The Outer Limits (1995)

Reporter Carter Jones is on her way to work when her cellular phone picks up a suspicious conversation about the ""removal"" of a controversial author. Her journalistic curiosity piqued, Carter investigates, despite the objections of her boss and the police. As a result, she finds herself in a deadly game of cat and mouse, involving a strange man with violet eyes, an ill-fated cruise and people who disappear leaving behind only a pile of purple ash. Can Carter get to the bottom of these mysterious disappearances? Or will she be the next to vanish?