Oh my god last installment! Yeah, so, granted, this one's kind of short. Really, there wasn't much left to do, but I tried to flesh it out as much as I could. I hope I did an alright job, I was in a strange mood whilst writing this one. I actually put it off for a while because I couldn't bring myself to actually write it.

But now it's done, and the end of the Graphic Novel has come. I used some things that were movieverse because I felt like they made more sense, but they really don't change anything. There's an author's note at the end as well that you should probably read.

Oh, one last thing. A conversation in one of the discussion forums kind of freaked me out about how many Watchmen fics were out now... I dunno. Just thought I'd add that.

Enjoy!

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The sun burned cold in the sky, colored an almost icy yellow behind the frozen clouds in the great Antarctic. Thankfully, Archie was warm and comfortable. Brygida held herself close, the sight of all that ice and snow making her insides cold. What she wanted was another body to hold, but since Dan was driving and Rorschach would probably deny access, she resorted to her own body heat that she barely retained anyway.

"How much further? Said we were over Antarctica hours ago." Rorschach complained.

"Veidt's fortress is nearby, along the coastline. That's what I'm following. Listen, I don't like the way Archie's handling. I'm going to take him down." Dan replied, and Brygida felt all her weight slowly begin to fall out from under her as they descended on a fairly quick and steep scale. It was quite foggy, and she felt slightly less safe than before...

"Sensible move. Make final approach low, beneath radar."

"I don't think we've got much choice." Daniel said as Archie jerked a bit, "You feel that sort of kicking in the engine, like it's about to seize? ... Ice. Shit. I bet it's ice. I had him soaking on a river bed all yesterday, then bring him into subzero temperatures! Why didn't I think?"

Brygida saw Rorschach raise his hand and point towards...

"Daniel... Coming in too low towards cliffs..."

There was an entire ice face in front of them; a tall, seemingly never ending piece of pure, grade A, bound-to-crack-your-skull-open cliff of ice.

"Oh god..." Brygida's eyes went wide and she pulled the white owl cloak over her head.

"Don't wish to interfere with running of ship, but should perhaps pull up sharply before—"

"I'm trying! I'm trying to pull him up, goddamm it!" Daniel replied loudly, through clenched teeth, "Wait! Wait, I think it's coming. I think we've..."

Daniel bit his tongue as Archie made a slow scale up the cliff and just barely made it to the flat surface, "... made it!" Daniel exclaimed.

"... Daniel..." Rorschach said, his tone less enthusiastic than normal.

"It's okay, we did it! We cleared the—"

"Daniel, engine just stopped."

"What?"

"Said engine just—"

"Alright alright, I know! Jesus Christ..." Archie began to lose altitude and gain speed.

"D-Dan..." Brygida stuttered, clutching to the chair. She had never even been in a car accident, and no doubt an Archie accident would be worse.

"Hang on, lemme try to... Whoo... Ooah..." He made strange noises that reminded the girl of Rorschach, slightly side tracking her from the soon to be fall...

"Ennk..."

"Hold on to something! I'm losing it! He's rolling! I think we're going to—"

Daniel was cut off as they tumbled to the ground, the sudden impact being just what Brygida had imagined as she smacked her left arm on the chair and heard a slight crack. Archie slowly came to a stop after skidding a good 6 yards or so. Brygida stood up and moaned a little.

"Oh god that hurt..." She shook her head, attempting to rid herself of the dizziness.

"Ow... Sorry..." Daniel stood up as well and looked at Rorschach, "You okay?"

"Twisted ankle. Nothing serious. Landed on it badly night police took me in. How bad is damage to ship?"

Brygida felt her arm down from her shoulder. She had a bruise just above her elbow, but that didn't hurt much. It was below her elbow that really hurt. She felt like she might have fractured it in the fall... But it moved decently and she could still feel it, so she took that as a good sign.

Daniel had picked up the white owl suit and slipped it on, and he and Rorschach were leaving. She quickly moved to follow, and before she could exit the owl ship, the door closed. She skittered up to the front and banged on the window, "Hey!!"

