| Synopsis
| - After ten years in prison for vigilante activities, Lori Lemaris has been released. She is going to contact her probation officer at a public videophone booth, but stops to give money to a homeless old woman - via credit card. Her probation officer is understanding. Lori was once a costumed hero called the Joker - before Superman took control of the world and outlawed all other superheroes.
On New Earth, the Flash is fighting a reality-hopping supervillain called Mirror Master. To defeat the Flash, Mirror Master shows several alternate versions of the Flash, before summoning a version of Johnny Quick to defeat him. Suddenly, Lia Nelsom of Earth-9 escapes her mirror - since she is already on New Earth. Defeating Johnny Quick and Mirror Master, Lia Nelson explains that she needs to find a lantern native to her reality - which is currently in the trophy room at the Hall of Justice. With the help of John Stewart, they activate the lantern. However, it suddenly sucks them into along with it as it teleports to Earth-9.
After seeing off a would-be Good Samaritan, the Green Lantern has returned to her graveyard, talking to herself. Sensing a mysterious presence, she starts shouting at it, berating it for madness and saying "If I can sense you, they will, too!" Becoming aware of the teleporting lantern, she summons it to her with a discharge of green energy.
At the Global Security Centre, north of New Atlantis, two vigilantes, Manhunter and the Spectre, are trying to break in. While Manhunter attacks the guards, the Spectre infiltrates the innermost room of the complex. Here, he discovers the hero known as the Atom, strapped into a chair with electrodes strapped to his head...
- In a well-appointed park, a weedy-looking man is approached by a woman in a black business suit with a low-cut top. Upon being told to "prove" himself, the man begins to tell a story: in 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis devolved into a war which destroyed Florida and Cuba. In the wake of the destruction, the hero known as the Atom emerged. The result of radiation testing on human subjects, his real name was Arthur Harrison Thompson, and he had atomic powers. Realizing how much the world had changed, JFK created a new covert agency called Nightwing, mere months before he was assassinated.
Other heroes began to emerge: Captain Comet in Chicago, Doctor Midnight in Seattle, and Booster Gold in Cleveland. Meanwhile, Nightwing started spending its funding on computer research in an effort to win the Cold War. In 1968, the United States intervened during the Soviet incursion into Czechoslovakia. The Atom refused to intervene, for fear of escalating the conflict. Captain Comet tried to end the war, but died trying. The war was ended thanks to the efforts of a covert US commando unit codenamed the 'Metal Men'.
Meanwhile, NASA made a Moon landing, to discover that the Atom had moved his family there in search of peace. His son, who inherited his powers, later took the name and became a high-profile superhero. Around this time, Nightwing's research began to be used in public life - mobile telephones, voice-responsive computers, solar powered cars, and artificial intelligence. Cyrogenics research allowed for the revival of the once-dead. Ferris Spacecraft began offering regular travel to the Moon colony on its fleet of ships, the Guardians of the Universe. However, Nightwing used its computer research to spy on every house containing the new technology.
The Atom was brutally killed by a group of villains calling themselves the Fatal Five. In response to this, a third-generation Atom, with the same powers as the first two, emerged to continue his family legacy. At the same time, other heroes emerged - Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Joker, Plastic Man, Manhunter, the Spectre, Power Girl and the Sea Devils. At this, the woman asks him to follow her and walks off. The weedy man runs after her...
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