.
"You won't like it," Irk's leader warned him.
"That's ok... oh wait."
Laes looked somewhat conflicted. He chewed his lower lip, and he glanced away from the monitor for a moment.
"I'm not sure if you've seen the purple Tallest yet, but he asked me to tell you something," Laes began, tapping his fingers together.
"He said he wanted you to come to your senses and to stop being a jerk..." The Vortian placed a finger on his chin. "Maybe that's why I forgot to say it before..."
Bann smacked himself in the face. Why off Irk did Laes decide to mention something like that now?
Tallest Red snickered. Then he laughed.
"Yeah, Purple would say that alright."
He pushed his antennae down and shook his head.
"Purple is really something..."
"Oh... so... did he tell you that already?" Laes questioned.
"No," Tallest Red immediately responded. He crossed his arms and scowled.
"Shut up. He's fine."
"I um... didn't ask if he..." Laes let his comment peter out when the Tallest's scowl deepened.
Bann knew Tallest Purple was dead... at least his PAK had been so badly damaged that no amount of probing could access his data.
The Tallest's body was being kept alive by a complex life-support system, so Tallest Purple was nothing more than an empty shell. There was probably no way for him to come back.
Tallest Red promptly changed the topic of conversation, clearly avoiding the topic of the other Tallest.
"We destroyed all of the worms near Vort, so you won't have to worry about an attack for a while."
"You did?" Laes questioned, tilting his head a little. "Why?"
"We did it in self-defence... they were trying to eat us."
"Oh, well, it still really helps us out that you did that."
"Heh," Tallest Red smirked. "You're pretty strange. Shouldn't you be angry at me for having you tortured, destroying your home, imprisoning your parents, and maiming you horribly? I think most aliens would be angry or at least bitter about all of that."
"You didn't kill me or my parents," Laes quickly responded. "You could have killed us, but you didn't, and I'm pretty happy they're still alive."
The Tallest shrugged.
"Ok. If you say so."
He looked off screen and gave a quick nod.
Then his eyes returned to the monitor.
"The barrier is ready to activate. You won't hear from me again after this... are you sure you want to know more about your people's involvement with the Invaders?"
"Yes, I do," Laes responded without hesitation.
The Tallest held up a very old looking disk.
"Then I'll send this to you."
He pointed to someone off screen.
"You over there!"
He held out the disk to his follower.
"You wanted to return to Vort don't you!? Then take this there!"
His eyes narrowed at someone else.
"And you! You're going with him!"
"Yes my Tallest," two voices echoed.
"Hurry up before the barrier activates!" Tallest Red's shoulder's drooped and his antennae became limp.
"Well," he looked back at the screen. "That's it then."
The transmission ended, and the communicator withdrew back into Bann's PAK.
"The Purple Tallest is dead, and all of the surviving Irkens are barricading themselves on Irk," Bann remarked slowly shaking his head as he placed a hand on his face.
He glanced down at Laes.
"Are you going to stay on the floor?"
"The drugs make my legs numb," Laes said, looking up at the Irken. "And I'm still mad at you for hurting Lard Nar."
"I don't remember 'Pain' getting this much attitude after he cut off your hand," Bann stated, crossing his arms and letting his antennae fall as he frowned down at his boots. He kicked an imaginary pebble too.
"Stop pouting and go apologize," Laes scolded him.
"I'm a navigator right now thanks, and I am going to apologize, so stop nagging me."
He bent down and picked up Laes off the ground, wrapping the Vortian's arm around his shoulders and supporting him with an arm around his waist.
Laes was able to move his legs a little, but they wouldn't support his weight, so Bann kept a firm grip on him.
This time he wasn't in a hurry so he didn't use his PAK legs for extra propulsion. He might have scared some of the Vortians with his metal appendages earlier since the Vortians kept looking at him while keeping well out of his way.
Those who were in his path quickly moved.
Laes' parents had returned to work which wasn't surprising.
Lard Nar appeared to be sleeping, so there was no reason for them to stay.
Darden's eyes were on him. The Irken soldier moved closer to the cot as he approached.
He offered the serious ex-soldier a friendly smile and was met with a scowl.
Darden wouldn't let him hurt Lard Nar again, he was sure.
After he helped Laes climb into his chair, he studied Lard Nar for a few seconds. There was definitely going to be a decent sized bruise where he'd struck him.
He'd watch a lot of Vortians get smacked around, and he'd also participated in beating a few himself when the other guards were watching. A single hit wasn't really a big deal. Besides, Lard Nar obviously had some combat training; it wasn't like he was helpless.
Still, Laes was upset about the confrontation, and he didn't really want to make an enemy out of Lard Nar when there was no reason to.
"Hey, sorry I struck you back there," Bann tried since he wasn't too sure if Lard Nar was awake or not. "I was trying to prove a point I guess, and you know how Irkens are when it comes to violence and using it excessively."
Lard Nar opened his eyes and looked up at Bann.
"You're still angry about what I did to the Resisty aren't you?" the former guard asked.
Even though he felt a little conflicted, he still didn't feel sympathy for anyone who died.
Instead he was concerned about how Laes was feeling.
"It wasn't personal."
"It wasn't personal?" Lard Nar repeated with a scowl. "Drent was beaten badly before the Tallest killed him... you did that didn't you?"
Right... he had done that. He'd also forgotten about it.
Mentioning he forgot about it probably wouldn't help this situation.
"Yes... I was a bit rough with him, but he was refusing to cooperate, and violence is easy."
He rubbed the side of his face.
"Maybe I was angry."
"You're dead..." Lard Nar stated. "The person you were before is dead." He let out a small sigh. "You can be different now... I'll try to give you that chance."
"Thanks," Bann replied with his usual smile.
He probably only had a few days left in this body, but he would try to help out as much as he could before Filik reclaimed his PAK.
Author's Notes: I will now answer my own question about the lack of guts and worm goo around the wrecked prison. The guards didn't detonate while getting eaten. Instead they self-destructed as the worms were beginning to break through the prison. This did injure some of the creatures yes, but considering worms can go through a planet's atmosphere without any issues, the explosions didn't kill them.
It's possible that the Tallest forgot to inform the guards about the worm's weakness... actually that's totally what happened. Oops.
Also Red finally answered the question if Purple's dead or not. Did you see it? "Shut up he's fine." You know that's the kind of blatant dismissiveness you can trust. I definitely don't suspect at all that he might not be fine now. Nope.