The night shift is the right shift...to have the living daylights scared out of you. While most graveyard shifts are marked by excessive coffee abuse and boredom, the stories that do go down hold a much higher terror level due to the lack of witnesses out and about.
If you're the only person on shift when a crazed customer rolls through or a mysterious event goes down, who do you share the terror with? Calling the cops over a gut feeling is irresponsible without an obvious danger, so sometimes all you can do is steel yourself for a story.
In a recent Reddit thread, graveyard employees shared their scariest stories from the job, and more than a few of them quit soon after.
I worked night shift at a gas station, so I saw a lot of weird shit, but I think the worst was a guy who stalked me. I went out to smoke during a calm period, he came up seemingly out of nowhere with a bag of trash and a knife, and started to explain how he was "making flash bangs" with a broken swifter handle and sparklers he had.
According to him, he was working with the CIA and the local PD to catch...someone? I'm not entirely sure, he was rambling and pulled out a knife, so I didn't listen incredibly well for focusing on what he was doing with the knife. He followed me into the store, cut himself with the knife and bled on everything and followed me around until he have me a glass globe from his trash bag and left. He came back randomly during my shifts for a few months bringing me stuff, and eventually tried to get in my car with me.
2. thats_specific almost got lured by a recording of a baby.
So, for a while I pulled the late shift at an Italian restaurant when I lived in Canberra. The park across the road was notorious for stabbings and violent robberies. I had to walk through it to get back to my college. For a little while there was this guy that would play the sounds of crying babies or wimpering dogs to lure people deeper into the park where he would attack and rob them - one time walking along the road that ran through the park at about 1am I heard a baby crying in the park. I noped out of there and booked it back to my college. Two weeks later the dude was caught - his phone allegedly had dozens of different tracks of babies and dogs crying.
3. rainycity111's brother watched a man eat a seagull by the spoonful.
Not me but my brother use to work at 7/11. He once saw a homeless man eating a seagull with a spoon.
4. Mashugana514 had to store a gun for a weird man at work.
Used to work at a late night arcade, and one night around 9:30 p.m. someone came in wearing a trench coat, which was creepy enough since it was middle of summer in Florida so it was very hot and humid, they came up to the counter and pull a rifle out from under the coat and set it on the counter. Of course instantly everyone starts freaking out, and me being the shift lead and highest ranking staff member had to deal with it. We had absolutely no policy for if someone needed wanted a gun stored while they’re on the property, so I just took the rifle and put it in the back room where we kept the money and such (heavy locked door, only I had the key). I texted all the managers and supervisors to tell them what was up.
The dude never came back for it. When I went in the next morning it was still back there, so he never asked the next manager for it back. We kept it there for the next day and then called to police to come in and get it. Never heard anything back about it. But why would the person bring it to an arcade, leave it, and never come back for it? It was fully loaded too. Had the safety on and I believe there was a trigger lock on it. Definitely one of the creepier things that’s happened to me at work
5. toucss still doesn't know what went down.
Was locked in the shop for my first ever single manned shift at a petrol station. I was on the floor stocking some stuff, I had the music off, because I wanted to be able to hear everything and not imagine things over the radio. All of a sudden I heard a massive loud bang and my heart stopped. I couldn't work out what it could have been.
It sounded vaguely like the newspaper stand door slamming but there was no wind for it to be that. I looked up onto the forecourt and saw a car not parked on a pump or in a space, just waiting there. I ran out into the office to check all the CCTV cameras. I waited till the car finally left 5 minutes later but it felt like a lot longer. Finally worked up the courage to go back to what I was doing.. a bag of wine gums had fallen off the shelf where I had overstocked.
6. Nihaodee doesn't miss the night shift.
I worked night shift at a medical company. Being that we were slow with work often, my coworker & I asked to be cross-trained in the warehouse to count inventory. We were the only workers in this giant warehouse after 4pm and no one else had access to it (other than security and custodians). One night we were closing up the warehouse around 1am and turned all the lights off (the switch was on the opposite end of the building from the main exit door).
