In Galaxy Quest, when the show's cast are taken to the spaceship by the Thermians the first time, Jason gets into a conference call with Sarris. At the end of the call, he off-handedly tells the aliens to shoot at Sarris' ship. The aliens seem to hesitate, but in the next scene they are shown thanking Jason for his help and happily send him back to Earth (at which point Jason finally realizes that he was on an actual spaceship).
I never got what actually happened here. He did tell the aliens to fire at Sarris' ship, which they presumably did. Sarris' ship was too strong for them to take out, so I don't think they were able to harm him in any way. After Jason reached back home, it looked like Sarris still hadn't destroyed the Thermians, and was still ready to negotiate with Jason for them to surrender.
I don't quite get what happened here. Could someone please summarize what happened during the first conference call between Jason and Sarris, and between the time Jason went home and came back to the ship the second time?
