Zari, Nate, Ray, Mona, Leonard, and Mick stood on the sidewalk between the Supreme Court and the Library of Congress. The Capitol loomed large across the street. All six of them were dressed appropriately and inconspicuously for 1950. Zari kept her totem on her wrist while Leonard and Mick concealed their weapons under their coats. They watched the crowds pass them in all directions, a mix of obvious tourists and people in dark suits walking from one government office building to another.

"Man," Ray said, taking in the famous landmarks around him, "I know we're in DC a lot because of the Time Bureau, but it's been a while since I was last back here. The Supreme Court, the Capitol, the Library of Congress…wow. So many iconic institutions in one place. It never gets old, does it?"

"Glad the Boy Scout's having fun," Snart said. "As for the rest of us, what's the plan to find Mick's book?"

Zari pointed at the library in front of them. "It should be open to the public right now. Once we get inside, the real question will be how to find one book among millions."

"Like looking for a needle in a haystack," Nate said, nodding in agreement.

"It's got to be organized, right?" Mona asked. "Maybe Brigid's Diary is shelved by author. You know, under 'B' for Brigid."

"It doesn't have her name on it," Mick replied. "How would they know where to put it?"

"They're expert librarians," Mona argued. "If anyone knows how to organize books, it's them."

"Well, we won't find it just standing around outside," Zari said. "Let's go in and check it out."

They made their way toward the tall, white building and entered through the visitors' entrance. Although they passed security guards, they were able to slip past them without drawing attention to themselves. "Thieving sure would've been easier in 1950," Mick commented once the guards were out of earshot.

Ray looked horrified. "Mick, you wouldn't rob a library, would you? That's pretty messed up."

Mick laughed. "Ha! Steal something that's already free? That's dumb. Who would do that?"

"Not really the point," Ray replied, "but I guess that's reassuring."

"Relax, Raymond," Leonard said. "We're here on a rescue mission. The only thing we're interested in taking out of here is that diary. For now." He turned to Mick. "Speaking of which, you've still got a lot of explaining to do."

"What's to explain?" Mick asked. "My alien girlfriend comes to life when I write stories about her in a magic book. It's not that complicated."

Leonard raised his eyebrows. "She's an alien now?" Mick looked away and ignored the question.

Ray stepped ahead of the team and gasped. "Guys, look!" he said, keeping his voice quiet out of respect for the library. He pointed at various statues, famous quotes, and ornate structures around him. "Isn't this so cool?" He spotted the entrance to the largest room and caught a glimpse of the inside. "Gosh, that looks amazing. Let's go in." He ran ahead and tried to walk in, but was immediately blocked by a security guard.

"Sir," the guard said, "this room is for researchers with valid Library of Congress cards only."

Ray's face sank. "Oh." He fumbled with his pockets, knowing very well that he didn't have one. "I…um…I may have misplaced it. Are you sure you can't…"

"Well, this is painful to watch," Zari commented. "Ray couldn't tell a convincing lie to save his life."

"You got that right," Leonard agreed. He smirked as he pulled a clearly marked Library of Congress card out of his coat pocket. "Good thing we're not all like that goody-two-shoes."

Nate stared at him in shock. "When did you even have time to steal that? We've literally been together this whole time."

"Don't underestimate me, Nathaniel." Leonard stepped forward and calmly approached the security guard in front of Ray. "He's with me," he said. "We've got some very important research to do, so how about you let us in?"

The guard looked up front the card suspiciously. "Are you sure that's you?"

"It's an old picture," Leonard answered without a hint of hesitation.

The guard gave it another look then said, "You can go in, but he needs an ID first. If you want to sign up for one, you've got to go to the desk."

Leonard opened his mouth to make up an excuse, but Zari took action first. She ran across the hallway and caught the guard's attention. "Sir!" she exclaimed, though she kept her voice at library levels. "Thank goodness I found you! I was just in one of the special collections upstairs and I think I saw someone trying to steal a rare manuscript. I tried to find someone closer, but it seems all the other guards were gone."

"Did he leave the building?" the guard asked.

