Chapter Summaries

Harley exploited the Nightmares’ operating-room setup to isolate and kill one of them, discovering that her belief could make weapons real in her dream. She left for the psychiatry department after a loudspeaker announced another patient awaiting treatment.

• Harley forced the Nightmare medical staff to repeatedly help her scrub in and wash their hands, keeping them occupied outside the operating room.
• After the Nightmares left her alone with the anesthetized patient, Harley opened its skull and killed it with an orthopedic hammer.
• Harley told the returning Nightmares that the operation was complete, then left with the hammer after using psychological suggestion to keep it from disappearing.
• The surviving Nightmares found their companion dead and roared in fury, but Harley had already gone to the psychiatry department to treat her next patient.

Harley recognized her patient as a nightmare impersonating Bruce Wayne and tried to turn the trap against him. After hypnotizing him, she convinced him that he was a real superhero, but he broke through her suggestion and declared himself Batwoman.

• Harley noticed the patient's notebook bore a bat symbol and guessed the nightmare was impersonating Bruce Wayne.
• Harley skipped therapy and wrote a prescription for euthanasia, but Bruce called her by name and insisted that they were in Gotham.
• Harley diagnosed Bruce with Delusional Disorder and hypnotized him with a spinning glass and a sharp sound.
• Harley told the hypnotized nightmare that it was a real superhero who had been used by someone, and the nightmare began to accept the identity.
• The nightmare regained clarity, declared that it was Batwoman, and laughed.

Harley kept a hypnotized Nightmare disguised as Batwoman as her companion and headed toward the morgue, despite its warning that the announcement was a trap. In a padded Arkham-like corridor, a crowd of Joker Nightmares tried to frighten her, but Harley spotted The Batman Who Laughs among them and ruined their ambush.

• Harley questioned the hypnotized Nightmare about Insomnia, but it admitted it had no leads and insisted it was Batwoman.
• Harley decided to keep the Nightmare around and followed the loudspeaker’s call for help at the morgue.
• The Nightmare warned Harley that the announcement was bait meant to trap her in a nightmare, but she ignored it and continued down the corridor.
• The corridor transformed into a green, padded room, where a crowd of Joker Nightmares rushed toward Harley.
• Harley pointed out that The Batman Who Laughs was not a Joker, and the other Nightmares blamed it for ruining their plan to scare her.

Harley fought through the Nightmares in her dream while Su Ming and the others watched over her sleeping body. The chapter ended with Deathstroke recognizing that Harley was deliberately helping him, though Dream of a Thousand Cats remained unaware of her plan.

• Harley manipulated the Nightmares into turning on the Imposter Batman Who Laughs, and they overwhelmed and devoured it.
• Harley charged the remaining Jokers with her enlarged hammer and killed them in the corridor.
• Harley dismissed Joker as an old nightmare and continued through the dream with the Imposter Batwoman and the doctor.
• Su Ming arrived at Harley’s apartment, brought Kitty to her bedside, and found Harley sleeping peacefully.
• Deathstroke told Dream of a Thousand Cats that Harley was helping him and that he understood her plan.

Su Ming explained that Harley was using herself as bait to lure Insomnia into her dream, where he planned to trap and interrogate it. With Dream of a Thousand Cats hiding them inside its Cat Domain, Su Ming entered Harley's nightmare and found her walking with a nightmare.

• Su Ming reasoned that Insomnia targeted people close to him and expected it to appear in Harley's dream after her other nightmares failed.
• Su Ming asked Dream of a Thousand Cats to take him into Harley's dream without being noticed, and the cat agreed it could do so silently.
• Su Ming let Strangle take over his body while Dream of a Thousand Cats brought his consciousness into Harley's nightmare.
• Dream of a Thousand Cats created a hidden Cat Domain that let Su Ming speak without alerting the dream's inhabitants.
• Su Ming spotted Harley carrying a hammer and walking with a nightmare, and decided to follow them.

Su Ming followed Harley through the dream hospital while Kitty explained that a nightmare was luring her to the second-floor logistics department. As they climbed, Su Ming began to worry that a nightmare might have entered Wade’s dreams and that Deadpool could already have killed Insomnia.

