I work as a security guard for a company that takes jobs no one else will [Part 12]

Originally Posted by: rikndikndakn123

Originally Posted on: https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/eg0tm7/i_work_as_a_security_guard_for_a_company_that/

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There was a place where I was stationed for two months, which served as a warehouse of some sort. The warehouse itself was made for mannequins and simply consisted of one big room, filled with hundreds of mannequins, which were no longer in use. I was to work alone there in the shifts, so the senior guard who was about to retire took me for a tour around the place.

He gave me a flashlight and told me to follow him. Now, going through a room full of mannequins at night is creepy enough as it is, but with the quirks that come with our company, it's even worse. The warehouse itself was so crammed with mannequins, that there were makeshift aisles between them, specifically made so that guards could take them as patrolling routes.

"Get your gun ready and keep the safety off." – the senior guard told me.

It immediately put me on edge, but he seemed pretty calm and he had been working there for the past six years, so I figured he knew what he was doing.

"This can be a nasty place, if you're not careful." – he said – "One slip-up and you're done for. Tell me, what do you see with your flashlight?"

I scanned the row of mannequins, checking each one of them out carefully. Some were missing heads, others were missing arms or hands, or were just dirty and overused. Other than that, they seemed like normal mannequins.

"Nothing."- I said.

"Yep. Press the button on the back of your flashlight." – the senior guard said.

I did as he ordered and instead of the regular light, my flashlight started emitting a blacklight. He told me to scan the area again. I slowly moved my flashlight from left to right, illuminating the mannequins with purple light. Everything seemed normal at first. And then my heart jumped into my throat when I stopped the light on one female mannequin which was different. It was in a regular standing position, with one hand up, as if explaining something, but that wasn't the odd thing. The mannequin wasn't really a mannequin. The crude body shape and the separations between joints which make a mannequin distinct were gone and I was instead looking at a realistic, human woman in old, tattered clothes.

As soon as the blacklight reached her face, she shielded her eyes and then started screaming like a banshee, showing off rows of sharp teeth. I pointed my gun at the thing, but before I could fire, the senior guard already put a bullet between the woman's eyes. Instantly, her head fell off and I was once again looking at a motionless mannequin. She was still in her screaming position, with arms and legs spread, but her head was gone, as it rolled somewhere in the background.

"Like I said. Nasty place." – he said – "Always use your blacklight and check every one of them. They are really sneaky. See that one there?"

He pointed his flashlight towards one male mannequin among the crowd, which was in the company's security uniform and missing an arm.

"That was George, the guy who worked here before me." – he said.

"What?" – I asked.

"Apparently he got a little drunk before the shift and when I arrived, he was like this. On the floor, all… mannequinized… missing an arm. There were a few other mannequins around him, in positions that suggested he was ambushed and killed by them. We're strictly forbidden from touching or moving any of them, so there's no way he managed to put them there in such an elaborate position, especially given the fact that he was so wasted."

"Anything else I should know?" – I asked.

"Yeah. If you hear footsteps somewhere, it means you may have missed one of them and now it's trying to ambush you. It's really important that you retrace your steps if that happens and find where it's hiding. It's never going to move in plain sight, unless you point the blacklight at it. You may hear footsteps and as soon as you turn around, everything will be still and quiet. You'll look at the mannequins, sure that you saw them in different positions and postures a minute ago, or they will seem closer to you, but you won't be able to put your finger on it. In that case it's better to be safe than sorry. Go back, check them all out once more and shoot the one that looks human. Just one bullet in the torso or head, your choice. They're pretty fragile."

We had to shoot three more mannequins by the end of the sweep and once we were done, he said:

"Oh, they may sometimes beg you to spare them, pretend they don't know how they got there and so on. If they do that, it means they are trying to distract you and another one may be sneaking up on you. In that case it's best to shoot the pleading fucker and run to the nearest corner. From there, slowly scan the area once more. Again, one slip-up and you're done for. But luckily, you only need to do one sweep per night."

"Are there always mannequins to shoot?"

He nodded:

"The best I got so far was two in a night. The worst… can't count."

