The Finale. Promise me that you'll tell me what you think.... once again, a sad goodbye to you... or a warm, welcoming embrace? You decide.

Teri's Journal; November 25th, 1986;
I never really cared about the world falling to pieces. Though it crossed my mind every time he walked by the newsstand, the sign he carried hitched on his shoulder; "The End is Nigh". There was nothing I could do. I wasn't a vigilante, so to speak, more of a scorned woman with a bad temper. I couldn't fight, barely defend myself let alone. I only ran a newsstand. But I wasn't stupid, I knew that NYC was full disgusting people, I knew that the city was rotting away underneath all the crime and corruption. Don't ask me why I moved here, even in my brightest moments I can't see that light. But my life changed the moment I stepped off that train. The moment I first walked down the filthy streets to the rundown apartment building that I was going to stay in. My life changed when I met him, when I saw what the vigilantes were capable of… It changed my whole outlook on life.

I still walk among the rubble they caused, bearing his child. I contemplated terminating her, but I didn't have the heart. She was the only piece of him that I had left. I've named her. Alice. She's beautiful. She has her father's eyes. I see him in her every day. I gave up hope of him coming home when Daniel tracked me down. I was eight months pregnant at the time. It was the first time that I saw a grown man cry. He didn't have to verbalize what had happened, but it took a while for the actual realization to hit me; the man I loved was never coming back to me. I joined him soon after. Dan was kind, offering to send me money, but I refused. I didn't need his money. We still got by. He thought that he was doing me a favor by giving me what he could find of Rorschach's journals, of what he could recover. Somehow his mask and hat had survive his death, and those he brought me as well. It was heartbreaking. I don't think I've cried so much in my life. In fact, this is about the only time I could bring myself to write something. A memory. I've pulled myself together. My daughters life depended on it.
Soon after the nuclear attack that Manhattan supposedly set off, Rorschach's conspiracy theory hit the newspapers. Don't ask me how they got a hold of his last journal. But they did, and though it caused an uproar, I was torn when the general population still took the side of the millionaire. It was sad to me that people could so easily be bought off like that. But who would believe a wanted vigilante over the most generous millionaire that the world had? I never doubted Rorschach. I still don't. Its not like I can do anything though. I'm just a wanted fugitive myself. With a child none the less. But someday, I'll go after Veidt. I'll let him know that someone still believes in justice for this world…

Teri sighed, placing the pin on the spine as she closed her new leather bound journal. She licked her lips, some days she could still imagine what he tasted like. As Teri placed the journal aside, she stood, running a hand through her hair. The babysitter would be here soon, she probably outta get ready to go. Teri shuffled around the room, picking up her various items, coat, hat, mask. She stopped last at the mask. Taking it between her fingers, feeling the slick material he had sown together. It had taken her weeks to clean it of his blood. Teri smiled down at Rorschach's mask, regardless. She had decided this a long time ago; to pick up where he'd left off. She'd learn the streets, and though she wasn't a very good fighter, most were afraid of the mask themselves and never once approached her. It was his image that she was conveying anyway. She wanted to let people know that he still lived. Teri frowned. Though it was working, and she had seen several others dressed in copy-cat clothing, she knew that she was playing Russian Roulette, any day now she could be killed or captured. But she figured she'd let that pan out when it happened, besides, it hadn't so far.

"Mrs. K?"

Teri turned to see her babysitter standing in the doorway. Teri immediately shoved the mask under the coat. "Ah, Ashley. You're early."

The teenager shrugged, her brown hair was pulled back into a ponytail today. Ashley had been helping her with Alice since she'd moved here. "Ah, I really enjoy spending time with Alice." she winked, "Besides, what single parent wouldn't want a little extra time to herself."

Teri smiled genuinely at the girl. Ashley was good with Alice, always had been. Teri could never express how grateful she was to the teen, especially on nights like this one. Ashley never knew what Teri went and did at night, but on a level, Teri thought that Ashley understood. "Alice is sleeping, so it should be a pretty quiet night." Teri explained, taking her white scarf from the corner of a chair. "Help yourself to whatever's in the fridge." she knew that Ashley never ate over, usually the girl ordered Chinese take-out, but she always left the offer open.

"Yeah, no problem." Ashley shrugged again, throwing a sweet smile Teri's way.

"I'll be back in a couple of hours." Teri called over her shoulder as she donned her overcoat.

***

Teri treaded down the streets, her hands in her pockets, her eyes scanning the rubble around her. You'd think that after everything happened that they'd clean this place up and things would get better. But this wasn't a fairy tale. Everything went back to normal. Rapists went back on the streets, murders and vermin still broke into peoples' homes, they still wrecked peoples' lives.
Teri kicked a tin can out of her way as she continued walking. It clanked against the ground before coming to a stop at the foot of a dumpster.
Teri now understood why Rorschach did the work he did. He had recognized that the world was still going to be as fornicated and disgusting as it always was. Teri never really figured out why she hadn't seen it sooner.
She made a turn into an alley way and settled herself against a wall, her usual wall, her foot up against the hard brick as leverage. She took a single sugar cube from her pocket, unwrapping it with unskilled fingers before she lifted his mask slightly, popping the cube between her lips, she sighed as she bit down, enjoying the crunch it provided her with. She watched as the citizens of the city walked in front of the alley, never seeing her. Never knowing that the one man who had cared enough about this world had died trying to expose the truth. Teri was here to make sure they never found out he had died. She was here to tell them all of the lie they were living in…

A man in shabby clothes walked in front of the alley, turning his head to look into it. He stopped as she crumbled the wrapper in her gloved hand and placed it back into her pocket.

Teri felt bad, it was true, about leaving her daughter at home with a babysitter several times a week. She was sure it was in parenting 101; 'Never leave a child to go gallivanting around the streets in a costume.' But it wasn't like Teri was in great danger. The few people who had believed Rorschach's accusations about Veidt, out of the extremists, there were those who had created copy-cat costumes. They were also running around the city. She smiled at the thought that she was probably seen to the police as a nuisance rather than a threat. It was the image that she was portraying anyway, not the actual fundamentals of his lifestyle.

Teri noticed that the man at the end of the alley was still watching her and she raised her gaze to him, wiping her fingers of the excess sugar. It wasn't unusual for people to stare at her in Rorschach's costume, fearing that the person they were seeing might jump out and attack them. But this time she froze, staring at him. No. no. no, it couldn't be. Teri mentally shook her head. Her eyes were playing cruel tricks on her. But she couldn't stop her heart from pausing as she ran her eyes over his familiar jaw line, his icy blue eyes… a pit grew in her stomach as he furrowed his eyebrows in apparent confusion at her. He stood perfectly still, like a predator, his head slowly tilting to the side, trying to understand. Just as she was.

She stared back into the icy blue eyes of Walter Kovacs.