• Kitty pushed Su Ming away and pointed out that the doctor had stopped to listen to a voice Harley could hear.
• Kitty explained that a nightmare was imitating the hospital broadcast and telling Harley to collect her wages from the second-floor logistics department.
• Kitty said that going upstairs could signal a change to a higher dream level and worried about Harley’s safety.
• Su Ming followed Harley up stairs made of flesh and blood, confident that her experience would protect her from the nightmare.
• Su Ming wondered whether a nightmare had entered Wade’s dreams and whether Deadpool had already killed Insomnia.

Su Ming learned that Insomnia had entered Deadpool’s dream and sent the Adjutant to investigate. After Wade confirmed that strange figures had appeared in his dream, he set out to rescue Spider-Man from the crisis on 40K Earth.

• Su Ming contacted the Adjutant and asked her to check on Deadpool and find out whether he had met Insomnia in a dream.
• The Adjutant woke Deadpool by warning him that his money was gone, then questioned him about his dream.
• Deadpool said strange, deformed people had appeared in his dream, but he had sent them to his Amusement Park and never met Insomnia.
• The Adjutant told Deadpool that people on Earth were having nightmares or had been brainwashed, and gave him plastic pieces to help with the rescue.
• Deadpool chose to save Spider-Man first, put on his costume, and prepared to teleport to him.

Su Ming and Kitty learned Insomnia’s appearance and decided to continue through Harley’s dream rather than pursue Damian. Harley entered a room where the fake Batwoman burned away, then found a wall of televisions showing tragedies.

• Su Ming and Kitty learned that Insomnia wore a purple robe with a Dream Ruby embedded in its chest, while Kitty guessed Damian had probably already been rescued.
• Su Ming explained that he avoided Damian’s dream because fighting nightmares resembling Batwoman and Talia could distress the boy.
• Su Ming and Kitty followed Harley upstairs, where she dismissed the nightmares’ attempts to frighten her as familiar tricks.
• A voice told Harley she had cleared the level, and the fake Batwoman disintegrated into ash and light as it crossed the room’s threshold.
• Harley looked toward a stack of old televisions playing countless tragic stories.

Harley reached the Debugging Room after escaping the Nightmares and was offered a comic handbook said to reveal the universe’s secrets. She rejected it as an outdated guide, and the scene ended as Adjutant answered her call.

• Harley entered the Debugging Room, where a voice praised her for escaping the dream and reaching a higher level.
• The voice offered Harley a comic handbook containing knowledge about the universe and its history.
• Harley suspected Insomnia had learned the truth about its world from the handbook and rebelled because of it.
• The voice urged Harley to leave the dream of reality and ascend to a higher level.
• Harley dismissed the handbook as an outdated navigation map and called for Adjutant, who responded.

Su Ming and Dream of a Thousand Cats watched Harley question a nightmare, hoping to lure Insomnia into appearing. Elsewhere, Batwoman woke Damian from his encounter with the purple-robed nightmare, and he angrily left the orphanage.

• Su Ming explained that the Adjutant was a dream construct and suspected the nightmare was trying to lead Harley toward a higher level of reality.
• Dream of a Thousand Cats offered to capture the nightmare, but Su Ming planned to let Harley provoke it into reporting back to Insomnia.
• Su Ming and Dream of a Thousand Cats waited in the dream and ate while Harley continued speaking with the nightmare.
• Batwoman woke Damian while he was enduring nightmares from the purple-robed creature, disrupting his plan to hold out until Deathstroke arrived.
• Damian argued with Batwoman and left the orphanage, insisting he could have handled the enemy himself.

Damian prepared for the crisis surrounding Insomnia and CAAT while Peter escaped a manipulated dream with Deadpool’s help. Peter and Deadpool confronted the Nightmare impersonating Uncle Ben and moved to capture it.

• Damian stopped complaining after Batwoman left, learned Insomnia was heading toward his father’s trap, and began preparing his Teen Titans for a possible CAAT crisis.
• Peter grieved over Uncle Ben’s death until Deadpool pointed out that the scene was a Nightmare manipulating him in a dream.
• Deadpool explained that he had entered Peter’s dream to rescue him, though he lied about how he got there.
• Deadpool drew his Katana and urged Peter to help capture the fleeing Nightmare with Spider Web.
• Peter fired Spider Web at the Nightmare while Deadpool prepared to deal with it.