We were walking down the dark aisle to exit into some offices and once we got to the door, the door did not open. It’s a sensor door, so it should have opened as soon as we touched it, but it didn’t. We figured, maybe security had overridden the lock and locked us in. At that moment we heard footsteps coming behind us and what sounded like something metal scrapping on the floor and hitting the racks (like a metal pole being dragged). We panicked and the footsteps got louder and closer and we frantically were pushing the door to get out but it wouldn’t open.
In the reflection of the window, we saw a dark figure standing right behind us and just then, the doors flew open on their own and we ran out of there so fast!! Turns out, security & custodial teams have all experienced creepy stuff at one time or another in the warehouse at night. So no one batted an eye when they told us that was normal. After that experience we just left the lights on and let security turn them off for us! Lots of creepy stuff happened in our 6 months of working there!
7. BadWolf1973 got freaked out by a teen.
I worked 3rd shift at hotels for awhile. One night I'm making the rounds and see something sticking out of the flatbed of a truck. I walk up to see a foot hanging out from under a blanket that very obviously has someone under it. The foot is blue. It's like 40 degrees. I'll never forget how scared I was as I reached out to touch the foot to check it out.
As soon as I touched the ankle, a teenage kid sits straight up from under the blanket. Scared the shit out of me. I'm like, kid...what the hell are you doing? He just groggily says, "Dad is snoring too loud". And then he went back sleep. I'd have put him in a room, but we were full. But, yeah... I thought I was going to find a body there for sure.
8. NeedsMoreTuba thought there was a vampire in Burger King.
I worked the first shift at a Burger King when I was in college, and was the first person to arrive every morning before the sun came up. The night crew always left a few hours before I got there, so the restaurant was supposed to be empty.
I walked up to the front door, key in hand, like I did every morning. But this morning there was a tall, dark figure standing right beside the doorway. I didn't recognize them as a coworker, and they just stood there in the dark, not moving. Since I was a tiny 95-pound lady I decided the best course of action would be to wait in my car until another person arrived, and then we could go check it out together.
Ten minutes later, the first crew member pulls up and I explain the situation. We cautiously approached the front door together. "Why is he still there?" I whispered as we slowly approached the front of the building, "Is he waiting for us?"
And then we got close enough to realize our embarrassing mistake: We were both students who worked mostly weekends, and during the week one of the managers had received a promotional display for the movie Twilight which was a life-sized figure of the vampire guy that was supposed to be placed on the front door. Here's an example I found online, mostly to explain why it was so scary to see in the dark. https://www.tmz.com/2009/12/05/twilight-posters-burger-king-stolen-taylor-lautner-robert-pattinson/
Turned out that it spooked a lot of customers as well, so I didn't feel quite as badly, but I'm so glad my first thought wasn't to call the police.
TLDR; There was a vampire inside an empty Burger King. No, really.
9. Sbadoosh found a dead man on the toilet.
I was an intern at an hospital after dropping out of school. Basically as a cheap worker but the staff were very aware of this and treated us well.
So in nightshift we were two nurses and an intern for two stations. At like 4 o'clock i brought some middle-aged men i didn't know to his toilet. He wasn't marked as immobile and unstable. I haven't heard of him in like fifteen minutes so i checked for him. First i thought he fell asleep and tried to wake him up. He was still sitting on the toilet. He didn't respond so i got help and only after a nurse told me i realized he was dead.
It was my first dead person after working there for like four months. A colleague had three in his first week.
Call me dead inside but now i think it's quite funny.
10. chirpiederp found a man and his machete near the AC.
I've worked night shifts alone at hotels for years and I've encountered quite a few crazies. One night I walked out back and a guy popped up from behind a large AC unit a ways down the building, and took off walking in the opposite direction. I followed him, telling him that he needed to leave the property. He cussed me out as he went, and I told him I would call the cops if he didn't leave. He left, but kept coming back on a bicycle.
