When Ben, Michaela, and Cal Stone decided to take a different plane home than the rest of their family, they never imagined what would be waiting for them when they landed. The engers are detained, as Flight 828's arrival was a shock to the people at the airport. As it turns out, they had not been a mere few hours behind their relatives, but five and a half years.
Things had changed in that time, as Ben looks at his now teenaged daughter. However, that was not all that was different. All the engers heard a voice in their head, almost like a warning. Throughout the series, everyone tries to understand what the callings are and why they are getting them. That is only the beginning of a longer list of questions that Manifest needs to answer.
What Happens If You Ignore The Callings?
The combination of callings and research lead Ben to believe that the only way to avoid the death date was to follow the callings. To do anything else could mean certain death. However, this could mean bad things for Saanvi, who had experimented on herself to be rid of the death date, and had succeeded in removing the callings.
During "Airplane Bottles," a brief image in a book showed Saanvi in a compromising position as if she had died. In which case, she may not be the only one in danger. In "Unaccompanied Minors," Michaela goes against a calling that tells her to let a man cooking meth go. As this is the first time Michaela had refused a calling, it calls into question what may happen to her in return.
What Happened To The Major's Experiments?
The Major, an antagonist, had taken several 828 engers that did not have close family or friends and experimented on them. Ben, Michaela, and Cal had narrowed down their location through a mental link all the engers share and the callings. Although the mind experiments were destroyed at the end of the first season, the Major continued to be a driving force in the second season. However, after taking Saanvi's experiments, she vanished. If the Major is still conducting testing on engers, it is not clear what she is doing.
The Holy Grail?
During the Major's experiments, she describes something as "The Holy Grail." Manifest implied that such a prize might have been Cal, who seemed to be one of the most significant engers. Yet, the search for Holy Grail came to an abrupt end when it stopped being mentioned. If anything is happening with that, it is occurring off-screen. While Cal's callings may have been some of the most intuitive, Cal's significance regarding what happened to the plane has yet to be revealed. Meanwhile, the Major has yet to define what she considers the Holy Grail to be.
What Happened To The Flight Pilot?
At one point, Manifest had suggested that the reason for Flight 828's disappearance had to do with dark lightning and a possible wormhole. The flight pilot took it upon himself to fly directly back into the whole to determine if he would appear five years into the future again. Since the pilot had never been found, vanishing from the grid, it is unclear if he died or was sent through time. Perhaps, if Manifest did another time jump, he may re-appear. It also suggests questions regarding the death date. If the pilot managed to jump forward in time again, was his life extended?
How Is Zeke Involved?
Zeke was not on the plane when it disappeared. While the engers missed five years of their lives, Zeke only missed one. He had frozen in a cave and discovered that a year had gone by since his initial trip. That does not add up with the engers' experience, and yet Zeke receives the same callings they do. Zeke's situation had not been specified on how he had managed to get caught in this situation as well. However, just as the engers are meant to, Zeke also has a death date.
How Does The Death Date Work?
A man, Griffin, is meant to die in a river. Griffin is saved, survives for the exact amount of days he was missing, then dies the way he was supposed to. Rather than being in the water when he dies, Griffin is on land and spits out water, drowning from the inside. Zeke started the process of frostbite, which would eventually lead to him freezing to death.
These events bring up the question of how the engers are supposed to die, as well. It still has not been revealed what happened to Flight 828, and thus the audience would not know what to expect regarding their situation. However, the characters are equally in the dark.
Heroes Or Villains?
Adrian posed a question to Ben regarding if the callings are good or bad. While Ben argues the side of good, Adrian suggests the opposite. While the callings have allowed Ben, Michaela, Zeke, and Cal to save lives, Adrian's theory suggests that it also endangers people. Grace may not have tripped and forced to deliver her baby early had she not been chasing a calling. Adrian's theory includes the engers are meant to be agents of the apocalypse, and that the callings are manipulating them into doing what it wants.
Why Do engers Get Callings?
All the engers of Flight 828 were living normal lives until they landed in New York. After stepping off the plane, their lives were forever changed in more ways than one. Loved ones had moved on, grown-up, or ed away. However, that was not the only set of problems they had to deal with. They were also experiencing hearing voices inside their heads, leading them to help people.
Even though they question how the callings work or why they get them, for the most part, Ben, Michaela, and Cal followed the callings blindly without a second thought. They believe in them. While the callings have something to do with what occurred on Flight 828, it has not been revealed yet.
What Happened To The Plane?
Dark lightning was a suggestion in season one. However, Manifest has not spent a lot of time diving into how the plane managed to vanish from the air. While flashbacks reveal how people handled the missing flight and how they responded to its return, there was still a gaping hole missing.
While a wormhole and other suggestions were questioned, nothing has indeed been confirmed. Early in the series, it looked as if the plane was being experimented on. However, that storyline stopped being involved in the show. Afterward, the focus had been more on individual people than the airplane as a whole.
What Happened To The engers?
Flight 828 disappeared out of the blue on an ordinary day. What the engers believed to be turbulence was a time warp, sending them five years into the future. Occasionally, Ben, Michaela, and Cal have callings that show them a snippet of what occurred on the plane. However, based on how they react to it, it suggests that their memories of the events were erased.
Yet, Manifest has to explain if the plane was taken or what happened to the people on the flight. Saanvi's experiments show that their DNA was changed after the flight to New York, suggesting that it changed something within them biologically.