Continued from part 4, book 4...

Book Five

With book five we are back to Rorschach's mistreatment of the cancer ridden former super villain as he presses the old man for more info about the death of The Comedian. Rorschach has become convinced that there is a "mask killer" on the loose searching out old super-heroes and marking them for death.

As Rorschach walks we see a newspaper at his feet the headline of which screams "Russians invade Afghanistan". A little while later the police are sent to investigate a double murder of children as society breaks down even further than it already has in the Watchmen universe (and presumably ours). Apparently, according to Moore, the Russians invade Afghanistan because there is no Dr. Manhattan to trump their boldness. We are yet to get any real explanation of the Russian's motivation, however.

To further the mystery portion of the story, there is an assassination attempt upon "the smartest man in the world", Ozymandias (real name Adrian Veidt). Ozy had come out to the world and revealed his real name before the 1977 Keene Act was passed and became a rich and powerful businessman as a result of his keen intellect. After this episode the sick old super villain that Rorschach keeps attacking is murdered with the murderer framing Rorschach for the act. The police take Rorschach into custody in a violent altercation, taking him off the street and temporarily ending his investigation into the mask killer theory. With an attack on one super-hero and the framing and apprehension of another, Rorschach's mask killer theory seems to be the right one.

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