I warned him a few more times, and he kept telling me to get screwed. I called the police. They tracked him down, and then, a little later, escorted him back onto the property. Turns out he'd left some stuff back by that AC unit, including his machete. He'd just gotten out of jail that day.
To be honest though, the times I've been most nearly piss myself scared is when I come around a building and run into a deer. They freak out, I freak out.
Worked as night audit at a small hotel that all the Mexican housekeepers believed was haunted because of the multiple suicides on property, things they felt or saw in rooms. One night around 2 in am, while working on a back office computer my desktop turned a full 45 degrees to the left. AC wasn’t on too high, desktop wasn’t loose on the base. There was no reason for it to happen. Freaked me the hell out. Got up and spent rest of the shift in the lobby.
12. Kramer512 got a healthy revenge.
Working a pretty rare Sunday evening shift for a tech company in an office park. Being the weekend and after hours the whole place is deserted. I'm babysitting a server move at another location. I've got nothing to do unless the move goes terribly wrong. Then someone knocks on the door.
I check the cctv, nobody anywhere. I convince myself I imagined it. It happens again - - again nobody. I take a quick look around the parking lot for anything making that noise. The lot is empty except for my car. A third set of knocking, and I finally manage to get a bearing on where it is coming from.
Not the door, but a co-worker's cubicle. The dipshit had set his IM "buddy coming online" sound to knocking and run it through his speakers presumably to mess with me. On Monday, when he asked about "strange noises" I pretended to have no idea what he was talking about.
A week or so later, I moved his office chair to the basement and set his keyboard to Dvorak mode.
13. Bradrb66 got attacked by a man high on meth and quit soon after.
Sit down and grab a drink this is gonna be a longer comment.
I'll set the stage. I used to work for a security company based in southern California. I was posted at an aerospace plant on the 3rd shift. And when this happened the county decided to clean up the Santa Ana river bed of all the homeless and move them out of the area, so you can imagine that there was a moment of several hundred people roaming the streets finding a new place, but this is less important as this happened just after everything calmed down. Anyway, this plant has two buildings just off the 55 freeway and they are situated next to a railroad track. Surrounding the building is a chain link fence with the plastic privacy shades and its lined with razor wire. The guard shack sits in between the two buildings and next to a rolling gate that operated by a three button controller. The building is basically a shed with 4 windows an ac unit a PC for the monitors and a chair to sit in. I should also mention that I am the sole guard on duty (because their logic made zero sense).
Anyway here's the story.
I was out making my round scanning my points, (so that the company can keep tabs on us to make sure were doing our jobs) and to note to get around this large compound we had a golf cart to use. I come back from my rounds. park the gold cart next to the guard shack, and I hear someone yell "GO FUCK YOURSELF YOU PIECE OF SHIT!" curious, I look through one of the panels to see if it's just another homeless man with a mental illness or if there is an actual issue.
I see a short stocky dude beeline for the gate. This guy is your stereotypical meth head. wife beater, sweats, and slip on saddles with socks. This guy comes right up to the gate and starts pounding on it. I sort of froze for a second and then pulled our site phone out, and called 911, and explain the situation to the operator.
This dude jumps up, and grabs the poll just under the razor wire and pulls himself up and over, shredding his whole chest, stomach, and legs in the process. flips himself over the fence. I'm yelling at the operator at this point to get someone there as fast as possible while running to get inside the shack. I slam the door shut and lock it, and slam the 'open' button on the gate.
This guy is so pissed off he yells "I KNOW YOU CALLED THE COPS ON ME FOR..." (I didn't hear the rest of what he said) and he proceeds to throws his fist through the main window. I'm absolutely shitting bricks at this point, and I bolt out the door, running in a direction I think makes sense in my adrenaline filled head. He apparently recovered faster than I thought, and grabs my arm and flips me over his back slamming me down to the floor. Not even 3 seconds later the cops speed in get him off me and get him in cuffs to take him away.
