"Leave me breadcrumbs for the ride
To guide me back
Leave me breadcrumbs for the ride
To guide me back
Leave me breadcrumbs for the ride
To guide me back
Leave me breadcrumbs for the ride
To guide me, guide me back…"
Jamila Woods (Feat. Nico Segal) —"Breadcrumbs"
Devika pulled in front of Erik's apartment unit and Maria was already standing by the curb waiting for him.
"Thanks for the ride," Erik said.
Devika nodded and Erik was surprised to see Giselle walk down their apartment steps to meet him too. Her eyes glanced at Devika in the BMW.
"See you tomorrow, Erik," Devika said.
She drove away and Erik faced Maria and Giselle.
"Where have you been?" Maria asked.
"Stark had me at his—"
Maria's arms were thrown around his waist before he could finish speaking.
"I thought you were gone for good until I saw your luggage," she whispered into his chest.
"It's all good. Stark had me work in another lab and then he took me to his house."
"For what?" Giselle asked.
Erik hoped she would hug him too, but she stood next to Maria with concern in her eyes. She was worried about him too.
"He had a party and I followed him around. That's it."
"He doesn't have a house. He has a mansion that is out of this world. I saw pictures of it in Architectural Design," Maria said.
"So you're not leaving the internship?" Giselle asked.
"Nah."
She let out an audible sigh and he followed them both back into the apartment.
"Who brought you home?" Maria said.
"Stark's secretary."
Erik looked at Giselle.
"Why are you over here so late?"
"Maria called me."
Maria showed him her cell.
"I received this email from our Project Manager. It says I have to meet in a different department tomorrow morning—"
Maria's face looked stressed out and beyond worry. Erik removed his bowtie and pulled off his tuxedo jacket. Both women ogled his clothes.
"Don't trip. You and Valentina are moving to a new department with me."
"Why? I thought…I thought they liked my work—"
"They do, but Stark let me move to a place that wanted me and he asked me to name two people from my team to go with me. I chose you. And Valentina."
"You chose me?"
Maria's face lit up and she hugged him again.
"Lemme change real quick," Erik said prying her fingers from around him again.
His luggage was on his bed and he quickly slipped into shorts and a t-shirt.
"I gotta warn you Maria, where you're going is pretty intense. The boss of that lab ain't no joke."
"I can handle it," Maria said.
"I know you can," he said.
"I'm going to bed so I can be ready. I can finally go to sleep. Night Giselle!"
Maria scurried into her room, her spirits lifted, and Erik let his eyes rest on Giselle. She looked shy almost, her eyes breaking away from his stare.
"Guess I'll head home," she said.
"You don't have to leave."
"It's really late. I'm glad things worked out."
"Me too."
He walked over to her, stepped close enough so that his face was near hers. Her energy was pleasant, but she wasn't welcoming in the way he wanted. Professional. Bet.
"Night then," he said heading to the front door and opening it for her.
Giselle patted his shoulder and left.
###
Valentina and Maria brought their A-game.
Erik was in the middle of trying to interface two software programs that had maddening glitches that stumped him all morning when Janine pulled him aside.
"You gave me some sharp picks, Stevens," Janine said munching on baby carrots.
"Yeah?"
"Valentina and Maria fit right in. You have a good eye for talent. Tell me something…what do you want to gain from this internship?"
Erik rolled back his standing chair and faced Janine as she snacked in front of him.
"Practical real-world experience with coding applications—"
"No, your endgame. Don't give me the resume speech. What do you want to be when you grow up?"
Erik smiled.
This always happened.
His work ethic, extreme focus, and interests in multiple fields always brought the curious his way. His being Black never let him blend into the background with white people like the Asian staff. Being the small five percent of Black faces in Stark's offices never allowed anonymity. And when one was as good as Erik, that subconscious threat always reared its ugly head: Who is this uppity negro blowing up the spot? Janine wasn't even aware of how she was sounding to him. They never were. It showed up as curiosity, but the goal was to assess where they stood compared to him. Was he coming for their spot? Janine really had nothing to worry about, but after two weeks of him helping that department make progress in such a short span of time, she needed to know if Erik was aiming to become permanent.
"I'm joining the Navy. I want to be an officer."
Janine bit into a carrot and nodded.
"A Navy career. No interest in working for us at all?"
He shook his head.
