How easy is it to differentiate AI work from real work? With this anthology series we want to try and tackle that question when it comes to telling stories. This series features stories created by different people with the same prompt. The catch? One of them is written by AI.
The Rules
- All stories must be based on the same prompt
- Try to keep the world count between 1000-1500 words
- All stories must be written by different writers
Anthology series 4
For this fourth anthology, the prompt chosen was an ominous scenario. The prompt is the following: ‘The elevator only stops on floor 13 when you work the night shift. There is no 13th floor of the building.’ This is what we asked chat GPT to generate the story:
‘Write a story anywhere between 1000 to 1500 words using the following prompt: The elevator only stops on floor 13 when you work the night shift. There is no 13th floor of the building.’ Without any further setbacks, here are the stories. Can you guess which one is AI and which one isn’t?
Triskaidekaphobia
It was a gray Thursday afternoon and Manuel was sitting at his desk at work, typing away at his computer with a fierce determination in his gaze, unconcerned by the dreary weather gathering outside.
“You do know we are on break right?” A female voice addressed Manuel. He stopped typing and tilted his head to the side and recognised Hannah, leaning back on her chair as she sipped a cup of tea.
“I do,” he replied as he turned around and faced his computer once again. The typing resumed as quickly as it had stopped.
Hannah sighed and turned away from Manuel and looked at the cubicle to her right where Cole sat, leaning on his chair, eyebrows raised.
“Hes at it again huh?” Cole asked as he reached for a protein bar.
Hannah nodded. “He can’t have a month without his workaholic spree,”
“Much to the boredom of our breaks.” Cole added as he bit off a chunk of his bar.
“ Can’t even amuse us for a few minutes, office hours are boring enough as is,” Hannah complained as she sipped some tea.
“Thankfully, tomorrow is Friday,” Cole continued.
“Are you doing anything interesting tomorrow?” Hannah asked.
“Of course. Tomorrow is extra special, I managed to convince James’ sister out on a date,” Cole said proudly.
Hannah laughs. “You do realise what date is tomorrow right?”
“You mean Friday the thir…”
A loud clicking noise erupted in the room as Manuel slammed his keyboard. Hannah and Cole looked at each other with their eyes wide.
“Don’t say it!” Manuel told Cole as he stood up and headed for the bathroom. “Never say that number in my presence!” he uttered as he disappeared into the corridor.
Cole and Hannah stared at each other and snickered.
“What was that about?”
“I don’t know, but that was the entertainment I needed,” said Hannah, smiling.
The dreary weather transformed into howling winds and sharp rain as Manuel kept working away. The typing was muffled completely, and instead of hearing the methodic clicking of the keyboard every time he pressed a key, a shrill howl, courtesy of the weather, took its place. Manuel felt like he was composing the track for a horror film with his keyboard, not that it bothered him as long as he could keep working. His eyes had turned red and his face showed wear as he worked in what was now a solitary workspace.
A lone light shown in the darkness, Manuel’s desklight, a haven from the ominous darkness that seemed to encroach around his cubicle. Manuel typed away as the space around him grew deeper and darker, until abruptly he stopped, and stared at the dark ceiling, a grin of relief on his tired face.
“Now I can work from home tomorrow,” he spoke to himself as he stood up and stretched his legs and arms around. The lamp flickered as Manuel grabbed his belongings and put them in his bag. Done, he flicked the switch off the lamp, submerging himself in darkness. The wind screamed louder as Manuel took out his phone and turned on his phone light. A weak beam made the valiant effort to conquer the dark, only managing to scarcely light a few meters in front of Manuel. It was enough for him to make his way towards the lift, past the silhouettes of the ghostly appearance of the workplace, cubicles that at a different time of day were filled with colleagues full of life and energy, and now in the darkness were lifeless reminders of the work that needed to be done.
Manuel looked at his gaunt face in the mirror on the back of the lift as the metallic doors shut the darkness and howling wind away. He checked the time on his phone, 11:45, before pressing the button for the ground floor of the building. He turned to look at his reflection again, and looked at the tired face staring back at him as he felt the lift lurch upwards. Confused, Manuel turned to the panel and tried pressing the button again as he resigned himself to his fate. 7,8,9,10,11,12. The lift eased to a stop and announced the arrival at the top floor of the building. Manuel faced the metallic doors as he waited for them to open and welcome the darkness on the other side.
