Chapter 1 Recap

Transcript: Chapter 1 Recap

A cropped image shows a portion of Into the Smoke’s chapter 2 cover, with Blaze placing his glowing, tattooed hand over smoky Alastor’s chest. Text reads, “Previously in Chapter 1…”

In a flashback, 80-year-old Madame Evelyn says, “And that’s why you must always follow the three cardinal rules of spirit seeing.”

In present time, four ghosts get together in Blaze’s apartment. One of them, a blue ghost in a 1920s newsboy uniform, kisses Blaze. Madame Evelyn’s narration continues, “Rule #1: You must never commune with more than one spirit at the same time.”

As Blaze’s lips part from the ghost’s, his breath is visible as glowing white vapor. Narration continues, “Rule #2: You must never allow a spirit to inhale your life’s breath.”

Narration continues, “And most importantly, rule #3:”

Blaze lies back, with the ghost lying close above him. They look into each other’s eyes. Narration continues, “You must never, ever, be intimate with a spirit.”

The next morning, Blaze wears a bedsheet like a toga and pours tea, his hair mussed. He says to Madame Evelyn’s ghost, now in the form of a 36-year-old (Evie), It was Halloween! They would have been out wreaking havoc in the streets.”

Evie folds her arms and says sternly, “These risks you take… They’ll come back to haunt you one day.”

Later, Blaze and Evie sit at the kitchen table. Blaze holds a cup of tea and Evie holds a clipboard. Blaze asks, “So, who’s my morning appointment?” Evie replies, “Vern.”

At the appointment, Blaze cocks his head sympathetically and asks Vern, a bearded smoky ghost, “You love her, right? Don’t you want her to move on? She was your wife.”

Vern replies heatedly, “IS. She IS my wife.”

After the appointment, Blaze looks distraught as he says, “If he moves on now, he’ll move into the smoke.”

Evie replies, “Maybe that’s who he is. And maybe you need to let him go.”

Blaze folds his arms, tears running down his face as he says to Evie, “I know you don’t always like the way I do things. But I’ve never lost a spirit to the smoke. How many of your other students could say that?”

Evie looks over her shoulder, squinting knowingly at Blaze. She says, “Maybe you should try making more living, breathing friends.”

Later, at a bar, Blaze laughs and chats among a circle of eclectic friends. His narration reads, “I have lots of living friends.”

A view of his phone on the table shows a missed call from a young, white-haired Catholic priest named Judd Abraham. Narration continues, “But they’re just… more complicated than the dead.”

Later, a handsome, dark-skinned man with scars on his cheeks and a lip ring, says flirtatiously to Blaze, “Have we met before?”

Blaze blushes and replies, “Oh, I… I think I would’ve remembered that.”

The dark-skinned man’s expression turns teasing, and he says, “Are you sure? Are you sure you wouldn’t forget?”

Blaze looks frazzled as the man holds a phone in his face, saying, “‘Cause you forgot your cell phone at the bar across the street.”

Later, at night, Blaze’s eyes go wide. Bright pink energy radiates from his chest.

He raises a hand to his chest and thinks, “I can’t speak… I can barely breathe… It’s like I’ve been impaled through the back and out my chest…”

He squeezes his eyes shut as energy swirls around him. He thinks, “It’s the echo of someone’s deathblow… A spirit being torn from its body…”

Later, Blaze stands on a hardwood floor beside the broken arm of a baby statue.

A man, facing away with large shards of stained glass sticking out of his back, says, “I-I saw… something fly across the room. It stuck a guy through the chest!”

Blaze listens as the man grimaces and yells, “He’s dead. A DEMON killed him! And it was gonna kill me too!”

Later, Blaze braces his bare, glowing left hand within his gloved right hand. He thinks, “But those people upstairs were wrong. It isn’t a demon. ‘Demon’ is just a label used by people who don’t care to understand the motivations of a spirit.”

A dead body lies on the floor in shadow, face down, impaled through the back with a large, broken gold cross.

A flashback shows the face of the handsome man who returned Blaze’s phone. Blaze’s thought bubble reads, “It’s him…”

Blaze kneels down beside the broken gold cross, touching it with his bare hand.

Blaze withdraws his hand and stares at the cross, puzzled. Behind him is a vague, smoky, humanoid silhouette. He thinks, “No spiritual energy on the murder weapon.”

Ghostly hands pull a black wire taut around Blaze’s neck. Blaze grits his teeth and grabs for the wire.

Blaze chokes and sputters while the ghost pulls on the wire.

Blaze raises his bare tattooed hands to the ghost’s head. They radiate with hot orange light.

Blaze’s hand is shown braced on the floor. His tattoos glow, and his narration reads, “People aren’t supposed to be able to touch spirits.”

A flashback shows the handsome dark-skinned man’s smile. Blaze’s narration reads, “But he’s not the killer. He’s the victim!”

The broken gold cross is shown in the man’s back. Blaze’s narration reads, “Who killed him?”

Blaze dodges as the smoky ghost’s clawed black hand swipes at him. He says, “If you’d just… give me a second to… mourn over your body…”

Blaze backs away as the smoky ghost closes in on him. He yells, “I promise you’ll feel better!”

Blaze reaches into a grocery bag and thinks, “But I can calm him with a circle of sage.”

Blaze stares down at a bundle of cilantro in his hand, stunned. Narration reads, “This is… cilantro.”

As Blaze stands behind the smoky ghost, his narration reads, “I can’t let him hurt anyone. But I don’t have my tools!”

Blaze’s hand is shown as he flicks on his lighter. He thinks, “There’s only one other way to contain a spirit who’s this close to the smoke…”

Blaze holds up the lit lighter, which radiates with energy. He says, “Your new home…”

Blaze holds out both his hands. Flames billow from his palms, and he’s surrounded by blinding white light. He yells, “IS ME!”

Blaze pulls the smoky ghost close.

Blaze breathes into the ghost’s mouth.

As the ghost leans in, clutching Blaze while sucking in his breath, narration reads, “Living breath is addictive. Irresistible fuel for a starved soul. Many a medium has tried using their breath to calm and control a spirit. But they are playing with fire…”

Later, Blaze leans his head back against the wall, his eyes closed as he wears a satisfied smile. He says, “Aahhhhhhh… I’ve never felt so alive.”

Blaze lowers his hand over the dead body’s face. He says, “I’m sorry.”

He closes the body’s eyes and says, “Whoever you are, you didn’t deserve this.”

The smoky, distorted ghost’s form shifts from monstrous to human. He is the handsome, dark-skinned man who returned Blaze’s phone, but his eyes are set in dark shadow with glowing white irises, and his chest is splotched with inky black. He holds a stained glass shard, looking stunned.

A pair of double doors burst open, and four armored police arrive with guns drawn. They yell, POLICE! Hands in the air!”

Blaze kneels beside the murdered corpse, looking over his shoulder with shocked, wide eyes. He warily raises his hands.

Cut to black.

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