*

One guy from the company works in a zoo of some sorts, but as far as I'm aware, it isn't a zoo which is open to the public. His primary job is to feed the animals once a night and make sure all cages and enclosures were secure along the way. Here's the thing – he never saw the animals there, because the cages were covered on all sides, making it impossible to peer inside. The guard would carry a bucket full of meat (some of it rotten) and he carried around a piece of paper which said which meat goes into which cage.

For one cage however, he had to take a live, sedated pig and lead it to a slide, which dropped directly into the cage. He described that just seconds after the pig was delivered, he'd hear a deep growl and the pig screaming in agony. Loud sounds of crunching bones and rabid flesh-chewing came from inside the cage for a few minutes after that. The pig would stop screaming within the first minute.

The second strict rule he has to follow is to patrol the area three times during the night and make sure all locks are secure tightly, calling the repairman for replacement if they so much as had their paint scratched. If he was to see any external damage on the cages, like broken bars, busted walls, etc., he was to remain as still as possible and just move his hand enough to radio HQ by uttering the code 10-98. He was to remain as still as possible until the intervention unit arrived and escorted him out of there.

He never got into that situation though, but he did feel on edge the first few shifts, because he'd often hear growling, thrashing, banging on the bars, etc. Despite not being able to see him, he was sure the animals knew exactly where he was at all times, because he could hear them following him alongside the cage when he patrolled.

He also said he'd often have armored units arrive in APCs, armed to the teeth, escorting something out in a cage so secure, that C4 couldn't get through it. They'd place the animal in its enclosure and leave the place without a word. I asked him what exactly was being guarded there and he shrugged, saying:

"Well I can tell you one thing for sure. Whatever it is, it's no fucking cougar."

*

A guard by the name of Michael used to work in an abandoned hotel. There were three other guards on the shift with him, each guard covering one floor. They had radios to keep each other company and generally nothing ever happened in the hotel. Michael told me about the night when he decided to quit the job in the middle of his shift.

It was around 2 am in the morning and he was patrolling around the second floor, checking each room. The rule was that if they found anyone or anything in any of the rooms, or even heard any noise, they were to go back to the reception and call the intervention unit. So anyway, Michael went about his patrol normally, when he suddenly heard a noise coming from the bathroom in room 204. He radioed it in to his coworkers, but no one responded. He tried multiple times, but it was as if the line was dead.

Not wanting to go all the way back to the reception and being curious about the noise, he slowly approached and opened the bathroom. He saw one of the guards there, standing in front of the mirror – guard Sean from floor 3, to be precise. Michael asked him if he's okay, but Sean just stood there, staring at the mirror and what Michael described as twitching his shoulder and head from time to time. When Michael grabbed him by the shoulder, Sean turned around and made his coworker scream in horror.

Apparently, Sean's face was completely distorted, as if his skin was stretched to the side of his face. Michael said that it looked like Sean was wearing a leather mask which he failed to put on his face properly and it was just sitting there sideways. Sean staggered towards Michael with an outreached arm, muttering something incoherent in a muffled tone, since his mouth was practically where his cheek was, revealing the sides of his teeth.

Michael ran out of there, slamming the door to 204 shut and tumbling down the stairs to the reception. When he got there, he tried radioing his coworkers again, but got only a muffled groan as a response over the radio. He panicked and picked up the phone to call intervention, when the door suddenly burst open. Two of his coworkers were there, laughing their asses off. Michael asked them what was so funny and they said it was all just a prank to scare him. He put the phone down and breathed a sigh of relief.

He didn't get angry and even commended them on a job well done, putting such a realistic mask on Sean. This is when his two coworkers gave each other a weird glare. When Michael asked them what was wrong, one of them simply said:

"Sean wasn't in on the prank."

It was then that they realized that Sean was unresponsive on the radio. Michael described being in sort of a trance from that moment. He doesn't clearly remember it, but his coworkers tried radioing Sean and when he didn't respond, they called the intervention unit. The unit went to investigate and after hearing gunshots coming from the second floor, Michael simply left the company belongings on the counter of the reception and left through the front door, never to come back again.