The episode opens with the Waverider landing in Star City in 2016.Rip explains that he’s dropping the team off in the present day, as they have no leads on Vandal Savage and no way to kill him as he has Kendra and Carter.Rip says that he’ll go back to the Time Master’s orphanage to retrieve his younger selves, but that due to wrinkles in the timestream he had to drop them off in May 2016 instead of January 2016.When the team tries to protest, Rip reveals that he’s not giving them a choice, as he’s actually projecting a hologram and is still aboard the Waverider.He flies away, leaving the team trapped in the present.
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Sarah returns to the Arrow Cave and finds her father there.She finds out that while she was gone, Laurel was murdered by Damien Darhk.
In Central City, Rory robs a bank with a new partner.When Rory’s partner kills a guard chasing them, Rory turns on his partner and sets him on fire.When he gets in his getaway car, he sees Ray sitting in the driver’s seat, wanting to talk. After getting away, Ray apologizes to Rory for Snart’s death, but Rory says that Snart was responsible for his own death. Ray says that they should become partners instead, as Snart knew that Ray would keep an eye on Rory and vice versa.
Stein enjoys a game of Trivial Pursuit with his wife, but realizes that he still has unfinished business with the team.The next morning, he heads back to where he last saw the ship with Jax, and discovers that the rest of the team also wants to find a way to bring the Waverider back to the present day.On the Waverider, Rip receives a transmission from the team and flies back to Star City.After a brief arguement, the team convinces Rip to let them back aboard the Waverider and continue their mission.
In 1944 France, Kendra runs into an American soldier.Recognizing the helmet as the one sitting in Rip’s cabin on the Waverider, she hides a message inside of it before Savage chases her down and knocks her out (and kills the soldier in the process.)
On the Waverider, Sara immediately decks Rip and puts a knife to his throat.Sara demands he take her back in time to rescue Laurel, but Rip uses a device to knock her out.As Rory drags Sara away to help her “sleep it off”, Jax accidentally knocks over the WWII helmet in Rip’s office.However, Rip realizes that the helmet has been displaced due to “chroniatic displacement” caused by a change in the timeline.Rip finds Kendra’s note in the helmet and tells Gideon to head to France.
Back in France, Savage draws blood from both Kendra and Carter, which he needs to activate the Thanagarian technology hidden inside of the meteors that gave him (and Kendra and Carter) their powers.Once he unlocks that technology, he can travel back to the past and erase history.
Rip talks to Sara about her sister’s death and reveals that he can’t save Laurel because he already altered the timeline when he originally recruited Sara.In the original timeline, not only did Damien Darhk kill Laurel, he also killed Sara and Quentin Lance too.Sara says she can’t go on without her sister, but Rip tells her that she’s one of the strongest people he knows.
The Waverider lands in 1944, just as Savage ambushes a Nazi convey carrying a Thanagarian meteor.Half the team moves in on Savage, while Firestorm finds Kendra and Carter on the time ship.While fleeeing with Carter and Kendra in tow, Firestorm accidentally transmutes a Nazi’s rifle and loses Kendra when she gets knocked out by one of Savage’s men.Outnumbered and outgunned, the team flees back to the Waverider without Kendra.
Back on the Waverider, a confused Carter tells Rip and the team about what he knows about Savage’s plan. Afterwards, Stein and Jax practice controlling their newfound power of transmutation, when Stein realizes what Savage’s plan is: he wants to detonate the Thanagarian meteor in three different time periods to create a temporal paradox and destroy the timeline.
Sure enough, Savage meets with his past self in the 1950s and gives him a vial of blood to detonate one of the meteorites.
Stein explains that in order to stop Savage, they need to kill him in three different time periods.Luckily, the radiation from the meteors will be enough to temporarily turn him mortal so anyone can kill him.Savage plans on detonating the meteors in St. Roch in 2021, Harmony Falls in 1958 and Norway in 1975.The team splits off into three teams to kill Savage in each time period simultaneously, using the meteor as a trigger to begin.
As Savage starts the ritual in all three time periods, the team simultaneously attacks.In 2021, Kendra frees herself from her bonds when Carter gets hurt and joins the fight.In 1974, Sara fights Savage one on one.Meanwhile, Rip gets shot in 2021 but lands on the Waverider, which gives Carter and Kendra and opening to attack Savage.Kendra stabs Savage in 2021, Rory torches Savage in 1958 and Sara snaps Savage’s neck in 1975.As Savage starts to bleed out, he taunts Rip about his family, which causes Rip to deliver the final blow.
The meteors start to go critical, but Ray and Firestorm manage to disable the meteors in their respective time periods.Unfortunately, when the team gathers in 2021, they discover that they can’t disable the third meteor, which is about to explode and destroy Earth in the process.However, Rip pulls the meteor onto the Waverider and sets a course to fly into the sun.The team tries to talk Rip out of committing suicide, but he thanks the team and guides the ship into the sun.A light overtakes Rip and he sees his family standing on the Waverider.Rip hugs his wife and son as the Waverider falls into the sun.
Rip wakes up and realizes neither he nor Gideon wants to die. He tells Gideon to prepare for one final jump: 20 minutes in the past.Rip picks up the rest of the team and explains that he dumped the meteor into the sun.He then explains that with the Time Masters out of commission, someone needs to protect the time stream and offers everyone a place on his team.
In the present day, Sara visits Laurel’s grave and says that she should stay to help fight Damien.However, she says that Laurel would have wanted her to go with Rip.
Stein plays another round of Trivial Pursuit with his wife, when Jax walks in.Stein doesn’t want to leave his wife, but Jax and his wife thinks that being Firestorm and protecting the timestream is more important.
In a skeezy bar in Central City in 2013, Rory meets Snart and tells his partner that he’s the best man he ever knew and that he was a hero to Snart.Rory leaves and meets Rip and Ray outside, and Rip says that they can always go back to the past so that Rory can visit Snart again.
When the team reassembles in 2016, Kendra and Carter decide to stay behind, since they no longer have Savage trying to kill them.After the two Hawks depart, a second Waverider appears and crashes in front of them.Hourman walks out of the ship and tells them not to get on the ship.He says that he’s a member of the Justice Society of America and that Rory and the rest of the team sent him to intercept their past selves.
