Manifest – Cleared for Approach

By: Luke Joseph

Unlike those on Flight 828, Zeke (Matt Long) ended up making the journey alone by foot. Rather than find himself going through a time loop on a plane it had been done during the blizzard when a storm had come out of nowhere. “I came back into a world that completely moved on without me,” Zeke states. He declines to head back into the city with Ben (Josh Dallas) and the rest of the family. It’s his lack of wanting to reunite with his family that makes Ben wary of him, but Michaela (Melissa Roxburgh) manages to convince her brother to head back home so that she can deal with Zeke.

It turns out Zeke isn’t an open book. He’s not even half opened. Getting agitated over Michaela’s twenty questions, he storms off but Michaela reaches for him. When she touches him the two share a calling together. It’s telling them both to “go back.” She believes it’s directing them towards the cave and though he’s reluctant he agrees. During her supply run she goes to the exact store Zeke had gone to before his hike. She comes across a missing poster and the talkative cashier explains how he believes Zeke had committed suicide because he had lost his younger sister Chloe who had died up on the mountain.  Hastily, she returns to the cabin and finds it empty causing her to hightail it out and find him. She does. They bicker and share another calling. This time he agrees to take her to the cave but once they’re done he’s out.

“Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs,” Zeke says to Michaela after they find the cave with no answers. When they hear “go back” in his voice Michaela realizes they have to look from his point of view. He tells her about the twelve step program of Alcoholics Anonymous and about his sister Chloe.  He admits that he’s the one responsible for his sister’s death, but it wasn’t done on purpose. He had been fifteen years old when he had taken his sister up to a ravine, but rather than looking out for his sister like a big brother was meant to do he took a phone call. That phone call had cost him his sister’s life. Rather than coddle him, Michaela explains how she can relate to that feeling of guilt because she still holds herself responsible for her friend’s death.  With the sharing that transpired between the two they do what Zeke hasn’t been able to do in years and that’s visiting his sister’s memorial. They build a cairn in her honor. Hearing “go back,”in Michaela’s voice is what presents itself to them and Michaela believes it means that Zeke needs to come with her and face reality.

Meanwhile, Ben is dealing with his own issues in the form of Cody Webber (Patrick Murney) who created a site to harass the passengers of Flight 828. During the drive home they come across a billboard that reads “are they even human?” He believes that they are aliens and finds it suspicious that the government has planted them through all parts of the world. Clearly, the unknown has the power to make people jumpy and Webber is using this in his favor as a scare tactic. The Stone family has come across things like this before and Ben suggests they just ignore it, but Webber escalates his harassing when he and his friends throw a brick through the window and paint a red X on the family’s front door.

Sometimes the law isn’t on your side because even though Jared (J.R. Ramirez) is able to take Webber into custody they don’t have enough to go by in order to hold him. This results in Jared having to cut him loose which makes Ben decide it’s time he takes the law into his own hands by breaking the law. While Jared had been called away for a second, Ben had looked through the file to obtain the information he needed. He heads to Webber’s job to confront him and the exchange is far from friendly. Webber is making it his mission to rile Ben up and Ben is able to hold back the temptation to snap. Unfortunately, the second Webber wonders if Cal (Jack Messina) bleeds all hell breaks loose. The police arrive on the scene, but it’s Ben that gets the cuffs because all the while this was happening Webber’s friends had live streamed what had been going down. Okay officers, I’m not telling you how to do your job, but Webber threatened a minor shouldn’t that have been the main focus?

Luckily being friends with a cop helps because Jared manages to get Ben off with just a warning. However, he’s pissed because he knows that Ben had used him to obtain the information. It doesn’t seem like it’s a good day for Ben but even in the darkest of moments light can be found. This time it’s found in two people, Olive and Grace. Olive (Luna Blaise) reveals to Ben that she’s known about the callings for quite some time because Cal told her. She’s hurt her father felt he couldn’t trust her, but Ben reassures her that it was only done for her protection. “This, this is happening to all of us,” she reminds her father and that alone is enough for Ben to agree he’s no longer going to keep her in the dark. It’s a good thing because her knowledge of Greek and Roman mythology might prove to be helpful to Ben when she explains they believed the peacock to be related to immortality. Remember how during the explosion Ben had seen a peacock? This definitely isn’t just a coincidence.

All along Ben has just wanted to come home but he’s respected Grace’s (Athena Karkanis) wishes. Still, after today he has felt powerless when it’s come to protecting his family. Wanting to do something at least he heads to his old house and begins to scrub the paint off on their door. He’s wrecked. Absolutely wrecked and Grace witnesses it first hand when she discovers him outside in tears. Now that she knows the burden of this secret and the harm that it can cause she’s starting to understand the toll it has taken on Ben. She consoles him and reminds him he’s not in this alone. “Our family. We’re supposed to be a team. This is your home and I need you here.  I need you here,” she says. The tears of dismay turn to ones of joy because Ben finally gets to go home.

The episode closes with Michaela and Zeke coming across carving of a stick figure. It’s of two people holding hands and it’s not a coincidence that Michaela and Zeke at the moment are holding hands. Lightning strikes coming out of nowhere and we fade to black. Did they travel through time again?