Daniel looked in at her and shook his head, "Not this time! Stay here until we get back!"

Brygida pouted and sat on the floor.

Outside the ship, Dan turned on his hover scooter. Rorschach looked at him.

"Might not get back. Could turn out to be a bad idea if we left her."

"If we don't get back, at least she'd be safe until Adrian's people found her... And he wouldn't hurt a young girl. She's better off in there."

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In Archie, Brygida felt herself going through the five stages of death, even though she wasn't dying... At least, she didn't think she was dying.

"They'll come back for me... They HAVE to come back for me... It's their fucking job to come back for me..." Brygida breathed, sprawled out on the floor of Archie like a cat in the sun. She scratched her nose and turned over, sighing loudly. They had left her there, in the cold. Sure it was warm inside Archie, but she would have much rather been out there with them, meeting the famous Adrian Veidt, blond sex idol.

"What gives them the fucking right to leave me here all alone, anyway?!" She growled, standing up as she slipped into the Anger stage, "I should be able to go with them! I'm not some baby!" She picked up a glass mug that had fallen in the crash and chucked it across the small room. It shattered on impact, and she jumped, not expecting it to have actually broken.

"Shit--!" She quickly got to her knees and started picking up the pieces. She wasn't getting anywhere by being angry, she realized...

"Okay." She took a deep breath and let it out as she picked up the final few pieces and threw them in the trash, "If they come back and get me, I swear to god, I won't do anything bad. I'll leave them to deal with Mr. Veidt and everything, I just don't want to be left alone... I don't enjoy being alone..."

And after another 15 minutes of promising, she dissolved to tears. Not very many. Just a few pathetic droplets of shallow sorrow and self-hatred. She curled into a ball after having taken the second snowsuit from the wall and laid in on the ground. She sniffled, wiping the tears from her cheeks as she whimpered for a little bit longer, just to take up time as she thought about following after them...

And she took another deep breath.

"Alright." She rolled up her sleeves, "Let's do this..."

She took the suit on the floor and put it on. It was way too big for her, but that didn't matter as long as it kept her warm. She tied the belt tightly around her waist, flipped up the hood, and opened the door of Archie. And she was met by a blast of wind too cold to even be possible. She stepped out, closing the door behind her.

The compound was pretty much a stone's throw away, and she thanked Daniel over and over for making the owl ship amazing enough to get them so close. She walked down Archie's side and fumped into the snow. She shuddered, feeling the cold beginning to melt against the warmth of the suit. She began to trudge, finding it more difficult than she had originally thought.

It wasn't only like wading through mud. Oh no. Mud was much kinder to the limbs. Her toes had already started to go numb. The cold moved through you like a hateful ghost, and there wasn't much you could do about it. Brygida trudged faster, feeling her nose begin to run. She felt like her snot was going faster than she was. As a comfort, she played the aria Sebben Crudele by Antonio Caldara in her head. The key of E minor in a place like the Antarctic was almost comforting as she continued through the snow, her mind on the music and not on the snow.

And soon, she was at an entrance. It looked like it was stuck, like it had been forced open. Probably Rorschach and Daniel. She walked in and shivered as the song was dispelled from her mind and she saw the interior of the compound. She first came to what looked like a lab, every kind of technological doohickey imaginable inside. She didn't know what to call any of it. There was a glowing thing, a chamber thing, a... round, thing. She didn't hear any noises coming from anything, so she could only assume that no one was there. Leaving the snowsuit in a corner that looked safe enough, she moved into the next room...

And she wasn't expecting such splendor. There was a large painting of what looked like a Roman soldier up on the purple wall. There was a bed of flowers in the middle of the foyer, huge purple pillars placed around the room. Brygida stared for a moment before shaking her head and moving on. She heard the sound of multiple televisions fighting for attention, and raised an eyebrow. Why would someone want so many TVs? Maybe Mr. Veidt was an addict.

