Legionaries

Ch. 2: Butterflies and Toy Soldiers

A/n: This chapter takes place two years after chapter one.

"Papa! Papa!" said 2 year old Walter "Wally" Hollis. He held up a drawing for Dan to see. "Lookit! Lookit!" Dan put down the newspaper he had been reading and turned to his son.

"Oh, very nice, Wally," he said with a smile. "Is that a—um…?" he chuckled to himself as he tried to see what the blue and purple crayon scribbles could possibly represent.

"Pwetty butterfly," said Wally as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. Dan laughed as he pulled his redheaded son onto his lap.

"Ah, yes, I see it! And it is a pretty butterfly," he said. "You wanna put it on the fridge with the rest of your drawings?" Dan wasn't sure if there would be any room left of the refrigerator doors. Wally loved to draw, and the one common factor in his scribbles was that he always drew two of everything. Dan had kept one framed at his desk. It was supposed to be two owls in a tree under a rainbow. At least that's what Laurie had labeled the picture when she'd framed it as a Father's Day present.

"Nah," said Wally, looking hard at the picture. "Anudder one!" he said, quickly climbing off his father's lap to toddle back to his pad of paper and crayon box. He ran back to Dan after a moment, clutching another drawing. "Doggies!" he said happily.

"Very nice," said Dan. "What should we do with them?"

Wally looked at the drawings thoughtfully. "Hurm…" Dan nearly burst out laughing. Whenever in deep thought or nervous, Wally always made his Uncle Walter's trademark grunt. He put the 'Pretty Butterfly' drawing on the table. "Unkie Waller," he said. Next, he turned his attention to the 'Doggies' picture, "Gwanpa Eddie."

Dan nodded. It had been a while since the family had paid their respects. The twins liked to leave gifts at the graves of the men their parents had named them after. They were too young to understand who they were and what they had done. Why they were heroes. "I think that's a good idea. Go get your coat and shoes for me; I'll go tell your mom."

"Tell me what?" inquired Laurie. She looked somewhat annoyed, holding little Eddie by the arm. Eddie had a mischievous smile on his face to which Dan frowned at.

"Eddie, what happened?" he asked. The boy was silent and Dan glared at him. "Edward Morgan…"

"Threw rock," Eddie grumbled. "Sorry." His smart-aleck tone made it clear he was anything but apologetic.

"He broke the study window," said Laurie tersely. "I don't think anything's been damaged from what I saw."

Dan exhaled sharply through his nose as he looked back at Eddie.

"You and I will be having a chat when we get home, mister," he said. "Get your shoes and jackets, you two," he went on, addressing the twins (Wally had frozen at seeing his mother's annoyed look).

"What's going on?" asked Laurie, wrapping her arms around Dan's waist. Dan smiled as he kissed his wife on the forehead.

"Wally and I thought it might be nice to pay your dad and Rorschach a visit."

"Doesn't it seem rather morbid?" inquired Laurie. "Making a family outing of the cemetery? We go once or twice a month. It's creepy."

"They'll understand the meaning behind these visits in time. Until then, consider it a history lesson," said Dan with a smile.

"History lesson?" repeated Laurie in disgust. "It's a cemetery!"

"I wouldn't want to die and be buried in the ground only to be ignored," Dan replied as he put on his coat. "Would you?"

"Huh—Hi, Unkie Waller," said Wally nervously. Dan watched the boy toddle up to his namesake's grave, placing a stone on top of the 'Pretty Butterfly' drawing to keep the wind from claiming it. "For you." Dan smiled as Wally toddled back to him, hugging his knees. He looked at Rorschach's grave, reading over the tombstone he had ordered the morning after Walter Kovacs had died.

Walter Joseph Kovacs

1940-1985

Antihero

Vigilante

Friend

Dan sighed, recalling a night when Rorschach had refused any painkillers as he dug into his own leg with a pocketknife in order to extract a bullet.

"Always hope to go down fighting…" Rorschach gasped, the lower part of his face that was not covered by the mask shining with sweat. "Two shots to skull or knife to heart. Prefer it that way."

Instead, he died alone, broken and beaten…

"Papa," said Wally, tugging on Dan's sleeve and jerking him back into reality. "Mama's callin',"

"Wally!" shouted Laurie a few yards away. "Come say hello to your Grandpa Eddie and let's get outta here before the rain starts!" Her voice was drowned out by loud clap of thunder. Dan looked over his shoulder as he followed Wally down the trail of grave markers. He always liked the rain. All the bad memories just washed away.

"'Bout time, I was getting worried," said Laurie. Eddie was sitting beside Edward Blake's tombstone, having created a small battalion of toy soldiers over and around his grandfather's grave. The boy was making 'ratta-tat-tat' noises to simulate the sounds of gunfire that the Comedian had reveled in when he was alive.

"Hullo, Gwanpa," said Wally with a sleepy smile as he put the 'Doggies' drawing underneath one of his brother's soldiers. "Here go."

Laurie scooped up her redheaded son into her arms while Dan helped Eddie pick up the soldiers, save one of that was brandishing an American flag.

"That fer Granpa," said Eddie, rubbing his eyes. Dan nodded, picking the boy up as he followed Laurie back to the car.