The Ant Man (2013) - the complete book

Four

Digman bumped the van down the overgrown track until darkness swallowed any sight of the road behind.

"I appreciate you coming with me," said Digman to Eric who sat, vigilant, in his usual seat. "It's me with the suspicious mind and the connection to all this. You could just walk away."

"They took a shot at me," said Eric, a lopsided grin on his face. "That kind of makes it personal."

Digman looked at the younger man for a moment. He suspected Eric was enjoying all this in some strange way. Certainly he'd never seen him smile as often, or heard him say so much.

Eric pushed open the passenger door. "Shall we go?"

They both climbed out onto sun-hardened mud, the only sound the rustling of the bushes around the track, the creaking of tree limbs overhead. Less than five minutes walk back on the main road brought them to the old gates of the Tigges factory, the name in iron letters sculpted in an arch across the top. Digman lifted the heavy padlock and examined it.

"Looks rusty enough on the outside, but the keyhole has been oiled and used recently. No rust there."

"Definitely something going on," said Eric, nodding. "You were right Digman. Now, how do we get in?"

Digman smiled.

"The benefits of working here for so long. If we follow the fence around to the left, there's a bit pulled loose. People used to skive off through it, get a friend to clock out for them."

Eric smiled. "You ever skive Digman? You don't seem the type."

"I wasn't always this old," said Digman, realising that he did actually feel younger than he had for some time. Maybe that was the secret of eternal youth? Find a mystery to solve and have someone try to kill you? He shook his head in bitter amusement. "I feel like I'm in an episode of Scooby Doo."

"You can be Fred," laughed Eric. "I always kind of identified with Shaggy. It's not quite there, but we'll make a movie buff out of you yet."

Feeling strangely excited beneath the fear that kept his heart racing, Digman led the way along the fence, keeping one hand on the wire barrier as the quarter moon slid behind a cloud and the darkness became almost complete. Grass and weeds had begun to reclaim the ground, but thousands of boots trampling it flat still made for easy footing.

The place wasn't hard to find, if you knew what you were looking for. Digman felt the dip in the ground first, where numerous men had, over the years, dug away the earth while slipping under the loose fence. From there it was easy to feel down the fence to the unattached bottom and lift. It was stiff with rust and age but Digman was able to hold it while Eric slipped beneath. Digman's stomach caused him some trouble as Eric did his best to hold the wire high, but, with a few scratches and a torn shirt, he managed to wriggle under and join his younger, skinnier workmate inside the factory grounds.

Ahead of them the darkened factory buildings rose black against the grey sky, edges rimmed with silver as the moon reappeared from the cloud. Silently the two men headed towards them, treading carefully through overgrown, weed-strangled pathways, stepping around or over rusted machinery, dragged from the buildings and discarded as useless in the shutdown.

"042 had its own annex," said Digman, keeping his voice low. "Through the main factory."

He led the way up to the main building, relieved that the doorway lay open, the door itself hanging on one rusty hinge. If it had been padlocked he wasn't sure how easy it would have been to find another way in.