Estrella De Asís
Copyright© 2025 by Jody Daniel
Chapter 30
Wolvenkopft Manor, Constantia, Cape Town, August 2024.
August rolled into the Cape like a tired, wet dog. You could feel it in your bones — that stubborn tail-end of winter dragging its heels across the Peninsula. The last of the cold fronts came grumbling out of the deep South Atlantic, marching north-east across the country like old soldiers who didn’t know the war was over. Here, closer to the mountain, the sky stayed grey and heavy for days. Showers came in hard and sudden, pounding the Cape Flats till the drainage system gave up, and the streets turned into shallow rivers.
Emergency services were stretched to the brink. People had to be evacuated from flooded homes, some of them clinging to their roofs or wading knee-deep through icy water with whatever belongings they could carry. The SAAF sent out two Oryx helicopters from Ysterplaat, and SAPS had their AS350B3 Squirrel up in the air too. Between the three of them, they pulled off a proper textbook rescue effort over about a day and a half. Not easy flying, either — the wind played rough, and the cloud ceiling dipped so low at times it felt like you could stick your hand out the cockpit and touch the damn sky.
Meanwhile, Ronny had just come back from Europe flying a 747 freighter gig for the Angels Express Logistics. Ash, ever the connector of people and ideas, thought it’d be a solid plan to get Ronny down here with Angels Leah and Olivia to lend a hand with the Super Puma. Sounded great on paper, but reality had other plans — SAPS and the Air Force had it under control. Still, they didn’t come for nothing. The three of them managed two quick sorties: one was a gnarly rescue out by Cape Point where a fishing trawler got into trouble; the other was delivering some serious kit to the Overberg region for SAPS. Quick, clean, and professional — just like them.
Back at Wolvenkopft Manor, Fiona was pacing like a cat in a cage. She was itching to get back to the Oread Halls cave, wanting to survey the Skylight cavern before her leave ended. But between Angie, Ash, Stella, and me, we managed to convince her not to risk it. The weather was dicey, the terrain even more so.
“My leave is coming to an end,” Fiona said, clearly frustrated. “And now that the State’s gone and frozen Anderson’s accounts, I’ve got no income, no support, no funding to keep searching for the Star.”
Angie, ever the diplomat, tried to reason with her. “Fiona, why don’t you go back to Gauteng, resume your position at UP? When the weather clears up, we can regroup and head back in.”
“But I don’t have any more long-term leave left,” Fiona argued. “If I go back, how do I continue the search?”
“There’s always the option of a full tenure at Stellenbosch...” Angie said, her voice a little too casual to be offhand.
Fiona gave her a long look. “You guys want me to stay here, don’t you?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “I for one do.”
She sighed, the fight still in her but softened now. “Let me see if I can extend my leave. Then I’ll take it from there.”
“The Foundation will provide the funds for the dig,” Angie added, shooting a glance across the room at Ash.
Ash leaned back, arms crossed, voice steady. “Well, back when Grumpy still ran the Foundation, he set up a bursary for Angie and funded the Smitswinkels Bay excavation. So yeah — the Foundation can absolutely fund the search for the Star.”
Fiona’s whole posture changed. She perked up and leaned toward me, eyes suddenly alive again. “Wait ... the Foundation can do that?”
“Yes,” Ash said with a small, sure smile. “It can. And it will. And you can use Stella as well.”
Stella, who had been standing motionless by the window with her hands clasped behind her back, turned her head precisely 30 degrees toward Ash. Her ocular sensors pulsed once in quiet acknowledgement.
“Statement acknowledged: the Foundation can and will provide financial resources for this operation. Cross-referencing: precedent exists — Smitswinkel Bay excavation, bursary issued to subject: Angelique Elizabeth Rothman, authorisation by: Grumpy Charley.”
Stella turned from the window and walked a few steps closer, hands still folded neatly behind her back and faced Fiona.
“Fiona, your work is of significant scientific value. With Foundation support, mission sustainability increases, and personal risk factors are reduced by 34.2%. You are not obligated to proceed alone.”
Her voice paused — not in calculation, but something more deliberate. A shift. Quieter, more human: “If I were you ... I would accept.”
Another flicker pulsed through her core, dim and brief — and somewhere deep in her matrix, Elara stirred.
Fiona’s brows furrowed. “Then ... if we find the Star, it becomes property of the Foundation?”
Ash didn’t miss a beat. “If we find the Star — and that’s still an if — it’ll be returned to Assisi. That’s where it belongs. Of course, the right universities will get their hands on it for study, but it goes back. That’s non-negotiable. The media coverage alone will be worth more than the artefact, at least for us. For you, Fiona, it’ll open doors. Big ones.”
