South Africa,
1984
I
“So now that we’re all on the same page, is it official that I say… call us a team?” asked Lana, her golden retriever energy pulsing over her gleeful face. Lana had her eyes on Xadie who seemed to be desperately pretending to not be part of the conversation. So, Lana turned to Isidora, ambushing her with jubilant anticipation.
“I mean, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, no?” Replied Isidora, answering from the spot as her unsure eye shifted to Xadie, her arms in shrug.
Cornered by both their eyes, Xadie then sighed.
“Ugh… Fine. Yes, we are a tea – “
“YAYYY!” beamed Lana, jumping into the air with animated excitement. She then hung in between Xadie and Isidora; her arms flung over both their shoulders.
“We’re going to be the best team ever guys; my father doesn’t stand a chance against us. Oh, and you know what this means, we need a name.”
“Uhm –‘’
“A team title, something legendary like… the Expeditionaries! With an x, so Xpeditionaries. Yes! That sounds so cool. I’m such a genius, guys.”
“Sureeee.” Said Xadie, flinging Lana off her shoulder as she marched for the car. Isidora then followed behind her, Lana in her ear as she started brainstorming team codenames, maybe even matching costumes — good for the team brand, you know?
Isidora did not know —she kept listening though, a nervous smile plastered on her face.
II
The XpeditionariesTM hit the road in Xadie’s truck in search of their next clue, desperate to get close to uncovering the mystery of the secret garden, and fast. If Lana’s father got to it first, the world’s fate would be grim, though some would win I suppose, but these would not be good winners.They’re the bad guys!
“Yes, the absolute worst! We need to do everything we can to stop them!” said Lana.
“How close to the garden do you think your father is?” asked Isidora, seated in the front passenger seat while Xadie drove. Lana then replied from the back, sat in the middle as she leaned forward.
“He isn’t close, but he’s not too far off either. He has no clue where the garden is, that I’m certain of. He’ll need to access certain key artefacts spread out across the globe. Those artefact locations though are in my research and he has mymother’s notes and all of my findings. I’d been using the institute to fund my research on the garden so once I refused to help him on his evil mission he fired me. The bastard —I built that institution, now he is using it against me!”
“That’s the thing about daddy’s money; he can always take it back.” Said Xadie, a smirk on her face.
“Fair enough, I merely needed his money to fund my operations. The actual work though is all thanks to my multiple PhDs, all before my 30s too. Genius, remember?”
“I’m sure we’d all be geniuses if we all had silver spoons in our mouths.”
Even having a spoon would be more than enough, thought Xadie, annoyed.
“Anyway, how much did you uncover through your research.” Continued Isidora, stumping out any tension before it could even simmer.
“I’ve got locations, but their all-ballpark hunches really. My mom’s notes are far more detailed.She tracked them all down after all, right into the jungle. So, I’m building off of her work, and all I’ve got are crumbs. The same crumbs that my father now has!”
“I’m aware of your mother’s jungle escapades. The infamous Britlee Bah. My dad was a BIG fan. Some of those artifacts she was “recovering” however were right where they should’ve been. They weren’t just keys she could use as a means to an end, they were sacred, and she was stealing them! I mean what kind of sick person raids tombs?! That’s why I’m here, to bring them back where they belong,” said Isidora, abandoning Lana as she was all on her own now.
“What can I say, I’ve got some really shitty parents, guys. Imagine being raised by them.”
“Wouldn’t be so bad, I’d get to have multiple PhDs, all before my 30s. Genius, remember?” Snarked Xadie, eyeing Lana through the rearview mirror.
Lana forced a smile.
III
The trio drove on, now entering the busy streets of Wittfontein. It had been a while since Xadie had been here, she’d spent a long time running away from this place. I guess you can’t outrun the past forever.
“We’re headed for Victory, that’s where my apartment is. I kept back up materials that we can use to search out the ke – I mean, artifacts, sacred artifacts. I can help direct you if y – “
“I know where it is,” said Xadie, her face cold.
It was called Victory today, but that hadn’t always been the case.