"I don't think so, but you must go up and check! I'd go with you, but I've already run so far, and these heels are just slowing me down..."

"All right, miss, all right," the guard said. "I'll have a look around. As for you two..." He turned to where Snart and Ray had been standing, but saw that they were gone. "Huh?" He spun around to face Zari again and found that she was also gone. "What the..."

Zari, Nate, Ray, Mona, Snart, and Mick stood silently against the wall inside the room they had just snuck into. When the guard poked his head in to look for them, they darted behind the nearest row of bookshelves, fully hiding themselves from view. Once the guard returned to his position, Snart smirked at Zari, impressed. "Not bad," he whispered.

Mick looked up and around at all the books they were standing in the middle of. "How do we find Garima in here?"

The Legends stopped walking and stared at the countless, tall shelves of books expanding all across the room. Ray let out a low whistle. Zari finally spoke first, "I would say to just start looking, but it'll take a really long time if we go in blind. It's not like an ancient diary has a call number."

Nate snapped his fingers as an idea came to him. "Not unless they gave it one when they got it," he said. "If we can get into whatever room they keep records in, we might be able to find what number they assigned it from their descriptions."

"Genius!" Ray whispered, giving his best friend a very quiet high-five.

Mick waved his hand at the millions of books surrounding them. "You see all these?" he asked. "We don't know what name they gave it. You can't go through all these records. It would take years."

"And this isn't even the whole collection," Leonard added.

"It wouldn't take years," Mona argued.

"You just have to be patient, Mick," Ray said.

"But what about Garima?" Mick countered, scowling at Ray. " I'm not leaving her stuck in here forever."

"Is she even conscious right now, though?" Nate asked. "She really only exists when you write stuff about her."

"You take that back, Pretty."

Zari stepped in between them. "Guys, you're fighting in a library," she reminded them. "The last thing we need is to draw attention to ourselves." She took a deep breath, then let it out. "This is why I don't envy Sara's job." She turned to Ray and Nate. "You two, go out through a different exit and find the records room. Try to at least narrow down which section the book could be in. Call us on comms if you find anything." She turned to Mick, Leonard, and Mona. "We'll get a head start on checking the stacks. Is that cool with everyone?"

"Still too many books to go through," Mick grumbled.

"Not a problem I can fix, man," Zari said.

Nate nodded. "I'm cool with that. Come on, bro, let's find the records." He and Ray turned and walked briskly away to find another exit.

Zari waved the remaining Legends closer together to make an only slightly conspicuous huddle. "We should split up," she said. "We'll cover more ground that way."

"Agreed," said Mona. "Where should we look?"

"The Library of Congress classification system is pretty precise," Zari replied, "but a book of unknown origin with a lot of unusual content like Brigid's Diary isn't necessarily easy to categorize. There are a few sections I think it could fall into." She dug into her purse and pulled out a notepad and pencil, then wrote down several ranges of letters and numbers. She tore the paper in half and handed one to Mick. "You check around those areas. I'll check these." She turned her head to look over the vast room's shelves full of books. Even with her narrowed down list, this would be a daunting task. "Hopefully, Nate and Ray can find something helpful before we spend too much time in here. We've still got a rift to find, too."

Mick read through the list. "Not until we find Garima." He turned around and started walking in the direction of the first range on the list. "Come on, Snart. Follow me."

Leonard did a double take. He looked over at his partner strangely. He couldn't remember the last time Mick had been the one to give the orders in their partnership. Not that he had any objection to following Mick in this situation, but it took him by surprise. "Did you just…tell me to…"

Mick froze, realizing what Snart was reacting to. "Yeah. I mean…you're coming, right?"

Leonard shrugged it off. "Sure." He followed Mick away to a shelf on the other side of the room to investigate their first option. Zari and Mona checked their list, then walked in the opposite direction to do the same.


"Ah," John Constantine said, looking up at the large sign in front of him and Charlie, "Heyworld."

Charlie frowned. "Doesn't look that magical to me, mate. All I'm seeing is a fence."

