doc and raider

For a couple of days afterwards, things were pretty quiet. We thought maybe we’d just heard something out of the ordinary: wind in the pipes, maybe. It didnt happen again, so we just dismissed it and got back to getting life organized. Doc was starting a class in short story writing, and I was trying to get my French back up to speed… not that it was all that good to start with. Tsi-boo even settled down, finding new spots in the apartment to hide away when we didnt have the door to the roof open. Whatever had paid us a visit that night seemed to have gone.

Doc was at class, and I was on the bed, trying to stay awake as I parsed my way through conjugating “-ir” verbs. The radio was on — on a French station, as part of my immersive instruction. I had no idea what they were talking about. Something about le hockey play offs, but I couldnt only catch the occasional word. Tsi-boo had nestled next to me, purring as we shared each other’s warmth. Suddenly, she sat up, her ears straight up. The purr disintegrated into a low growl. I tried to follow her line of sight, but she was just looking at a wall. She bolted off the bed and ran into the kitchen, worming her way into a spot inside the cupboards.

Then I heard  it. Just as before, a man’s voice, barely audible. I snapped off the radio. The voice was there, no doubt about it. It was almost like he was mumbling something, but it was so faint, I couldnt tell what it was.

“Hello!” I called out.

The voice stopped.

“Okay, look, whoever you are, come on out. I know you’re there.”

Silence.

Then it started again. Faint to the point of now being annoying. “Dude,” I yelled, “if you’re gonna try to scare me, at least do it so I can hear you. Now speak up, or shut the hell up. Your choice.”

It was silent again. Then the doorknob gently turned, and —

… Doc walked in, throwing his satchel on the table. “God! You will not believe what we had — ” He stopped, looking at me. “It’s back?” he whispered.

I nodded.

Doc stood frozen in place, listening. The voice started again, still low, but now a bit more insistent. It spoke for some time, annoyingly soft, little more than an relentless buzz. Doc listened, straining in intent, then interrupted the voice before gesturing to me. “Get over here,” he whispered.

“Why?”

“Because I want you next to me in case anything happens.”

My eyes went huge. “You think something will?”

“Just do it!” he hissed. I stood next to him, putting a protective pair of arms around him as I looked at the space on the wall that had alarmed Tsi-Boo so much. Doc spoke once more, softly, almost encouragingly.

“What’s going on?” I quietly asked.

He ignored the question, instead continuing to talk to the empty space above the sofa. “Viens, mon ami. Viens,” he repeated over and over, as if trying to convince… whatever was there… that it was okay to viens. The room went silent again, but I could feel it: something was about to happen…

It was a small studio/loft apartment, what Montrealers call a “une et demi”, a “one and a half”, because it consists of one big room with a closet-sized bathroomm usually hidden away out of sheer embarrassment. But Doc and I decided it would do as a starting point. The rent was cheap, the fridge and stove were included, and we were told that hydro, even during the worst days of winter, would never exceed fifty bucks a month. Situated on the roof of a three-story building in the Plateau, it had a large open rooftop space and a spectacular view of downtown, which more than made up for the low ceilings and dark wall colours over which we were not allowed to paint. Weighing the good against the bad, we decided it would do, for now.

With all of our stuff still in storage, we opted to buy some cheap yet sturdy used furniture that would likewise do, for now. We splurged a bit on a new bed, with a mattress that would take whatever we could throw at it and a brass-rail headboard that was perfect for grabbing onto. Everything else being second hand, it all needed some cleaning after we hauled it in, but most of it shined up pretty nice. So, all in all, an apartment that would do.

For now.

And yet… there was something about the place that didnt sit quite right. Maybe we should have noted the landlord’s slight unease when he walked us around the place at the viewing. You know the feeling, right? When you think you might have seen something out of the corner of your eye — and then when you look directly at whatever it might have been… it’s gone. Our cat, Tsi-bou, certainly noted it: for no real reason, she would look at empty spots on the wall and growl with her ears flattened against her head. We initially wrote it off to just living in a new space and getting used to the apartment’s eccentricities…

… but then, one night, just after dinner, we heard it. A low, barely audible voice, so low that it sets the hair on your forearm aloft.

“You heard that, right?” I whispered.

Doc nodded… with more than a bit of apprehension.

It wasnt like the temperature dropped to a bone numbing chill. No strange winds racing through the apartment. Nothing at all out of the ordinary… except that voice. It wasnt the sound of a neighbour: we were on the top floor, we had no neighbours. No, it was definitely right there in the room.

A dozen apartments. We looked at a dozen apartments. And the one we chose was haunted…

Twelve down, one SCOTUS decision to go!

So.

The boys are finally back in Canada where, to be honest, they probably belong. And this means a bit of a major shift in what you see in “Doc and Raider” from here forward. But before we get to that, let’s anticipate a few questions:

— Are they ever coming back to the US? At this point, probably not. But remember that things are sometimes loosey-goosey in the DnR universe, so anything truly can happen.

— What about Mik and Kai and Al? They’re still part of the cast, dont worry. Those are great characters, and I have lots of plans for them. They’re my strip’s anchor babies.

— And Eddie as well? Eddie? Are you kidding? He’s one of my favourite characters. If anything, that guy might spiral off to his own strip, but we’ll see.

— Will you still be commenting on American issues? As long as the US continues to provide as much drama over gay marriage as it has in the past decade, you bet I will. And let’s face it: no country has quite the politicians with as much showmanship as the US. So yes, we will be taking target shots there on a regular basis.
Now, having said that, some of the focus will also move to more Canada-specific issues. While we’ve certainly addressed issues like gay marriage, we Canucks still have our own bevy of brain-dead politicos and pundits, and I dont see that changing anytime before the next federal election in 2015 (if not, hopefully, sooner). And I know you will find them just as wondrously bizarre as we do. Ask any Canadian about Bev Oda’s $16 glass of orange juice, and you’ll see what I mean.

— So why are you sending them back? Because Canada is their home, just as it’s mine. The boys got their start in Vancouver and rose to real stardom in Toronto. I dont expect lightning to strike twice on that front, but they have always been Canadians first and foremost, and I felt it was time to return to that.

Attendant to that, I’m going to move it away from a word-heavy comic into something akin to straight text accompanied by illustrations, as I did with the little novella “The Steps”. The comic strip format will show up from time to time if it feels like things should be expressed in a pithy little exchange, but I intend to make this more about writing-with-visuals and less about “comic books”. And there will of course be the occasional single-panel, because the caption contests are turning out to be more fun than I dared hope.

We’re gonna take a day or two’s breather from this, so I can get the Brothers Voltaire up and running and get Raymond and François back on track after what’s been a woeful lapse of time. The next time you see all of us, I hope you’ll enjoy it.

/Sean

So who were these guys who guest-appeared in the boys’ blog?

You’ll find them here…