Dan looked around the room full of grown-ups in their underpants. A big part of him couldn't believe he was actually here, actually doing this. It seemed so much more ridiculous to be dressed up like an owl in an ordinary living room, with regular lighting, than in a dark alleyway. He sighed and tried to return his thoughts to the conversation he was supposed to be having with someone who called himself Ozymandias.

The door opened from the hall and a very young girl entered. Dan could see her over Ozymandias' glittering shoulder: pretty, her brown hair swept off her face, with jewel-green eyes, dressed like a showgirl. This must be Sally Jupiter's little girl: the new Silk Spectre. Dan did the math quickly in his head. She couldn't be much more than fifteen years old, and here she was with stage-worthy makeup, her long legs exposed to the hip. She looked like one of the child prostitutes he and Rorschach had been cleaning off the streets of late.

Rorschach. He could only imagine what he must be thinking about this spectacle. With one hand Rorschach cursed the teenaged girls who hooked on street corners in the seedier parts of town as being nothing more than scum, the filth of the city, amoral creatures corrupting other children and enabling the disgusting habits of disgusting men; with the other he cradled them, delivering them to St Mary Magdalene Convent for the nuns to look after, time and time again when too many of the girls returned to the streets because they had nowhere else to go, and no one else to turn to but their pimps.

Her eyes met his for a moment as she nervously scanned the room, and he visibly jumped at the electricity she seemed to put out. The girls on the streets were old for their years, and she was too, but they had been beaten and abused, seen so much they never should have, that they no longer betrayed their sense of lostness in public. This girl, the Silk Spectre, looked distinctly alone.

And to think, her own mother had put her up to it.

She silently leaned against some piece of enormous machinery, staring down at her feet, and Dan pulled his eyes away from her as Captain Metropolis began to speak. "Call me Nelson," he stated, absurdly, as if this were any old cocktail party. Beside Dan, Rorschach made a grumbling noise that almost produced an audible chuckle in Dan. The slender, yet powerfully built Ozymandias had taken a seat, like a prince in his throne despite the fact that this was "Nelson's" house and the fact that an actual superhero was glowing blue in the opposite corner of the room. Dan crossed his arms over his chest; this whole event was becoming more and more painful with every moment.

It seemed that he wasn't the only one who felt it. A large man, who needed no actual introduction, let out a resounding belch and then interrupted Captain Metropolis with an obscenity. Dan didn't know the Comedian well, but he already didn't like him. He was the last of the Minutemen, and it seemed that he had survived the years by sheer power of will. His broad shoulders took up too much space, his cigar smoke stank, and he had yet to look up from his newspaper to speak to anyone in the room.

"This whole crimebuster schtick, it stinks," he declared, as if there was nothing more to discuss. A bully if ever Dan had seen one. Didn't the Comedian know, from his own experience, that a group standing up for what was right was more powerful than a lone gunman? Didn't he and Rorschach do more for the city as a partnership than when he had been at it alone? Wasn't it worth something to know that someone else had your back? Nelson might be a bit of an idealist, true, but he had organized this gathering with good intent. Then the Comedian laid into him, his cigar clamped between his teeth. The Comedian was really little more than a monster with the American flag on his shoulders. Dan had to speak up.

"Uh," Dan began. Oh how he hated speaking in public. "Listen, let's not throw the idea out right away. Me and Rorschach" (Had he really just blundered his grammar like that?) "have been making headway into the gang problem by pooling our efforts ..."

At the mention of his name, Rorschach stiffened. Though slightly built, especially in the company of men like the Comedian, he was not a man to meddle with. Dan knew what Rorschach was capable of, and it scared him. Instantly, he wished he hadn't brought Rorschach into the conversation.

But Rorschach stepped forward slightly, his gravely voice gaining the attention of almost everyone there. "Obviously, I agree - but a group this size seems more like a publicity exercise somehow." Dan thought for a moment about the press photos of the Minutemen. Ever-suspicious Rorschach continued, his words ringing true. "It's too big and unwieldy ..." Years later, Dan would think back on that moment with pride, and wonder what happened to his friend.

Then there was nothing but yelling and name-calling. The room seemed to erupt, and Dan lost track for an instant of who was saying what. Rorschach continued to object, and Captain Metropolis continued to sputter, and then, incredibly, the display of the US map in the middle of the room was on fire and the Comedian was strolling out the door like nothing had happened. Dan started to say something, even called the host by his name, but his words were drowned out by the confusion as everyone started to leave. Rorschach was silent again, having spoken more words in that conversation than in the average week, and Dan could only hang his head.

Wasn't it worth something to know that someone has your back?