"And on the other side of that fence," John told her, "you'll see a whole lot more. Remember, the magical creatures living here wanted to stay somewhere out of the public eye. They're not exactly trying to get outsiders to notice them." He pressed a button on the gate and a buzzer sounded. "John Constantine," he said to the speaker above the button. "I'm here on important business."

"John Constantine?" a high-pitched voice repeated back to him. "Do you mean, John Constantine, Master of the Dark Arts?"

"I'm not aware of any others," he answered.

Charlie leaned over so she was in front of the speaker. "And he's got a friend with him. Charlie here, immortal shapeshifter of the Legends."

"Oh, yes!" the high-pitched voice replied much more enthusiastically. "I do remember you, Charlie. We were in Mallus's prison together for a time. You transformed into my shape once to make it look like I was still in place while I tried to escape."

Charlie's face lit up as she recognized the voice she was speaking to. "Penny the pixie? Is that you? My, it's been ages. Literally."

"Hi, Charlie!" Penny said, a smile apparent in her voice. "It's lovely to see you again. How are the Legends?"

"Brilliant. Well, mostly. That's why we're here. Mind if I come in?"

"Oh, of course! Welcome!" The speaker went silent for a moment, then added, "And John Constantine can come in as well."

Charlie chuckled and looked back at John as the gate slowly opened before them. "I guess Sara was right," she said smugly. "You do need a friend with you."

"No need to rub it in, love," John muttered.

The two of them stepped inside the gate. As John had promised, they saw a lot more inside. It looked every bit as whimsical as a neighborhood of magical creatures could be expected to be. Buildings of all different shapes, sizes, colors, and cultures lined the streets. There were numerous flying beings flitting through the air, and an even larger variety of creatures could be seen on the ground level below them whether on the sidewalk, through the buildings' windows, or driving on the street in vehicles from at least a few different time periods.

Charlie smiled as she took it in. "It's absolutely bonkers in here. A bloody nonsensical mess." She turned to John and exclaimed gleefully, "I love it!"

John shrugged. "Eh. Could do with a bit better planning. Now, let's see…" He adjusted his tie, rolled up the sleeves of his trench coat, then declared, "I've got a contact on Fifth Street. Want to start there?"

"By all means," Charlie said, still looking around at the strange and wild sights around her. "Lead the way."


Sara and Ava strolled along the side of the National Mall. There were a few tourists around, but it was mostly calm. They'd walked this area many times before when they were dating. Sara tried to remain in the moment and avoid letting those memories take too much of her attention. "So," she asked Ava, "what do you need to know?"

"Frankly, everything," Ava answered. "The more I know about what happened to the timeline, the easier it may be to fix it."

"I told you what happened," Sara said. "Snart was stuck in the timeline and we had to work together to pull him out. It took a lot of different steps. There were speedsters involved, magic, technology, medical tests…"

"Snart?" Ava repeated, latching onto the name Sara had said. "That's his name? Your lost teammate, I mean."

"Yeah," Sara said. "Leonard Snart."

"Oh, okay," Ava said as she put the pieces together. "This is Leo's doppelganger, then."

"We tend to think of Leo as the doppelganger, but yes."

"Tell me about him."

Sara hesitated. It felt weird to talk about Leonard with Ava. "What do you mean? What about him?"

"Anything. He was embedded in time, then suddenly pulled back into living in the timeline again. Now, apparently, he's on the Waverider. It's my business as someone tasked with protecting time to know who he is and what to expect from him."

"Oh. Yeah, of course. That makes sense." She paused as they crossed a street, then began to speak again. "Rip recruited Snart back on our first mission. He was a friend of Rory's. They were recruited together, actually." The more she told Ava about Leonard, the easier it became, although she still felt a little strange about it. "He's pretty different from Leo. He was always kind of the team rebel. Or, at least, he tried to be. Deep down, he really did care about all his teammates. He didn't like getting close to people other than me and Mick, but he still had everyone's back when they needed him."

"Why didn't he mind getting close to you?" Ava interrupted. "Not that it's a problem, but why the exception?"

