“Rogue Air” is episode twenty-two of season one of The Flash.
At the end of the previous episode, “Grodd Lives”, Eobard Thawne had said he finally had everything he needed to return home. He was hiding beneath the particle accelerator, which was where he was also holding Eddie, and he entered into it, placing a glowing tube in the accelerator which appeared to activate it.
This episode with Wells talking, as the others are seen at various different places saying to think about the people who define your life, your friends, your co-workers, and imagine that, one day, in a flash (which is probably a deliberate choice of word), all of that vanished. He asks whether you’d accept your new life, or do whatever it takes to get back was taken. Wells is talking to Eddie (and it’s still not clear why he took Eddie; all he’s done is basically taunt Eddie about what a miserable failure he is compared to the other Thawnes) and he tells him he will get back everything that was taken from him.
Iris is at Jitters looking at some address labels bearing her and Eddie’s names on them when Barry arrives. She tells Barry that they are return labels, and that she ordered 200 to start with, but 2,000 turned up. Barry tells her he will find Eddie, but she wants to know how, as he’s already searched everywhere. Barry tells her that the Reverse-Flash already took his mother, and he won’t let Wells take someone from Iris as well. Cisco then sends Barry a message.
At S.T.A.R. Labs, Cisco is talking about Wells’ wheelchair. He is asking why would Wells pretend to need a wheelchair. Caitlin suggests sympathy but Cisco says that’s not the only reason. Joe says as misdirection; no-one would expect the other speedster to be a man confined to a wheelchair. However, Cisco decided to examine the wheelchair and found something else. Tech that appears to be similar to what is inside Gideon. Cisco says that the device has enough energy to power all of Central City, and that it’s a battery that Wells was using to power himself, to gain more speed. Which is why he was always faster than Barry.
A warning is then flashed up as the particle accelerator reactivates. Joe asks how that could happen, as it blew up. So they assume that Wells rebuilt it. The question is how Wells has activated it. At which point they realise why they couldn’t find Wells is because he was at S.T.A.R. Labs all along. Joe, Barry and Cisco go looking for Wells, who speeds past them out of the building and Barry follows. A voice then says prisoner release protocol activated and Peek-a-Boo, the teleporter from “Crazy for You”, escapes. She gets past Cisco and Joe and is about to kill Caitlin when Iris knocks her out. Inside the accelerator, Joe hears a voice, and they manage to find Eddie.
With the particle accelerator activating, all the meta-humans will die if they are still in it. They have 36 hours to save them. Joe says that Iron Heights can’t hold them, but Barry knows a place. Lean Yu, the island where Oliver was shipwrecked, can. For A.R.G.U.S. built a covert military prison there, which is where they sent Captain Boomerang (from “Flash vs. Arrow”), and it’s where Oliver keeps his worst criminals. Joe isn’t terribly happy with this idea.
The question is how to move them to the airport from the lab. No-one can get loose. Oliver can’t help, nor can Firestorm, and the police won’t. So, as can be guessed from the title, Barry reaches out to Leonard Snart, Captain Cold. Barry tells him he needs five meta-humans transporting out of the city. Snart wants to know why he would help Barry get rid of his enemies. Barry points out that they are Snart’s enemies too; Snart says he loves Central City, and if the meta-humans get free, there won’t be any city left. And that he can’t rob anybody if everybody is dead. Snart has a price of course. This does not go quite to plan and Lisa Snart arrives as well. She spends a lot of time flirting with Cisco; whether this is genuine or simply to mess with his head isn’t clear. Plus, there’s still the Reverse-Flash to deal with.