It gives me goosebumps to recall that dark and stormy night. The weather was at its worst. I was on my way to a party in Madison with my best friend. The weather forecasts called it for severe thunderstorms, but we refused to miss our long awaited trip. We all piled in my car for a six hour drive. The first
few hours were fine, just raining and seldom lighting. Then the typical thunderstorm started, the kind where you look down at the lines on the road so you don't end up in a ditch since you can't see anything else. Once when the lightning flashed, my friend Zen swore he saw a tornado in the cornfield in the distance. We finally gave up and pulled under a bridge until the rain led up enough for us to see. We waited to twenty five minutes and then drove a few miles
through the storm. The rest of the trip was drizzle, and that post thunderstorm fog made driving impossible. There were hardly any other cars on the interstate since most people were too smart to be out driving, which added to the creepy feeling. Luckily, we had found a little motel at twenty minute drive away that was dirt cheap. It was three stories tall and with no interior hallways. All
the rooms were accessed from the outside. Unfortunately, the cheapest rooms were on the third floor and the elevator needed to be in order. The owner had put up a signboard right next to it. Checking into the motel in the middle of the night was interesting. It was still foggy and drizzling out, but humid and hot. There were only two to three other cards in the damp parking lot. The only lights were from the lobby and the street lights. We walked inside and no one was at the desk.
After ringing the bell for about fifteen minutes without a response, we called the motel from my friend's cell phone. An older man answered and soon approached the desk from the back room. We tried to negotiate a first floor room since they were not busy. He was a jerk, though, and kept saying they're booked. There were two to three other cars there, indeed, some rooms on the first floor
had to be available. Exhausted, we took our third floor room and prepared to drag our suitcases up three flights of outside stairs and the drizzle and heat. As we left the lobby. The old man called down to us, locked your doors, don't answer them. After dork he went back into the back room and slammed the door. Cat That creepd me out. We unloaded the car in the foggy, dark parking lot and dragged our luggage to the stairs. We all saw the elevator as we came around the
back of the building. The out of order sign was gone and the doors were open. The light in the elevator was the only light source in the entire back of the building. It seemed like something good finally happened to us on the trip. The elevator worked and we didn't have to carry our things up those slippery stairs. I remember thinking it was weird that the doors were open. Didn't elevator doors usually stay closed until you pushed the button. Whatever,
it was better than stairs. We loaded our luggage and got in. I pushed the button for the third floor and the doors started to close. The doors were standard elevator doors, and right before they closed all the way, words appeared written in red paint or marker on the far side of the elevator doors, so that it was only visible when the door closed. It said stay in dude, what the hell, Zen said, looking worried, I assured him it was just red paint and a silly kid prank.
The condition of the motel screamed about sketchy people in danger, but that was our only option, so we made it up to the third floor and checked into our room. It was a big room with three single beds, more than we could have asked for for that night. I went to wash my face, but turned on the tap. Murky, ironclad water came out of it. Ah, yuck, that sticks. Shut up, Zen, be grateful to have a roof over your head. We were all tired, so we immediately threw
ourselves onto the beds. My friends were snoring, yet I struggled to sleep. The riding on the elevator door kept flashing in my mind. After struggling for a few more minutes, I heard the elevator ding. Who's coming up at this hour? I came to the door and placed my ear on it. I heard nothing. I looked at the dim antique brass door handle. I slowly put my right hand on the handle and turned it. The door creaked open, and I quickly peeped out at the slightly open door. I saw
a silhouette. It looked like a person. I couldn't make much out of it. All I saw was a tall, lanky, black silhouette standing beyond my hallway. He was not taking anything or doing anything. He was standing there. It made it so much more creepy. It's standing perfectly still. The elevator's sound again appeared, and the doors started to slide. The elevator's light hit the hallway and I saw the man. He stepped inside the elevator, facing his back to me,
and then he turned to the front. I will never forget the grin on his face, but that wasn't the only disturbing thing about him. He was holding a woman's head by her long black hair. The woman's mouth was half open, with her eyes wide in fear of death. We watched each other silently, and then the elevator doors closed, locking the door. I came back to the bed. I woke up my friends. I don't care if they believed me,
but I forced them to leave the motel. We reported to the cops about the motel and the owner, but never got any follow up. Years later, I learned in the news that a famous serial killer was arrested at that same motel. He cut his victim's head off and then sneaked out the body in plastic wrap to dump in the lake. It's been roughly eighteen hours since the elevator stopped, and I don't know what to do anymore. I was heading to my apartment on the ninth floor
and got trapped in this hell hole. Several times, I've contacted the twenty four to seventh service number printed on the inside of the elevator, but they're no help. Neither are my parents nor the police. I got into the elevator on a Friday night, thinking this weekend will give me some more time to relax. I watched the number plates change. Everything was fine until the sixth floor, but right on the seventh a sudden jerk took place. Ah. I grabbed the corner walls for support, and then the
elevator stopped. It took a minute to realize I was stuck in an elevator, but once I did, I started panicking. I pressed the emergency button, but nothing happened. I checked my phone, which had no network. I looked at the CCTV camera and waved my hand, Hello Hell. The elevator stuck. I sat down on the elevator floor. Worries started to hit me. Tomorrow is a Saturday. The cleaning guy took off for this weekend, which means he will be here on Monday morning. How am I gonna get out of this?