I made my statement and they left. As for company protocol I have to notify my shift lead and let them know what happened. I didn't know, and was never properly informed as to who that was, so I called the field operations manager (FOM) and I inform them of what happened and that I'd like to go get checked out for any injuries I may have received in the incident. Well, in was informed that since they are so short staffed I'd have to wait until after my shift to be looked at (illegal I'm pretty sure). I left not even a month later after discovering that basically the company doesn't care about its employees and only really care if something serious like a stabbing or death ect. occurs.
I could have taken them to court most likely, but seeing as I wasn't injured and I found a higher paying job it didn't matter to me.
Hope you enjoyed this story!
14. winterstargamer encountered the worst kinds of bros.
Not exactly night shift but at the old grocery store I worked at there was always one cashier at a register from 8:30pm-8:30am. The shift I most commonly worked until I transferred to customer service and accounting was 3pm-10:30pm. At 10:30pm is when night crew came into the store and I would leave but for a solid two hours it was only me and the assistant manager in the store (This was a very small store). Also should note that I was 19 at the time.
One night this group of guys (in their mid to upper 20's; i had to card them) came in with a pretty large order of alcohol and chips. After I rang them up, one guy asked if they could also get three boxes of condoms from the customer service desk. It was about 9:30pm and customer service was closed so I grabbed the key to open up the service desk and the same guy followed be to pick out which ones he wanted.
During this time he would make remarks about how "quickly he goes through them" and how he "needs the BIGGEST size there" like okay dude whatever. I grab the condoms he wanted, went back to my register and finished the transaction so these guys could get the fuck out of my store. After they paid and I heard one of the guys the receipt I hear a different guy from the group say "maybe we should use these on her" while holding the bag that had the condoms in it. I felt my face go white and they left to go sit down in the deli/restaurant area after laughing at the guy who made the com.
15. onlysister4 still laughs about the baby mouse.
At a Hotel. Watching the camera I saw this thing hop/run across the screen. Went out to check and nothing was there. watched the screen and saw the same thing go across a different one. This happened for a week, talked with the other auditor and he saw the same thing just not as often. It got so that I would watch and the moment I saw something I ran out of the office to chase it down. I thought it was a frog that got in. Nope I chased it down to the elevator doors, it was a baby mouse. I had to get a new plan because I had a cup to catch the frog... ended up sweeping it outside with a broom.
I still watch the cameras for little mice running across the screen. It scared the shit out of me, yet we all laugh about it to this day.
16. CrazyCatLadyBoy was not going down there without a raise.
I worked night shift for an alarm company. 7pm to 7am, just me, in a room alone responding to alarms going off. Terrible job really.
The alarm center office was above the garage and warehouse of the company.
One night there was a huge wind storm on the power went out. The backup generator kicked on. That was the day I learned the backup generator was in the garage below me and exhaust venting apparently wasn't proper. The alarm center started to fill with diesel exhaust.
There are no windows that open. The only door is the stairwell with a door at the top and bottom of the stairs (fire hazard much?) and opening these did nothing.
I'm starting to get a headache from the exhaust.
I tried to call the owner - no answer. I tried to call the manager - no answer. I managed to reach the person coming on shift after me and told him what was up. I said I'm leaving in a few minutes because they don't pay me enough to die up here. If you want to risk it and want to pick up hours, you're welcome to it.
He asked me to wait until he got there. I did. I just stood outside.
17. yanakam noped out of there.
I was working night shifts in a convenience store for a little less than two months, in a pretty rough neighborhood in Montreal (lots of violence, robberies, gangs and shit). One January night, I'm moping the floors when I hear a loud bang on the door. I turn around and see a dude (?) with a ski mask, leather gloves, huge winter coat and duffle bag trying to open the door repeatedly (it's locked from the inside from 11pm to 6am and I have to run back to the counter to press the button to open it).
I didn't question the ski mask since it was freezing outside so I signed him to calm down and I went behind the counter to open the door. I froze in my tracks when I saw him reaching for something in his coat and staring at me. I stood there looking at him and just shook my head no. He started banging on the door again so I held up my phone with 911 already dialed up and showed it to him. Gave me the finger and left running in the snow. That was the night when I decided to quit.