When Xadie was younger, the place was known as Opheliatown. It’s there that her father purchased the Xhoss’s family’s first home. Those childhood days were as close to bliss as Xadie ever got. Her father, a Xhomani prince, had fled his titles desperate to make a name for himself, earned and not inherited. He served in the South African Army fighting alongside the British against the Nazis in North Africa.
He earned the nickname “Blackjack” from his comrades, yet he wouldn’t share in the glory. As a black soldier, he was relegated to a lower rank, merely supporting the effort, barred from fighting in the fronts. Frustrated, he then left at the war’s end, headed for the bustling city of Wittfontein.
The city was economically booming from the successful mining industry. De Witt Diamonds led the charge, and the De Witt family practically owned the city as they had their hands everywhere in the rapidly developing metropolis. Xadie’s father worked for them as a low-level minor, yet the money was good, especially for someone like him whose social mobility was limited.
Xadie’s father worked hard and eventually met a beautiful Zulu woman called Amandla. She stole his heart, and he put on a good show, telling tall tales of his days in North Africa hunting down Nazis. Amandla worked as a housemaid, and together, they put their resources together and built a family.
Opheliatown was the culmination of their love, and in that house, Xadie and her siblings were born. Despite the limited opportunities they had, Opheliatown granted the Xhoss family paradise. It was a diverse neighborhood bustling with different cultures that lived side by side. Little Xadie had many friends from Indians, to Chinese, Coloreds* (South African term for biracial people) and fellow black friends.
Some White South Africans also harmonized in the rainbow chorus, but the melody became too loud for the actual white neighborhoods that bordered Opheliatown and felt themselves a little too close to their “lessers.” Thus, Wittfontein succumbed to their demands, despite counter protests from the Ophelian community. Xadie’s parents had organized and marched against these demands, and they were joined by many figures of the anti-apartheid movement, including a charming lawyer by the name of Nelson Mandela.
The city would choose to enforce Apartheid laws , doubly pressured by the De Witt family which had investment plans to develop the area into luxury apartments for white clients thus further entrenching segregation.
Xadie was an Ophelian, thus she and her family were forcibly displaced by the Police. She watched her family home be bulldozed to the ground. All the family photos, the toys she’d begged Amandla to buy her, her own notes and school research, razed to the ground.
Nothing but cinders were left as paradise was lost.
Xadie and her family were then moved to a black township, Xhomville. Here she would grow up in the depths of poverty as the innocence of childhood was stripped away.
The rubble of her childhood home was swept away, and from the ashes of Opheliatown arose, Victory. Errol De Witt, patriarch of the De Witt family named it himself for it was a triumph for the white south African community and it would make him a pretty penny too as his family’s companies developed the neighborhood into an upper-class neighborhood filled with luxurious properties.
The jewel of Errol’s construction was a beautiful extravagant apartment complex dubbed De Witt Towers, and its very foundations had been built on the carcass of Xadie’s childhood home.
The seed of her family’s memory was buried in the dirt as a golden tree of concrete sprouted forth.
IV
Xadie and the trio drove to a stop, disembarking from her truck as their eyes were transfixed by the extravagant developments in Victory. Xadie had never seen anything like them, and she could barely reconcile that once upon a time, she had a house here.
“Wait till you see my apartment, this is nothing. My grandad named my apartment complex after the family, De Witt Towers, he calls them. A bit too tacky for my tastes, but hey, daddy’s money am I right. What are you gonna do” Lana said, gesticulating.
Xadie and Isidora followed Lana’s lead as they bore witness to her golden tree of concrete. It looked completely alien like a zombie of the living dead, despite its glitter and gold it would never look as beautiful as when it was still human, and full of love.
It was so unrecognizable to Xadie that she had clue the Tower’s foundations were built on her family home.
The trio waltzed in, clinging to Lana otherwise they most certainly would’ve been kicked out, even Isidora who was almost white passing wouldn’t have been spared. Only daddy’s money could earn them such access, so they stuck close to his golden girl, well, former* golden girl, luckily security hadn’t yet gotten the memo.
“Whenever I bring my English friends here, I always joke and call myself a Victorian, except I’m from… Victory… get it?” said Lana, face lit up.
The room didn’t really light up to that one.
“The English find it funny.”