Without warning, Fiona sprang up and hugged Ash with the kind of energy that makes you smile even if you don’t mean to. Then she turned and wrapped Angie in an even tighter embrace.
“Whoa, easy there, girl,” Angie squeaked, her arms pinned to her sides. “You’re gonna strangle me...”
We all laughed. It was the first real moment of lightness in days. Outside, the clouds were still hanging low over the mountains, but inside, things felt a little clearer.
Groote Schuur Hospital, Salt River, Cape Town.
Perched on the rugged slopes of Devil’s Peak, Groote Schuur Hospital stood like a stone sentinel over Cape Town, a sprawling complex of brutalise concrete and purpose. Founded in 1938, this vast public teaching hospital had long since transcended its utilitarian beginnings. It was not just a place of healing — it was hallowed ground. It was here, in a cold, fluorescent-lit theatre, that history was carved into flesh: the first successful human-to-human heart transplant, performed by the brilliant, relentless Dr. Christiaan Barnard, a son of the University of Cape Town, on the gravely ill Louis Washkansky. That moment, in December 1967, had ignited a global blaze of medical wonder and ethical debate.
To this day, Groote Schuur remains synonymous with medical excellence. Its trauma unit, battle-hardened by the violence of city life, is one of the best on the continent. Anaesthesiology and internal medicine are treated as art forms, not just disciplines. Its halls echo with the footsteps of young medical minds from across the globe, drawn here by reputation and the promise of rare, real-world experience. As of the last official count in 2006, it housed over 500 doctors, 1,300 nurses, and 250 allied health professionals, with nearly 900 beds spread across multiple wings. It is a city within a city — with its own logic, rhythm, and secrets.
The name “Groote Schuur” — Dutch for “Great Barn” — harks back to colonial days, to the original estate mapped out by early Dutch settlers in the 17th century when the dusty, wind-blasted outpost that would become Cape Town was barely more than a dream of empire. But now, the estate had transformed. What was once farmland had become a place where life and death danced daily on a knife’s edge.
And deep inside this labyrinthine hospital — not in the gleaming public wings or open wards, but in a private suite tucked away in the east wing — Alan Anderson lay quietly beneath crisp white sheets.
The official diagnosis read: “minor stress-related neurological incident.” But whispers among the medical staff told a different story. Cardiac arrest? Possibly. A stroke? No. The truth was more elusive — and stranger. According to the consulting neurologist, Anderson’s autonomic nervous system had essentially pulled the emergency brake. Faced with a psychological impact of extreme magnitude, it had simply shut down — a rare biological defence against total mental collapse.
Through the window beside his bed, Anderson could see Salt River stirring with weekday life. Taxis honked, shopkeepers opened shutters, children ran through puddles from last night’s rain. Most people thought Groote Schuur belonged to the Mother City’s CBD, but in reality, it was planted squarely in this working-class suburb — Salt River, a place with a thousand stories hidden under its corrugated iron roofs.
Anderson flipped through a dog-eared issue of Time, barely registering the articles. The SAPS officer stationed at his door — kind, bored, and just out of college — had given it to him in a moment of awkward generosity. Anderson, drugged just enough to feel detached but not enough to sleep, didn’t care. Not about the criminal charges stacked against him, not about the media circus, not even about the trial. All that mattered now was the insurance payout for the South Sea Spirit — the container ship that had vanished into the cold southern currents with a cargo that, if you believed the rumours, might’ve been worth killing for.
The nurse entered without knocking — standard issue uniform, efficient movements, and a neutral expression that could mean anything. She looked, at a glance, like any young coloured woman from the Cape Flats — but there was something too precise in the way she moved. Something not quite right.
“Meneer Anderson,” she said in flawless Afrikaans, “the doctor would like to run one final test before you’re discharged.”
Anderson didn’t look up. “Oh? And what would that be?”
“We need to take you for an MRI scan,” she said, already moving to disconnect the ALERT monitor and IV drip with the deftness of someone very familiar with hospital routines. “The orderlies are here to take you down.”
Anderson blinked. Orderlies?
Through the open door he saw them: two men in green surgical scrubs, chatting casually with the police officer. They looked ordinary — forgettable. That was the point.
Things moved quickly after that. Before Anderson could even protest, the men were in his room. One released the bed brakes, the other nodded to the nurse. The SAPS officer followed, not entirely relaxed, but not alarmed either. The elevator doors closed on all of them, and they began the descent.
It was smooth, sterile — elevator music playing faintly in the background. Just another day in a hospital where life and death were part of the décor.