18. TheBoneyeard almost scared themselves to death.
I work/live in southern California and had a telephone conference with some people on the east coast at 7:30 am their time. Though I typically don’t even get out of bed until about 7:00 west coast time I rolled into my 10 story office building at 3:30, bleary-eyed and ass dragging. I meant to hit the 9 but instead hit the 7 button on the elevator, I walked off the elevator and unlocked the door of an office that was under construction. To this day I don’t know why my key worked.
I walked through the door into a pitch dark office. A door-closer had been installed but a doorknob on the inside had not and the door closed behind. I fumbled for a light switch but there wasn’t one and I didn’t really panic, I just waited for my eyes to adjust for the small amount of light coming through the windows. Eventually my eyes did adjust and I noticed a guy standing across from me just staring at me. It scared the ever-loving shit out of me, there were a lot of homeless in the area and I thought one had gained entry, and I was about to get rolled. I asked him what he was doing in there, he just stood there and I could feel my blood pressure rising.
I took a single step toward him and he took a step toward me and then I lost it. I went into a full panic, was going to rip the door off the hinges if I had to. But I fell over some construction materials, hit my head on the concrete floor and was knocked unconscious. I’m not sure how long I was out but I came to in a pool of my own blood when some construction workers showed up to work. And it turned out after all that, the homeless guy was actually a large mirror and I quite literally nearly scared myself to death. I had a pretty bad concussion and got 6 stitches in my head.
19. tdasnowman went to The Quiet Place.
I was working security, this was early 2000's. That becomes important later. Normally my company did events but they would branch out a bit here or there if you just needed a warm body to stand around looking imposing. I got a graveyard shift watching a gate, some road construction in my town they were supposed to stop running truck in the area at a certain time of night because it butted up against residential but the city was getting complaints of large trucks. My job was to watch that gate and take license plates, wasn't even supposed to stop them. Just report plate numbers in the am.
First night one truck, I was working triple shifts boss even told me I could sleep as long as I woke up when a truck passed. Second night no trucks. Third night, third night is where shit got weird.
So I'm sitting in my car bit in the shadows. I hear this buzzing. High High pitched from a distance but it's getting closer. I thought maybe it was just a really loud version of that sound power lines make but then it was right above my car. Dips low. This shit is loud. Then just gone. They were building a new road to connect two major existing roads through a canyon. I was sitting in a more commercial section.
Around me parking lot lights started going out. That sound would come back near the light, they would go off, then the sound would disappear and lights would come back on. Varying businesses. This wasn't some timer Or per outage. Then lights started going out in a straight line down through the canyon. At this point I'm out the car with my super bright flashlight trying to see anything around me find out whats making that sound.
The all lights on my side go off, and the sound is coming closer again. I'm back in the car locked doors and the buzzing is getting closer and closer louder then before. It's above me again I'm making myself as small as possible and it sounds like something is banging on the car, it's not shaking but it sounds like a dozen people where hitting it. Then gone. All sound stop, lights come back on. Told my boss I was done with triples that week.
Now if you asked me to describe the sound today I would say drone. It sounded just like a very high performance drone does. But we didn't have those in like 2001, and this sound so much larger. But that same super high pitch.
20. ArgotheRattus doesn't wanna know who played that folk music.
Back when I was a bar manager, I had to stay in a dark bar alone for a bit after everyone else goes home to file nightly reports. Before I took the job i had heard that some weird things happened there after close like the sounds of chairs moving and receipt paper printing. But I'm a non-believer and thought "that's just people's minds getting the better of em!" Well, my first night of staying late rolls around and everything is going fine, when suddenly the music turns on.
The music which I controlled from about 5 feet away from where I'm sitting and I can clearly see that no one has turned on. And it's playing some weird folk music that definitely isn't on the "Top Hits" playlist that was playing when we closed. I ran out of the office to see if anyone was there and of course saw nothing. I wound up staying later than I should have because i was constantly looking over my shoulder.
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