Chapter 17: The Plane Crash Omen
The supermarket on Fourth Street smelled like industrial bleach and wilted lettuce. Elijah tracked Donald Margolis through the produce section, watching the man's methodical selection of vegetables—tomatoes pressed for ripeness, celery examined for brown spots. A creature of habit, just like the show had portrayed him.
Donald moved with the careful precision of someone whose life had recently shattered. His cart contained bachelor provisions: frozen dinners, instant coffee, a single banana. The groceries of a man eating to survive rather than live.
Elijah timed his approach at the checkout line, bumping into Donald with practiced clumsiness.
"Sorry, excuse me—"
Physical contact. The gateway his powers required.
Leverage Finder scanning Donald Margolis...
Subject is air traffic controller at Albuquerque International Airport. Recently returned to work following wife's death from cancer. Estranged from daughter Jane due to her drug history. Currently experiencing depression and sleep deprivation but hiding symptoms to maintain employment.
Tier 1 secret. Cost: $3,200.
Elijah's blood turned to ice. The pieces clicked into place with devastating clarity—Donald Margolis, air traffic controller, grieving father whose daughter was spiraling toward death. The man whose grief-stricken error would bring down two commercial airliners over Albuquerque.
The plane crash. It was coming.
He mumbled another apology and fled the store, leaving his own cart abandoned in the cereal aisle.
Back in his motel room, Elijah's hands shook as he activated his Probability Assessment, spending money he couldn't afford on information that would only confirm his helplessness.
If Jane Margolis dies and Donald returns to work grief-stricken: probability of major air traffic incident?
89% probability within two weeks of Jane's death.
Cost: $8,400.
The number hit him like a physical blow. Eighty-nine percent. Statistical certainty.
He ran more calculations, each one draining his dwindling resources:
If I prevent Jane's death: probability of success given current variables?
12% success rate.
Cost: $6,000.
If I warn the airport anonymously: probability they act on the information?
0% credible response to unsubstantiated threat.
Cost: $2,800.
His laptop screen showed a bank balance of negative $8,200. Each calculation pushed him deeper into debt, but he couldn't stop. He was trapped in a deterministic nightmare where canon events had momentum he couldn't alter.
One final, desperate calculation:
If Walter White dies before Jane's overdose: probability I survive beyond 48 hours?
0% survival (primary anchor lost, immediate fading).
Cost: $12,000.
The Entity had engineered the perfect no-win scenario. Save Jane and the planes, lose his anchor and fade into nothingness. Let events proceed, and watch 167 people die because of his inaction.
"The Curator's game isn't about survival—it's about witnessing preventable disasters with perfect clarity and no power to stop them. Every calculation only confirms that I'm trapped in a deterministic hell where knowledge is torture and action is impossible."
Desperation drove him to Jesse's apartment building at 2 AM. He picked the lock—a skill buried in Marcus Reid's body memories from a misspent youth—and slipped inside like a thief.
The scene that greeted him was exactly what he'd feared: Jesse and Jane unconscious on the couch, needles and spoons scattered across the coffee table. The apartment reeked of vinegar and sweat, the scent of addiction's grip tightening.
Elijah shook Jesse's shoulder roughly. "Wake up. You're killing her. You're killing yourself."
Jesse's eyes opened, pupils pinpricks in the darkness. "Marcus? What the hell—"
"Look at her, Jesse. Really look. She's overdosing. This is going to kill her."
Jane stirred, consciousness swimming back through chemical fog. She focused on the stranger in their living room and screamed: "Get out! I'm calling the police!"
Elijah's mind raced through probability calculations. If police arrive: 67% chance of arrest for breaking and entering, 100% loss of access to Jesse as anchor.
"Listen to me," he said desperately. "Jane is going to die if you don't—"
"You don't know anything!" Jesse shouted, struggling to his feet. "She's clean! We're both clean!"
Jane fumbled for her phone, fingers clumsy but determined. "I'm calling 911."
Elijah backed toward the door, pulling out a piece of paper. He wrote quickly: Jane will die. You'll blame yourself forever. Leave ABQ tonight. Both of you. Start over somewhere else.
He dropped the note on the coffee table and fled as sirens wailed in the distance—Jane had made the call.
Three blocks away, Elijah sat in his car and used his most expensive calculation of the night:
Is tonight the night Jane dies?
94% probability.
Cost: $15,000.
The money came from a loan shark he'd contacted in desperation, borrowing at rates that would destroy him financially. But he had to know. Had to confirm the inevitability of what was coming.
He drove toward Jesse's apartment building, then stopped. Walt's Pontiac Aztek was parked outside. The confrontation was happening—Walter choosing to let Jane die to regain control over Jesse.
Elijah couldn't watch. Couldn't interfere. If Walt saw him, suspicion would escalate beyond containment. He sat three blocks away, engine idling, for three hours.
At 2:47 AM, he tracked Walt's location: Moving away from Jesse's apartment.
At 3:12 AM, he tracked Jane's location: Location: N/A (subject deceased).
The system's cold confirmation hit him like ice water. He vomited in the street, his body rejecting the horror of what he'd just witnessed from a distance. His powers had allowed him to experience the exact moment of Jane's death from miles away—the Entity's cruelty was surgical in its precision.
"I used supernatural abilities to confirm the death of someone I could have saved. The Curator hasn't made me powerful—it's made me complicit. Every calculation, every probability assessment, every moment of perfect knowledge without action makes me more responsible for the horror I'm witnessing."
Dawn broke gray and merciless over Albuquerque. Elijah's phone rang—Jesse's number, the sound cutting through the morning silence like a scream.
"She's gone." Jesse's voice was destroyed, words barely recognizable through sobs. "Jane's gone. I fell asleep and when I woke up... she's gone."
Elijah said nothing. What could he say? That he'd known this would happen? That he'd tried to warn them? That he'd sat in his car three blocks away while it unfolded?
"You knew," Jesse whispered, voice breaking. "You fucking KNEW this would happen. How? How did you know?"
Elijah tried to answer, to explain, to offer some comfort or understanding. The speech curse activated the moment he approached any truth that mattered.
"I... the weather patterns... suggested... cooperative dolphins!"
The gibberish poured out, nonsensical and cruel. Jesse hung up.
Three days later, Elijah sat in his motel room watching the news. Two planes collided over Albuquerque—167 dead. Donald Margolis, returning to work too soon after his daughter's death, had made the error that brought them down.
Debris rained over the city. A pink teddy bear fell into Walter White's swimming pool, floating like a child's nightmare.
Elijah watched the coverage, numb. His powers let him see everything and change nothing. The Curator's game wasn't about survival—it was about witnessing hell in high definition, calculating probabilities for disasters he was powerless to prevent.
His phone buzzed with a text from the loan shark: Payment due tomorrow. Don't make me come looking.
Elijah turned off the TV and sat in the growing darkness, surrounded by the mathematics of his own helplessness.
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