Deadpool explained his theory that CAAT infected universes through breaches in their dreams, then intervened when a nightmare wearing Aunt May’s face overwhelmed Peter. He chased the frightened nightmare through Peter’s dream, while his suspicions about CAAT remained unspoken.

• Deadpool said he had come to care about Peter and described how spiders wrapped prey before dissolving and consuming it.
• Deadpool explained that CAAT might first rot a universe from within through a breach, and he suspected Peter’s Spider Totem could connect universes and spread the corruption.
• Peter struggled to fight a nightmare that had taken Aunt May’s form, while Deadpool ignored his calls for help.
• Deadpool charged at the nightmare, frightening it until it abandoned Aunt May’s appearance and tried to flee.
• Deadpool pursued the nightmare with a lasso, threatening to catch it and play with it.

Harley kept a hidden nightmare talking while Su Ming and the Adjutant dealt with the chaos caused by nightmares across the multiverse. Su Ming ordered synthezoids to contain the affected people and waited for Insomnia to come to Harley.

• Harley questioned the mysterious voice and used talk of The Void, God, Hypertime, and timelines to expose its hesitation and keep it occupied.
• Su Ming reviewed recordings of nightmare victims attacking people while apparently coordinating with one another in their dreams.
• Kitty suspected Insomnia had used the ruby to link nightmares together and agreed it would probably come looking for Harley.
• Su Ming decided to wait for the hidden nightmare to seek Insomnia's help, then trap it and capture Insomnia as well.
• Su Ming ordered the Adjutant to deploy synthezoids across the invaded universes to restrain the madmen, sending them to 40K-1 or 40K-2 if necessary.

Su Ming monitored the Nightmare crisis after the Synthezoids suppressed the rebellions and contained the human captives. He checked on his allies, learned that many had awakened on their own, and saw that Star-Lord remained trapped in a nightmare as the Guardians argued over how to help him.

• The Adjutant reported that rebellions had been suppressed and around thirty-six billion human captives had been contained, and Su Ming ordered continued patrols without waking them.
• Su Ming watched Doctor Doom imprison settlers and investigate his nightmare, praising Doom for waking quickly on his own.
• The Adjutant showed Natasha shaking Steve awake, and Su Ming told her to stop and use the plastic sheet instead.
• The Adjutant listed heroes who had woken or resisted Nightmare's influence, while Su Ming asked whether any monitored heroes had gone mad.
• Su Ming checked on the Guardians of the Galaxy and found that everyone but Star-Lord had awakened; his teammates bickered over who would give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

As nightmares began turning people into monsters in Gotham, Batwoman and Alfred investigated the growing threat and suspected the victims would keep hatching nightmares until they died. As darkness swallowed the city, the Bat-Signal appeared in the clouds, offering a brief sign of hope.

• Alfred reported that nightmare-afflicted people were increasing, and Batman tagged a subdued Sleepwalker with a homemade Brainwave Blocker.
• Alfred showed Batwoman recordings of people vomiting purple slime that became monstrous Sleepless Knights, including Skeleton Centaurs, Giant Centipedes, and a Half-Human Half-Fly Creature.
• Batwoman and Alfred concluded that the monsters were entering reality by consuming human Life Force and that victims might repeatedly sleepwalk and produce more nightmares until they died.
• Batwoman said she was trying to end the crisis as Gotham fell into darkness and eerie silence.
• A beam of light rose over Gotham and projected a bat onto the clouds, briefly reassuring Batwoman.

Batwoman investigated the origin of Insomnia and concluded that the Nightmare was likely connected to a Gotham resident rather than a power that feared no one. Commissioner Gordon’s records pointed to Christopher Lucas, a grieving Arkham patient whose insomnia had gone inadequately treated.