I jumped and started banging my fists on the elevator door. Hello, can anyone hear me? I'm stuck in here? Please help. The doors were so tightly closed that I couldn't hear any sound outside. Slowly, I started sweating. I began biting my nails while thinking of ways to escape this purgatory. The closed environment started to make me claustrophobic. I got rid of my tie and unbuttoned my shirt to breathe Correctly, wiping the sweat off my forehead, I sat down again.
I don't have any food or water, and if no one comes to my rescue tonight, I might have to be here till Monday morning. I looked above and saw the vent. I tried jumping to reach the top of the elevator, but my height wasn't enough. I started sweating even I could hear my lungs rising higher and higher to catch a breath. I I can't waste my energy like this, The feeling of being trapped inside an elevator gradually took over my mind. Am I gonna die in here?
It's possible, right, The scarcity of oxygen and water can kill me, no doubt. It started getting so hot inside the elevator, like someone had set a fire from the outside. I could feel my lips tremble. My feet were numb, and I started to pass out, and I got onto my knees, holding my neck. I could feel someone was choking me. My vision went blurry and I don't remember when I fainted. A high pitched, squeaking sound brought me
back to my senses. I opened my eyes to see a pair of big black eyes staring back at me. My heart stopped as those eyes never blinked. Ah. I jumped in fear, moving straight to the other side of the elevator, and the mouse from my chest, Geez, almost gave me a heart attack. My scream scared the mouse, and it ran to the hole in the left corner and disappeared. But now I noticed the walls of the elevator.
Something bizarre had started to happen to them. There was a big damp like mark on the elevator doors, and a hairy, stringy thing, almost like a twig, was poking out of it. I touched the damp with my fingers and a thick black liquid started dripping. The texture of the damp felt disgustingly squashy. What the hell is all this? And then again I heard the squeaking sound. I thought the mouse was back, so I looked at the hole
in the corner, but I didn't see it. I went close to the hole and tried to see what was on the opposite side. At first, it was only darkness. Suddenly, a tongue sprung out from that hole. It started to move like crazy. Bah, what is this? Please help me give me out of here. Growl could be heard as well. The tongue looked like it belonged to some creature from a terrifying place. Right then, the elevator lights started to flicker. No, no, please, I kept hitting all the buttons like crazy. I just
wanted this nightmare to end. I knew if I didn't get out of there, I would eventually go mad forever her worst, I might end up killing myself, losing my mind. I grabbed the tail like thing poking out of that damp wall and started pulling it. The more I pulled, the squeaking sound grew louder. The tail came from the wall at one point, making me fall on my back, and thousands of mice started crawling into the elevator. Their dirty smell and soggy, hairy bodies made me nauseous. The
site was straight out of a horror movie. Tons of mice jumped out from the damp wall, filling the closed space like water. Mice were everywhere. They were on my shoes and soon rose to my waist. I was drowning in a sea of plagued mice, and my screams were dying down in my throat. Ah slight, I want to diet, heir please. Someone called it cops. When the army of mice reached my neck, I felt their teeth on my skin. They were biting me off like ants finishing a sugar cube.