“I’m part English. Not really laughing.” Said Isidora.
Isidora was Mestizo, having travelled all the way from South America, but she kept her nationality undisclosed. All that she let be known was that her father, a lord, soldier, renowned British explorer and many other titles he fondly reminded her to remember, had ventured into what he called the new world and taken himself an indigenous wife. He then introduced Isidora into the world.
Instead of playing house with his newfound family however, he instead chose to raid his wife’s sacred cultural relics, as one does, and then bring them back to European museums and galleries where they would be hung in display and receive fortune and admiration.
He then abandoned his beloved wife, stealing little Dora and raising her with an evil stepmother while grooming her to take care of his hoarded treasures and one day become an explorer too all because he couldn’t conceive a son and made sure to always remind her how she was his last choice for an heir. Too bad for him, ISIdora, had other plans.
She really, really despised her father. Once she reunited with her real mother, she’d change her last name to Cruz just to spite him.
Dads, can’t live with them, can’t live without them am I right, you know what we should call this team, daddy issues… is something Lana probably said.
V
The trio finally entered Lana’s lavish apartment, getting ever closer to solving the mystery of the secret garden.
“Why not just call yourselves Victors, that’s why that word exists.” said Isidora, responding to Lana’s earlier Victorian joke, or lack thereof.
“Doesn’t rhyme as well with Ophelian, the people they were trying to replace.” Added Xadie, not wanting to reveal that she herself was an Ophelian.
“Yes, this was once a black township I believe…”
“You’ve got no clue what a township is.” Said Xadie, swiftly turning on Lana as she stared her down with a sharp tone, a fuse setting off inside her.
“It wasn’t just black people that lived here. It was everyone, we were all united, each of us, Ophelians, living alongside one another in harmony. But someone didn’t like our peaceful kumbaya, so they destroyed it. Now they call themselves Victorians, so desperate to catch the magic we already had.”
The water finally boiled, and Isidora could no longer stop the pair from clashing.
The awkward silence persisted as Xadie disarmed, but the smoke still spurred as the fire was fresh.
“…….” Lana didn’t say anything, she knew nothing could be said.
This was the state of their country, a cycle of theft and discrimination that fueled the wealth of an oppressive minority. Now that minority demanded more and more as the walls of its system were closing in as the world isolated them with a global boycott on the Apartheid regime in effect.
The regime was growing desperate, and the secret garden could change that, the secret garden could be their salvation, if only it could fall into the wrong hands.
“I – … I’m here to help. I want to make things right. I want to be part of the solution. I am what I am, and I have what I have, and I want things to change. I’m not here to save anyone, I’m not here to cry and wallow in my guilt for having bloodied hands. I just want to be helpful; I just want to assist in making things better. I want to stop my father from making things worse, for all of us. This isn’t about me; this is bigger than me, I just want to… I just want to help Xadie, that’s all I want, I’m here to help.”
……………………..
“The guera’s right, we need to work together on this. We’re running out of time, if her father gets a hold of the garden’s secrets. Its going to get a whole lot worse, and its already crazy right now! We’re like at zero, we’re going to end up in the negatives. It wont just be a new world for these psychos, its going to be a whole new planet, a new galaxy even, not even the aliens are safe Z, we – ‘’
“I get your point.” Said Xadie, leaking a smile.
She then faced Lana, resting her palm on Lana’s shoulder. She locked eyes with her, staring intensely, then rose her finger in wag…
“No. More. Team Names – or codenames, or nicknames, or callsigns, or safe words or any of that – none of it, Okay?”
“Okay.”
Isidora then joined the pair, resting her arms on both their shoulders.
“You better listen to her Ms. De Witt, as for myself though, I’ve got a great team name – ”
“Nooo –”
“Yesss –”
“The Rainbow Raiders, its perfect, we’ve got all the colors, well kind of, more like just shades of brown, still though.”
“I can rock with it.”
“I refuse to rock with that.”
“You don’t rock with anything”
“I Second that”
“Two against one how fair”
“Okay maybe you do rock with some things”
“Stop bootlicking”
“Not so nice being ganged up on huh….”
END
This story was originally published in Volume 24, Issue 7 on March 6 2025
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