In the 1960's, Eldon Peck started his criminal yet supernatural career when he began trafficking human souls in the San Francisco Bay area. According to John Zatara, who knew of Peck's work, the dark forces granted Eldon an extended lifespan in exchange for his services. As a wannabe flower child, Peck hijacked a busload of kids that were heading to Mt. Diablo and after three days, Peck was found bloodstained by the police. Apparently, Peck had ritualistically killed thirteen children and arranged their corpses in an unusual manner. When the police attempted to arrest him, Peck uttered a single word and walked away while the police stood still as stones.
Years later, a Det. Dale Colton meets with Zatanna after her show at the Orpheum in San Fran. He asks her to accompany him to the Nob Hill Steak House where a crime scene has just been committed. According to surviving witnesses, the circumstances of this crime were deemed supernatural. It turns out that Brother Night bumped off Alberto De Cecco, one of San Francisco's drug kingpins. Currently Brother Night is attempting to wrest control of both the supernatural and everyday criminal element in San Francisco. Zatanna and a Detective Colton are the only ones standing in his path.
After Peck's first encounter with Zatanna at his Club Bewitched on 666 Haight St., Peck forces a nightmare demon named Fuseli to terrorize Zatanna as she sleeps. Meanwhile, Peck confronts Colton at his precinct and offers Colton the chance to work for him since the mystic criminal underworld is making its move against San Francisco's criminal element. Colton refuses and Peck vanishes.
Zatanna manages to capture Fuseli and manipulates him to do her bidding from now on. Peck decides to conjure the spirit of Zatanna's father Zatara since John owes Peck a debt for saving him from oblivion. Zatara's spirit now acts as Peck's servant against Zatanna. Zatanna's final encounter with Peck forces her to contend with her father Zatara. She sends Fuseli to distract Peck while she breaks Peck's hold over Zatara's spirit. She frees her father by an incantation and they have a heart felt talk before he fades into smoke.
In a fit of rage, Zatanna cuts loose with spells and magic to destroy Peck for all the torment he inflicted on her. She tries to smash Peck with two boulders after he defeated Fuseli but no success. Finally, Zatanna uses a powerful spell that forces Peck to renounce what he had done to those children, his masters and his powers. In the end, Peck is left in a catatonic state as he is carted off to San Quentin's Prison Infirmary.
During his stay in San Quentin, the prisoners have begun to chant Peck's alter ego "Brother Night." One prisoner became Peck's zealot by writing messages on the walls of the prison in his own blood. Before he died, the zealot prisoner slit his throat and wrote messages in blood like "Brother Night Lives" or that Brother Night is "God". As for the staff, one doctor tried to sedate Peck but instead he was subjected to a dozen deadly syringes and one officer who tried to help the doctor, became so traumatized by the voices that Peck put in his head that he simply blew his head off with a shotgun.
Detective Colton is called in by the prison's warden, who looks an awful like Quincy Sharpe from Arkham Asylum, to investigate these strange occurrences. Colton walks into the infirmary and finds Peck levitating off the ground with medical utensils spiraling around him. Brother Night is back. Unbeknownst to Colton, Peck has tattooed other prisoners with a strange summoning insginia. Peck runs out of the infirmary and heads toward prison yard. Peck chants a spell which causes the tattooed prisoners to be stripped of their flesh right down to the bone. The skeletons of the prisoners transforms into a ladder and Peck places the ladder at the prison gate.
Peck makes his way up the ladder and distracts the guards as well as Colton with a flock of crows. Colton shoots into the air to scare off the crows and races up the ladder to apprehend Peck. Peck summons a guard's attack dog to pin Colton on the street outside of San Quentin. Peck taunts Colton by asking the detective to say "Hello to Jenny Myers" then Peck makes his escape thanks to his followers who brought a getaway car. Peck returns his Club Bewitched which is also his temple of worship and finds out that someone has purchased his property during Peck's absence. Peck disposes of the club's new manager and enjoys his return home with a new bar maid.
Colton couldn't understand how Peck knew about his estranged mother. Colton goes to visit his mother at Napa State Hospital where he learns that his mother had etched crosses in his skin when he was young because she was trying to protect him from his father who happens to be Brother Night. Jenny also reveals that Peck has had other women in his accursed life and they too have bore his children.
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