Ah A stop stop. I began picking each mouse and throwing it away as far as possible, but they didn't stop. I screamed for one last time and fainted. When I woke up, I heard the ambulance. Two men were taking me out on a stretcher. An oxygen mask was covering my face, and I saw the daylight shining on my face. I stayed in the hospital for a week due to severe dehydration and low blood pressure. The cleaning guy found me in the elevator Monday morning. I was trapped inside
the elevator for more than forty hours. Though there were no wounds or bite marks on my body, that invasion of the mice still haunts me to sleep. My doctor said, I suffered major hallucinations and panic attacks due to the claustrophobic environment. I still get goosebumps thinking how real it all was, even if none of it made any sense. I don't think I'll ever feel safe inside an elevator again. The story you just saw is a fictional representation of the trauma lived by a man who spent forty one
hours trapped inside an elevator in nineteen ninety nine. Nick White was thirty four with a home, a beautiful girlfriend, in a great social life, and a good job, but all that was about to change when he got trapped in an elevator without food or water. Working late one Friday evening, Nick left office to smoke a cigarette outside. Once he'd finished it, he walked back into the building. He got into the lift and pushed the button. On the way up to his floor, he felt a jolt
and the lights dimmed for a second. Nick White soon realized that the elevator had stopped. He rang the emergency bell, the first thing anyone would have done. He waited for a while for someone to answer, but no one did. The more time passed, the more the horrifying thought of dying in that closed space rained his mind. Two days in an enclosed space without food or water is an incredibly long time to be imprisoned. The CCTV footage of that night went viral, and Nick eventually filed a lawsuit
against the managing committee. When I returned from work, I saw a cop car parked under my building. I went in and saw two cops talking to the landlord. They looked at me suspiciously and said we'll be back for more. The cops left, and I asked the landlord, is everything all right? He scratched his head in confusion and gave me bizarre news. One of our tenants named Marcus went missing today. He was last seen taking the building elevator from the ground floor. His apartment was on the ninth,
but before he could reach there. He just disappeared from within the elevator. I was so shocked to hear this that I couldn't grasp the landlord's words. For a moment, I was checking the elevator footage from last night. Marcus was inside the elevator till it hit the sixth floor, and then on the seventh it was gone. But how is that possible? It makes no sense. I can show you the footage I have shown the cops. I went to his office and he showed me this clip of
last night. Around twelve thirty, Marcus got into the elevator. The floors went one after the other, and the elevator suddenly stopped. The visual suffered a few glitches, and the screen went dark. After three seconds, the screen turned on, but Marcus wasn't there anymore. My apartment was on the first floor, telling my landlord to keep updating me on this disappearance case of Marcus. I walked up the stairs. I noticed the normal looking old elevator from the corner
of my eye. Felt shivers. How could a person just vanish like that? He was right there on the sixth floor, and after that malfunction, it was just the empty elevator on the seventh. I got inside my apartment, showered and had dinner. Even though I was exhausted, but I still struggled to sleep. That was the moment I realized it's been eleven months I've been living here now. But not Once I availed the elevator, I looked at the clock. It was twelve thirty night yesterday. At this time Marcus
went missing. I never talked to Marcus much, not like he was a talker anyway. We mostly said hello whenever we came across each other in the lobby. He would smile awkwardly and walk away. I don't know what came over me, but I just couldn't stop thinking about this incident. Dragged down by my curiosity, I ended up leaving my apartment. I walked up to the elevator and pressed the seventh floor.
The metal doors closed with a screeching sound, and the number plate began to change, but the elevator functioned correctly this time. I reached the seventh floor without any trouble, which surprised me. Once I stepped into the lobby, I felt cold. I had never come to this floor. The lights on this floor flickered like crazy. Some were even burnt out, making it hard to see. I slowly walked up to Marcus's apartment. We came into this building the
same day. While filling out the forms in the landlord's office, I remember seeing the number of his apartment sixteen. I stopped outside the apartment using my phone's flashlight. I saw the door sealed with yellow tape. The cops must have searched his apartment. Should I go in? My hand trembled, Am I doing the right thing? I switched on the light and saw the room as a mess. The closet was open, with clothes on the floor, bed and linens were turned over to the edge. Geez. Realizing how crazy
I had been, I quickly exited the apartment. I closed the door and rushed into the elevator. I pressed the ground floor and the elevator door closed once again. But wait, why isn't it going down? Oddly, the elevator was just standing on the same floor. What the hell? I pressed the button again, still no movement, and then the elevator
made a sudden jerk and started going down. But before the number could change from seven to six, the lights inside the elevator went off, and it ultimately got dark, Hello, anyone's here? I started having a panic attack. I switched on my phone's flashlight, and just then the elevator light sparked and shattered, splashing droplets of fire above my head. Ah. I covered my face while screaming. I removed my hands,
hearing the sound of the door sliding by. In front of my eyes stood this dark space with a small white spotlight in the distance, and under that light stood a man, yes, a man. He had his back to me. Hello, oh me, Marcus, what are you doing here? Which floor is this? I looked at the number plate and couldn't believe my eyes. It was floor six point five? Me please? Marcus's ominous cry brought my attention back to him. Was shaking footsteps. I stepped out of the elevator. The floor
beneath my bare feet was so cold. Marcus still had his back on me. Marcus, what's going on? He's just carrying me now, Marcus. I took two steps ahead, and so did he. Is this guy crazy? I again took two steps, and Marcus did the same. I looked back at the elevator and felt Marcus's head turning as well. Moment I looked at him again, I saw his back. He was mimicking my every move like a puppet. Stop it, just turn around. What are you trying to You must
turn around. I turned around, and holy smokes, Marcus was now standing right behind me, facing his back at me. I walked towards him, screaming how did you get behind me so fast? And he mimicked my footsteps again, walking straight inside the elevator. I stopped in fear as he turned around and said, I'm sorry. There's no other way, no way