Sara looked at Ava's face and tried to read her expression, hoping to determine whether this question was asked out of suspicion or genuine curiosity. Not succeeding, she answered, "Well, I'm not sure exactly what made him first decide to talk to me, but we became friends pretty quickly. He's just…he's a great guy. Some people think he's so cold-hearted, but he really isn't once you get to know him." She smiled involuntarily as she recounted their friendship. "We used to play cards together whenever we had downtime on the ship. And we watched TV together. And we would talk to each other about literally anything. And we worked together super well on missions. He has this really sarcastic sense of humor and was always trying to make me laugh. I think he had about a fifty percent success rate." She chuckled a little just thinking about it. "Of course, if you asked him, he'd say it was higher."

Ava glanced sideways at Sara, then returned her gaze to the sidewalk ahead of them. "You guys were pretty close, then," she said, her voice a bit quieter than when the conversation had started.

"Well, yeah," Sara replied. "Like I said, he's one of the best friends I've ever had. He just…got me, you know?" She lowered her voice slightly as her tone became more serious. "I was struggling with a lot of stuff back then. It was my first year back to life. I still had major bloodlust issues. I didn't want to be an assassin anymore, but I also didn't really know what else to do with myself. Snart listened to me and he really believed I could be better, even when I didn't believe it myself."

"Hm." Ava continued to look straight ahead as she thought about what Sara was saying. "If he's so important to you, why didn't you talk to me about him before?"

Sara didn't answer right away. "I…um…I didn't talk about him much to anybody after he…after we thought he died." She hesitated, then continued, "When I…we lost him, I was the last one to see him. Someone had to stay at the Oculus to blow it up and it was going to be Mick, but Snart wouldn't let him. He knocked him out and took his place. I was there too, so he told me to get Mick back to the ship." She stopped walking and turned to look directly at Ava, who did the same. "I didn't have a choice, but that didn't mean I felt good about it. Snart has a code, and part of that code is never leaving anyone behind. Then, I had to do exactly that to him. I didn't want to talk about it with you or anyone else because it hurt so much."

Ava looked at her understandingly. "That's where your rule came from, isn't it?"

Sara nodded somberly. "I left one person I cared about behind. I decided never to do it again if I could help it." She began to walk again. Ava joined her. "Of course, it's much easier now that he's alive. We had a whole talk about it when he first got back."

Ava still felt like Sara wasn't telling her everything. She said she used to talk to Snart about literally anything, she thought. We used to talk about literally anything, too. Why didn't we talk about this? Did Snart know her better than me? No, that's impossible. They knew each other for what? A few months? That couldn't be it. Right? "I still don't see why you never mentioned him," she said. "We talked about complicated stuff all the time. Why was this different?"

"I don't know. It…it just was, okay?" Sara realized how defensive she sounded and immediately backtracked. "I mean, I wasn't trying to hide anything from you. You weren't there. You didn't know him. It would've taken a lot of explaining. I didn't think you'd understand…"

"Understand?" Ava repeated with surprise. "Why would you think I wouldn't understand?"

"Because…he's just not like you. At all."

"How so?"

"He hates following other people's rules, for starters. He never got along with Rip. Plus, I know it took you a long time to warm up to Mick. I didn't think it would be any easier with another…"

Ava shot Sara a sharp look. "Another what? Please don't tell me you've got two thieves on the Waverider now. It's hard enough keeping history safe from one."

Sara smirked back at her mischievously. "Maybe."

Ava sighed and shook her head. "Yet another issue I now need to deal with, because this situation wasn't messy enough. Why can't the Legends recruit someone normal for once?"

Sara laughed. "We'd hardly be the Legends if we did, Director Sharpe."

"Oh my…I give up." Ava took a deep breath and changed the topic. "Whatever Snart is, I need to know how exactly he got here. That might help us repair the timeline faster. Can you tell me exactly how you got him out?"

Sara nodded. "Of course." They crossed another street, moving closer to Capitol Hill along the green space beside them. "First of all, Wally West had a theory about the speed force…"