Gafford left Marvel in January 1981 and began freelancing for both DC and Marvel, one of the few colorists to work at both companies at the same time. He returned to staff at DC in the summer of 1981 as the proofreader, then by year's end had become Len Wein's assistant editor on "Justice League", "The Flash", "Teen Titans", and the Batman books. At this time, Gafford became editor of "Adventure Comics Digest", and with writer Bob Rozakis revived the "Challengers of the Unknown", with art first by George Tuska and later by Alex Toth. Gafford also wrote most of the short-lived Creeper back-up series in "The Flash", featuring British artist Dave Gibbons' first work for DC, — though most of the scripts were scrapped after a change of editors. He colored the second to last issue and was the artist on the final back-up.