Damon makes a selfish decision… or did he?
Tonight we saw the cause formostof that division is because of a decision Damon made.
Although, Matt takes a fair share of the blame, too.
Credit: Annette Brown/The CW
But before the flashbacks made full sense, we started back in the past (present?).
Fresh off herOriginalscrossover, Rayna emerges from the ashes again.
She makes a quick trip to Mystic Falls… just in time to save Matt and Pennys lives.
They pay her back by helping her torture vampires at Mystic Grill.
Shes trying to find out where Stefan is, but no one knows.
Damon walks in and says he can help.
Based onlast weeks ending, I thought he might have come there for Rayna to just take him out.
But instead he takes her out.
(Matt had texted to let him know where Rayna was.)
Matt shoots her, Damon rips out her heart, and Penny stands by confused.
She thought all vampires were bad, but Matt explains that some are his friends.
She says he has to stop standing by.
Which I guess isntwrong, but ugh, Penny, go away.
Meanwhile, after leaving New Orleans, Stefan is still on the run with Valerie.
Only problem is the herbs are all gone, a lady with a very burned face tells them.
Someone came before them and took them all.
Now that its gone, theres no hope of Stefan getting any more magic paste.
(I hope we get to see the garden witch lady again.
Her creepy night night as she knocked out Stefan and Valerie was perfection.)
So Stefan and Valerie go back on the run.
She asks him about moving to Texas, and Stefan doesnt seem too into the idea.
So for now, he jumps back in the car with Valerie to avoid Rayna.
But Damon is working on a plan to get Stefanoffthe run.
He thinks maybe he can help her change her huntress nature (its notthatcrazy it worked on Jeremy).
Alex St. John Enzos family apologizes to Bonnie for Enzos techniques.
She says they want to workwithBonnie.
Alex calls them the everlastings, but as Bonnie points out only three of them look everlasting.
The rest just look dead.
Alex freaks out because there should be four who look like theyre just sleeping.
Once she leaves the room in a panic, Enzo tells Bonnie that these represent Raynas lives.
Every time shes reborn, a shaman dies.
And he cuts the story off there (way to not give all the details, Enzo).
Bonnie texts Damon the info she gathered, so Damon kills Rayna again.
But as soon as Enzo sees another shaman die, he tellsthe restof the story to Bonnie.
Once Raynas last life is spent, everyone who has her mark will die with her.
Put simply: If Rayna dies one more time, so will Stefan.
Now, this is incredibly problematic since Damon buried Rayna.
His plan was for her to wake up underground, suffocate, and die.
Kinda brutal, dude.
Quickly, Bonnie tells Damon, and he rushes to dig her back up.
Shes already rebirthed and died.
Cut to Stefans hunters mark spreading out and killing him.
Valerie is trying to siphon out the magic, but it wont work.
Luckily, Damon knows CPR and is able to revive Rayna.
He was a vampire, and she ended up staking him (flashback episode like!).
And itstilltakes her a while to fall.
Shes pretty badass is what Im saying.
Once Rayna is in captivity, Alex tells Enzo that Bonnie Bennet is the Armorys second priority.
There isnt much time to think about this, though, because Stefan has come back to town.
Then Damon hands him a letter.
His way of remedying this: Desiccating himself for the next 60 years.
NEXT: Goodbyes and hellos
Stefan is not happy.
And Stefan doesnt even have time to wallow in it.
Matt walks into the Salvatore mansion and says hes taking the town back.
Vampires need to leave Mystic Falls for good.
He has CCTV footage of everyone doing non-human things that hell share with the world.
So Stefan gets in his car and takes the short drive (LOL) to Dallas.
THIS GUY IS NOT HAVING A GOOD DAY.
So he texts Valerie and says they should hit the road again.
Hello, whatever the Alaric/Caroline and Stefan/Valerie ship names are.
After leaving a note and a bottle of bourbon for Ric in Dallas, Damon heads to Brooklyn.
Enzo told her what he was doing and she ispissed.
Damon says he left a note, but she says, Are we friends?
He tries to reply with his characteristic wit, but she stops him.
He tries to explain, but she stops him.
You dont get to say goodbye.
And with that she walks away.
He climbs inside and closes the lid.
Then we jump to the three-year future weve been watching all season.
(What are the people of Dallas doing for news in this trying time??)
Rayna is there saying shes exhausted now that she finally caught him, but she doesnt take credit.
She knows it was because he came for either Damon or Caroline, though he wont answer which one.
Maybe Raynaisable to fight her huntress nature because she doesnt kill Stefan right away.
She tells him theres a Plan B: She can transfer the mark to someone more deserving.
She says it should have been Damon all along anyway.
So she tells Stefan to choose who gets to die: himself or his brother.
This was all Damons idea.
So now for the questions: Did Damon have this plan before he went into the coffin?
(I mean theres no way either of them will die, right?)
We still dont know what made Bonnie end up in a mental hospital… any ideas?
And when do she and Enzo fall in love!?
(Imherefor that.)
Is it okay to hate Matt now?
(Im not mad about that, honestly.)
Will Caroline keep her job at the news station after all of this?
Now that the timeline has finally come together, Im ready for some answers!
Lets chat below or on Twitter@realdalener.