• Batwoman told her butler to contact the Birds of Prey and send the gathered intelligence to the Justice League.
• Batwoman met Commissioner Gordon on a rooftop and received the file she had asked him to investigate.
• Batwoman reasoned that Insomnia had targeted Damian because of his connection to Deathstroke, and that the Nightmare’s creator might be a Gothamite.
• Batwoman asked Gordon to search Gotham records for people tied to the names Insomnia or knight who had entered hospitals or Arkham.
• Gordon’s investigation identified Christopher Lucas, whose wife and daughter had died in a Great Sundering and who had sought treatment for severe insomnia at Arkham.
• Batwoman learned that an under-resourced Arkham doctor had prescribed Christopher sleeping pills and sedatives without specifying the dosage.

Batwoman and Gordon uncovered Christopher Lucas's past as a serial killer who had spent more than twenty years in a vegetative state, and suspected his Nightmare had become the enemy called Insomnia. Batwoman returned to Arkham to investigate Christopher, where she found the Tower transformed and recognized it as a trap.

• Gordon reviewed Christopher Lucas's medical and police records and learned that Christopher had entered a vegetative state after overdosing on sleeping pills, following the deaths of his wife and daughter and a series of murders.
• Gordon wondered whether finding who had caused the explosion at Christopher's home could reveal Insomnia's inner knot, but Batwoman disappeared before answering.
• Batwoman returned to Arkham and found most patients asleep while others praised the darkness; she checked the wards and headed toward the Tower where Christopher lived.
• Batwoman discovered purple roots growing around the Tower's base, then entered and found its interior had become an unnaturally spacious, bright corridor.
• Batwoman called the transformed Tower a trap, bypassed the elevator, and silently climbed the stairs.

Batwoman navigated Nightmare’s warped maze inside Arkham Tower and reached a dreamlike forest, where she identified the direction of a hidden door. Nightmare’s Joker illusion tried to stop her, but Batwoman pressed on.

• Batwoman resisted the looping staircase by closing her eyes and following the steps and turns she remembered.
• She reached the fourteenth floor, where the corridor had become a strange forest and the staircase behind her had vanished.
• Batwoman ignored the enormous Arkham Tower that appeared behind her and headed toward the direction where she sensed the strongest malice.
• Nightmare’s Joker illusion emerged and tried to persuade Batwoman to stop, but she identified the door ahead and told him to get lost.

Harley talked a Nightmare into leaving, while Su Ming and Kitty watched the Guardians attempt to revive Star-Lord and tracked the Nightmares’ invasion. The chapter ended with Kitty warning that Nightmares were materializing in Gotham, posing a threat ordinary people could not handle.

• Harley waited for another Nightmare to appear after her talk therapy drove the voice away.
• Su Ming and Dream of a Thousand Cats watched the Guardians of the Galaxy try to revive Star-Lord, whose ribs Drax had crushed during the attempt.
• Su Ming ordered Adjutant to show Kitty surveillance feeds, revealing the Justice League rescuing people while J'onn remained trapped in grief.
• Su Ming spotted people in Gotham vomiting purple wax that formed grotesque creatures.
• Dream of a Thousand Cats identified the creatures as Nightmares taking physical form in reality and warned that ordinary people could not stop them.

Su Ming refused to intervene in Gotham unless Batwoman asked for help, while he and Dream of a Thousand Cats examined her attempt to investigate the Nightmare that had birthed Insomnia. He planned to use whatever Batwoman learned to turn that Nightmare against Insomnia.

• Su Ming explained that sending forces into Gotham would invite Batwoman’s suspicion and create trouble, though he would reconsider if she asked for help.
• Dream of a Thousand Cats noticed Batwoman standing asleep in Gotham Tower, and Su Ming asked Adjutant to show footage of her meeting Commissioner Gordon.
• After watching the footage, Dream of a Thousand Cats reasoned that killing the original dreamer could weaken Insomnia, but Su Ming pointed out that the Sleepless Knights were not protecting the patient and that the patient no longer seemed central to Insomnia.
• Su Ming proposed learning what was inside the patient’s Nightmare and turning it into a farce that could undermine Insomnia.
• Dream of a Thousand Cats realized Su Ming had left Batwoman to act so he could trade for what she discovered and prepare a combined plan with dream manipulation, Origin Force, and Harley’s hypnosis.