Suddenly, the lift croaked and shook itself and Manuel desperately grasped a railing to steady himself. His heart started beating faster as the shaking and groaning increased violently, deafening his ears. He grasped the railing with both hands and closed his eyes, scared for his life. Just as quickly as it had begun, the racket in the lift stopped and was replaced with a heavy silence, punctured by Manuel’s heavy breathing. A small ding forced him to open his eyes, only to close them again as his knees buckled to the floor. In bold red font, the number 13 shone on the screen.
Memories surged through Manuel’s mind as he crawled to the corner of the l and cooped himself up into a ball, trying to make the world around him disappear. He remembered the jagged saw, red dripping from it. Antonia racing him to the swings on a warm summer day. He recalled his mother crying into the police officer’s arms, the policeman looking at him, pity in his gaze. He remembered playing Monopoly with his mother and Antonia, laughing as he chided his mother for not knowing the rules. He recalled the shattered vase, the trampled flowers on the ground, dying around the shards of its home. Eyes closed, Manuel trembled and whimpered as he kept remembering, gripping his body closer, oblivious to the lift doors creaking open, and the sharp howling of the wind overtaking his whimpers.
He saw Antonia at her first tennis tournament, waving a bronze medal high in the air, grinning from ear to ear. He remembered locking himself up in his room, throwing books and ripping clothes and wondering how unfair it was to not be able to play with Antonia anymore. He recalled the time Antonia drew him a picture of them with their mother, in a house on a mountain surrounded by books. He remembered the dark red, oozing into the floor, tainting everything forever. Manuel shivered and a feeling of cold wetness overcame him. He realised he was actually feeling something seeping through his clothes and shoes. With a shaky hand he reached out and felt a cold sticky substance enveloping him. He opened his eyes and a shrill scream came out of his body.
At the edge of the lift , lay Antonia’s dead body. Her soft white skin was slowly drowning in blood, oozing from deep slashes around her body. In total, there were 13 deep cuts across her body, crude unclean cuts, chunks of flesh hanging from the edges, and glistening white bone showing. Manuel’s heart started hammering as he tried to turn away, submerging himself in sticky blood. He tried to stand up, but his knees buckled, and facing the wall he grasped for the railing with trembling hands and raised himself to look at the mirror and stared at Antonia’s lifeless body through the reflection. Instinctively, he thrust his fist forward and punched the mirror, blood seeping through his knuckles as the mirror cracked under his blows.
“She deserved to live!” Manuel wailed through the wind as Antonia’s image got blurred by the new cracks and blood on the mirror. Once he realised he couldn’t see Antonia anymore, he gave a weak sound of exasperation and looked at his own distorted reflection. He saw a shriveled sweating face, dotted with blood, and tears running down his eyes looking back at him. In the back of the reflection, looming between the cracks he saw the silhouette of a figure shrouded in darkness. Manuel observed the heaving of the figure’s chest, panting repeatedly, with his left arm sagging, a dripping saw on his hand. The figure gave a limp forward and in the darkness of his face a bright white grin spread from side to side.
Manuel’s heart thrummed rapidly, and his breath quickened, and any remaining colour drained from his face. His vision blurred as the figure limped towards him and Manuel tumbled to the ground headfirst into the pool of blood at his feet. He felt the cold blood eating away at his skin and slowly closed his eyes, embracing the safety of darkness within his head.
Where the Building Breathes
The first time the elevator stopped on the thirteenth floor, I thought it was a wiring issue.
I work the night shift at Calder Building, a thirty-story glass-and-steel monolith wedged between a shuttered department store and a parking garage that smells like old rain. My job is simple: monitor the security desk from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m., log deliveries, watch cameras, and make rounds at midnight, three, and five.
The elevator panel goes from 1 to 12, then skips to 14. When I was hired, my supervisor, Martin, tapped the panel with a nicotine-stained finger and said, “We don’t have a 13th floor. Don’t let anyone tell you differently. Superstition, mostly. Architect’s decision.”
I didn’t argue. Buildings skip numbers all the time.