"Been wanting to be in the Navy since I was little. It's why I went to the Naval Academy."
"Our loss," she said walking away.
Erik rolled back to the computer viewscreen. Janine was glad he wasn't trying to stay there. And she would use his brain up all she could before he left.
"Erik, can I see you for a minute?"
Valentina's face popped up on the viewscreen in a smaller chat screen. Erik closed down his work station and padded over to another station.
Valentina lounged in a beanie bag with her keyboard on her lap and her floating screen hanging above her.
"'Sup," Erik said.
"Does this look right?"
Erik enlarged the string of code near his face.
"What are you trying to do?" he said.
"Bypass all this junk code. There's got to be a better way to streamline all of this. We're on deadline and Janine wants a working simulation by Friday. This is going to take longer than Friday."
"You tell her that?" Erik asked swiping images, searching for problematic links.
"I'd like to keep my head on my shoulders."
"Want me to talk to her?"
"No. If you do that, then she might question why I'm here. Can you look this over later? Maybe you can catch something I'm missing. I'm getting a migraine over it."
"Let's go to lunch."
"Outside of the cafeteria?"
"Yeah."
Valentina powered down her computer and grabbed her purse. They walked through the hallway and found an express elevator they could crowd on. Once they made it to the lobby, Valentina gave out a loud sigh.
"How can you deal with Janine? She makes me feel like I'm not pulling my weight," she said.
"She giving you grief?"
"She doesn't say anything, just gives you those looks with those creepy eyes of hers. It's like playing poker and she has that neutral poker face, but with shades on. And a ten-gallon cowboy hat. And six-shooters on her hip waiting to take you down."
"She ain't that bad."
"I enjoy the work that I do, so don't think I don't appreciate your name dropping me, but sheesh…every time she comes to my station, I feel like I'm under a guillotine."
A bit of a ruckus stirred up near the entrance as Tony breezed in followed by reporters. Security surrounded the paps as Tony pulled off his shades. His head security officer, a big dude he heard Tony calling Happy, posted up next to him with his hands folded in front of him but his green ear bud glowing as he whispered instructions discreetly to the rest of his staff.
Tony held his hands out to the paps.
"There is no connection between my deal with the Afghan government and the SICA rebels. I am a businessman who works with many countries and I don't deal in politics—"
"But your weapons systems give certain groups advantages that our government has questioned because of anti-democratic behavior and human rights abuses—"
"And our government does business with plenty of countries with anti-democratic behavior and human rights abuses…China anyone?"
"Tony-!"
"Mr. Stark-!"
Tony turned away from the paps and Happy herded them out of the lobby with security in tow.
"Stevens, Berlotti…"
Tony's eyes swept over them.
"We're heading out for lunch," Erik said.
Valentina stood next to Erik a bit starry-eyed.
"Where to?" Tony asked looking at his platinum watch.
"The taco spot—"
"Cool, let's go," Tony said.
They followed Tony to a side exit.
"You not worried about reporters following you out here?"
"Happy has that under control," Tony said.
Alberto's Tacos was a small vendor cart that Erik found to his liking. The carne asada street tacos were flavorful and cheap and washed down with a cold Coke, it was heaven. The three of them sat on a bench not too far from the Stark building. White-collar workers streamed past them and no one took notice of Tony scarfing down greasy meat with his fingers.
"This is really good. Had no idea this stand was here all these years," Tony said licking his fingers.
Erik gulped down his Coke and Valentina kept quiet as she listened to Erik shoot the shit with Tony. He couldn't understand why she didn't ask the questions she was burning to ask him that she was always pestering Erik about during their lunch breaks. Tony took notice.
"You're really quiet Valentina," Tony said, his eyes taking her in.
"I'm just soaking it all in, Mr. Stark," she said, her eyes darting over to Erik.
"Things working well for you in your new set-up?"
"Yes—"
"Janine makes her nervous," Erik said.
Valentina nearly choked on her Sprite as she pulled the can from her lips.
Tony chuckled.
"You alright there, Berlotti?"
"Yes…yes, Sir. Went down the wrong pipe," she said wiping her lips.
"Janine is a tight ass, but don't let her chilly façade scare you. Are you worried about something?"
Erik gave Valentina a look for her to open her mouth and speak on her concerns openly. Her perfect bow lips quirked and then she put her soda can down. Erik nodded his head slightly at her.
