Dora

"My very first memory is a promise he broke."

Dora is a character in The Dreaming, a series of comics released in 2018 by Vertigo, that unfolds after the events of The Sandman's main story arc.

Appearance
Dora is usually depicted as a young woman, probably in her early twenties. She has short, dark hair, and often wears casual, even untidy clothing, not caring about her appearance. She likes to wear simple t-shirts, brown pants, and suspenders, sometimes with a long-sleeved flannel shirt on top. She is also seen wearing more formal clothes depending on the ocasion, such as bow ties and long coats.

She has a set of white wings sprouting from where her ears should be, although it has not been made clear if she can actually fly with them. Despite her soft appearance, Dora can transform herself into a huge monster, with bloody eyes, long teeth, and sharp claws. It seems she is able to transform herself at any moment, although she's particularly inclined to do so whenever she is angry or scared, as a means of self-preservation.

Personality
Due to her lack of memories, and her absolute uncertainty about her origins and purpose, Dora is a lonely and angry girl. She resents Dream for promising that she didn't need to be scared anymore since apparently he wasn't able to fulfill a promise. Also, it appears that Dora already existed previously in some other "dreadful and beautiful" form, but all her memories prior to her "creation" were lost or erased at some point. She doesn't know who she is, or even why she is, as Matthew at one point indicates, in The Dreaming, sometimes these two questions are one and the same. Dora doesn't actually believe she is real, and that is her greatest weakness. Every time the subject is brought up to her, she becomes helpless and scared, not being able to cope. Eventually, Matthew tells her that, in The Dreaming, Nobody gets to say how real you are except you. This ends up helping Dora regain some of her trust and, with the help of the other dream entities, she's able to defeat Judge Gallows.

Every day, she receives a gift from The Dreaming: a hairless Barbie doll, a book with the final chapters missing, the first bars of a lullaby in the wrong key, etc. For some reason, the gifts please her, but she's not quite sure why. At some point, Dora starts believing that those gifts are little parts of her memory that Dream hid in the form of common objects to help her regain consciousness of who or what she was. Eventually, Dora finds out that Mervyn Pumpkinhead was responsible for making the gifts. These trinkets were not her memories, in fact, just objects that were broken but still had some meaning and value to her. The message Morpheus tried to convey to Dora was that broken things are not necessarily worthless. This helped her understand that, even though she's been through something awful that broke her spirit, she still has value and is worthy of love and respect.

She also has an insatiable hunger, which implies that she's not actually a dream or a nightmare, but something else entirely, since the Dreaming's residents don't need actual food to survive. Although she's been invited to the castle to feast, she prefers to visit real people's dreams and eat their food, because, in her own words, the residents of The Dreaming always want something in return.

History
Dora became a resident of The Dreaming after a traumatic event in her life, which led her to the shore where Morpheus found her. It is known that she first appeared right before Morpheus's death, with no memories of her past and without any knowledge of who or what she is. Because of this, she is very lonely and prefers to stay away from other dream entities, even though she seems to enjoy meeting people through their dreams.

While living in The Dreaming, Dora started to use her abillities to steal items from dreams and sell them, usually in exchange for food. This is how she meets the demon called Balam, a powerful duke of Hell, who is in love with her and wants to be more than a business partner. Although they have casual sex, Dora is not interested in any more involvement with him. She is also friendly with Ziggy, a blank person made of dream matter who appears from a crack after Daniel's absence.

Although distrustful and disrespectful towards the other denizens of the dream realm, Dora eventually starts working with them to destroy Judge Gallows, a nightmare that is set free by Mervyn Pumpkinhead and takes control of The Dreaming after Daniel resigns and abandons his duties. When the battle with Judge Gallows is over and a new entity, Wan, is born to repair the damages caused by Dream's absence, Dora goes on a hunt with Matthew, to find the Dream Lord, not only to help restore The Dreaming to its proper state, but also to find out about her past and unlock all of her memories.

After failing to find Dream and discovering that he had left that universe for good, Dora goes on another hunt to find out who was responsible for her trauma and get revenge. For this end, Dora strikes a deal with other demons from Hell in order to obtain their favours. Once they're defeated in their own games, Dora asks that Balam is reinstated as a duke of Hell, since he was previously demoted to a lower rhymer demon after failing to invade The Dreaming in Daniel's abscence. Since now Balam owes her a favour, she asks him to reveal who was responsible for breaking and traumatizing her.

Balam reveals that the man was Hyperion Keter, a genius billionaire who created the Asiyaha Tech Group and was the mastermind behind the schemes and plans to conquer The Dreaming all along. Immediately, Dora travels to Hyperions's house, which happened to be Fawney Rig, the former home of Johanna Constantine, and former headquarters for Roderick Burgess' order, where Morpheus was trapped many years before.

Upon arrival, Dora discovers that Hyperion is already dying from cancer and was made hostage by his own A.I. defense system, since he had a change of heart after learning from Daniel what would happen to the universe if his plans were to succeed. The A.I. system, which was now inhabited by a twisted version of Cain, the Master of Mysteries, trapped Dora inside the house and made her watch Hyperion's video diaries, through which she finally understands what happened to her.

In essence, Dora was a dreadful and beautiful Night Hag, a creature that visits people in their sleep to copulate with them and feast on their fear, much like a succubus. Having visited Hyperion, he decided to fight her and find a way to get rid of her. He realized all he had to do was acknowledge the fact that she wasn't real, that she was not rational and, therefore, couldn't exist. This was enough to brake Dora's spirit since, being a myth like many others, she relied on people's belief to self actualize.

At this point, Dora is already ceasing to exist due to Hyperion's plans, which involved erasing all dreams and irrational toughts and creating a new world of science and reason. Wan, the A.I. who took control of The Dreaming as part of this plan, sends it's henchmen to finish the job. One of these henchmen was Ziggy, her friend made out of dream matter, who decides to go against his orders and help Dora, although that decision is made too late.

Dora is saved at the last minute by Rose Walker, the woman who was once a Dream Vortex. Rose willingly gives Dora her fear, which in turn unlocks all of her memories. When Morpheus found her, he hid the Dream Ruby inside her in order to protect it, just in case he was once again held captive or somehow lost his powers. Believing she would become an ally and a friend someday, he erased her memories and promised she would find peace, knowing that she would be able to heal and truly believe in herself one day.

In the end, Dora finally understands that the only person who needs to believe in her is herself, which was Morpheus's plan all along. Once healed, Dora returns to The Dreaming with the Dream Ruby and helps her friends to defeat Wan and bring Daniel back.

Powers and Abilities
Dora has the ability to visit any dream and also to cross through realms without effort, by creating portals which more people can cross with her. She can also push away dream entities from people's dreams.

She also has the ability to observe the waking world through the dreams she visits. She can tell what's happening in the room where the dreamer sleeps and what the people in there are feeling and thinking. Dora can also smell the fear of people and feast on it.

In her monster form, Dora gains an impressive body strength, being able to defeat strong foes with a single hand. These powers are very unusual and seem to impress all the residents of The Dreaming, although not even Dora is able to explain how or why she can do those things at first.