For the first three months, nothing strange happened. The nights were long but predictable. Cleaning crews vacuumed law offices on eight. A software startup on seventeen left neon signs glowing at 2 a.m. I’d ride up, check doors, stare out at the city blinking below like circuitry.
Then Martin retired. My replacement supervisor, a woman named Denise, transferred to another property, and for a few weeks, I was alone most nights.
That was when the elevator began to misbehave.
It happened at 3:17 a.m., the deadest stretch of the shift. I’d just finished my second round and was heading back to the lobby. I pressed “L,” and the doors slid shut with their usual reluctant sigh.
The elevator began its descent from 21.
20.19.
The fluorescent lights flickered once.
18.17.
There was a soft jolt, not enough to throw me off balance, just enough to feel like a hand had tapped the roof.
16.15.14.
Then the display changed.
The car slowed.
I remember staring at the glowing red number, my brain refusing to process it. The panel inside still showed no button between 12 and 14. My finger hovered over “Door Open,” but I didn’t press it. The elevator stopped on its own.
The doors slid open.
There was a hallway beyond.
Dim. Narrow. Carpeted in a pattern I didn’t recognize—dark green with thin gold lines curling like vines. The walls were paneled in wood so dark it looked wet. No signage. No directory. The air beyond the threshold seemed heavier, like it hadn’t been moved in years.
I didn’t step out.
After five seconds—long enough for my pulse to begin drumming in my ears—the doors closed again.
The elevator resumed its descent.
- 11.10…
When it reached the lobby, I checked the main directory board. It listed floors 1–12, then 14–30. No 13. I went to the stairwell and walked up from 12 to 14. There was no hidden landing between them, just a solid slab of concrete and a locked service door that required a keycard.
Back at the desk, I replayed the elevator camera footage.
At 3:17 a.m., the feed flickered to static for exactly seven seconds.
The timestamp skipped from 3:16:58 to 3:17:05.
There was no record of the doors opening.
I told myself it was a glitch.
The second time, I wasn’t alone.
Two nights later, one of the cleaning crew, Rafael, was riding down with me from the twelfth floor. He was mid-story about his daughter’s school play when the elevator lurched.
“Did you feel that?” he asked.
I nodded.
The numbers ticked down.
Then:
Rafael frowned. “There’s no thirteen.”
“I know.”
The doors opened.
The same hallway waited beyond—dark wood, green carpet, dim lighting. But this time, something else was there.
A desk.
It hadn’t been there before.
It sat directly opposite the elevator, heavy and old-fashioned, carved with ornate detailing. A single brass lamp glowed on its surface. Behind it was a high-backed chair, turned slightly away.
Rafael leaned forward. “Is this… renovation?”
“I’ve never seen it,” I said.
A faint sound drifted from the hallway. Not mechanical. Not air ducts.
Breathing.
Slow. Deep. Deliberate.
Rafael swore under his breath and jammed his finger into the “Door Close” button. The doors hesitated, as if resisting, then slid shut.
The elevator descended.
When we reached the lobby, Rafael refused to get back on. He took the stairs for the rest of his shift. The next week, he transferred to a different building.
After that, the elevator only stopped on 13 when I was alone.
It became routine.
At 3:17 a.m., sometimes at 1:13 or 5:13, the elevator would pause on 13. The doors would open.
Each time, the hallway changed.
The third visit, there were doors lining the corridor, each with frosted glass windows. Shadows moved behind them.
The fourth, framed photographs covered the walls. I couldn’t make out the faces clearly, but they all seemed to be watching the elevator.
The fifth time, I stepped out.
I don’t know why. Curiosity, maybe. Or the slow erosion of fear that comes from repetition. If something terrible is going to happen, your mind reasons, it would have happened already.
The carpet muffled my footsteps. The air was cool and dry, tinged with something metallic.
The elevator doors remained open behind me.
“Hello?” I called.
My voice sounded absorbed, swallowed by the walls.
I approached one of the doors with frosted glass. A silhouette shifted behind it—tall, thin. I raised my hand to knock.
The silhouette mirrored me.
My hand lifted.
Its hand lifted.
I froze.
The shape behind the glass was not tall and thin.
It was my exact outline.
I lowered my hand slowly.
So did it.
Except its movement lagged, just a fraction of a second behind mine.
The elevator chimed.