"I'm worried about an assignment I have due on Friday. I won't be able to finish it because I need more time to work out the kinks because there are so many of them. There is no feasible way to have a working simulation up and running by then. There are four of us working on it and I'm the lead, but I can't…I can't fix it under this rigid time limit."
She pushed her hair back behind her ears. Her face looked ashamed. She sipped her soda again and Erik felt all of her confidence drain out into the ether.
"What do expect to happen on Friday?" Tony asked.
"Failure. I asked Erik to take a look at the work—"
"What about your immediate team?
"They are working on it—"
"Why aren't you with them now?"
Tony's eyes were bright and firm looking. He wasn't here for excuses.
"I have to eat."
"Working lunches are a thing Berlotti. You are the team leader. You wrangle your people and you figure the problem out. Why are you asking Stevens to look at your work? He has his own deadlines and team to worry about. You want him to take on your workload too? Alvarez has the same deadline and you know where she is right now? At her desk grinding. Janine said jump, Alvarez asked how high."
Valentina crushed her soda can and tossed it in a trash receptacle. She stood up and stared at Tony.
"I better get back to work," she said. The click-clack of her heels echoed as she left them.
"That was cold," Erik said.
"Cold? How?"
"She was confiding in you."
"That's what you're for. Not me. I expect results. Janine answers to me. So who do you think needs those codes running on Friday? Me."
"Did you have to throw Maria in her face like that though?"
"Maria works her ass off—"
"Valentina does too. She just hit a snag."
"And she will unravel the snag."
Erik finished his taco and Tony made a quick call.
"Let's get back to work," Tony said.
Erik followed him back to the offices and when they separated, he texted Valentina.
You okay?
He thinks I'm shit.
No he doesn't. Just high expectations.
Did he talk bad about me when I left?
Said you'd figure out the problem. Want me to look at the codes tonight?
No. I'll figure it out.
I know you will. Badass.
She sent him a happy face emoji.
"Erik Stevens?"
A guard at the information desk stopped him from going to the elevators.
"Yeah."
The guard reached down behind the desk and handed Erik a FedEx package.
"This came for you twenty minutes ago."
"Thanks," Erik said.
He walked over to a lobby couch and sat down. The return address was from his Uncle Bakari in D.C. Erik quickly opened the package. A folded note was taped to a small black notepad.
"JaJa,
Hope this finds you well. We found this in some of your mother's belongings when we cleaned out our attic for some installation issues we were having. Don't know how we missed it. Looks like it belonged to your father. We didn't want to throw it out. Not much written in it, but we wanted you to have it.
We are proud of you and look forward to seeing you at the end of August.
Love and Hugs,
Uncle Bakari & Aunt Shavonne"
Erik quickly pulled out the small black notepad. He flipped through the pages that had his father's distinct script written in it. All in Wakandan.
His eyes darted around where he sat. No one was paying attention to him. He jumped up and walked briskly to the nearest restroom.
Locking himself in a stall, Erik pulled down the toilet seat cover and sat down. He opened the notepad again and flipped to the first page. His fingers touched the paper gingerly, and he saw his fingers shake. His tongue touched his top lip and he felt the sting of tears prick the corners of his eyes.
"Baba," he whispered.
Wiping his eyes, he tried to gather himself together. The writing was neat, legible, and concise. Erik's brain shifted its language mode. Memories flooded his mind.
Sitting in his room back in Oakland tracing letters.
Wakandan letters.
Baba singing to him in his language, telling him stories about his homeland. Copying Baba's habit of writing in journals.
Stringing symbols to make sentences that looked otherworldly.
Think.
Remember.
Translate.
These were numbers. Cardinal directions.
Coordinates. GPS coordinates.
His father had made a handwritten map. For himself or someone else?
The numbers came to him quickly, but it took several minutes to accurately make out the rest.
Three places.
There was something buried in three different locations.
One of the places wasn't that far away. Joshua Tree. A little over three hours away.
Erik stepped out of the restroom stall and washed his hands. He stuffed the notepad in his shirt pocket right over his heart.
He wiped his face with a paper towel, and when two interns walked in chattering away, Erik slipped out and onto an elevator.
Baba left him a treasure map.
He just needed to figure out a way to go find what was buried in all three places.