@mark noble,
one of my favourite stand alone stories from the Sandman comic book series is this one
A Dream of a Thousand Cats
This tale begins with a small, white cat being called by another cat to sneak away from her house one night. They speak of an event in a graveyard that they don't want to miss. When they arrive, they see that many cats are already there. A Siamese cat comes to tell her story.
A long time ago, the Siamese cat relates, she met a Tom-cat, who became her lover. Eventually, she gave birth to several kittens. Her human owners were not pleased, and the male owner put the kittens in a bag bound to a rock, and threw them into pond. Traumatized by the callous murder of her kittens, the Siamese becomes disillusioned in human beings and ultimately rejects the life of a pampered pet. Her cause is strengthened when she has a dream that she has entered a boneyard in the Dreaming. In the dream a raven with no skin on its head informs her where she can find out exactly why the humans killed her offspring: a cave inhabited by the Dream Lord. At the entrance to the cave that the raven told her of, many fearsome animals tell her to leave. She responds by saying that she will only state her business to Dream. Inside, she finds Dream in the form of a cat.
Dream presents her with a vision of an alternate reality where cats are huge and humans are merely their playthings, tiny servants which groom their bodies and which the cats can kill at their pleasure. A man ruined that world by informing the humans that their dreams will shape the world. Enough humans listened to make the vision a reality. Upon waking, the cat undertakes a spiritual quest for justice. She preaches her vision to motley assortments of housecats around the world, hoping that if she can make enough believe in and dream of this reality, the world will change to conform to their dreams.
The cat from the beginning of the story heads home. Her friends were slightly disappointed, though they admitted that what they heard was interesting. The white cat, however, was fully taken by the tale. She returns home and heads to sleep. Over breakfast, her owners remark on what a cute stance she's in: it looks as if she's hunting something, or someone.
Although seemingly a complete diversion from the basic story of the Sandman, it in fact illustrates one of the core themes of the series: the idea that reality is shaped in the most literal sense by the dreams, beliefs, and expectations of humans (and, in this case, of other animals as well). The story also serves as a reminder that dreams are truly universal.
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