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I was the last in the office around Halloween a few years ago. The building was rumored to be haunted as strange noises were heard at night and unexplained experiences with machines coming on or off on their own.
There were only two entry/exit points in the office. As I was ready to leave, I verified the back was locked and the alarm for it on. Then worked my way to the front, turning lights off as I made my way through. Mid way, you turn a corner where there is corridor to the front entrance/exit. On that corridor there is a door to go to the bathroom. When you open that door, there's a second door to get to the toilets. That second door is basically isolated, and has a piston that resists it being closed fast.
As I turned the corner, I heard the second bathroom door slam shut really hard. I just assumed there was someone else in the building that I had missed. I didn't see the first bathroom door open and I could see clear to the front of the building from there so whoever it was, must've still been in the bathroom. Furthermore, that second door was slammed shut *hard*. That doesn't happen by letting it close on it's own - even if fully open. You have to fight the strong piston on the door to get it to go fast.
I didn't see anyone in the office in both directions (front and rear, which I could see from the corner), so I went into the bathroom area. There was no one there. Now I became spooked. I ran out of the bathrooms and looked around again. Nothing. I turned off more lights all the way to the front. The front light just lights the entry/exit door. The rest of the office was completely dark, which added to the spooky mood. The way that front exit works, I have to turn off the lights (making it pitch black), turn on the alarm, then open the door and shut it behind me *fast*. At this point, if there was anyone hiding in the office, they would trigger the alarm (motion sensors), cops would show up, and he/she would get in trouble so I was confident I was alone.
By this point my heart was pounding a bit fast and I had become more paranoid and scared. When I turned off that last light, with my back to the office I got the scare of my life. When turned off the last light and became engulfed by complete darkness, a female scream, the loudest scream I've heard in my life, came from 4 feet behind me. In the darkness I almost jumped off my skin. If I had a weak heart, that would've killed me. My whole body discombobulated uncontrollably. I desperately flailed around completely uncoordinated to turn the light back on. In my panic finding that light switch seemed to take forever. When I regained some composure, I finally reached the light. I was shaking like I was freezing to death. I turned around extremely slowly - like a slomo movie turn around (which when you see in a movie makes no sense, but in real life it happens because you're so afraid of what you're going to see). When I finished turning, there was nothing there. Scared to inches of my life, I still made myself investigate where the scream came from. My scientific nature, i guess. I found a bowl of Halloween candy rigged to play the scream when people reach to grab candy. The mechanism that detects a human hand trying to grab candy, also triggers if the lights go off suddenly. I swear the scream I heard was 10x louder and more real than the plastic toy sounded like, but I accept that that could have been psychologically amplified.
As you leave the office area and close the door behind you, you end up in a windowless room with an elevator, an emergency exit, and an overhead fluorescent light. As the office door closed behind me, the fluorescent light went off, making it pitch black again. More panic ensued. Couldn't see anything. Tried walking with my arms extended out desperately trying to find the emergency exit while barely keeping it together. After a few moments the lights came back on flickering - like in a bad horror movie. There is no switch for that light, it's supposed to be permanently on, guiding people to the emergency exit. Already freaked out beyond belief, I ran out the emergency exit as fast as I could.
I never solved what made that second bathroom door slam, which set the mood for the events that followed. Talking to everyone else the next day, there hadn't been anyone else in the office for hours.
I don't think I was the last one to leave the office ever again.
Edited by ranrod, 13 October 2012 - 04:49 AM.
I could feel how you must have felt, though not totally I'm sure.