She walked towards the sound, moving around pillars and through precariously placed flowerbeds, feeling as if she were in a gay jungle rather than the home of a rich person. She saw a shifting light coming from a door, and heard both voices and static behind it. Pushing the door open, she was surprised and delighted to see Laurie and Jon there with Rorschach, Dan and a blond man she could only imagine was Adrian Veidt.

Smiling, she approached the woman, capturing her in a hug. Laurie jerked away and turned around. Her eyes were red and swollen with tears past and present, black make up streaked down her cheeks. Brygida's delight vanished instantly, "Laurie, what's wrong...?"

The woman didn't respond and instead turned to Dan, hissing, "You brought her here?!"

"At least she wasn't in New York!" Daniel snarled back, his sudden ferocity disappearing when Laurie choked back another sob, "Sorry..."

She shook her head, "I have no reason to be angry at you..." She turned back to Brygida and hugged her tightly, "I'm so glad you're alright..."

"Why... Why wouldn't I be?" The younger girl asked, trying to get a look at the televisions that Laurie seemed to be blocking from her view.

"Bridget..." Laurie tried to take her outside of the room, but the girl pulled away from her.

"Laurie, what's going on?" She asked

"I'll tell you out there..." Laurie's voice was pleading.

Brygida shook her head and looked at the televisions. All of them were a different channel, and she saw bodies being dragged from wreckage, little children in the arms of strangers, a gaping hole in the middle of a city. A broken sign flashed on the screen:

Welcome To New York

Brygida stared at the televisions, "Is this some kind of Sci-Fi marathon or something? I can't believe someone would make a movie about destroying New York, especially now."

She heard Laurie begin to break down. She turned around, "What? Am I not getting something here?"

"New York is gone, Bridget." Jon said, stepping into the conversation.

"What? No it's not." She laughed, "It's still there, you can't just destroy a city."

"I can't do this..." Laurie walked out of the room, a hand at her mouth and new tears running down her cheeks.

Brygida looked at the door and then back at Jon, "... Am I wrong?"

He nodded, "New York has been gone for about 9 minutes now. I am sorry. All of your friends, and your family were there..."

Brygida didn't say anything to him. She looked at Rorschach and Daniel, "Is it true...?"

Rorschach looked away, and Dan tried to make words, but nothing came out. He joined Rorschach in looking away. Brygida blinked a couple times and looked back at the TVs. She recognized a couple things. Her old apartment was in shambles; she saw the body of her landlady being dragged away. Half of Central Park was gone in the crater in the middle of the city.

She saw Michelle's body... And it suddenly hit her. It was all gone. She couldn't breath. She couldn't think. Her pupils contracted as she leaned up against a pillar and tried to catch her breath. But every body of a person she knew made it all the more terrible. She felt warm tears trickling down her cheeks, but they didn't register as she sank into the floor. Someone laid their hand on her head, and she winced back. It hurt her to be touched.

"How did this happen...?" She asked in a whisper, almost unable to speak, "Who...?"

Someone took hold her hand and hauled her up, and she found herself staring into the dark eyes of one Adrian Veidt as he spoke:

"I did this."

Something in Brygida made her want drag her nails across the man's face, scream at him until she was hoarse, stab him in the back, beat him until he bled out of every orifice...

But she couldn't. So she unconsciously put her forehead onto his chest and cried, because she felt like that was the only thing that she could do. He didn't touch her, nor did he move. She didn't hear anything, even though she knew they were talking. But she heard the door open and close, and she knew that it was Rorschach who had gone. She found it hard to find the strength to pick up her feet and follow after him, but ironically enough, Veidt helped her. He put her chin in his palm, brought her face up to look at his, and smiled.

She slapped him across the face-

And walked towards the door.

She saw no color. Felt no cold, no heat. Ignored the heaviness in her head, her heart, her feet, and just walked. She felt confined to basics. And at that moment, the basics were all she knew.

Keep moving.

