THE RECLAIMER
Died an addict.
Returned a warrior.

Michael Reyes overdosed in an alley and did not come back the same. Death offered him a chain of light and a job: go back among the living and pull people out of the dark — one at a time, carrying every piece of what he takes from them.

An original comic built out of real recovery. No sanitizing. No sermon.

Digital download · Read on any device · $1 from every issue goes to Herren Project.

Who he is

He isn't a hero. He's a man who owes a debt.

The Reclaimer doesn't fight because he's brave. He fights because he was there — on the needle, in the alley, on the wrong end of every promise he ever made. He knows exactly what the people he saves are feeling, because he never fully stopped feeling it himself.

"This is not a gift. Gifts do not scream. It is every chain that ever held you."

The chain on his chest is always burning — it never goes out, because there is always someone else out there. His eyes soften when he's pulling somebody back. They go bright again the second it's done. That's the whole job.

Death offers the chain

The run

One issue a month.

Every issue is a self-contained story about somebody worth pulling back — and about what it costs the man doing the pulling.

Issue 1 cover
Available now
ISSUE No. 1
Died an Addict

The overdose, the offer, and the first soul he reclaims. 24 pages, full color.

Get it — $3.99
Issue 2 cover
Available now
ISSUE No. 2
Consequences

The enemy isn't a dealer in an alley. It's a licensed pain clinic with a clean waiting room — and the man whose name is on the building. 52 pages, full color.

Get it — $3.99 Read the opening free
Issue 3 cover
Halloween
ISSUE No. 3
Your Story

Submissions are closed and the story has been chosen. One real person's recovery, drawn as the entire issue. Arrives October 31st.

What happens next

Issue #3 — Your Story

Somebody's recovery is about to become a comic book.

We didn't make this one up. People sent in their own stories, and one of them is now being drawn as the whole of Issue #3 — out this Halloween. Thank you to every single person who trusted us with theirs. Writing it down takes something, and we know it.

  • They chose how they're credited — full name, first name, or fully anonymous.
  • They told us what's off-limits, and it stays off-limits.
  • They see the script before anything is published, and can stop it at any point.
  • Submissions for a future issue will reopen. Watch this page.

The mission

This came out of a real bottom.

The Reclaimer was created by Mike Drake, a recovery coach in Austin, Texas, who lived the first half of this story for real. Addiction took his career, his relationships and his family. Recovery gave him the job he has now.

The comic exists so that somebody in the middle of it can see themselves on a page and recognize that the ending isn't written yet.

Official recovery partner

$1 from every issue and $3 from every shirt goes to Herren Project, a national non-profit whose services are all free of charge: treatment placement, seven-week recovery housing scholarships with a certified recovery coach, family support and school-based prevention programs. Since 2011 they have awarded over $9.1 million in scholarships and placed more than 2,500 people in treatment. herrenproject.org

$1 per issueand $3 per shirt goes to Herren Project.
Monthlynew issue, every month, no gaps.
Reala real person’s story becomes Issue #3, this Halloween.

Follow him

He posts in his own voice.

Not a marketing account. Messages of hope, and of reclaiming your life, from the character himself.

And Mike Drake, the man he came out of — Facebook · Instagram