Screams and shouts echoed through the halls of Pemberton as groups made their way down the elevator and into the darkness of the basement for the annual haunted house.

Alicia Blair, a junior marketing major, dressed up as Raven from Teen Titans and braved the Haunted House with her friends and twin sister Alison Blair, a junior accounting major.

Since it was her first time attending the haunted house, she said she was curious as to how everything looked.

“I want to see what they can offer,” Alicia Blair said, before making her way down the corridor to the elevator that took groups down to the dark and eerie basement.

Her twin sister, on the other hand, was not as confident.

“I don’t handle it well,” Alison Blair said.

The elevator was dimly lit and hummed as it slowly scaled down to the first floor.

Huddled together but smiling, the group talked about who would jump or get scared first.

Mikayla Sanford, one of the tour guides, said it was fun being able to put on a haunted house at the hall.

“They switch it up every time. Even I get scared sometimes, so it’s really good,” she said, chuckling and standing before the doors of the elevator creaked open and signaled the group to step out.

Volunteer actors for the Haunted House stationed themselves throughout the basement, jumping out at the group at every corner.

They screamed and shouted at the group, anything from “help me, help me,” to “you’ll float too.”

“It took us a few hours every day (for about a week) to set up,” Sanford said, leading the huddled group through the small twists and turns of the basement. “I like all of it.”

She said her favorite part was a scene in a room behind a glass window. Static illuminated from the television screen as an actor pounded on the glass with fake blood smeared across her face, pleading for help and to be let out.

“It tells a story so I kind of like this one,” she said.

The theme for this year’s haunted house was “Carn-evil.” Sanford said when members of Pemberton Hall were designing the props and scenes, they wanted to be as creative as possible.

“They didn’t want to do a straightforward carnival, so they kind of did more like an American Horror story (vibe,)” Sanford said.

Toward the end of the haunted house journey, the group walked down a narrow hallway with doors along the sides that rattled with loud bangs, making the entire group, including Sanford, jump.

“We might as well let this group go,” said one of the two actors who followed and screeched at the group during the entire experience. “If you don’t want to play then get out.”

A bowl of candy greeted the group after their experience.

“It was good, it didn’t really scare me as much but it’s really hard to scare me,but it was put together really well,” Alicia Blair said.

However, the rest of the friend group said they were scared, including Alison Blair.

“I knew they were coming and then once I went around the corner (and they jumped out) I was like ‘Oh my God,’” she said.

Participants paid $2 to enter the haunted house.The funds went to support Housing, Outreach, Prevention and Education.

Analicia Haynes can be reached at 581-2812 or achaynes@eiu.edu.