But then the doors hissed open.
This wasn’t Radiology.
This was the parking garage.
Dim overhead lights flickered. The air smelled of oil, antiseptic, and something metallic. The SAPS officer turned instinctively, suddenly alert — and that was the last thing he did.
One of the orderlies jabbed a hypodermic into the officer’s neck. He gasped, stumbled forward, and dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.
“Sleep tight, flatfoot,” the orderly said, switching to Arabic as he stepped over the unconscious man.
Anderson’s eyes widened. The sedatives fogged his brain, but not enough to dull the rising panic. He tried to move, but the restraints had been re-secured.
He was wheeled between rows of parked cars, the fluorescent lights above strobing across his face like a scene from a nightmare.
Then — an ambulance. Engine running. Doors open.
They hoisted him up and inside the ambulance.
And that’s when he saw him.
Sitting in the shadows of the ambulance’s rear compartment, legs crossed, watching with a thin smile.
“Hello, Anderson,” the man said, his voice like silk stretched over steel. “Missed me?”
Anderson’s heart punched his ribs.
Khassoun!
Wolvenkopft Manor, Constantia.
With the temporary break in the rain, the clouds finally parted — just a little — to let in the pale, watery light of the mid-winter sun. It wasn’t much, just a soft glow that filtered through the rain-streaked windows of the manor house, giving everything a faint golden wash. Most of the windows were still shuttered, their heavy wooden slats closed up against the rain and cold, but a few had been unlatched and swung open to welcome in the light. The contrast between the gloomy hallways and those small, sunlit patches felt almost theatrical — like someone was slowly turning the lights back on after a long intermission.
Inside, the fireplaces were roaring with warmth, and the scent of burning wood added a comforting, nostalgic layer to the air. It made me wonder, only half-jokingly, if the Windsor clan owned their own private forest just to keep the fires going. With a house this size and winter settling in with its usual stubbornness, you’d need a mountain of logs just to keep the frost off the drapes.
I was, however, soon to discover that only one fireplace — the one in the grand drawing room — actually burned wood. The rest were clever illusions: gas burners with ceramic logs that looked just real enough to fool you if you didn’t look too closely. Trust Ash to find a shortcut that still felt like the real thing. He always did like a bit of illusion in his comforts.
But of course, nothing ever flows smoothly for too long. There’s always a kink in the cable, a speed bump in the road, a knot in the rope. Pick your metaphor. In this case, it was Ash catching me just after lunch and casually inviting me into his study, which is never just a social call.
Ash’s study was what you’d expect: low lighting, a fire crackling in the hearth (real wood, this one), the smell of old books and leather, and chairs deep enough to swallow you whole. We settled in with mugs of strong, black coffee — three sugars, just the way I like it — and I waited for the punchline.
“Roy,” he said, “it looks like Stella will be available to join Fiona and you on the Star Quest mission.”
I nodded slowly, setting my mug down. “You suggested it not so long ago.”
“It makes sense,” he said. “She’s equipped. Reliable. Blends in. And right now, she’s ... underutilised.”
“No argument here,” I replied. “But what’s the snag?”
Ash sipped his coffee, then set it down with deliberate care. “The issue is integration. Not operational capacity. Social capacity.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You’re worried about Stella passing as human? We’ve been through this before.”
“We have,” he agreed. “But this is different. Before, she worked in controlled environments. Labs. Closed systems. This is the field. Public. Students. Civilians. People who aren’t trained to look the other way. People who talk.”
I leaned back in the chair. “She’s already good at blending in. Most wouldn’t even suspect.”
“Yes, but blending in won’t be enough this time. She needs more than just passable behaviour and reactive programming. She needs a full identity. A history. Something that holds up under scrutiny.”
“An identity?” I echoed. “As in, government ID, medical records, a digital trail?”
“Exactly,” Ash said. “She’s going to be ‘Stella Mara’ now. A young tech consultant with a flexible back-story and no ties. To make it work, we need to build that life from scratch — and carefully. Because while she’s good at blending in, she can’t lie.”
I frowned. “Right. The honesty protocol.”
“She can deflect. Be vague. But she can’t actively falsify. Which means we have to feed her truths — ones that are artificial but internally consistent. She needs to believe the role. And remember – she herself can check the facts online. We need to be – creative.”
“And what about the elephant in the room?” I asked.
Ash sighed. “The Elara-ghost.”
The name hung there like smoke.
“Her base model,” I said quietly. “The architecture.”
“She’s more than based on Elara. She is Elara, in so many ways. Facial structure, neural mapping, even speech cadence. Thorne didn’t just build a robot. He rebuilt his daughter.”
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