Don't stop.

Just walk.

And she was soon at the makeshift entrance. She saw Rorschach; he was just standing there. She moved towards him, not caring that he would probably beat her within an inch of her life if she did what she was planning on doing...

Around the corner, she saw Jon, his arm outstretched towards Rorschach. The red head removed his mask, and the tears sprinkled about his cheeks snapped her back to reality as she began to cry again, the color and sound and feeling returning to everything, and she smiled, reaching her hand out to...

"You are real..." Brygida whispered, feeling Walter's cheek beneath her fingers. He was real... He had a face. She felt stubble, and skin, and the cold wetness of actual tears, and his eyes met hers...

... And he was gone. Brygida stumbled forward, feeling suddenly unbalanced. She looked at Jon, whose expression could be considered that of horror. She stared at the space in front of her. There was blood in the snow.

"I'm... sorry..." Jon said slowly as his fingers twitched slightly.

"... It's alright." Brygida replied, "Can you teleport me to...?"

"Of course..."

She felt the world fall out from under her as she closed her eyes. She opened them as it was returned to her, and she was back inside the compound. She stumbled to the left, falling into a pillar as she saw Dan and Laurie and smiled at them...

They looked completely horrified. Adrian Veidt too looked dumbstruck, and Brygida thought it odd and humorous that the smartest man on earth could be dumbstruck...

She felt warm liquid running down the outside of her leg. She couldn't piss on herself from the outside, so she looked at her right shoulder—

Laurie grabbed the girl's face and made her look at her, "Bridget? Baby? Stay with me, alright? You're going to be okay. Look at m- LOOK at me!"

Brygida was confused, "I am looking at... you..." Her eyelids fluttered and she felt tired beyond belief.

She heard Dan and Mr. Veidt talking.

"We need to get her to a hospital..."

"In the middle of Antarctica? Daniel, she won't survive the trip..."

"Well I'm not leaving her here with you! Her arm..."

Brygida blacked out...

Her unconscious dreams were horrible to her. Her head recapped her entire life.

She dreamt about the night of her sixth birthday, when Laurie brought Jon over as her own personal party clown. The children's mothers didn't allow them to stay very long at the party: they claimed that none of them were worthy to be around Jon for very long. So the young Brygida played with Jon all day, on her own.

She remembered her first professional vocal performance, after dropping out of high school. She blanked out on her first song and ended up restarting. Everyone around her told her that she did wonderfully, but she never forgave herself for it. Her mother had treated her to her first alcoholic drink that night after stealing the unopened bottle from her husband, who had already passed out. Brygida found out that she could really hold her liquor.

She remembered the night that the man attempted to mug her, and how Rorschach had... knocked her out. And introduced her to Dan. And then blew her off. And then returned her glasses. And then in front of the fire...

And became her friend. She didn't know if he considered her a friend, but she did to him. Yes, he smelled gross, but his mind was just lush with ideas... After talking with him during the time that they were considered fugitives... His intelligence was intoxicating. It was so wonderful to know someone who wasn't just smart, but so witty and astute, and...

Through the darkness, she saw a light. Only a slight twinkle at the edge of her consciousness, but it was there. Like a star... She stared at it inside of her head, finding it a strange and strong comfort. She stood up, feeling as if her entire body was made of clouds as she floated on dreamy steps towards it. Maybe Rorschach would be there... Maybe Walter would be there...

Maybe it was the Hell that she had always dreamed she would eventually go to.

The light was blinding, but Brygida's eyes were otherworldly, and immune to such a sensitivity. She came to the source of the light, and smiling, touched it...

It felt like skin...

And she started crying...

Rorschach was real...

But now he was dead.

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There IS going to be a sequel. Keep an open mind kids, I thought about it for a long time, and personally, I think that it's a decent idea. It may have my readers dropping like flies because I move REALLY slowly with stuff like this, but I don't care much.

Look out for the sequel, guys! Thank you so much for reading and reviewing this much! You're all amazing!