There's this new guy in work. I'll call him Eric. Eric is weird, he's about 36 and has the weirdest sense of humour we've ever seen. He doesn't cause problems though, so we tolerate him for the most part. He'll crack the odd off-colour joke every now and then, but we let him know. He looks weird, I can't really pin my finger onto why, but something about his face is just...unsettling. He was wearing tinted lenses so I couldn't really make out his eye colour either. Personal choice, perhaps. My friend, Emily, works in the cubicle right next to mine, and if anything odd happens at work she's always the first person to let me know.

It was a couple weeks after it happened. Some guy at work didn't check in for a while and I overheard my boss speaking to Emily about it. He said it was probably the flu and he was too sick to actually phone in sick, which I can believe, since last time I had the flu I was bedbound for almost two weeks in what I could only describe as a combination of a semi-coma and fever dreams.

We figured to wait it out for a couple days. Our boss says he'll give it a couple of days and if the guy didn't phone in he'd try and contact his family, to see if anything happened.

Meanwhile, Eric's behaviour started getting...weird. I'd went downstairs to get to the vending machine and Eric was there too. As I was getting my food Eric just stood there staring at me. I noticed he wasn't moving at all and he wasn't wearing his glasses either. Immediately the hairs on my arms stood up. I noticed the whites of his eyes weren't white. They were this odd juxtaposition of sky blue and grey. Even without his glasses being there his face was just..uncanny. The best way I could describe it is unnaturally symmetrical and doll-like but it was worse than that. He then slowly started to smile, and after a few seconds he was smiling ear to ear. Before he smiled his mouth looked a little too small for his face. But now it was unnaturally wide. There was a deafening silence so I said ''can I help you?'' and that's when Eric slowly began to 'walk' up the stairs. He was walking up those stairs as if he'd never seen stairs before. But that's not all, as he walked up the stairs, there was this godawful cracking and snapping sound, like a branch snapping - each time the sound could be heard, he stumbled for a split second. It was almost like walking up stairs was hurting him.

I didn't mention this to my boss because earlier that morning the ventilation system stopped working and was dripping a foul-smelling liquid. Our boss said he'd get it fixed the next day. One of the vent hole covers was broken off. I could've swore I passed that vent hole a few days ago and it was fine. ''Probably a rat got in there and got stuck'' my boss says.

Eric didn't turn up for work the next day. I told Emily about Eric. She laughed, then said ''thank god, guy sounds like a weirdo''. Work was fine, and I'd largely forgotten about Eric by this time. When we turned up for work the next morning, our boss said the vents are fine and aren't dripping liquid anymore. ''Probably a malfunction that's sorted itself out'' he said.

I went to Eric's cubicle to ask him why he didn't turn up for work yesterday. When I said ''hi'' before asking him, he jumped. Then he began looking around as if he was confused. ''I was sick'' he said. I noticed a jar of some sort which looked like it had meat in it. It almost looked like pulled pork but it was in a jar. The jar had a label with the word ''NEGALLOC'' on it. I said ''is that your lunch?'' he paused for a couple of seconds before flatly saying ''yes''.

My girlfriend recently got fired from her job so while she was trying to get employed at another place I asked my boss if I could work overtime to help her. He agreed to it, and instead of finishing at 5 PM I'd be working till 9-10 PM. It was the first night of overtime it happened. Everyone else had left including my boss. My office was dark, only lit up by the light of my computer. There was dim scattered lighting here and there, but overall it was pretty dark. I was finishing up my work when I began to hear banging sounds coming from above. It sounded like something blunt knocking on metal. I tried to ignore it but the bangs kept getting louder and I went to investigate where it was coming from. I was in the hallway and I could see the vent. The banging was coming from almost directly above. Then I noticed the banging sounds were moving. They were moving towards the end of the hallway, towards the vent hole. The banging stopped. The only substantial lighting was coming from my phone flashlight. I was trying to get video recording on my phone. Just as I was about to take video I saw a man's head and face peering out of the hole from my phone camera. I was frozen in fear. It was him! It was Eric! He was just glaring at me with a blank expression followed by that same damn ear-to-ear smile. My fear turned into amusement as I realized he must be stuck in the vent! I laughed at him. ''Okay buddy, you scared me, but now you're stuck and I'm gonna have to get someone to get you out!''.

Eric froze still for a second again. There was no way he'd be able to fit through what looked like an 8 inch by 8 inch vent hole, I thought. I don't even think a child could fit in there.

That's when Eric thrusted his arms forward. I heard those god awful snapping and cracking sounds again. His shoulders looked completely broken as he made his way out of the tiny vent hole. Then his head emerged. He was smiling with his teeth this time but his teeth didn't look right, they looked jagged and razor sharp. In my shock I saw him fully emerge from the vent with his shoulders, arms, and hands looking completely twisted and broken. He started dancing while trying to adjust his mangled joints. Then he looked completely uninjured, but his eyes were so dilated they looked black. At this point he lunged at me and I screamed. I don't know what happened after that. The next thing I remember is being with a bunch of cops telling them a guy at work tried to attack me.

They tried to tell me the guy was probably just some homeless dude who got into the building at night to sleep and didn't believe what I told them. Since I didn't have any injuries they didn't take me too seriously. The next morning I called up my boss and told him I'll be finding another place since my girlfriend is moving states. That was a lie of course. I met Emily at the store and asked her about Eric. She told me he hasn't shown up for work again. She said his office was completely empty.

I don't care what anyone else believes. I don't know what Eric was, but whatever he was... that look he had when he saw me, no human could look like that. Sometimes when it's late at night and I catch a glimpse of the street through my window bedroom, for a second I feel like I see him. It makes me wonder why we as a species evolved to experience the uncanny valley. What was it that looked so human yet scared us so much?