I turned. The doors were beginning to close.
I ran.
The hallway seemed longer now. The green carpet stretched like taffy under my feet. The lights flickered, plunging everything into a stuttering half-dark.
I dove through the narrowing gap just as the doors sealed shut.
The elevator dropped hard enough to make my knees buckle.
When it reached the lobby, I was alone.
The security monitors showed me standing in the elevator the entire time, facing forward, unmoving, for exactly one minute and thirteen seconds.
After that, things escalated.
The elevator began stopping on thirteen every time I rode it during my shift. It didn’t matter which floor I selected. Sometimes it opened to the wood-paneled hallway. Sometimes to a different space entirely.
Once, it opened onto a replica of the lobby—same desk, same potted plant, same flickering fluorescent light.
But there was someone sitting at the security station.
Me.
He looked thinner. Paler. His eyes were ringed with deep bruised shadows.
He was watching a bank of monitors I couldn’t see.
He didn’t look up.
The elevator doors closed before I could step out.
I started taking the stairs.
That worked for a week.
Then the stairwell door on the twelfth floor opened onto thirteen.
No elevator. Just the hallway, waiting.
This time, the photographs on the walls were clear.
They were all security guards.
Some wore uniforms I didn’t recognize—older styles, different logos. Some stood in front of the Calder Building when it was still under construction. Others posed stiffly in the lobby, decades apart.
At the end of the hall was a large framed portrait.
It was empty.
A small brass plaque beneath it read:
CURRENT.
The breathing sound returned, louder now. It seemed to come from everywhere at once—walls, ceiling, floor.
“You don’t exist,” I whispered.
The lights hummed.
The carpet rippled slightly under my shoes, as if something massive shifted beneath it.
I backed toward the stairwell door.
It was gone.
In its place stood the ornate desk from my second visit. The brass lamp glowed warmly. The high-backed chair faced away from me.
“You’ve been working very hard,” a voice said.
It was my voice.
The chair turned slowly.
He looked like me, but older. Not in years—just in wear. His skin was sallow, stretched too tight over sharp cheekbones. His eyes were dull.
“There’s no thirteenth floor,” I said, though it sounded childish now.
“There isn’t,” he agreed calmly. “Not during the day.”
He gestured to the empty portrait at the end of the hall.
“Every building needs a place for what accumulates,” he said. “Late nights. Unnoticed hours. People who exist between shifts. We keep it running.”
“We?”
“You’ll understand.”
The hallway lights flickered in unison. The breathing grew rhythmic, mechanical, like a vast lung drawing air.
“You’re tired,” he continued. “You’ve seen it already. The lobby. The desk. It’s easier if you stop fighting it.”
“I’m not staying here,” I said.
A faint smile touched his lips. “You already have.”
The wall behind him shimmered.
I saw flashes—Rafael stepping into the elevator alone on his last night. Martin rubbing his temples at the desk years ago. A guard I didn’t recognize staring blankly at a bank of monitors in a wood-paneled room.
All of them paused at 3:17.
All of them alone.
The floor beneath me shifted, tilting slightly toward the desk, like gravity had changed direction.
“You don’t have to disappear,” he said gently. “You’ll still work nights. Just… permanently.”
The portrait frame at the end of the hall creaked.
The empty canvas rippled, forming an image.
My face.
Eyes wide. Mouth half-open.
I lunged for the desk, for him, for anything solid.
My hand passed through his shoulder like smoke.
The world inverted.
I was sitting.
High-backed chair. Brass lamp glowing warmly.
Across from me stood a man in a security uniform, breathing hard, eyes darting.
He looked exactly like me.
“You’ve been working very hard,” I heard myself say.
The words felt rehearsed. Automatic.
Somewhere, far above—or below—the elevator chimed.
A red number glowed in the darkness.
13.
And the doors slid open.
So who wrote which?
This time around, Stepping out on the 13th floor was written by Manujya Ghosh, After 12 By Rishi Renjith, Triskaidekaphobia was written by Gabriel Pazmino and Where the Building Breathes by Chat GPT. Could you tell the difference?
The rest of Series 4, and more anthologies
If you want to read Part 1 of this anthology click here. If you are interested in seeing previous anthologies click here for Series 3, here for Series 2 and here for Series 1.
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